Let's have a little fun today with my friend, Tracy Farr. When I was the managing editor for the online community magazine here in East Texas, Tracy was a regular columnist sharing his "I'm Just a Guy" column with our readers. This is one of his offerings from 2009. Enjoy... There comes a time in a man’s life when he wakes up one morning, feels his bones creak as he gets out of bed, and realizes his tree-climbing days are just about over. He feels old, he feels tired, he looks like he hasn’t slept in days, and the monotony of every day life is an anchor that keeps dragging him further and further down into the abyss. It’s at that moment that a man decides his life would look a whole lot better from the saddle of a brand new Harley Davidson Fat Boy – a black one, with straight pipes kicking out un-godly decibels of thunder, with the optional Biker Babe attached and holding on for dear life. Yes indeed! Sometimes you need a bit of spice in your life to make it thro...

The ability to tell a good story can come in handy for more than publication. Just take it from my friend, Tracy Farr. Life has a way of making perfect sense until you wake up and find you are 20 minutes late for work and there's no way on Earth you're going to tell the boss you overslept, so you come up with some ridiculous lie about how you came upon a nasty accident, and since you were the only one around who knew the number to 911, you were obligated to stay and render whatever aid you could give, to the best of your ability. The horrific wreck, which was 20 miles south of the Middle of Nowhere, was burning when you came upon it, bodies were strewn across the county road like dropped matchsticks, and the smell of gas fumes meant an explosion was imminent. With only moments to spare, you moved the helpless victims away from the wreckage, beat the fire down with your jacket, performed CPR on three victims at the same time, set the broken leg of a middle-aged woman who kept sc...

Thanks to humorist and friend, Tracy Farr, for letting me share some of his humor here. It is always good to just stop all the work for a few minutes and de-stress with a little chuckle. Enjoy.... What was that again? Putting together a newspaper, whether it be national or small-town, is a BIG JOB. Millions of words have to be spelled correctly, names have to be right, photos have to match stories, headlines have to entice the reader to read -- and all of these are subject to criticism by us, the reading public. It's not right, but that's just how it is. Speaking of headlines...I ran across a few headlines recently in my local daily that made me pause and ask, "What was that again?" They just hit me as funny, or confusing, and I thought I'd share: American orders 460 new airplanes I thought to myself, "Holy cow, that must have been some wealthy American." Preparedness net stretched taut across county Shoot, how could I have missed THAT?...

Sharing with us today is humorist, Tracy Farr, writing about the very first review of his book. This first appeared on his blog in May 2010 , and since he doesn't think more than ten people actually read the post, he thought it was okay for us to use it today. Enjoy.... J-Walk reviews "Never Trust a Goat" Holy Cow! Somebody other than my mother actually downloaded my "Never Trust a Goat" e-book and read enough of it to actually write a review. And the reviewer? None other than John Walkenbach of The J-Walk Blog! Okay, so let's cut to the chase and see what J-Walk thought of my little book: "Just a bunch of humorous essays. I got it because a few of the essays mention banjo. But, as it turns out, he plays a 4-string banjo. I'm pretty sure I could write a book like this." Plus, out of Five Stars, he gave me a Three! I mean, that's like a "C+" -- just enough to pass the class and not have to go to summer school. Hot Digge...

Since the humor offered here doesn't always have to connect to writing, I thought I would share a bit of humor from my friend, Tracy Farr, that is all about goats.  Enjoy..... Never trust a goat I have three goats – a mamma and two twin daughters. I bought them from a little girl who knocked on my door one day, asking if I'd like to buy some goats. And since goats like to eat grass, I figured that I’d let them eat it (instead of me having to mow it), leaving me free to nap on the couch. I give a lot of credence to napping on the couch, especially when I’m supposed to be doing yard work. I actually enjoy watching my goats, but the only reason they tolerate me is because I bring them food every now and then. If it wasn't for the food, they'd steal the credit card right out of my wallet, and head for the mall to hang out with their little goat friends and eat Chinese food. It's a good thing they can't drive, but I suspect while I’m asleep they’re secretly l...

 Once again, Tracy Farr, (who considers himself somewhat of a writing coach) steps in with some advice for writers: Taking a look back at my Old Year’s resolutions You wouldn’t believe the number of people who have asked me where I get my story ideas. I can count them on one hand. One finger, to be more precise. It was my mom. I think she was bored. Anyways, story ideas come from everywhere – your pets, your car, your spouse (with prior permission), and other writers who live far, far away, because you’d be just plain stupid to “borrow” an idea from someone who might actually read what you’ve pinched. But sometimes an idea plops itself right down in your lap (usually when you’ve forgotten to cover it with a napkin), and you’d be foolish not to make something useful from it. Here’s my latest thought: The way I figure it, New Year’s resolutions are a dime a dozen. Everybody makes them. Everybody breaks them. Some of those people are writers who think their readership would ...

From our friend and writing mentor, Tracy Farr.... It's so frustrating to see people wasting time doing insignificant things when what they should be doing is focusing on ways to make their "product" so good that they can't be ignored. ("Product" can refer to art, music, pole vaulting, etc.) These people do a lot of silly things that have nothing to do with their main goal, but they talk themselves into believing they ARE important, thus preventing them from doing what they really know they should be doing. I, of course, have no such problem. My goal is to produce a Website that is like a three-ringed circus of humor (you never know what to expect, something's always climbing out of the clown car) with an ever-changing Side Show that keeps you coming back for more. But to accomplish that, I have to remain focused on my goals. I can't waste time on trivial things. I must always think about the means to the end. And that's why, when I sit...

Thanks to my friend Tracy Farr, we have another installment of his very important advice for writers.... The final step to becoming a writer is to let someone read what you've written. Sounds simple, doesn't it? But it's not! After you've spent weeks, months or even years on your story (I limit myself to an hour, and I'm sure it's quite noticeable), the hardest thing you, the writer, can do is hand over what you think is a masterpiece to someone who may or may not like it, may or may not give you honest constructive criticism, and may or may not still be your friend depending upon what they have to say about your story. "Well, I think your opening really caught my attention, especially the part where the bad guy is chasing the good guy on a John Deere tractor through a hay meadow, looking to turn the good guy into goat feed, but I really think the second page was, how should I say it...it really sucked, and it kept sucking from that page to the end!...

From our guest humorist, Tracy Farr: Writing Tips: What to Write About What do you mean, you can't find something to write about? Aren't you looking hard enough? Aren't you paying attention? Hold on, maybe you're looking TOO hard. Maybe it's right under your nose and you can't even see it. "You mean I should write about my mustache?" Why not? It's there isn't it? So write about it. By the way, it needs a bit of a trim, and I think you have some spaghetti sauce stuck in it. Ideas are everywhere. You see that UPS driver? The one who just delivered that package to your next door neighbor's house? Looks mighty suspicious to me. Looks like he's casing the joint. Looks like he's not even the regular delivery guy, but an escaped convict who highjacked the truck and is looking for easy access to a house. He'll end up terrorizing the lonely widow who lives there, who doesn't turn him in because he looks like her long-dead ...

 Writing Tips From Our Guest Humorist, Tracy Farr.... The final step to becoming a writer is to let someone read what you've written. Sounds simple, doesn't it? But it's not! After you've spent weeks, months or even years on your story (I limit myself to an hour, and I'm sure it's quite noticeable), the hardest thing you, the writer, can do is hand over what you think is a masterpiece to someone who may or may not like it, may or may not give you honest constructive criticism, and may or may not still be your friend depending upon what they have to say about your story. "Well, I think your opening really caught my attention, especially the part where the bad guy is chasing the good guy on a John Deere tractor through a hay meadow, looking to turn the good guy into goat feed, but I really think the second page was, how should I say it...it really sucked, and it kept sucking from that page to the end!" Yes, indeed, we hope for good reviews, but w...

How to Tell Your Writing is not C-R-A-P by Tracy Farr Let's be honest -- you are not Ernest Hemingway, I am not Charles Dickens, and your next door neighbor is not Stephen King (unless your next door neighbor IS Stephen King, then good for you!). Of course, we all dream that our names will one day be mentioned in the same breath as these masters, but it won't happen unless we do the one thing they all did (or doing -- sorry Mr. King): Revise, Revise, Revise. Everything you first write down is C-R-A-P! Nothing comes out great the first time. That's why you edit, revise, copy, paste, destroy, give mouth to mouth, slap, jab, throw down, pick up, edit again, realize it's still C-R-A-P and start all over again. And you keep doing that until it's NOT C-R-A-P! Do you think the great writers of our time just sit down at their computers and type heavenly-blessed stories without revising the crap out of them? Heavens no! And if you think you can, then someone needs to knock t...

Let me just set one thing straight right here and now -- I am NOT a blogger. I am a writer who chooses to publish little stories using a program used by bloggers. But that does NOT make me a blogger. I am NOT a blogger! A "blogger" is a person who writes about how they feel, what they think, how they perceive the world, how they think others perceive how they perceive the world, and a fair amount of angst-filled paragraphs that other bloggers read, make comments about, and then link to, Tweet about, Digg up, and so on and so on, using a blogging "platform" because that's a whole lot easier to do than to create a website from scratch using HTML. I am not a blogger! Bloggers enjoy sharing their inner-most feelings with total strangers; they describe the minutia of their every-day life as if the rest of us don't have our own minutia; they rant and rave about this subject and that subject; and then they ask how YOU feel about the matter, please leave a ...

Well, actually you will. Tracy Farr, a humor writer, shared these tips on his blog recently and graciously agreed to let us post them here. Enjoy! What do you mean, you can't find something to write about? Aren't you looking hard enough? Aren't you paying attention? Hold on, maybe you're looking TOO hard. Maybe it's right under your nose and you can't even see it. "You mean I should write about my mustache?" Why not? It's there isn't it? So write about it. By the way, it needs a bit of a trim, and I think you have some spaghetti sauce stuck in it. Ideas are everywhere. You see that UPS driver? The one who just delivered that package to your next door neighbor's house? Looks mighty suspicious to me. Looks like he's casing the joint. Looks like he's not even the regular delivery guy, but an escaped convict who highjacked the truck and is looking for easy access to a house. He'll end up terrorizing the lonely widow who live...