tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-76136484669172161432024-03-12T19:07:03.623-07:00Matt SomebodyThe blog of writer and former wrestler Matt Murphy, author of THE SOMEBODY OBSESSION: A NOBODY'S DESPERATE JOURNEY TO STARDOM.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger28125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-36258673682838526762012-06-28T07:47:00.000-07:002012-06-28T07:47:17.564-07:00When a Headliner No-ShowsReby Sky, an independent wrestler who is best-known as Matt Hardy's girlfriend, has received both strong support and fierce opposition for her recent Twitter comments about former WWE Champion Sid Vicious/Sycho Sid's, who appeared on <i>Raw</i> Monday Night.<br />
<br />
Here are some of her comments from @RebySky:<br />
<i>That piece of sh*t Sid no-shows almost EVERY show in the last yr but prances onto Raw. Please tell us again how much you LOVE "the business". Guess he managed not to "lose his wallet" this time. Sad thing is, now that he got 10 more mins of fame he'll get more bookings to NO-SHOW. F*CK people like that. You f*ck with peoples' time, money & professional integrity because you're too much of a douche to keep your word. I'm all for hustlin, but BLACKMAILING promoters into giving you more $ after threatening not to show then STILL not showing after they do...makes me sick.</i><br />
<br />
Many fans and wrestlers have passionately picked a side. Some have blasted Reby Sky for disrespecting one of wrestling's all-time great big men and dismissed her as a wrestler's girlfriend who shouldn't have an opinion. Others agree with her 100 percent.<br />
<br />
Among those opposing her is WWE Hall of Famer Sunny who, like Sid, is notorious for no-showing independent events.<br />
<br />
As someone who has wrestled on the independent circuit, I have mixed feelings on former stars being booked on indy events at all. Between airfare, hotel, and booking fee, they usually make more than every wrestler on the card, often just to sell and sign their own photos and other merchandise. I don't think their appearances usually draw enough fans who wouldn't buy a ticket otherwise, but if the promotion has a solid product they might turn some of those new fans into regular fans and maybe it pays off in the long run. Some former stars are a pleasure to deal with and show a genuine love for the business, interacting well with fans and with the locker room, while others make it painfully obvious that they are just there to get paid. Some don't show up at all.<br />
<br />
When a former star no-shows an independent wrestling event, everyone suffers: the fans, who've spent their hard-earned money to meet the star and are left disappointed; the promotion, which now has its reliability questioned when advertising the next star's appearance; the wrestlers, who suffer right along with the promoter when a no-show hurts ticket sales short- and long-term; and the wrestling business, which comes off even sleazier than it often does anyway. But some former stars don't care about the business or how their actions affect it. They only care about what they can take from it, not what they can give back to it.<br />
<br />
Reby Sky might be an independent wrestler who doesn't have 5,000 matches under her belt. Her greatest claim to wrestling fame might be as Matt Hardy's girlfriend. We don't know each other and I doubt we'll ever meet . But she spoke for a lot of us who work these small shows and feel the negative effects of stars such as Sid no-showing. We respect the stars and what they've achieved in the past, but when they start squeezing out the little breath independent wrestling has left, they shouldn't expect a warm response from the fans, promoters, and wrestlers their selfishness affects.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-74514807749633502992012-06-12T00:56:00.000-07:002012-06-12T00:56:15.346-07:00False-FinishThe false-finish, when executed correctly, can be one of the most exciting elements of a pro-wrestling match. It draws fans in, makes them invest in the belief that they're about to see the end, and then, at the last second, the wrestler kicks out to avoid defeat. Unfortunately, it's terribly overused and often desensitizes the crowd so the false-finishes that really matter mean less than they should.<br />
<br />
Pro wrestlers are notorious for another overused false-finish: the finish of their careers. Terry Funk, Ricky Steamboat, Ric Flair...they've all retired multiple times, and they kept coming back. It has made for some special moments but, like the in-ring false-finish, it has watered down the real retirements and left fans wondering how long until we see the retiring star back in the ring.<br />
<br />
Last week, I announced via Facebook that my comeback was coming to an end. I won't call it a retirement--I don't make a living as a wrestler--but I was going to walk away. That was the plan. And now, just days before my last match, as the referee's hand is inches from the mat, I'm kicking out.<br />
<br />
Here's the story.<br />
<br />
I've always been more sensitive to loud noise that most. During the last several months, however, I have had some serious issues with intolerance to noise.<br />
<br />
While installing a home alarm days after Christmas, I accidentally set off the 125-decibel alarm just inches from my head, and the pain was different from anything I've ever felt. It felt like I'd been brained by Mike Tyson, and I could feel moderate to loud noise vibrate on every hair cell in my ears.<br />
<br />
At a WWE event in late-January, I had the misfortune of sitting in front of a psychotic girl who screamed throughout the show (she screamed full sentences--who the hell does that?) and I had to remind myself several times that my son was with me so I wouldn't turn around and punch her dad in the throat, give the little nut-job something to scream about.<br />
<br />
As my intolerance to noise grew, my reactions became more aggressive and, a handful of times, downright nasty. It's as if loud noise sometimes sparks a brief case of Tourette's in me, and I've felt bad for some of the things I've said in reaction to someone unintentionally assaulting my ears.<br />
<br />
The noise sensitivity started to have a negative effect on my ability to perform my regular job. I usually didn't last five minutes in the office without choking down a few Excedrin. I finally scheduled an appointment with an ENT specialist.<br />
<br />
The ENT specialist was a strange dude who seemed more interested in sharing his story of cancer survival than in my purpose for visiting him. He said that I have hearing loss, Recruitment, and Hyperacusis. In a nutshell, some of the sensors in my ears are dead, so other sensors are overcompensating, and the result is the amplification of certain sounds. So what is normal to the average person, in some cases, is intolerably painful to me. He said trauma from wrestling is likely accelerating my hearing loss. I left the appointment with the understanding that I could be going deaf and that wrestling could make me deaf faster.<br />
<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">
I understand what it would mean to be deaf. It would suck. Driving, watching TV, having conversations, walking through Walmart, nothing would be the same. I'd have to learn sign language (right now the only signs I know are "F--- you" "Peace" "Devil" and "Rip 'Em"), and that would be a pain in the ass. I wouldn't hear my kid's voice evolve as he grows to become a man.</div>
<br />
I decided it was time to step away from the ring. If it would preserve my hearing, or at least prolong with hearing-loss process, I thought it would be best if I stopped wrestling after I fulfilled my June booking commitments. To the credit of every promoter who'd booked me for June, each said he'd understand if I couldn't work his show.<br />
<br />
The next day, I went to an audiologist for a hearing test, and the results showed me unable to hear some tones as well as I should and able to hear some tones that are inaudible to most people.<br />
<br />
I went back to the ENT specialist for a follow-up visit the following week. The doctor came in and talked about stopping the ringing in my ears. I told him I wasn't experiencing that, he said he understood, and then we repeated this cycle several times as I became more irritated. He also didn't say a word about deafness this time and said that nothing could be done for the hearing loss, but that my sensitivity to noise might go away in a year or two. The doctor told me there wasn't much he could do for me but suggested I pick up these pills that should help with noise sensitivity and, when I went to buy them, I saw printed large-as-can-be on the box: "Stop the Ringing in Your Ears". This multiplied my already strong desire to facepunch the doctor.<br />
<br />
Most of my life, I have handled life's curveballs matter-of-factly without a whole lot of emotional attachment. I receive the information, analyze it, and figure out if and how that information should influence my thoughts and actions. This is how I handled the hearing and wrestling issues. I bought some shooting-range earplugs to block sound above a certain decibel level and announced I was wrapping up my days in the ring.<br />
<br />
Last Saturday night, I debuted for 3XWrestling in Iowa. I worked with Jimmy Rockwell, who I knew from Metro Pro Wrestling in KC and who I liked a lot as a wrestler and as a person. We had a fun match that he won (with a little help from WWE Hall of Famer "The Million-Dollar Man" Ted DiBiase) and I had a great time working with 3XW, one of the best independent promotions I've worked with. As I was leaving the show, I thought about how that would be the last time I ever worked a match as a heel (which I absolutely love). I thought about how I would soon no longer be able to create memories for the fans, to tell stories inside the ring, to do it all on-the-fly.<br />
<br />
The reality of it all finally hit me, and it sucked. And as cheesy as it may sound, I felt like I was leaving a big piece of myself at Boone County Fairgrounds as we drove away.<br />
<br />
I thought about the hearing issue and about the end of my wrestling career, which was to come in one week, for most of the six-hour drive home and most of the next day.<br />
<br />
Monday, I talked to my wife Jessica about it. We mutually decided that, since I could lose my hearing whether I continued wrestling or not (accuracy depending on which, if either, day my doctor was sober), I should continue to wrestle because I love doing it.<br />
<br />
Is there a chance that everything could go wrong and I could wind up deaf? Maybe, but I can't give up wrestling for maybe.<br />
<br />
Two years ago, I would have given my right arm to get back in the ring. I'm thrilled that I had a chance to get back in the ring once again because, despite my love-hate relationship with the wrestling business, it is a big part of who I am.<br />
<br />
Thanks to everyone who showed support when I thought I was walking away. No one wants to be the boy who cried wolf, but it's a title I'll wear with pride as I continue doing what I love.<br />
<br />
<br />
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One day I'll have to call it quits, and I truly hope that it will be on my own terms. Until then, I'm not ready to stay down for the three-count.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-57501910692611475922011-12-31T00:38:00.001-08:002011-12-31T00:38:16.617-08:002011, and 2012When the clock struck midnight to bring in 2011, I was a different person than I am today. Sure, we grow each year, but the transformation I've experienced in the last 12 months has been unreal.<br /><br />On January 1, 2011, I was a walking zombie working the overnight shift, grouchy due to sleep deprivation most of the time, and nearly 260 pounds. I was a has-been (or never-was, depending on who you ask) wrestler who wrote about my wrestling memories, among many reasons, to preserve them as they became less vivid each time they crossed my mind. Of course, I always hoped to find my way back into wrestling, but my wrestling career had been deceased for more than eight years.<br /><br />I had been invited to be a part of Metro Pro Wrestling since its first show, but my work schedule wouldn't allow it. Once I left my job to start my own business (which tanked so quickly I could write a How-NOT-To book about it), I was finally able to join Metro as the Vice Commissioner.<br /><br />I've worked for countless promotions and haven't liked the way most of them have operated. Many of them didn't do good business. Some were dishonest, some didn't respect the fans, others had poor locker room morale, and others just plain sucked.<br /><br />When I came to Metro in March, I fell in love with the promotion quickly. The locker room was full of hungry young talent like Jeremy Wyatt, Tyler Cook, and Heroes for Hire, and veterans whose love and passion for the business was infectious like Pete Madden and Derek Stone. The TV program was great in both creative and production. <br /><br />I kept thinking how I wished I could have worked for a promotion like Metro during my in-ring days. I was so infatuated with the promotion that soon I was no longer content just being an on-air personality. For years, I thought there was no chance of an in-ring return, but I finally decided it was time to find out for myself whether I still had any gas left in the tank.<br /><br />Losing 45 pounds was easier than I expected. With most of the extra weight gone, it was time to step into the ring and knock off the rust. I started training at the Harley Race Wrestling Academy a couple times a week to get comfortable once again.<br /><br />If I was going to return, I was going to make it count. Now the commissioner, I set my sights on Michael Strider, the most beloved wrestler in the Central States region, and started a war with him that resurrected my in-ring persona, "All That" Matt Murphy.<br /><br />As the Murphy/Strider war was reaching its boiling point, I also made a surprise return to Arkansas for Traditional Championship Wrestling, defeating "Golden Boy" Greg Anthony for the TCW Junior Heavyweight Title in my first match before losing it back to him two weeks later.<br /><br />I could list many accomplishments that I'm proud of, but my three proudest wrestling accomplishments happened this year. The first was seeing my wrestling-fanatic son's reaction to seeing his dad in the ring live for the first time. The second was my childhood hero, Ricky "the Dragon" Steamboat, passionately praising my tag team match with my old partner Steve Fender vs. our old enemies Trevor Murdoch and Bull Schmitt on a WLW show in Eldon. And the third was my feud with Strider in Metro Pro.<br /><br />Though I've had many great matches as I've had with Trevor Murdoch, Bull Schmitt, Wade Chism, and others, the heel run in Metro Pro was the most fun I've ever had in the business.<br /><br />When I think of a great heel, I don't think of someone who grabs a microphone and insults local sports teams. I don't think of a wrestler who takes the crowd's breath away with flashy moves (they should be going "boo" not "ooh"). I think of someone who the audience hates with such ferocity that they'll buy a ticket to see him get his comeuppance. To be a top heel requires nuclear heat--true hatred--and that's what I set out to achieve. While a wrestling show needs all varieties of characters, I'm a firm believer that buyrate is more important than workrate. Dean Malenko was 100 times the wrestler Hulk Hogan was, but Hogan drew 100 times the paying customers that Malenko drew (probably more). Did I have a 5-star match, or even a 4-star match? No. But I had true heat, and being hated never felt so good.<br /><br />2011 ended with a bang, literally. Michael Strider ended our war with the Strider Spiral followed by a sick chair shot, which blasted me on top of the head hard enough to leave a half-dollar-sized bruise on my spine. I was sore as hell for a couple weeks, but any questions I had as to whether my neck could withstand the rigors of pro wrestling were answered when I healed just fine.<br /><br />I'm having too much fun to quit wrestling now. 2012 is a new year; I've got some big plans in Metro Pro Wrestling and Traditional Championship Wrestling. And if the Mayans are wrong, maybe I'll still be going in 2013.<br /><br /><br /><br />- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-7131795958148740462011-10-24T00:11:00.000-07:002011-10-24T01:01:33.606-07:00Project: RedemptionI never thought I'd live in a world where I'd agree with Justin Bieber, but he was right: Never Say Never.<br />
<br />
My professional wrestling career was dead. "All That" Matt Murphy was dead. I was a wrestling junkie who'd been clean for years. And as many stories of addiction go, I had a relapse.<br />
<br />
I had been an on-air personality for Metro Pro Wrestling for several months as the commissioner. Some of the fans knew who I was, but to most of them I was just the authority figure who made an occasional appearance during Metro Pro Wrestling's monthly live events at Turner Rec Center in Kansas City, KS, and on their weekly TV show on Metro Sports.<br />
<br />
Then August happened.<br />
<br />
It was the main event. Michael Strider, the most beloved star in the Central States region, was defending the Metro Pro Wrestling TV Championship against Derek Stone, the psychotic former champion...and the man who trained me at the Harley Race Wrestling Academy. They collided with the referee and all three men dropped to the mat. The ref was out. Stone was the first to his feet. He grabbed a foreign object.<br />
<br />
Commissioner Matt Murphy ran to the ring with a steel chair in-hand and berated Stone as Strider struggled to get to his feet. Then, I delivered the shot heard 'round the wrestling world, a steel chair to Strider's head.<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmg4GF-RDpKYiPHNQR_Z87r3aFLO-NYPGQHMf9CfEtBA12MnViCdw4zRq5qLHbDHlA3hfLH0jCYn2dLpcf0NMQ1QInT3x2mMfZjIaAOSioNQJ1rZ6uus88SW3NggPhOYIg0bIOKOXmzfQ/s1600/matt_murphy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmg4GF-RDpKYiPHNQR_Z87r3aFLO-NYPGQHMf9CfEtBA12MnViCdw4zRq5qLHbDHlA3hfLH0jCYn2dLpcf0NMQ1QInT3x2mMfZjIaAOSioNQJ1rZ6uus88SW3NggPhOYIg0bIOKOXmzfQ/s320/matt_murphy.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Slamming a steel chair into Michael Strider's skull.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
I revived the referee. "Count!" I demanded as Stone covered Strider.<br />
<br />
<i>One...two...three.</i> We had a new Metro Pro Wrestling TV Champion.<br />
<br />
I yanked the belt out of a kid's hands--Strider had given the belt to the kid pre-match for safe keeping--and handed it to Stone.<br />
<br />
"It was me, you idiot!" I yelled into the microphone, revealing myself as the Mystery Attacker in Metro Pro Wrestling's ongoing whodunit. "Oh, one more thing..."<br />
<br />
I pulled off my tie and unfastened a couple buttons on my black dress shirt, then ripped it off to reveal a blue wrestling singlet with ALL THAT embroidered in silver letters.<br />
<br />
"A star is born...again."<br />
<br />
Fans booed, commentators struggled to find the words to describe the bombshell I'd just announced.<br />
<br />
"All That" Matt Murphy was back!<br />
<br />
Fast-forward a month and it was time for my first weekend back in the ring. I started off on a Friday night with Metro Pro Wrestling, where I participated in an 8-man elimination tag team match. From there, I returned home (across the bridge from home, anyway) to Keokuk and Burlington, IA for two World League Wrestling shows on Saturday and Sunday.<br />
<br />
After three matches in three days, I was wiped out. It took me two weeks to recover from the physical toll the matches took on me.<br />
<br />
During the Metro Pro show this month, the fans let me know I was on a meteoric rise to the top of their most-hated list. They chanted insults, some PG rated and some that made me uncomfortable given the children in the audience (most of them were chanting the vulgarities, too), and they booed the hell out of me.<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFbZkimx4yzoy1qEFqlLw_Z3WX55vkhN8l2jufi96_n6xKwe3VfCNblOGkhhgYnj9yrIDmkOMM8IUO-Fx25z1Lw7-PteKVN2S-8GK1QUBbXZqgWUM_ZOv9R3cLGA3rU-XeA9M6_JQyN14/s1600/metro+entrance.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="205" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFbZkimx4yzoy1qEFqlLw_Z3WX55vkhN8l2jufi96_n6xKwe3VfCNblOGkhhgYnj9yrIDmkOMM8IUO-Fx25z1Lw7-PteKVN2S-8GK1QUBbXZqgWUM_ZOv9R3cLGA3rU-XeA9M6_JQyN14/s320/metro+entrance.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Enjoying the response from my adoring fans at Metro Pro Wrestling.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
I wrestled Domino Rivera that night. I'd spent months humiliating him while he served as my administrative assistant and he was looking to "come with the uppance" in our bout, but I pulled out the win by nailing him with Dinner With Kate Bender, which looks just like a piledriver except more awesome.<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjb_IIEDLelqCOp3oQd_rAEgsluPvyYmiWBxhQVZ0Ns0I9RF3xLxEjpPiZpaha8u1zqVQsbkogGDjC4BPih3a7tNdukO5unU2tKIfsyNuqyHa0JQkqWQXZKPpKWKKUjxQPOUr7ykGGl3Dg/s1600/DinnerWithKateBender.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjb_IIEDLelqCOp3oQd_rAEgsluPvyYmiWBxhQVZ0Ns0I9RF3xLxEjpPiZpaha8u1zqVQsbkogGDjC4BPih3a7tNdukO5unU2tKIfsyNuqyHa0JQkqWQXZKPpKWKKUjxQPOUr7ykGGl3Dg/s320/DinnerWithKateBender.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Domino Rivera learns that Dinner With Kate Bender isn't as fun as it sounds.</td></tr>
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<br />
On Saturday, October 22, WLW returned home to Eldon, MO for its annual Harley Race/Pro Wrestling NOAH camp show. Headlining the show were Kevin Von Erich, William Regal, and my childhood idol, Ricky "the Dragon" Steamboat.<br />
<br />
My friend and one of the best wrestlers I've ever been in the ring with, Ace Steel (for the few of you who don't know him, he trained C.M. Punk and Colt Cabana) returned to the ring for the first time in three years to face Regal in the main event. It was a wrestling clinic and Ace showed that he could go toe-to-toe and hold-for-hold with the greatest technical wrestler in the world.<br />
<br />
Three of my favorite people, Miss Natural, Lucy Mendez, and Stacey O'Brien, had an awesome three-way match for the WLW Ladies Title. Those ladies work their asses off and I was proud to see them get such an amazing reaction from the crowd.<br />
<br />
I had been one of the most beloved, and then hated, stars in WLW, and in Eldon a decade ago. My tag-team partner, Superstar Steve, and I teamed up for the first time in nine years to take on our old rivals, Trevor Murdoch and Bull Schmitt. In the early days of WLW, that match-up had stole the show countless times and just plain tore the house down many times.<br />
<br />
The match started off clean and, for the most part, fun. Then, while landing a leapfrog, my left knee blew out. The crowd went into a hush as my partner and opponents stopped the action to help the referee check on me.<br />
<br />
"It's bad," I said, swatting their hands away from my leg. "Get someone else out here to take my place. Get me out of here."<br />
<br />
"Someone get Harley!" Trevor yelled. Someone ran to find Harley Race.<br />
<br />
Ricky "the Dragon" Steamboat came to ringside.<br />
<br />
"What's going on?" my childhood idol asked.<br />
<br />
"I hurt it bad, sir," I said. "I just need to get out of the ring."<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhBaicOsSg9h9FMpLx0zDOX_IPWmZROYxLytZAOzy0P9iSyBMpzzYRsyeLlxyYi6F2hf5mld7yh2qRBeki40u2L9FHDEB1eVD4nbxSAWbxQ-pZfM1guvsDb5xRhrrsuXwAERXiGII1C4s/s1600/KneeInjurySwerve.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhBaicOsSg9h9FMpLx0zDOX_IPWmZROYxLytZAOzy0P9iSyBMpzzYRsyeLlxyYi6F2hf5mld7yh2qRBeki40u2L9FHDEB1eVD4nbxSAWbxQ-pZfM1guvsDb5xRhrrsuXwAERXiGII1C4s/s320/KneeInjurySwerve.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ricky "the Dragon" Steamboat checking on my after I blew out my knee.</td></tr>
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<br />
Bull sat between the top and middle ropes to widen the gap for my exit while Trevor and Steve carefully helped me to my feet.<br />
<br />
I felt my balance shift and Steve was gone. He ran across the ring and drilled Bull with a boot to the face. Trevor let go of me and took one step toward Steve. I whipped Trevor around and kicked him in the gut, then planted his head into the mat with the BDT from Pay TV, a beal throw into a DDT.<br />
<br />
The whole damn building had been swerved. They groaned and booed. Steamboat cursed me from ringside.<br />
<br />
I blew them all a sarcastic kiss, then did a few jumping jacks to show them I was fine.<br />
<br />
"Thanks, Dragon," I told the man who I'd worshipped as a kid, drawing a fiery glare from him.<br />
<br />
Harley stormed back to his spot at the merchandise table, realizing I'd fooled him along with everyone else.<br />
<br />
Steve and I pummeled Trevor for the next several minutes while he desperately tried to make the tag to Bull. Finally, he caught me with a running bulldog to give himself the time to make it to his partner. The crowd erupted when their hands clapped together and Bull became the legal man.<br />
<br />
Bull knocked me and Steve down with punches and clotheslines, then fired me into the corner and whipped Steve into me. Trevor shot Bull into us, sending me and Steve both face-first to the mat. The crowd was roaring. Bull clotheslined Steve over the top rope and, as I staggered to my feet, my opponents set up for the finale. Trevor clipped my legs while Bull hit me with a clothesline--the Sweet-and-Sour, made famous by former WWE World Tag Team Champions Trevor Murdoch and the late Lance Cade.<br />
<br />
All that was left was referee Scotty Z's three-count.<br />
<br />
The crowd came to its feet when announcer Dan Gier rang the bell and announced Trevor and Bull the winners. But even though the good guys had their hands raised, there were no losers in that match. We'd recreated the magic we'd made a decade ago, back when we were young and our dreams were as big as our imaginations. And I'd like to think that the fans were winners, too, because that was one hell of a match.<br />
<br />
All four of us embraced in the ring, drawing applause from the fans, and raised each other's arms. This was a special night.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-3GFHhGNXV5cKuy3m7TjUA1fzUs8QClHSsnRblPDuSkSc6Jk-vr-3lO8dOeKWi0ShA-3hUOobDHX_OK3O8KurjqFo-X3UhLOq0lXrYG8-O0QTPF8hVAzX3gG32a2elnTKrXaV_Q9QdA4/s1600/302580_10150333452607901_648232900_8036546_1091579031_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-3GFHhGNXV5cKuy3m7TjUA1fzUs8QClHSsnRblPDuSkSc6Jk-vr-3lO8dOeKWi0ShA-3hUOobDHX_OK3O8KurjqFo-X3UhLOq0lXrYG8-O0QTPF8hVAzX3gG32a2elnTKrXaV_Q9QdA4/s320/302580_10150333452607901_648232900_8036546_1091579031_n.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Referee Scotty Z, "All That" Matt Murphy, Trevor Murdoch, "Superstar" Steve Fender, and Bull Schmitt after our match Oct. 22 in Eldon, MO.</td></tr>
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Steamboat stormed into the locker room. For a moment, I wondered if I was going to get an ass-chewing for making a fool of him. His stern look softened and he grinned ear-to-ear.<br />
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"Excellent match," the Dragon said, then went on for several minutes about what he loved about it.<br />
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As Steamboat sang our praises, I was overwhelmed with the greatest sense of satisfaction I've had as a professional wrestler.<br />
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Life is like a photo montage; your life experiences--the memories, the moments--are small snapshots that make the big picture that is you. The memory of Ricky "the Dragon" Steamboat praising what I'd done inside the ring with three of my closest friends will always stand out as one of the greatest pictures in my montage.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I don't know if Ricky "the Dragon" Steamboat has ever had a more thrilled recipient of his handshake.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_Jwrvo9z3fZAups_CC-TbLAki0LJJk1Kg2gxB6WZIH6kxDRDqw7_Z5qtvtEsOU0O2Ov9Zk9A8-9ckYQx2G8XW480v4FOPdMcZ4GIZXD3iBxHJhVuicJ7nJPkT5Hj8FKkMw9RegyrdbYQ/s1600/HunterTrevorPaulSteamboatSmall.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="241" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_Jwrvo9z3fZAups_CC-TbLAki0LJJk1Kg2gxB6WZIH6kxDRDqw7_Z5qtvtEsOU0O2Ov9Zk9A8-9ckYQx2G8XW480v4FOPdMcZ4GIZXD3iBxHJhVuicJ7nJPkT5Hj8FKkMw9RegyrdbYQ/s320/HunterTrevorPaulSteamboatSmall.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Trevor Paul (Trevor Murdoch's son), Hunter Murphy, and Ricky "the Dragon" Steamboat.</td></tr>
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-61594626172642919322011-05-21T11:28:00.001-07:002011-05-21T11:28:26.587-07:00Macho MemoriesIt was the most terrifying thing I'd ever seen. And for a seven-year-old boy, I'd seen a hell of a lot. My hero, Ricky "the Dragon" Steamboat, lay helplessly while the WWF Intercontinental Champion, Randy "Macho Man" Savage, tried to kill him right in the middle of the ring. The first strike, a Savage double-axehandle from the top rope that drove a prone Steamboat's throat into the steel guard-rail, had been devastating. But this was criminal. I cried and yelled at Steamboat to move, but it was no use. "Macho Man" launched from the top rope and smashed the timekeeper's bell into Steamboat's throat.<br /><br />My hero was surely dead.<br /><br />I've shared my memories of that famous 1986 match several times in my book, in blogs, and in interviews. And I've credited Steamboat for being the one who inspired my dream of becoming a professional wrestler. But the one thing I haven't done is give credit to the other half of the team that created that magic: Randy Savage.<br /><br />Lex Luthor. Darth Vader. The Joker. Marshmallow Man. Without villains, there are no heroes. And Savage was the most dastardly villain of my childhood. Not only did he try to kill my hero, he also treated his beautiful, pure-as-snow valet, Miss Elizabeth, like garbage. Men and boys of all ages daydreamed about rescuing her from him. But none of us ever did anything to help her and she suffered for it.<br /><br />When "Macho Man" became a babyface (wrestling lingo for good guy), the wrestling fanatic in me was thrilled. But the Steamboat worshipper in me would never forget what he'd done to "The Dragon".<br /><br />Randy Savage was one of wrestling's greatest success stories. He captivated millions, became a household name, enjoyed success in other forms of entertainment as a spokesman and actor.<br /><br />Randy Savage. Rapper. Sorry, I just can't put those words in the same sentence. But it's cool that he tried.<br /><br />As a wrestler, he was one of the top 5 stars from 1985-1998. He was believable, innovative, and intense. Fans either loved or hated him but they never felt indifference.<br /><br />I'm saddened to hear about the death of Randall Mario Poffo, a.k.a. Randy "Macho Man" Savage. "Macho Man" was one of the greatest characters and a big influence on many of today's greatest stars. And while I'll always remember him as the villain who tried to kill my hero, I'll also remember him fondly. <br /><br /><br /><br /><br />- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-5818466393985417672011-05-19T06:15:00.001-07:002011-05-19T06:15:52.828-07:00Peace & Quiet: O-ver-ra-ted (clap, clap, clap, clap, clap)"If I'm writing and the house catches fire, call the fire department. But leave me alone." That was the rule around my house back in the olden days. My wife, for the most part, respected my need for solitude during marathon writing sessions in the computer room. I needed peace and quiet, no distractions, so I could focus on creating.<br /><br />Alone with my thoughts, I produced zero finished full-length manuscripts and added at least 100 documents to my computer's Incomplete & Abandoned folder. I wasted a lot of years of my writing life consumed by self-doubt, afraid to male a mistake, and worrying about how each word would be received by editors and readers and critics. Alone with my thoughts, I was my own worst enemy.<br /><br />I tried everything to break out of my funk. I read books on writing. I listened to the Writing Excuses podcast. I journaled. I wrote fiction and non-fiction, poetry, short stories and screenplays. I wrote in the morning and at night. I wrote using Word and writing software and longhand. I replaced computer desks and notebooks and everything else I could blame for my writing woes. Nothing could help me work through it.<br /><br />Then my son came along and rescued me from peace and quiet. The interruptions and distractions that were once a sin in my house have become commonplace:<br /><br />"Dad-dee...can I play the Star Wars game on the computer?"<br /><br />"Dad-dee...I'm thirsty."<br /><br />"Um, Dad-dee...when I'm a parent, I don't think I'll want to drive a car."<br /><br />My wife joins in:<br /><br />"I'm making tacos next week. Would you rather have beef or chicken?"<br /><br />I wonder if Elmore Leonard's wife has ever interrupted him during sacred Writing Time to ask him "beef of chicken?"<br /><br />But to my surprise, the distractions and interruptions have actually been refreshing. They keep my mind from wandering to self-doubt and other thoughts that quickly become barriers to my writing productivity.<br /><br />I'm also becoming less interested in solitude. These days I'm more comfortable writing from my living-room chair than at one of the desks in my writing den.<br /><br />My writing self from eight years ago wouldn't even recognize me.<br /><br /><br /><br />- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-5567642298953176812011-02-18T07:45:00.000-08:002011-02-18T07:45:53.504-08:00Once It's in Your Blood...Just a few months ago, I was content with my role as a passive wrestling fan. I watched WWE programming once in a while with lukewarm interest, mostly to see how a few of my friends were doing and what storylines they were involved with.<br />
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An old friend said I was getting bitter towards the wrestling business. He couldn’t have been more wrong. I love wrestling, always have and always will, but I had already struck out with WWE as a writer didn’t see any future for myself in the business. I thought it would be best for me and for my family if I just stayed away from wrestling.<br />
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And I tried. I pushed wrestling to the back of my mind did what I could to leave it there. My wrestling DVD library started to collect dust. And as I finished the first draft of my latest book, The Somebody Obsession: A Nobody’s Desperate Journey to Stardom, I wrote about my relationship with wrestling as if (and believing) I’d found closure.<br />
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My passion for wrestling never died and I could still feel it inside, but I dismissed it as indigestion and moved on with my life.<br />
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It had been more than a year since I’d done an interview when some old friends invited me to appear as the guest on their Squared Circle Round Table wrestling talk show on JCTV in Jefferson City. I wasn’t nervous or excited when the interview started, but I surprisingly had a blast talking wrestling with them. We filmed a pair of one-hour episodes and I felt like could have sat there and talked wrestling all night.<br />
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At Christmastime, I was adding items to my Amazon wish list to make my wife’s gift-buying as painless as possible. I thought it might be fun to kick my son’s butt at some <i>WWE Smackdown vs. Raw</i> on the Xbox 360, so I added that game to the list. On Christmas Eve, we let Hunter open one present. In turn, he insisted that I open one as well and he picked out the wrestling game to be that early gift. Minutes into my first match against Hunter, I could see that he was going to get hooked on wrestling.<br />
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During the next month, I watched and worried as Hunter’s obsession with wrestling grew. He staged matches with his rapidly growing collection of action figures, wrestled with his giant stuffed Batman on the dining-room floor, watched my <i>Wrestlemania</i> anthology and other wrestling DVDs (ever seen a five-year-old choose to watch a Verne Gagne vs. Baron Von Raschke match?), and played that wrestling video game so much that I had to buy a kitchen timer to make sure he still made time for other activities.<br />
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I had always said I would support my son’s interests to the best of my ability, no matter what those interests were, and he was putting that promise to the test.<br />
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Wrestling was a big part of my past that I expected to stay in the past, but he pulled me back in. And despite my uncertainty as I felt it happening, deep down I was glad.<br />
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I started looking for ways to contribute to the business again.<br />
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I’ve been called both a hack and a genius when it comes to the wrestling business. While the truth probably lies somewhere in between, I’ve always felt like I had something special to offer.<br />
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Many people who leave the business miss the camaraderie among the boys most of all. I miss it, of course, but more than anything I miss the thrill of feeling my creative wheels constantly turning, of scribbling down ideas for gimmicks and storylines and match finishes as fast as I could before they were lost forever, and that sense of accomplishment when I watched one of my ideas played out in front of a live crowd. Those are feelings I’ve never experienced in a “real” job and I miss them.<br />
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While browsing Facebook, I came up with an idea to create a networking site similar to Facebook but exclusively for those working in the business. Instead of piling that idea on the growing heap of ideas I’ve had in the last couple years that never made it a step further, I created the site that night. After one week, <a href="http://www.kayfabeconnect.com/">Kayfabe Connect</a> has almost 80 members. I hope to see that number grow to 250 members in the next three months.<br />
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I didn’t watch <i>Raw</i> on Monday night but I heard about the Rock’s return soon afterwards. I found it on YouTube and watched in awe, forgetting about all my successes and failures in the business, and got completely engrossed in the segment once again as a fan. For the first time in I-don’t-know-how-long, I can’t wait until next Monday night.<br />
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A few nights ago, I went into the Harley Race Wrestling Academy for the first time in more than a year. I spoke briefly with Harley, who I’d only seen once during that time, and stood beside my old friend Trevor Murdock as we watched our sons, who are two months apart in age and are best friends, wrestle around. Since then, Hunter can’t stop begging me to take him back there. It seems that wrestling is in his blood, just as it’s in mine. Maybe this is just a phase and he’ll lose interest, and it’s okay with me if that happens, but for now I’m having fun watching him get wrapped up in wrestling the same way I did when I was a kid.<br />
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I don’t know what the future holds for me in wrestling. I know only two things: 1.) I want to work in the business in some capacity again, and 2.) I don’t expect to make profit in wrestling, but I owe it to my family to make sure I don’t take a loss, either.<br />
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No matter what happens between me and the wrestling business in the future, it feels pretty damned good right now to feel that fire rekindled.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-82780898750430952332011-02-17T06:05:00.001-08:002011-02-17T06:12:33.961-08:00Still undefeated against Foley<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8610510-undisputed" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px"><img alt="Undisputed" border="0" src="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51jbDlsHctL._SX106_.jpg" /></a><a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8610510-undisputed">Undisputed</a> by <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/623125.Chris_Jericho">Chris Jericho</a><br />
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My rating: <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/148746954">5 of 5 stars</a><br />
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It was fitting that Mick Foley wrote the foreword to Chris Jericho's memoir, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0446538159?ie=UTF8&tag=thegos-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=0446538159">UNDISPUTED: HOW TO BECOME THE WORLD CHAMPION IN 1,372 EASY STEPS</a><img src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=thegos-20&l=as2&o=1&a=0446538159" width="1" height="1" border="0" alt="" style="border:none !important; margin:0px !important;" />, and passed the torch to Jericho as the new champion of wrestling books. Jericho uses the formula that made Foley's books so successful, creating a personal connection with his readers with his openness and wit, and in the process does it even better than the long-reigning king of wrestling authors. <br />
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Unlike his autobiography <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/044669861X?ie=UTF8&tag=thegos-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=044669861X">A LION'S TALE: AROUND THE WORLD IN SPANDEX</a><img src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=thegos-20&l=as2&o=1&a=044669861X" width="1" height="1" border="0" alt="" style="border:none !important; margin:0px !important;" />, Jericho's new book UNDISPUTED is a memoir, chronicling his journey through WWE as he becomes one of the biggest stars in the wrestling business while he battles to be taken seriously as a musician and actor. The book is an intriguing look inside all three forms of entertainment and shows how his success in one venue often serves as a hindrance in the others. His metal band, Fozzy, struggles to break away from its reputation of a gimmick act and becomes a legitimate band that headlines sold-out events in some places and flops in others. HIs acting career seems doomed before it starts, as the black cloud of wrestling superstardom lurks over his head while he tries to catch a break as a "real" actor. <br />
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UNDISPUTED is entertaining cover-to-cover and, although I expected to skim over his adventures in music and Hollywood, those tales prove to be every bit as captivating as the wrestling. But there is plenty of wrestling in UNDISPUTED, offering readers an peek behind the curtain from his highly anticipated and disappointing start in WWE to his reign as the first-ever Undisputed Heavyweight Champion then back into mid-card purgatory. He details the political forces that worked against him, his backstage fight with the feared Goldberg, the heartbreaking loss of his close friend Eddie Guerrero, and the senseless Benoit family tragedy. <br />
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A LION'S TALE came close to unseating Foley's <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0061031011?ie=UTF8&tag=thegos-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=0061031011">HAVE A NICE DAY: A TALE OF BLOOD AND SWEATSOCKS</a><img src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=thegos-20&l=as2&o=1&a=0061031011" width="1" height="1" border="0" alt="" style="border:none !important; margin:0px !important;" /> as the greatest wrestling book of all time; I'd call it a draw. UNDISPUTED surpasses them both and now reigns as the new king of the wrestling genre.<br />
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<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/list/3857717-matt-murphy">View all my reviews</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-29771209811335439932011-01-29T07:15:00.000-08:002011-01-29T07:15:58.251-08:00Why I passed on the YA genre<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtuC78zz8PVkndcJe1DYvTCYNPR7XdfIU2652yyKziY1HWkCytNe3LZY5vC6VOKU3181JoA6sO5J6wd4JAa6lbPhZkV_wZ4vfzAVws16tJ4LbztjOqsXIp2rPIwFyEQI1EppwWnEKaRc8/s1600/Parental+Advisory.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="135" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtuC78zz8PVkndcJe1DYvTCYNPR7XdfIU2652yyKziY1HWkCytNe3LZY5vC6VOKU3181JoA6sO5J6wd4JAa6lbPhZkV_wZ4vfzAVws16tJ4LbztjOqsXIp2rPIwFyEQI1EppwWnEKaRc8/s200/Parental+Advisory.gif" width="200" /></a></div><br />
A teen walks into the guidance counselor's office at school. The kid is having a hard time finding his own way: his relationship with his parents has deteriorated and his grades have declined during the last couple years; he continues struggling to find acceptance at both home and school. The counselor gives him that "I've got just what you need" look. Ritalin? Nope. Prozac? Nope. She slides open her desk drawer and lifts out a paperback book.<br />
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"Read this," the counselor says.<br />
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The teen looks at the book. "<i>The Somebody Obsession</i>? You think I should become a professional wrestler?"<br />
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"Absolutely not," the counselor says, chuckling. "But the book is about so much more than wrestling. The guy who wrote it became a wrestler, but he has quite a journey along the way. You should read it--I think you'll find that you have a lot in common with the author. Just make sure I get it back when you're finished."<br />
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This was my vision. My book, I daydreamed, would be the modern, nonfiction version of <i>The Catcher in the Rye</i>. I'd be the real-life Holden Caulfield; teens would read my story and think destiny brought them and my book together. It would be quoted in locker-room speeches and commencement addresses, love letters and manifestos.<br />
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Alas, it was not meant to be. My vision and reality, as is often the case, were not one in the same.<br />
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I wanted nothing more than to write my story for the Young Adult genre. Well, almost nothing. The only thing I coveted more than the opportunity to connect teens with my story was <i>honesty</i>. I tried for weeks to come up with a way to write my story in a teen-friendly way so it could be borrowed from the school library. I wasn't afraid to bring a little sex and alcohol into the YA market--those are real issues in a teenager's life--and I wasn't afraid to be controversial. If I could have found a way to write the book in a YA-friendly manner without softening or dancing around the truth, I would have done it. But I wasn't willing to do it at the expense of honesty or jeopardize the thing that makes my book so unique: its voice.<br />
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My book connects with a good percentage of readers, but it's not for everyone. There's a lot of R-rated content that will turn some people off. Others will simply find it uninteresting. But it's my story and I told it the way I thought it should be told. I wouldn't have it any other way.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-25371488710835447852011-01-28T17:22:00.000-08:002011-01-28T17:23:12.930-08:00THE SOMEBODY OBSESSION reaches #1 on Amazon bestsellers list<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">THE SOMEBODY OBSESSION: A NOBODY'S DESPERATE JOURNEY TO STARDOM is currently ranked #1 on the Amazon Kindle bestsellers list in the Wrestling category! This was one of my main goals for the book, and it took just a couple weeks to get there. Many thanks to everyone who bought the book! </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhu6cs53Y1-pGT9qmxGzEhPMyEvyHh3D7VWX1q4s7TFYvUzcOeTNn3rFtqNTQ35hwZa1A3jLpF39vdaRQJUWZJHm44O-97_YAoiu6N5r2kgjPVkPRDSN8jbN31PfUhyphenhyphena72qkJ0J7t2wcpE/s1600/AmazonKindleBestsellers.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="251" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhu6cs53Y1-pGT9qmxGzEhPMyEvyHh3D7VWX1q4s7TFYvUzcOeTNn3rFtqNTQ35hwZa1A3jLpF39vdaRQJUWZJHm44O-97_YAoiu6N5r2kgjPVkPRDSN8jbN31PfUhyphenhyphena72qkJ0J7t2wcpE/s400/AmazonKindleBestsellers.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-78703441291025808282011-01-19T07:52:00.000-08:002011-01-19T07:52:28.742-08:00The new book debuts on Kindle bestseller listCurrent Kindle bestseller list, wrestling category: The Professional Wrestler (#11) and The Somebody Obsession (#15). The Professional Wrestler peaked at #3 a couple months ago--I'm confident The Somebody Obsession will make it to #1. Go to Amazon.com to download the free Kindle reading app for PC, Mac, iPad, iPhone, Android, and Blackberry.<br />
<br />
You can order THE SOMEBODY OBSESSION for Kindle for just $2.99 by clicking here:<br />
<a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004J4WJ6G?ie=UTF8&tag=thegos-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B004J4WJ6G">The Somebody Obsession: A Nobody's Desperate Journey to Stardom (Kindle version)</a><img src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=thegos-20&l=as2&o=1&a=B004J4WJ6G" width="1" height="1" border="0" alt="" style="border:none !important; margin:0px !important;" />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-24711283789951918912011-01-18T12:46:00.000-08:002011-01-18T12:46:36.505-08:00Sheldon Goldberg reviews THE SOMEBODY OBSESSION<div style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 1.5em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333;"></span></div><div style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 1.5em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: left;">THE SOMEBODY OBSESSION: A NOBODY'S DESPERATE JOURNEY TO STARDOM has just received its first review on Amazon.</div><div style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 1.5em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 1.5em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: left;">Wrestling promoter/journalist/historian Sheldon Goldberg is the author of the review. His voice is among the most respected in the wrestling industry and, though I never had the pleasure of working with Mr. Goldberg, I've always admired him.</div><div style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 1.5em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 1.5em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: left;">Here is his review:</div><div style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 1.5em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><blockquote style="border-left-color: rgb(221, 221, 221); border-left-style: solid; border-left-width: 5px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 15px; padding-right: 15px; padding-top: 0px;"><div style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 1.5em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: left;"><em>As someone who has read a good 60% of the pro wrestling bios out there, "The Somebody Obsession: A Nobody's Desperate Journey to Stardom" by Matt Murphy ranks with the very best of them right alongside Mick Foley's bestsellers and Brett Hart's autobiography. </em></div><div style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 1.5em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 1.5em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: left;"><em>Matt's autobigraphical tale of his journey from troubled childhood to fondling, but not quite getting a grasp on the brass ring that is pro wrestling superstardom, is compelling, poignant, and often laugh out loud funny. As interesting as the lives of the big stars who have endeared themselves to us or entertained us in the squared circle throughout the years may be, this story of a man who tried and came close is in many ways more interesting than any of them. </em></div><div style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 1.5em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 1.5em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: left;"><em>Even if you are not a fan of pro wrestling, Matt Murphy's story is a top notch page turner that anyone who ever had a dream will surely identify with. This is one of the best bios of any kind I've read in a while.</em></div></blockquote>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-59403150136488030622011-01-15T03:56:00.000-08:002011-01-15T03:57:34.959-08:00A Crash Course in MarketingSelf-publishing my autobiography has allowed me the freedom to do pretty much whatever the hell I want with all things relating to my book. I can't say I'm intimidated; I was responsible for 99% of the marketing of the original version, which was released by a so-called "traditional" publisher.<br />
<br />
I've learned a lot in the months leading up to the book release. With the help of two excellent Kindle books, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001O9BERY?ie=UTF8&tag=thegos-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B001O9BERY">Are You Still Submitting Your Work to a Traditional Publisher? by Edward C. Patterson</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=thegos-20&l=as2&o=1&a=B001O9BERY" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" /> and <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001NPD2AQ?ie=UTF8&tag=thegos-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B001NPD2AQ">Plug Your Book! Online Book Marketing for Authors, Book Publicity through Social Networking by Steve Weber</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=thegos-20&l=as2&o=1&a=B001NPD2AQ" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" />, I created a low-cost marketing plan to help my book become a success. Its effectiveness is TBD.<br />
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<a name='more'></a><br />
My primary target is Amazon customers. Although my royalties are lower for Amazon sales than they would be if I directed buyers to the CreateSpace page or sold them through my own site, Amazon is a virtual bookstore, fully customized for each user. Amazon sales and reviews = greater visibility on the Amazon site.<br />
<br />
Getting reviews, as I've said before, is a challenge. Less than 1% of the people who read my previous titles took the time to review them. Here's my strategy for getting reviews:<br />
<br />
1. <b>Review Copies:</b> I sent a copy of my book to wrestling journalists and other readers who I thought were likely to review my book.<br />
2. <b>Goodreads Giveaway: </b>I'm giving away 10 free books on the Goodreads giveaway. I'm hoping to have 500 people enter to win because that means 500 readers have taken notice of my book, leaving 490 potential book-buyers. Winners of the giveaway are encouraged by Goodreads to review the book. I've also added excerpts on the Goodreads site.<br />
3. <b>Free Digital Copies: </b>I'm giving away 50 digital (PDF, EPUB, MOBI) copies of my book and asking those who receive a free copy to review the book on Amazon.<br />
4. <b>Kindle/Amazon Gift Card Giveaway:</b> I haven't decided on this one--it depends on what early sales figures look like--but I'm considering randomly selecting one reviewer to receive a free Kindle or a $150 Amazon gift card if/when my new book reaches the lofty goal of 100 Amazon reviews.<br />
<br />
I've also created a Facebook ad which will be seen by 2,000 potential book-buyers during the next few weeks. I'm not sure how effective it will be, but I am sure that I don't want to spend a bunch of money on a book that won't likely make me a whole lot of, if any, profit. I budgeted just $1.00 per day for this ad campaign, and if I like the results I will increase the budget.<br />
<br />
That's it so far. I'm doing some trial-and-error while trying to keep expenses to a minimum in the process. Feel free to share any other marketing ideas.<br />
<br />
<br />
<iframe frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=thegos-20&o=1&p=8&l=as1&asins=B001O9BERY&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="height: 240px; width: 120px;"></iframe><br />
<br />
<iframe frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=thegos-20&o=1&p=8&l=as1&asins=B001NPD2AQ&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="height: 240px; width: 120px;"></iframe>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-79127808479503818842011-01-15T00:25:00.000-08:002011-01-15T00:25:53.177-08:00Read THE SOMEBODY OBSESSION free!<h3 class="UIIntentionalStory_Message" data-ft="{"type":"msg"}" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><span class="UIStory_Message">If you'd like to read the new book in PDF, EPUB, or MOBI (Kindle) format, please send me a message including your email address and which format you prefer and I will email it you a digital copy. My email is mjhmurphy at gmail dot com.</span></h3><h3 class="UIIntentionalStory_Message" data-ft="{"type":"msg"}" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><span class="UIStory_Message"><br />
</span></h3><h3 class="UIIntentionalStory_Message" data-ft="{"type":"msg"}" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><span class="UIStory_Message">All I ask in return is that you take a couple minutes to share your thoughts about the book <span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">with the rest </span></span>of the world by leaving a review on the book's Amazon product page after you read it.</h3><div><span class="UIStory_Message"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><br />
</span></span></div><div><h3 class="UIIntentionalStory_Message" data-ft="{"type":"msg"}" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><span class="UIStory_Message"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">This offer is limited to the first 50 readers.</span></span></h3></div><div><br />
</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-71547965699842354392011-01-14T11:33:00.000-08:002011-01-15T03:25:33.633-08:00THE SOMEBODY OBSESSION now available on AmazonIt's ten days ahead of schedule but THE SOMEBODY OBSESSION: A NOBODY'S DESPERATE JOURNEY TO STARDOM is now available. Click <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1456339303?ie=UTF8&tag=thegos-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=1456339303">here</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=thegos-20&l=as2&o=1&a=1456339303" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" /> to view it on Amazon.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-51685805833460123822011-01-11T16:39:00.000-08:002011-01-11T16:39:23.839-08:00Like father, like son<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgc5uTRxLXSPKXNhy1PrCOYRje9c2G4U0GTNizt5AsdckAcAvIf88MvmLGmp8u_C-kooOMRQdc0OWvjGZuXciUjy9NURc_XCP1tXtYiQLRM0jHxdwZHLCX1CkIn2O6xtfWBAB9GjSbmhUo/s1600/Hunter+mask.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgc5uTRxLXSPKXNhy1PrCOYRje9c2G4U0GTNizt5AsdckAcAvIf88MvmLGmp8u_C-kooOMRQdc0OWvjGZuXciUjy9NURc_XCP1tXtYiQLRM0jHxdwZHLCX1CkIn2O6xtfWBAB9GjSbmhUo/s320/Hunter+mask.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I guess I should have seen it coming.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>It's not that I don't want my son to love wrestling. I loved it as a kid and it played an important part of my life. But I can't help but feel a little uneasy right now.<br />
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Hunter has grown up around the wrestling business even though I haven't been a part of it for a couple of years. He calls Harley Race "Pap" and Trevor Murdoch's son is his best friend. When Hunter was a baby, Ted DiBiase Jr. came over to the house occasionally. Later, Joe Hennig (a.k.a. Michael McGillicutty) was a frequent guest. Most of my friends are or have been involved in wrestling. Hunter has Harley and Trevor's action figures and seems to think that every kid knows some of the people they see on TV. He also knows that I was once a wrestler.<br />
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He just never showed a whole lot of interest in wrestling and I was fine with that. Instead, he loved superheroes. First, it was Buzz Lightyear. Then it was Batman, then Anakin Skywalker. What I liked about it was that all these characters had one thing in common: they weren't real. They never let him down. None of them battle addictions or burn out. I'll never have to explain to him that something terrible has happened to Buzz Lightyear in real-life. Right now, Hunter has about ten wrestling action figures. Two years ago, all the people portraying those characters were still alive. Since then, two of them have died very young.<br />
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When you hear a familiar word, memories associated with that word flash through your mind. When I hear "wrestling" I see a mixture of images. Some of them are pleasant and some of them are not. I see the fans standing on their feet after I hit a frog splash and pinned my opponent and I see a former star stumbling into the locker room, half-drunk and hitting everyone up for pain pills. I've seen and experienced what a wonderful business it can be, but I've also seen its dark side. It's hard for me to forget my personal experiences and see it from a young fan's point-of-view. To Hunter, it's simply a battle of good guys versus bad guys. I don't think it would be right for me to let my personal experiences influence his newfound love. It's not like he's telling me he's dropping out of his Pre-K class to enroll in wrestling school.<br />
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Hunter's interest in wrestling had been limited to the rare occasion that he'd ask, "Can we watch some old-school wrestling?"<br />
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That all changed on Christmas Eve. We let Hunter open a present early, a Star Wars video game. He thought I should also open one early. My early present was <i>Smackdown vs. Raw 2008</i>, a game I'd put on my Amazon wish list because I thought it would be fun to play against him. Since then, he has become a wrestling fanatic.<br />
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He plays with the action figures, slamming them around the ring or making them leap off the steel (actually cardboard) cage I made for him. He constantly wants to play the wrestling game on Xbox 360. He has gone through five favorite wrestlers during the last three weeks: Shawn Michaels, then Triple-H, C.M. Punk, Rey Misterio, and now Edge.<br />
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Hunter has a stuffed Batman toy that's as tall as him; the poor thing has taken a beating recently. He slams it, puts it in figure-four leglocks, and some sort of monkey-flip/powerbomb hybrid I've never seen. Sometimes (not often), he lets his stuffed opponent get in a little offense. I'm not crazy it, but I've warned him about wrestling against other kids at school and daycare, so if wrestling against a toy keeps him from hurting other kids or getting in trouble then so be it.<br />
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I've seen Hunter go through dozens of phases and most of them pass quickly. If the wrestling phase passes, that's okay. If not, I guess he has a dad who understands his love for the business.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVJvieWzFFgarC_xh9OImj7C-APXZYwXOfm_G7Da44HLtpO4FbguXkS1M4JuSA_WnN1QuC8q1zIW_JaC-Lx-pZ1YCyxCLJtP_I5JUasQxevfsE5-08egiTUt4uQxTN-zxAXi1dws3gaFM/s1600/Hunter+vs+Batman.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVJvieWzFFgarC_xh9OImj7C-APXZYwXOfm_G7Da44HLtpO4FbguXkS1M4JuSA_WnN1QuC8q1zIW_JaC-Lx-pZ1YCyxCLJtP_I5JUasQxevfsE5-08egiTUt4uQxTN-zxAXi1dws3gaFM/s640/Hunter+vs+Batman.jpg" width="480" /></a></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-23962432386245972252011-01-06T01:55:00.000-08:002011-01-06T01:55:29.976-08:00Scrivener - my favorite writing software<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXg-zNEzivxN0bYCuvRsVidJbfs1tRAgbprHZTFHgGW2Iqz5vUSnKxTNtDk3EmH4p-rdqc4IYxXaJfIyy3uhhUIb4y2c03cmm4EXU5P7YABaQMZFi7Bth-Kzxaw7NsbSe73dDIACFCfTw/s1600/Scrivener+logo.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="93" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXg-zNEzivxN0bYCuvRsVidJbfs1tRAgbprHZTFHgGW2Iqz5vUSnKxTNtDk3EmH4p-rdqc4IYxXaJfIyy3uhhUIb4y2c03cmm4EXU5P7YABaQMZFi7Bth-Kzxaw7NsbSe73dDIACFCfTw/s320/Scrivener+logo.png" width="320" /></a></div>I've bought several software programs to make my writing as easy as possible, but most of them just got in the way. It was the same story every time: I would download a demo of a writing program, convince myself it would help me write a bestseller and I'd one day become its celebrity endorser, then within hours of using the full version I would close the program and switch to my word processor. I was running out of excuses to tell my wife when she asked why I was using OpenOffice to write instead of using the new software that cost a day's wages.<br />
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Then I found Scrivener.<br />
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Before I get too far into this review, you should know that Scrivener is currently available for Mac only. But don't fret, Windows users, it's coming to your OS early this year.<br />
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<a name='more'></a><br />
I've used Scrivener for roughly one year and I love it. The powerful program allows me to quickly access all of my files--documents, research, photos, videos, character profiles, everything--in the Binder located on the left sidebar. This is especially useful for my current true-crime work, which contains more than 3,000 pages of research in many different formats. I can view my files and folders in Outline or Corkboard mode, two awesome features that are especially useful to me in the early stages of a writing project. I'm easily distracted, so I don't always want those sidebars and options in my line of vision. Simple enough: I just switch to full-screen mode and everything disappears except the document I'm writing. I can even customize the background and text colors in full-screen mode to prevent headaches that often come with extended focus on my backlit monitor.<br />
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Yesterday, I learned of Scrivener's newly released version 2.0. I checked out the new features, including e-book exporting options that would allow me to publish to MOBI (Kindle) or EPUB (iPad, iPod touch, Sony Reader, Nook, etc.). I quickly bought Scrivener 2.0 ($45 for new license, $25 for upgrade) and had THE SOMEBODY OBSESSION converted to MOBI and EPUB with just a few clicks.<br />
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I highly recommend Scrivener to all writers. Download a demo and see if you find it as useful as I have.<br />
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Scrivener is available by clicking <a href="http://www.literatureandlatte.com/scrivener.php">here</a>.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-83283862942028620802011-01-06T01:22:00.000-08:002011-01-06T01:27:36.049-08:00TRAILER TRASH is a treasure<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiZWCvIZn0fWsqfTogH-sBGyJ6Rf8xgBWaBhkl06z85eXk2RCGF7uzcYtW6Pieh_-_1KO0_G4ilzEPViTtNKcJv5hygywHl5oSj7Ee4xsmDsKpIw0b_GIA3xQ4MZXV7vi_8f40iVlzq1U/s1600/Trailer+Trash.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiZWCvIZn0fWsqfTogH-sBGyJ6Rf8xgBWaBhkl06z85eXk2RCGF7uzcYtW6Pieh_-_1KO0_G4ilzEPViTtNKcJv5hygywHl5oSj7Ee4xsmDsKpIw0b_GIA3xQ4MZXV7vi_8f40iVlzq1U/s320/Trailer+Trash.jpg" width="300" /></a></div><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Buying dirt-cheap Kindle books can be kind of like dumpster diving: there's a lot of garbage, but once in a while you'll stumble across a treasure.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"> </span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">TRAILER TRASH by Timothy Boling was an impulse purchase several months ago and it wasn't until yesterday that I finally opened the digital file to give the story a chance. It was a pleasant surprise. The short novel was well-written and featured an interesting cast of characters. Boling really brought Tramp Manor, the run-down trailer park that's a nuisance to everyone except those who call it home, to life.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><a name='more'></a> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">The book wasn't perfect--there are a couple typos and style issues--but the imperfections didn't get in the way of a very good story. When I learned that TRAILER TRASH was one of several short novels Boling wrote while serving time in prison, it made the book even more interesting to me.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">I definitely recommend this book and look forward to reading more of Boling's work.</span><br />
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<iframe frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=thegos-20&o=1&p=8&l=as1&asins=B002R5B19K&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="height: 240px; width: 120px;"></iframe>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-5995580297415845642011-01-03T23:46:00.000-08:002011-01-03T23:46:35.537-08:00My title is weirdTHE SOMEBODY OBSESSION--it doesn't exactly roll off the tongue, does it? A book title is important and I don't like the way mine sounds. So why did I name it that? Three reasons:<br />
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1. The book is about the life experiences I collected that contributed to my obsession with becoming what I believed was a somebody, my journey into professional wrestling, and what I learned from the experience. The first quarter-century of my life was driven by this obsession, so I think the title is appropriate.<br />
2. I wanted a short title. THE STORY OF A NOBODY AND THE PURSUIT TO BECOME A SOMEBODY (12 words) and THE PROFESSIONAL WRESTLER IN THE WORLD OF SPORTS-ENTERTAINMENT (9 words) were too long.<br />
3. I couldn't think of anything better.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-44790252794852768962011-01-03T23:30:00.000-08:002011-01-03T23:30:08.011-08:00THE SOMEBODY OBSESSION release date is three weeks from todayJust three weeks to go until the official release date of THE SOMEBODY OBSESSION: A NOBODY'S DESPERATE JOURNEY TO STARDOM, although it may actually show up for sale on Amazon a day or two before then. While I don't expect to make a significant profit from the book, I'm confident that the Kindle version will quickly ascend to #1 on the Amazon bestsellers list in the Wrestling category and hope the print version can do the same. Those will be nice accomplishments, but it would be nice to see my book crack the top 100 on the overall Kindle bestseller list as well. The success of the book will be highly dependent on word-of-mouth and Amazon reviews, but I believe I have a solid marketing plan that will get my story in the hands of enough readers to make it successful.<br />
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Because I self-published, Amazon doesn't have my book available for pre-order. So it makes little sense to do a whole lot of marketing until I have a place to send the traffic. I created a Facebook page for THE SOMEBODY OBSESSION, but that hasn't turned out too hot with just 40 followers so far. Turns out most of the 400-plus people who were sent the invite never received it and Facebook won't allow me to resend it to them. You can follow it by clicking <a href="http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Somebody-Obsession-by-Matt-Murphy/135657619820740">here</a>.<br />
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I know that some people will love the book and some will hate it. I don't expect too many people to be on the fence. To share an artistic endeavor, especially one so personal and one which required hundreds of hours to complete, is rewarding. That reward, however, comes with risk. It takes thick skin to read criticism, separate the useful information from the crap, and use it constructively to make myself a better storyteller.<br />
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THE SOMEBODY OBSESSION just received its first bit of criticism. A guy made assumptions without knowing anything about my book except that I was critical of my mom in it. He questioned my motive for writing the book, suggesting it might be for money or for attention. Let's address the money issue first. If I sell 5,000 copies, the book would be considered an enormous success by any publisher in the country (the average book sells less than 300 copies, and that's with Stephenie Meyer and James Patterson figured into the equation). My cut of that money would be about $10,000. Given the time I devoted to writing, editing, editing, editing, laying out, designing, and promoting my book, I will earn less than minimum wage. Realistically, it will take good fortune to sell 1,000 copies of THE SOMEBODY OBSESSION. So money obviously isn't my motivation. Attention? I'm socially awkward and I feel embarrassed these days when someone recognizes me in public as Matt Murphy, former pro wrestler. I've signed thousands of autographs; while I'd never decline a request, I don't get giddy anymore the way I did the first couple-hundred times and I don't care if I ever sign another. I don't feel a need to be adored once again. The first version of my autobiography, THE STORY OF A NOBODY AND THE PURSUIT TO BECOME A SOMEBODY, and my 2008 book, THE PROFESSIONAL WRESTLER IN THE WORLD OF SPORTS-ENTERTAINMENT, have both connected with an audience. It's a wonderful feeling to hear from a reader who has been entertained, educated, and/or inspired by my written work. I won't rant on every bit of negative feedback I receive and I don't value an uninformed opinion, but I thought this was a good time to clear the air about my motivation for writing and publishing THE SOMEBODY OBSESSION.<br />
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On to the topic of the content which is critical of my mom and others ...<br />
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I am very grateful for anyone who reads my story, whether they've purchased the book themselves or borrowed it from a friend or local library. When a person reads a book, they are making an investment in time that is lost forever. I can't guarantee every person will consider the time they spend reading my book as time well-spent, but I wholeheartedly believe that I owe it to those readers to be honest with them, to tell my story as completely and truthfully as possible. And I'll offer no apologies to those I offend with truthful statements, even if they are hurtful. If anyone brings it to my attention that I have written something inaccurate, I will be glad to set the record straight on my blog, website, and Facebook, and in any revised editions of the digital and print versions.<br />
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Thanks in advance to everyone ordering the book. I look forward to hearing your thoughts and reading your reviews on Amazon.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-67287716159322038102011-01-02T03:05:00.000-08:002011-01-02T03:05:03.897-08:00Included in Mike Mooneyham article in The Post and Courier, Charleston, SCI recently answered some questions from Mike Mooneyham, bestselling co-author of <i>Sex, Lies, and Headlocks</i> and writer/editor for <i>The Post and Courier</i>, which were used in an article about a local man pursuing wrestling stardom. Check it out <a href="http://www.postandcourier.com/news/2011/jan/02/local-wrestler-chasing-dream/">here</a>.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-32624990571702848792010-12-14T15:45:00.000-08:002010-12-14T15:45:45.278-08:00Disappointed by CROSS RHODES: GOLDUST, OUT OF THE DARKNESS<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Of every wrestling book that has been released, I've looked forward to none as much as CROSS RHODES. Dustin Rhodes grew up the son of a wrestling legend, quickly became a star, and transformed into one of wrestling's greatest characters during the WWF Attitude era; I thought he would have an amazing story to tell.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"> </span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"></span><br />
<a name='more'></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">I ordered the Kindle version today (release day, 12-14-2010) and read the whole thing in about three hours. It wasn't because the content was so captivating that I zipped through it--this book was very, very short. If the print version is 240 pages then it must be large-print or filled with photos.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><br />
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</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Mick Foley's HAVE A NICE DAY: A TALE OF BLOOD AND SWEATSOCKS is the measuring stick in the pro-wrestling genre. His book was successful because it was honest, entertaining, and it made readers feel an intimate connection to the author after reading his story. What we got with CROSS RHODES was a brief overview of his career, a whole lot about his personal demons, and very little reading pleasure. There was so much omitted--Barry Windham and Ricky Steamboat were barely mentioned, Ric Flair's name appeared just once, he never mentions Terri's run in WCW as Alexandra York, etc.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><br />
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</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">I'm giving CROSS RHODES three stars because I'd recommend it to anyone battling addiction. The book is simply not what a reader thinks he's getting when he buys a wrestler's memoir.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: small;"><iframe frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=thegos-20&o=1&p=8&l=as1&asins=1439195161&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="height: 240px; width: 120px;"></iframe></span></span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-40706756459032842632010-12-08T19:27:00.000-08:002010-12-08T19:29:14.442-08:00Excerpts from The Somebody Obsession<div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; page-break-before: always; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;"><br />
Here's a sample of my upcoming book, available January 24. These are excerpts from pages 1-104. You can preorder now at my <a href="http://www.mattsomebody.com/">website</a>.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;"><b></b></span><br />
<a name='more'></a></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;"><b>FROM THE DEDICATION:</b></span></div></div><br />
<div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; page-break-before: always; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">A Ford Ranger pulled onto the shoulder fifty yards past my car.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;"><i>Thank God</i></span><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">, I thought. I trotted towards the truck.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">What happened next took me several years to see from a different point of view.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">Picture this: You're driving down a dark highway at three-thirty in the morning. You see a stranded motorist and you pull over to help. You look in the side mirror and see the idiot running at you with a lug wrench in his hand. What would </span><span style="font-family: Times, serif;"><i>you</i></span><span style="font-family: Times, serif;"> do?</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I was only about twenty feet from the Ranger when its tires spun, showering me with gravel.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I remembered the last time I'd been covered in gravel that way. It had been the day before my sophomore year started, the day I'd waited more than two-and-a-half hours for Grandma to pick me up after football practice, unaware that I'd been deserted there by design.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">Then memories of everything else, all the bullshit I'd gone through, flashed through my mind. The sight of Kyle beating the shit out of Mom while Shane and I cried and clung to each other. The feeling of clenched fists and blue Nike lowtops smashing into my frail twelve-year-old body as the Crips beat me down. The smell of the piss-stained mattresses that bordered the apartment walls. The sound of my college-roommate-to-be's hateful, half-drunk dad berating me and calling me a welfare bum. The taste that filled my mouth, however, was new and it was awful.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">For twenty years, I had eaten shit from the world and kept my emotions inside. On the side of Missouri Highway 19 between Center and New London, two decades of bottled-up torment exploded from inside me.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">The rage was like nothing I'd felt before, something I hope to never experience again. I’ll never forget the unearthly sound my yells and cries made. It's a horrific feeling when you meet your darkest side for the first time and you realize what you might be capable of doing.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I saw the faces of evil that had made my childhood a nightmare and I crushed them, slamming the lug wrench into the hood and roof of my car. With each dent, another face of evil vanished.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I was out of my fucking mind.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I was exorcising my demons.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">Either I bashed all the demons away, the impact hurt my hand too much to continue, or I just plain wore myself out, but I eventually stopped hitting my car. The Plymouth Duster looked like it'd been through a Southeast Kansas hailstorm.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">Sometime during my tantrum, the rain had started to pour again.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">My mind was tired and my body was soaked. I stared at the lug wrench on the ground.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I climbed into my car, taking shelter under its pock-marked roof. With each drag off a Newport cigarette, apathy set in just a little more.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I would sleep in the car and walk to Center or New London in the morning to get my tire fixed. The direction I walked, I decided, would determine my future. North to New London meant I was on my way home to settle for whatever dead-end job I could find; I'd grow tired of failure, give up on life, and end up dead or in jail soon enough. South to Center meant I was on my way to Springfield to pursue my dream. When I went to sleep, I didn't really give a shit either way.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I never had to make that decision.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">A few hours after I'd drifted to sleep, I was awakened by tapping on my driver's-side window. A mail-cargo driver stood next to my car.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"Need some help?" he asked.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I did, in ways that a stranger could never know.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">He was headed south. He drove to Center, took me to get my tire fixed and then back to my car.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I never asked his name. To him, he was probably just helping a stranger with a random act of kindness, but to me, his generosity meant the world. Without knowing it, he made my decision for me; for that, I owe him everything.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">It is to him that I dedicate my book.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><br />
</div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><b>FROM THE BOOK:</b></div></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">Mom bought Kyle a new Yamaha motorcycle and threw him a "Welcome Home" party at our little ten-dollar-a-month shack in the Northeast Missouri sticks. Kyle got the liquid evil in his veins and got mean.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">It was an arm-wrestling match that started it all that night. Kyle had a harder time with his opponent than he'd expected and they were at it for a while. Shane and I were playing fifteen or twenty feet away when Kyle got loud. Mom and Kyle's friends left us to deal with him.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">Kyle yelled at Mom and she yelled back. Then things got physical.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">My brother and I clung to each other, crying in stereo while we watched our mom get the absolute shit beat out of her.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">Mom told us to run. It was dark and we lived along some curvy, narrow highway, but we were too scared to think about that. We ran. Mom caught up with us while Kyle kicked his new motorcycle to pieces. I only looked back once. I could see the bonfire illuminate Kyle; this is what Satan looked like to me as a six-year-old boy.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">We walked several miles to the nearest house. Mom sobbed and bled. Her face was swollen and cut and broken. Shane and I cried too.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">The distant neighbors were probably watching Johnny Carson when we came knocking. This was 1985 in Small Town, Missouri, when only whores and druggies had visitors after the nightly news. I'm sure they were shocked to see a bloodied woman and two terrified boys standing at their doorstep. They let us inside and called the police.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">My great-uncle Doc, a police officer who was on duty when the call came through, called my grandpa. When a police car took us back to our house, Doc and other police officers were already there. So was Grandpa. </span> </div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I could see through the window that Kyle was passed out on the couch. Grandpa grabbed a stick and went inside, where he gave Kyle one hell of a beating.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">Mom took Kyle back several times and several beatings after that night.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><br />
</div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"></div><div style="text-align: center;">***</div><br />
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</div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">My love for wrestling grew to an obsession in late-1986. During a challenge for the WWF Intercontinental Title, Steamboat suffered a "crushed" larynx at the hands of Savage, the defending champion. Watching Steamboat gasp for breath while paramedics and WWF officials scrambled to save him, I was first paralyzed with fear. Then I cried. A lot. Steamboat was sidelined for several weeks. During this time, WWF aired an interview with Steamboat’s doctor, who said that "the Dragon" should never step into the ring again, and another video in which Steamboat went through speech therapy. On January 3, 1987, Steamboat guest-starred on an episode of the crime drama <i>Sidekicks</i>, starring Ernie Reyes Jr. Later that night, on <i>Saturday Night’s Main Event</i>, Savage was about to injure George "the Animal" Steele the same way he’d injured Steamboat weeks before. Steamboat came to ringside, restrained by several WWF officials, and saved his friend Steele.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">Just like that, I was hooked. My future was decided; I was going to become a professional wrestler just like my idol, Ricky "the Dragon" Steamboat. I immersed myself deep in the mysterious world of wrestling and worshipped Steamboat. He was tough, exciting, and he represented good (me) overcoming evil (Kyle and the other sources of my childhood angst). When Steamboat beat Savage for the WWF Intercontinental Championship at <i>Wrestlemania III</i>, I thought he did it just for me.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 19px;">***</span></div><br />
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</div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I was in seventh grade when I had my first masturbation injury. Back in the early days of my hand's relationship with my penis, I was anything but gentle. I wrapped it in a white-knuckled grip and pounded fiercely, anxious to experience the mess-free tingle of prepubescent masturbation.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">After a typical self-service session, I felt a bit of discomfort downstairs. I pulled out my penis. I was concerned when my eyes met my flaccid, hourglass-shaped dick. Concern gave way to indescribable fear when I remembered what Mr. Coffin said in science class.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"How does Jesus bite his nails?" I had asked in class that day. I put my palms to my mouth and made chomping sounds, drawing widespread groans from my classmates.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"You know, San Kinison told a joke about Jesus the night he died," Mr. Coffin said.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I laughed it off at the time, but fast-forward a few hours and I was a whimpering mess. I thought my dick would stay that way forever, a permanent hourglass. I thought about next year's football physical and how the doctor would surely know what I'd done to myself. He'd tell Uncle Steve and everyone at school. It would probably be on the news, my picture superimposed in the top-right of the screen while Dr. Dean Edell talked about the physical and spiritual dangers of masturbation.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"I'm sorry," I told God. "Just make it go back to normal and I'll never play with myself or make a Jesus joke again."</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">It took a few days to return to its natural shape and, though I wouldn't dare make another Jesus joke for many years, I was whacking off (albeit more gently) within hours of my penis's healing.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 19px;">***</span></div><br />
<div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><br />
</div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I always thought it would be a lot of fun to sit behind the merchant's table at a yard sale. What can I say? I always envied the kids who sat behind the tables during those times I'd been dragged to yard sales. It looked like a whole new kind of fun I hadn't yet discovered.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">Grandma had a yard sale a few days before the start of my freshman year. The only thing standing between me and the thrills of second-hand commerce was that I had football practice that day. I'd had a very good eighth-grade football season and I was looking forward to the start of my high-school career on the gridiron, but I really, </span><span style="font-family: Times, serif;"><i>really</i></span><span style="font-family: Times, serif;"> wanted to take part in that yard sale. Visions of used kitchenware, nearly new clothes, and dusty books spread across folding tables danced through my head.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">There are two lessons to be learned from the decision I made. First, sitting behind the merchant's table at a yard sale is God-awful boring. Ranking my life experiences by the pleasure derived from each activity, yard-salesmanship falls between re-stringing a weed-eater and shitting in a flea-market port-a-potty. Second, if you want to be accepted in high school, do not start your freshman year by quitting football to help your grandmother with a yard sale.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 19px;">***</span></div><br />
<div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><br />
</div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I stood at the edge of the parking lot alone with my thoughts after football practice. It was the day before my sophomore school year began and three things were clear: I would not be the starting wide receiver when the Clark County Indians visited the Hamilton Cardinals in Week One; I couldn't catch crabs let alone a spiral; and Coach Cavanah and my teammates didn't think that a five-foot-three, 120-pound weenie who quit football a year earlier deserved to wear Indian scarlet and grey.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">My knees were swollen and aching like they were every time we ran the mile instead of sprints. I finished near the middle of the pack on sprint days but in the back with the slowest linemen on distance days.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">Forty-five minutes after our final morning practice of the season, the last teammate at the facility drove his truck through the parking lot. He gave it hell where the parking lot met Main Street, his tires kicking gravel all over the place. I didn't want to give the asshole the satisfaction of watching me duck for cover, so I just stood my ground like an idiot. A barrage of pebbles bounced off me harmlessly, but one sharp rock cut me on my right nipple.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">Everyone—coaches, teammates, parents—was gone, but I still didn't want bypassers to see me standing shirtless in the parking lot with nipple-blood trickling down my torso. I fetched a Penny Hardaway shirt from my bag.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;"><i>Grandma needs to get her ass in gear.</i></span><span style="font-family: Times, serif;"> It was unusual for her to be late.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I stood there looking stupid and sunburned while cars crossed the Kahoka city line and drove past the football field. My shirt slid across my sweaty, narrow body except a small spot on the front that was soon pasted to my skin with sun-dried blood.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">A distant siren made me hope karma struck down the asshole that spun rocks at me and tragedy befell him. But then we'd have to dedicate our football season to him and I'd have been forced to act like I cared while coaches and teammates sobbed through teary-eyed tributes before each game.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">Forty-five minutes became an hour, then an hour became an hour and a half. I waited. The unyielding sun made me smell awful. I always waited until I got home to shower because groin peachfuzz sucks when you're almost sixteen.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I had been impatient before, but after two hours I was getting pissed off.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I thought about the school year, about how this year things would be better than before. I'd picked my first-day wardrobe in June and was ready to make my statement to the entire school: NO FEAR. The next day, I'd find almost every guy in school making the same statement, only most of them had more than one T-shirt with which to express it.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I thought about Shane, who'd been gone forty-seven days, and I worried.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">After two and a half hours, I was tired and smelly and hungry. A burglar hadn't invaded our house, I was sure; this was Kahoka, where I used to imagine people ate laxatives by the mouthful to break the monotony in their lives.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">It was only a mile and a half home, so I started walking. I took the long route to avoid St. Paul Cemetery because I was a pussy. I passed Mac's Supersaver and Doctor Crenshaw's office. At the intersection of Main and Johnson, I headed north, walking by the family services office.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I'd spent a lot of time at the family services office since I became a ward of the state. During two visits there, they made me talk with a child psychologist. I hated that clock-watching bastard. He invited me to open up and share my feelings with him, asked me personal questions. When I answered, his attention wandered. He fidgeted like he had a bowl of his wife's special soup getting cold at home. I grew tired of him fast. I started to insert random tidbits of trivia unrelated to the conversation topics, confirming my suspicion that he wasn't listening, and asked him why he was ignoring everything I said. After two sessions, the kiddie-shrink said I was uncooperative and stopped seeing me.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">You know you're a loser when even the child psychologist doesn't want to talk to you.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"Matt!" a voice called out.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I turned. It was Shane. He stood outside the family services office; he'd been caught.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"They're taking you away," he said.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"What? Who is?"</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"Grandma and Grandpa called Gloria and said they don't want you to live with them anymore."</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"Where are they sending me?" I waited to hear if I would have to move to another new school.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"I don't know."</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I followed Shane into the family services office. Gloria told me that my grandparents thought they were getting too old to raise kids any longer. That was bullshit; I knew that they blamed me when Shane ran away. When they kept me around, there was a chance I would lead them to Shane or lure him home. They swore I knew where he'd been hiding, but I honest-to-God didn't. After the cops picked Shane up in the Quad Cities for curfew violation, I guess I wasn't useful any longer.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">They could have at least sent somebody to pick me up rather than leaving me to bake in the goddamn sun for two and a half hours.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I was flattened. Don't get me wrong, I didn't like living with my grandparents a whole lot, but having my own family abandon me that way made me feel an unbelievable sense of rejection.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"Where are they sending you?" I asked Shane.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"Ater's."</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"Then that's where I want to go."</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 19px;">***</span></div><br />
<div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><br />
</div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">The supervisors heard about all three incidents and put me on medical hold pending alcoholism evaluation. It was a joke.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"Has your alcohol tolerance increased since you started drinking?" he asked.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"Yes."</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"Have you ever had a physical altercation while under the influence of alcohol?"</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"Yes."</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"Have you ever blacked out from excessive consumption?"</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"Yes."</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"Have you ever sexually experimented with another male?"</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"What? No. What's that have to do with drinking?"</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"Studies show that everyone has experimented."</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"Then they need to stop doing their studies at gay bars."</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"You interest me. You are an emotional safe. If you give me a chance, I will figure out the combination."</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"No, but thanks. Are we finished?"</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">We were. According to this fuckwit, I was an alcoholic.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"></div><div style="text-align: center;">***</div><br />
<div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><br />
</div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, serif;">Outside the armory, I couldn't take my eyes off Valiant as he interacted with fans and police officers, still talking Boogie-jive and trying to sell something to everyone. During my first two weeks in professional wrestling, I had slept in my car on Christmas Eve, had a rifle pointed in my face, and was evacuated from a building due to a bomb threat. But none of it raised a red flag like seeing what Jimmy Valiant, a true legend in the business, had become.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 19px;">***</span></div><br />
<div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><br />
</div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">A half-minute after my ass cheeks hit the toilet seat, I felt the backs of my legs slide. I was too committed to the poop—I couldn't stop—and my body just kept going until my bare ass gave the grimy floor a chocolate kiss. Don't worry, it gets worse.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 19px;">***</span></div><br />
<div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><br />
</div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">Finally, Griz got himself disqualified. As I sold the beating I'd taken and slowly walked toward the locker room, a kid stood up and asked me to autograph his Trapper Keeper. The moment I grabbed the pen out of his hand, a herd of middle-schoolers stampeded down the bleachers and surrounded me. A hundred voices called out to me.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"Will you sign my shirt?"</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"You're awesome."</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"Sign this poster."</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"Do you have a girlfriend?"</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">Until then, I had only signed maybe a dozen autographs, but I had spent years practicing.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">Thinking about how many people with big dreams are never asked once for their autograph, I tried to conceal my pride and I continued to sign: MATT MURPHY.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"Can you put 'The Missile' on it, too?" one kid asked.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I drew a blank.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;"><i>Missile? M-I-S-S-—come on, this is easy. You were a spelling nerd, for Christ's sake.</i></span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I looked at a poster for the evening event: MATT "THE MISSLE" MURPHY. I copied it. And for the first three months of my career as a World League Wrestling star (during which I signed at least a couple-thousand autographs) I spelled my nickname wrong.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 19px;">***</span></div><br />
<div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><br />
</div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I knew one thing for sure: one or both of us, most likely me, was going to get hurt if we continued. I fought my hands free.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">Harley had a strange look in his eyes. I think his competitive side wanted to finish what we'd started and the rest of him knew it was better if we left things where they stood.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"Almost had you," I said with a smile.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"Like hell you did."</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 19px;">***</span></div><br />
<div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><br />
</div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">I walked through the doorway and was met by the ever-present Marlboro haze that lingered in his ten-by-ten office. I sat down and stared at the NWA World Heavyweight Championship belt which hovered four feet above his head on the back wall.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"What's up?" I asked.</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"That computer in B.J.’s office is for business," he growled while he made a jack-off gesture with his hand, "not for this."</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"What are you talking about?" I asked. "I haven’t looked at porn on the company computer."</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">"You weren't on some Hot Male website?"</span></div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">My heart damn near stopped. I couldn’t stop my laughter despite the agitated wrestling legend's scowl directed at me. When I finally pulled myself together, I explained to him that I had visited Hotmail, the free email site, not Hot <i>Male</i>.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 19px;">***</span></div><br />
<div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><br />
</div><div style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0.33in;"><span style="font-family: Times, serif;">All my worries would be gone as soon as WWF or WCW signed me to a contract. It wasn't ego, it was self-confidence, and I had more of it than anyone I knew. Few others had ever believed in me. I had always relied mostly on myself for motivation and encouragement. With my new wrestling family now supporting me, challenging me, and showing me that they believed I had the talent to become a star, failure didn't stand a chance.</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-32743280468279008662010-12-08T16:13:00.000-08:002010-12-08T16:25:27.095-08:00How to read Kindle books from your computer or phone<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-ZBmC1kDGgaQzY7IaiN95_AmqJFpc0pKrOzN8qKGEDfzY3AVhN3xmIbHxZXzLdbBntzf1DObmu0nHRXkPsTPQTWwTMrz5flxvr3yCyXqYGjx7ly-vJxZtmJGcnCCBdLJDlS0GcvJGxtU/s1600/Kindle+devices.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-ZBmC1kDGgaQzY7IaiN95_AmqJFpc0pKrOzN8qKGEDfzY3AVhN3xmIbHxZXzLdbBntzf1DObmu0nHRXkPsTPQTWwTMrz5flxvr3yCyXqYGjx7ly-vJxZtmJGcnCCBdLJDlS0GcvJGxtU/s200/Kindle+devices.jpg" width="189" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div>When my book, THE SOMEBODY OBSESSION: A NOBODY’S DESPERATE JOURNEY TO THE SPOTLIGHT, is released January 24, it will be available in print and Kindle formats. The cost will be $12.95 for the print version and $2.99 for the Kindle version.<br />
<br />
I know I’m going to sound like an Amazon salesman here, but I love doing business with the company as a consumer (did 90% of my Christmas shopping on their site) and as a writer.<br />
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<a name='more'></a>The <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002FQJT3Q?ie=UTF8&tag=thegos-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B002FQJT3Q">Kindle</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=thegos-20&l=as2&o=1&a=B002FQJT3Q" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" />is an awesome device. It’s portable, convenient, and it can save readers a lot of money in the long run. I lugged around Stephen King’s mammoth <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0030H7UIU?ie=UTF8&tag=thegos-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B0030H7UIU">UNDER THE DOME</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=thegos-20&l=as2&o=1&a=B0030H7UIU" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" /> hardcover for a solid month before I had my Kindle. Now I can download it for ten bucks and save myself the hassle of carrying it everywhere.<br />
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A true-crime project that I’m working on included thousands of pages of documents. I could have sent the files to Staples for printing, but that’s awful expensive; it would have cost $200+ for the court transcript alone. I transferred the .PDF document to my Kindle through my computer and didn’t pay a dime.<br />
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As much as I love my Kindle, I know that the majority of readers aren’t going to spend $139 or more into an electronic reader. Amazon has a solution: Kindle apps. You can purchase Kindle books (or enjoy their large library of free books) and read them on your PC, Mac, iPad, iPhone, many Blackberry devices, and Android or Windows smartphones.<br />
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Click <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html/ref=sa_menu_karl3?ie=UTF8&docId=1000493771">here </a>to download the Kindle app and start reading now. I humbly recommend <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001F0REP8?ie=UTF8&tag=thegos-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B001F0REP8">THE PROFESSIONAL WRESTLER IN THE WORLD OF SPORTS-ENTERTAINMENT</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=thegos-20&l=as2&o=1&a=B001F0REP8" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" />.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7613648466917216143.post-59385091015409526372010-11-27T04:17:00.000-08:002010-11-27T04:17:38.327-08:00THE SOMEBODY OBSESSION on Facebook<a href="http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Somebody-Obsession-by-Matt-Murphy/135657619820740">Here's </a>the link. 'Like' it to keep updated on my latest book's news, reviews, etc.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0