BTB first draft is almost finished.

First of all this feels like yelling into space.
Is anyone going to read this? Who knows. I'm not going to worry about spelling mistakes and grammer here so theere.
My name is Peter MacKenzie Hammond and this is my first blog post about a book that I am almost finished writing. That book which I am sure you have figured out by the title is called "The Bad Times Bible."

At this time in my life I am 37 years old, 38 in a couple of weeks. To be brutally honest, I am in financial ruins due to a really shitty experience in real estate that I am still dealing with. I am not saying that so people will feel sorry for me or any of that bullshit. I am writing a brutally honest book so it goes without saying I will be brutally honest here. That being said, I understand why people rob banks and do crazy shit sometimes because I have thought of doing that stuff too. For about a minute. But instead of being a criminal and taking the punk ass way out, I am going to get out of this massive hole by doing something positive. That thing is writing this book. Now you know where I stand.

The BTB is a book for young men in crisis, although it seems to have something for eveyone I have been told. I wrote the book I wanted when I was going through my own crisis as a young man. It draws from my experiences in life as a cancer patient and a sufferer of depression. It is written as a field guide for both the person in crisis and the people that love them. Having had the experience of being both patient and caregiver, I chose to write to those two groups. Its two books in one you lucky bastards. Told you I wasn't doing it for the money!

 The book is not a cheezy "how to beat cancer" book. I will not be on the cover with a sweater over my shoulders and seagulls flying behind me. If I am on the cover, it will be looking like a fucking psychopath.

Don't get me wrong folks, I am not writing this book hoping it will make me alot of money to get out of my  hole. I have no doubt that will happen. Before you write me off as some cocky prick, please read on and let me explain myself.
 I am writing this book because I have to. I am being driven to. (hold on, got to make room for the cat to sit by the keyboard) Yes, I live with three cats. They came with my girlfriend and I love them. I love her too so lets move on.

I talk about the cat because it seems like everytime I try to do something really positive there is a distraction. Its like the devil keeps pulling me away from the things I should be doing. Right now at this moment, like everytime I write, the cat is rubbing her face on my hand making it really hard to write. She is so fucking cute that I have to stop and kiss her and rub her little furry fucking face.
Sometimes the distractions come in the form of cats, and other times the distractions in my life have been car accidents and other fun things. For the record, I am not religious but I do think dark forces fuck with me sometimes. More on that later. Its a Jedi thing.

So back to the BTB. (The title is too long to write everytime to it will be BTB okay?) This book has been a grind to write to say the least. It has been about a year and a half in the writing. In that period I went from being unemployed living on an air mattress in my sisters computer room in her basement, to driving a recycling truck to working for a friend who owns a property management business. This book was started in my 1997 subaru legacy behind the trainyards near my sisters house. I found an outdoor power plug there and would roll down my window, plug in the 10 year old laptop a former kind hearted girlfriend gave me, and start writing. I needed the plug because the battery dies quickly on the old laptop.

I loved the subaru office. (See picture above) It had a hockey bag with my jiu jitsu gear and a couple of duffel bags with my clothes in them, my bike which I never rode, boxes of books and various other things. I had a storage unit with the rest of my furniture and possesions that I could no longer afford to keep so I bought an old schoolbus for 500 bucks that still ran,  borrowed a friends dealer plate, loaded the bus up with my shit and drove it to a friends house.  I told him he could keep the bus once I get my shit together and get a proper home for my things.

So as it stands, my things are in a schoolbus, (see picture above) I live in an apartment with my lady and her three cats (which I love) above a detailing shop in an industrial park.
So back to subey.
I loved the mobile office because I could drive to get food or something to drink if I had the hankering for it, (when I had the money)  I could really focus in there and still to this day need a corner to write in or I feel exposed. I am excited because my girlfriend's parents gave me an older dodge van and I am going to put a desk in it to write. I am very excited about this. I will be able to write anywhere and that makes me happy.

Distraction and tangents, such is life.

 So as you see my mind wanders and jumps around like a sand flea. That is part of the reason I am blogging, to unload my mind. I am a private person writing a book about my most personal experiences. That doesn't make sense I know, but I have to.

And this brings us back to the point I am trying to make which is I am writing this book because I have to. Not because I am broke and in desperate need of a major fucking boost in the finances, but because it seems I simply have to.

Why else would I write long into the night and get up at blue collar hours to write? Why would I force myself to re live my most humiliating, horrible moments? Well, because those same moments are wrapped in hilarity and also hold hands with powerful insights and useful skills that I learned the hard way and want to and am really being forced to, share with the world.

My life has led me to this place. I am writing a book that is going to help alot of people. Of this I have no doubt. Again, I am not cocky, I am simply trusting in the gut feelings I have about this whole process. Speaking of guts, I am hungry and must go eat. More later.
Petey