I told a joke once around a table in the dining hall of my college dorm to impress a girl. Everyone laughed except her. She replied with "who are you?" in a voice that suggested she needed to know so she could properly file the restraining order. Since then, I've felt the need to explain myself.
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I was barely present for my birth, so the details are fuzzy. I was born and raised in Poplar Bluff, Missouri. The television of the '70s and movies of the '80s shaped my worldview just as much as the values of my parents.
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I started writing stories as a young boy. My first creation was a ghost-chasing cat named Midnight. While in junior high school, I wrote short sci-fi stories, including a series called Spaced Out, about a couple of yokels who meet up with some aliens and hilarity ensues. Another work of mine from that period was a short Superman spoof, Exceptionally Good Man and the Terrible Thing From Ivan's Discotheque.
I discovered the world of Douglas Adams as a freshman in high school and read The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy in one night. The dream has always been to be a novelist. Throughout high school, I wrote short stories and injected my essays for classes with humor wherever possible. I served on the school paper, too, writing stories about the football team, school dances, and the like. I also exposed a major gambling ring involving girls cross country.
That last sentence might not be true.
I went to college on a theater scholarship and, in between stage shows and skipping class, wrote scripts and started 18 novels with the same sentence: Kip woke up. Those novels remain unfinished. I eventually earned a Bachelor's and Masters. After a brief stint teaching theater, I entered the corporate world and drifted away from my writing. Every once in a while, I'd sit at a computer and type those three words again. Kip woke up. Then, I'd stare off into the distance and dreamed of a Kip-less existence.
Finally, I realized I'm a writer so I needed to write. I used to maintain a blog, "Upstream of Consciousness," where I wrote about film, television, music, books, pop culture, and the occasional memory of growing up in southeast Missouri. I retired that blog last year, but it is archived on this site at the UPSTREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS tab. My new blog is here now.
I also returned to stories and novels. No Kip, though.
I also still do some acting every now and then. I appeared in the short horror film INNARDS, which played in various film festivals in 2014. I'm also in the upcoming feature-length comedy DRINKSGIVING, which will be released to various streaming services on November 14th.
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You should buy my book, Kilroy Was Here. I think Kip would want you to.
