A little more about me…
Now that you know who I am and what I do, here are a few random facts about me and my writing career.
I grew up in Fort Collins, Colorado, but I’ve spent most of my adult life in the Kansas City area. (Go Royals! Or Chiefs, if that’s more your style.)
I was once a professor of Greek and Latin classics. I completed my Ph.D. at Indiana University and taught for three years at Berea College in Kentucky. Although I left the academic life behind, my fascination with language has always stayed with me.
My side hustle during my teaching years was gag writing for cartoonists. My clients were mostly freelancers, but I wrote for a few syndicated strips as well. My gags appeared regularly in Frank and Ernest. I also sold a few to such long-running classics as Dennis the Menace and Ziggy.
On Season 3 of The Office, you can often see one of my Hallmark cards hanging up in Toby’s cubicle. It reads, “These days, you can get high-fiber, low-fat, sugar-free birthday cake! Or you can eat this card. It’s tastier.”
A Hallmark gift book I wrote, Christmas Unwrapped, had over 100% sell-through in its first year. How is that possible? In addition to being sold at retail, it was included in a bag of free sample products for loyal Gold Crown Store members. When the retail copies sold out, store owners raided the sample bags for more books to sell.
StoryBots made me a songwriter! When I started writing original songs, my written lyrics alone couldn’t convey the rhythms and cadences I intended. I quickly learned just enough guitar to figure out chord progressions and record a scratch track. The effort paid off in the many educational songs I contributed to “Ask the StoryBots.”
My wife and I have two black cats named Hector and Alexander. (Yes, that ancient Greek habit dies hard.)