Should You Shift Your Sleep Schedule with Daylight Savings Time?

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Yesterday was Daylight Savings Time, where everyone in the US turns back their clocks an hour and reverts to Standard Time. While recent bills passed by both the Senate and numerous states suggest it’s likely that our years of changing the clocks are numbered, the tradition is here to stay for at least a while longer. Meanwhile, changing the clocks has gotten me thinking about my sleep schedule, and what sleep habits are best for me as a creative person who makes his own work schedule.

Quick rewind: I spend kind of a lot of time talking about sleep on this blog.  One of my most popular posts chronicles what happened when I went to work on two hours of sleep (Spoilers: It sucked), and more recently I’ve realized that spending the time it takes to get enough sleep is a great investment if it means I can use my remaining time productively.

More importantly, when I consider what kind of daily schedule I want to keep, first and foremost is the idea of when I’d like to be getting up and when I’d like to be going to bed Continue reading »

Reflections on Six Years of Blogging

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Hard to believe that I started working on the But I Also Have a Day Job blog six (!) years ago this week.  At this time in 2016 I was testing designs and playing with WordPress formatting while I drafted the very first posts on Day Job Basics, and from there, it was off to the races.

This blog represented a really big step for me: back in 2016, I’d finished grad school, was trying to sell one novel and finish another, and made a major life change by moving out of Nebraska, where I’d gone to grad school and stayed an extra year working in the Agriculture department.

I knew I had to start taking my writing more seriously and figuring out my next steps, and the But I Also Have a Day Job blog was a HUGE step in clarifying the direction I wanted to take my creative work and my life in general.  Before this blog, I didn’t have much of an online presence at all, had very little published work, and it felt like I was just barely starting out.

Fast forward to six years later, and I’m…pretty satisfied with how how far I’ve come.  I haven’t done as much as I’ve liked, but I’m overall Continue reading »

I Finished My Secret New Novel Rough Draft!!!!!!

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The title says it all—last Wednesday at approximately 12:45pm Eastern Daylight time, I, Ian M. Rogers, finished the rough draft of the Secret New Novel I started 20 months ago.

The moment was surprisingly anticlimactic—as in, I wrote THE END, typed out a few notes for later, then turned off the computer and ate lunch.  Writing that last line felt really, REALLY good, but at the same time, in the words of Princess Leia, it’s not over yet, and I’ve got a lot of revising to do.

In the grand scheme, though, the moment was pretty significant.  For me, getting the damned thing down on the computer is the hardest part, and takes the most mental energy.  It’s often when I feel the most intimidated, procrastinate the most, and in general feel the most stress about the writing process Continue reading »

I Made a Kick-Ass New Website!!! (and Here’s Why!)

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(I mean, a kick-ass new website besides this one, of course ;-)

ianmrogersauthor.com has been online for a few weeks, first in a “Coming Soon!” capacity, but more recently in more substantial form as I added pages and links.  I’m really happy with how it’s come out, people seem to like it, and I can always go back and makes changes later.

I wanted the new author website to have a cleaner, sleeker feel than But I Also Have a Day Job (which I intentionally designed to look like a blog from the late 2000s) and be easier to navigate, ESPECIALLY on a phone.  The plan is to keep the new website as a separate entity from BIAHADJ (which I assure you isn’t going anywhere!) as a way of highlighting both MFA Thesis Novel and my editing work (which I’m doing more of now!).

When people who don’t know me look me up, I’d like the new website to make a better first impression and be a bit cleaner around the edges while still retaining my intentional overuse of words like “awesome” and “totally.”

I also wrote a short humor piece especially for the website: Imaginary Hate Mail I’ve Received About MFA Thesis Novel.  I wanted a fun, absurd piece that was a spin-off of the novel Continue reading »

April 2022 Novel Update: My Writing Hiatus is Almost Over…

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As many of you know, it has NOT been a good few months for writing…

When I last checked in on my novel progress back in November, I was facing an avalanche of pressures at my university teaching job in Japan, not to mention a busy few weeks working with Vine Leaves Press getting MFA Thesis Novel ready for publication.  For all of November to December I felt overworked, exhausted, and in a disconnected state of mind.

Then in January and February I spent a LOT of time prepping for my big move from Japan back to the States—mailing boxes home, cleaning out my apartment, and doing a whole lot of packing…which then turned into a whole lot of unpacking, plus dealing with jet lag and social readjustment when I got back to New Hampshire.

March and April, meanwhile, were REALLY big months for MFA Thesis Novel as I set up the pre-order and prepared for the novel launch.  This was a HUGE project Continue reading »

MFA Thesis Novel Launch Party Recap!

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MFA Thesis Novel was released last Tuesday (wooooooooo!), though for me, the real release day felt like last Saturday, when I held the novel launch party at Main Street BookEnds in my hometown of Warner, New Hampshire.

This was a BIG day for me—as in, I wanted it to be as big as I could make it.  It was also my second time doing a reading at BookEnds (the first was back in 2019 when I released Eikaiwa Bums), and because this reading was for an actual novel, I wanted it to be even better.

 

Preparing

I did a fair amount of promotion for the event beforehand: besides getting it up on the BookEnds website, I put up flyers around town, mentioned it in some blog posts, sent out a message on my email list, made a Facebook event, sent it to the town email newsletter, and Continue reading »

The MFA Thesis Novel Pre-Order is Done!!!

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MFA Thesis Novel launches TOMORROW (!!!) and I spent most of last week shipping out copies from the Special Pre-Order period.  I was no stranger to bulk mailings from the Art Swap days, but this was my first time tackling a mailing this big.

After the pre-order period I crunched some numbers and realized that with all the pre-orders, copies I’d need for future events, and probable future webstore purchases, it made sense to order 250 books and get an extra 10% bulk discount on top of the regular discount.

Continue reading »

Does Getting Enough Sleep Every Night Help You Stay Focused?

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Yes, yes it does.

I’ve been back from Japan for nearly two months now (!), and I’ve been getting adjusted to my Self-Directed Work Schedule, where instead of having a Day Job, I plan my own time and work on my own projects at my own pace.  As of now, my main focus has been preparing for the release of MFA Thesis Novel, working on my freelance editing jobs with different clients, and getting back into a writing groove with my new novel, which has been unfortunately stalled for the past few months (. . .).

One of my big worries about not having the structure of a Day Job to guide me through the week was that working from home without external motivation would cause me to get distracted, start feeling like my work wasn’t taking me anywhere, or even get depressed.
Continue reading »

Novel Events: Come See My Online Readings in March and the MFA Thesis Novel Launch in April!

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It’s that time!  I’m kicking off an actual, for-serious book tour promoting MFA Thesis Novel (!), with events both online and in person!  This includes the actual novel launch party (!!!!!!) that’s sure to be an amazing time:

Interested in coming to see me?  Read on for the event descriptions, plus some info at the end about how I got involved with each one…. Continue reading »

HUGE Thanks to Everyone Who’s Pre-Ordered MFA Thesis Novel So Far!!!!!!!!!11

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Update: The Special Limited Pre-Order for MFA Thesis Novel is over, but you can still order a signed copy and get a free bookmark! See my webstore for updated info.

Last week I posted to this blog about the Special Limited MFA Thesis Novel Signed Pre-Order and sent out a few social media posts.  To be honest, I wasn’t sure what to expect: if the pre-order went well, I’d be happy, but if it didn’t, I resolved not to be disappointed or angry.  As a way of not building up my hopes too much, I told myself that maybe people wanted to buy the novel somewhere else, or maybe they’d wait until it actually came out.

It’s always a nerve-wracking experience putting a part of yourself out there and risking failure.  In my darker moments, I worried no one would be interested, or that people would be willing to Like a post but not actually order the book.  Worst of all was the fear that I’d come across as some sort of pestering MLM Ponzi-scheme jerk making money off of the people in his social network, like those people who get sucked into nutrition supplement scams.

As it turns out, I shouldn’t have worried. Continue reading »

Special MFA Thesis Novel Signed Pre-Order With Bookmark and Sticker!!!!

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Update: The Special Limited Pre-Order for MFA Thesis Novel is over, but you can still order a signed copy and get a free bookmark! See my webstore for updated info.

Many of you have been asking about the best way to get a signed copy of MFA Thesis Novel when it comes out on April 19th.  Others have been asking how to buy the novel in the way that gives me the largest amount of royalties.

Whelp, you can kill two birds with one stone during the Special Limited MFA Thesis Novel Pre-Order Period!

Order a copy of the novel through my webstore by clicking here, and not only will I sign it and write you a cool personalized message (if you want one), but you’ll also get some super-cool FREE swag, including…

  • A limited edition MFA Thesis Novel bookmark designed by Jessica Bell!
  • A 3″x2″ You Don’t Pay Me to Care sticker inspired by the But I Also Have a Day Job blog!
  • The satisfaction of knowing that more of your money went toward supporting me as a small-press indie writer and not toward Jeff Bezos sending billionaires into space! (Technically not swag, but still important!) Continue reading »

How MFA Thesis Novel Went From Word File to Actual Published Book

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Most people never consider how books get made.  We have that idealized image of the grizzled writer sitting at a typewriter then delivering a hearty stack of clean pages to the publisher, who waves a magic wand and PRESTO, out pops a cleanly printed book with cover and crisp inside pages.

Nowadays, that fantasy involves a Word file and email instead of a typewriter, but the disconnect between writing and bookmaking still seems to be there for a lot of writers.  Truth be told, I had no idea how much work and how many steps go into publishing a book, which is why it was cool to learn the process when my own novel got made into an actual hard-copy book (Spoiler: I’ll show pics at the end!).

Here’s a rundown of how that process went, how much work it took from me and the others at Vine Leaves Press, and where the novel stands now. Continue reading »