Hello again!

Hope you've been well!

I am not sure whether I mentioned this, but I grew my hair long for a while. It went down past my shoulders—the longest it has ever been! Or, actually, had ever been, because I finally got it cut short again just recently.

It was a strange, new experience, and one that had been a quiet ambition of mine since high school. I never actually dared to grow it long, but this time, I succeeded. It looked good—at first. But then, after the exciting first phase, it turns out that it's just a lot of maintenance and upkeep.

Beyond that, Australia is a hot country. Having long hair is like having a woolen beanie you can't really take off. You wouldn't believe how hot your neck can get if you don't tie up your hair! Or, maybe, statistically around half of you would believe it.

Other than that, I've been thinking of bringing back a form of storytelling that has long fallen out of fashion: parables!

They don't have to be religious, or have anything to do with that long-haired carpenter from olden times who got really famous for telling parables. Parables can be about anything.

I might not succeed in actually 'bringing them back,' but I think they're a really interesting and underutilized way of getting a point across. What I like most is that the whole point of them is to have a point worth getting across. A lot of films and books these days seem to have no point of view, nothing to say. Just glittery chatter, fascinating yapping. I have been sick to my soul searching for stories that mean something, even just something simple. Every once in a while, a good one comes along, and I slurp them up like a camel at a water-trough.

Since parables are so short, I'll most likely be releasing them here and on my website. They'll be funny or sad or strange little stories containing the modest nuggets of wisdom I've found useful in my own journeys. I'm not quite an old man yet, but as I'm in my mid-thirties I've really gotten a handle on making major mistakes in life, which is really fertile ground to prospect for little nuggets of wisdom. And I see so many people struggling with things that I've gone through myself, and I wonder if offering a little hint at the solution I found might help others do the same.

Plus, if I start practicing the 'passing on wisdom' thing now, I'll probably be decent at it by the time I actually am an old man. You've always got to plan career moves decades in advance!

(Damn it—I just realized that if I was going to be speaking in parables, keeping the long hair would have been perfect! Ah well — it can grow back.)

More on those parables later. For now, I'll leave you with a whole bunch of books you might enjoy from authors like me. Have a look and see what you like!

Also — War with Elves for Profit and Amusement is still on sale for 99c, if you were looking for a new series to sink your teeth into ...

War With Elves - 99c

If you prefer a free review copy, you'll find it in the 'Review Bonanza' below.

Enjoy!

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Thanks for reading

Until next time!