You know those little cartoon things making their way around Facebook and other social media sites? They’re the ones with a couple of panels separated into What Someone Thinks I Do, What Someone Else Thinks I Do, What My Mother Thinks I Do, etc? Yeah, those. Some of them are really quite funny and it got me thinking. What did it get me thinking? It got me thinking that I didn’t have a blog post in mind for Monday, so it might be fun to explore the answers to those questions here, just from the perspective of being an internationally known and gleefully ignored non-award winning author. See? I can see the bright spot in anything!

What My Readers Think I Do
Would I really be so arrogant as to put words and descriptions into the mouths of people who’ve read my work? I’m a writer. Of course it’s not arrogant. It would be disservice not to embellish the kindness they’ve shown! My readers think I take some generally very unfunny things in life and somehow find the positive and humor in them. Okay, that’s really not so farfetched. Um…let’s see…,any of the e-mails I received for A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to My Sexual Orientation had stated that I made them feel better about themselves, that being gay isn’t a curse or something horrible. Also not farfetched. But those are the nice ones.

Other readers have been under the assumption that I’m raking in the royalties and have free books stacked everywhere in my flat that I could send them if I really wanted to.. That is so not true! You can ask any of my staff–tea maker, toast maker, bed sheet flatener, vacuum bag changer, mail opener, lube buyer…any of them–and they’ll tell you I don’t allow piles of anything in the flat.

What My Little Brother and Mother Think I Do
Can you really trust what they think? My little brother only buys my books when I mention his name in the “thank you” section. He also met my friend and fellow authorette, T.C. Blue…or Tis if you get permission to call her that because, well, that’s her name. Anyway, my little brother doesn’t always translate what he hears into proper English so well and what he ended up thinking I called her…and consequently called her himself…was Tits. He called me during DragonCon and asked “Are you going to see Tits today.” I didn’t actually put it together at first because he knows I don’t look at tits. I guess that makes me kind of an ass man. And when I did put together what and who he was talking about, well, I thought it was funny in a good way.

As for mother, please. When we were in Nashville, Tennessee a week ago for my dad’s army convention, I showed her how to connect her laptop up to the hotel’s wireless. I didn’t use a mouse. I used the touch pad. This woman cannot get used to nor has any desire to get used to the pad. So when I teased her about it, she stared at me with indignant defiance, reached down and started moving her finger…next to the touch pad as opposed to on it. We laughed for a good five minutes about this. But, really, can you take what someone has to say about little ol’ innocent moi when they can’t even use a touch pad on a laptop. Exactly.

What My Husband Thinks I Do
He thinks I steal bits and pieces of his life as well as bits and pieces from his friends. Seriously? Have you ever heard of anything so short-sighted? Please. I borrow from him, his friends and my own. Why should I limit myself? And have you seen the results? They’re hysterical! But I am careful. His friend Kimberly who incidentally stood up in our wedding was renamed Miss Kim in Andy Stevenson Vs. the Lord of the Loins. And his Rice Queen friend Albert who may or may not have picked a little something extra up from a trick that a doctor had to cure? I may or may not have named him Albert in Gaylias: Operation Thunderspell, made him a Rice Queen and mentioned he brought a different kind of luggage back with him after a trick.

It’s possible I’ve mentioned his Grandmonster in Andy Stevenson Vs., too, but just in passing. She’s not someone who I can really just say a few words about, which is why I’ll be dedicating an entire novel to detailing her evil exploits. That’ll be the third Andy book. It’s partially written, but will most likely be two novels away from being finished. So, yes, I am somewhat liberal in being inspired by those around me. And if you still think I’m being too hard on myself, just wait until you read Spacehunters and see who I mention!

What I Think I Do
I am a modern day gay Indiana Jones of action/comedy writing! I have none of Nathan Fillion’s good looks or charm in person, but it’s all there in the ability to write in a such a way to make readers think I’m good looking and charming. I can take the oldest ingredients on the shelf, add a dash of Kage-spice and it comes off as fresh, fun and exciting.

My life is an adventure and even though I may think of myself as Indiana Jones, my husband has never been and never will be a sidekick. I’m his sidekick, but we allow each other just enough space so it doesn’t look like either of us is the sidekick. Still, just watch him if you ever see us together. He’s either verbally telling me what to do or he’s using non-verbal communication to order me around. It’s his Chinese side and yet he wonders why I plan on writing a book about his Grandmonster…where his Chinese side comes from.

What I Really Do
I eat Boo Berry during Halloween, watch bad b-movies, some good bad b-movies, and thank He Who Walks Behind the Blu-Ray Racks that my husband likes me well enough to keep me around.

So…you know…what do you do?

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Kage Alan is  the Castle (Season 4) watching, Nightwish listening author of “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to My Sexual Orientation,” “Andy Stevenson Vs. the Lord of the Loins” and the first book in a separate series, “Gaylias: Operation Thunderspell.” Alrighty, I’m gonna own it. Castle needs to improve in Season 5. Not only do the writers need to avoid the Moonlighting syndrome if Castle and Beckett are going to sleep together, but they also need to up the humor a bit. Season 4 was so much angst that it was TOO much angst. And instead of being broken up by the B-stories, those were saw by-the-numbers that they became entirely predictable. Come on, guys. You were so fresh with the first three seasons! Am just sayin’.