Songs of the Week 06/30/2023 (coming to you from 07/07/2023)

Posted on by maxtodd

Pscyh! I’m alive! Silly me, writing some drama update for clout. Look how that worked out… if I’d really wanted numbers, I’d have sung it all on ukulele. Just a little trendy apology video joke for you.

No, actually, this is the final regular Songs of the Week post loaded in the chamber I alluded to last week. For those who didn’t catch it, until I can get my work schedule together—until I can uncluster my fuck, if you will, or perhaps unfuck my cluster—I’ve decided to refocus my free writing time on larger fiction and nonfiction projects instead of weekly song reviews. Stuff like this is super fun, but as these reviews have spiraled into multi-paragraph ponderings with curated playlist pairings, they’ve become a lot more time consuming than the routine writing exercises I meant for them to be, and I sort of felt like I was treading water. This July, I was hoping to shift to a temporary monthly schedule where I’d post songs every week on my twitter (that alone didn’t age well) and have a summary post at the end of the month with written “highlights” from each week, but since I’m lazy, I didn’t get this final post done quite as quickly as I’d hoped, and there were just too many thoughts already here to scrap the whole thing. Folks, my music taste is just too good.

In any case, I’m sorry to temporarily reduce the amount of posts I’m putting out—I know it won’t look the same on a week-to-week basis, but like I said in my update post, I’m sincerely making an effort to use any time I’d normally spend writing these instead working towards publishing stuff here and elsewhere. I don’t want to make promises, but I’ve got a couple poems and short stories I’m hoping to put out there soon that I’m excited about when I’m not sucked into a screen. In the meantime, though, if you’re looking for a fix with the weekly consistency I pretended to have, I’m super proud to say I can finally plug my sister’s blog, Madeline Todd Dot Com (Madeline! Todd! Dot! Com!), which has been putting out Sunday Songs posts inspired by Songs of the Week since the beginning of the year. As a multi-year camp Nanowrimo winner, she’s on the reading and writing grind way more than I am, meaning her main schtick is book reviews every Tuesday, if that’s more your style. Be sure to check her work out and support the Todd dynasty while I explore whether it’s possible to be a writer working 9-5 and still maintain healthy relationships. Enthralling!

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Where Did the Dinosaurs Go? | Songs of the Week Update 06/23/2023

Posted on by maxtodd

Turns out, it has a lot less to do with dinosaurs than you’d think. Everybody stay in your seats, there will probably be a regular Songs of the Week post this week, but I wanted to do a quick update to let everyone know where I’m at currently when it comes to being an Author, Science Communicator, and Creature of the Night, as advertised. You may have noticed (like I did last time science communication came up before promptly never addressing it again), but this site has been a whole lot of “author” and a lot less “science communicator” throughout this past year. Obviously, that’s not something I want to demean—I’m very proud of the amount of words I’ve sunk into this site, no matter what they’re dedicated to—but I’m beginning to wonder if they’re a true reflection of my intentions as a writer going forward, especially now that I’m more or less working 9-5.

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Lethe | Out Now!

Posted on by maxtodd

Heyo!! Published fiction author here!! Recently, I had the privilege of publishing an old flash fiction of mine, “Lethe,” in a local magazine, the Meridian Creative Arts Journal. It’s about fly fishing, and also about the nuclear apocalypse, but most of all, it’s my response to writing about love, and what’s worth writing about love. All that in 1000 words, too—because, you know, I’m so good at conciseness and that kind of thing. In any case, it was such a privilege to not only be able to put my name in actual print (!!), but to also do a reading of this story. I’ll do more voices next time, and that’s a promise, but I had a lot of fun this first time and would be honored to read again. If you’re interested in reading “Lethe,” you can read the 51st edition of Meridian online here—I’m the finisher, on page 77. While you’re there, be sure to check out the wonderful work of some of my wonderful writer friends, Sierra Farnum, Jemma Kuster, Ruth Nowotny, Jeffrey Pincus, Emma Schick, and Tristan Skogen (whose name is spelled with an “e,” Meridian). I hate to pick favorites, but Ruth’s “Psalm” will knock your socks off, Jemma’s “The Life Cycle of the Mimic Glass Lizard” would have made me a super fan if I wasn’t already, and Jeff’s “Full of Surprises,” well… it plays out as advertised. I’m gonna risk speaking for them and say your support means a lot to all of us!

While you’re still here, though, I figured it might be fun to talk a little about my process behind the scenes, like with my last SciAll project. Without further ado, let’s talk Lethe! But not out loud, because I don’t totally know how to pronounce it… still.

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