Hello hello hello, it’s three posts in 2 days coming out of SheanHQ. This time with 2 big news items!

Big News Item the First

Last week, when I announced I had a second story coming out, I mentioned that my career was taking another turn coming up soon. It’s time to fill you in!

After years of toiling away in molecular biology labs doing bench science, I quit that life two and a half years ago to write full time. Since then, I’ve have some success with my writing. Some publications, some encouraging rejections, public appearances, and a remarkable turn at a prestigious writing workshop. But as I said in that earlier post, the first rule everyone says about writing is don’t quit your day job.

Well, I did quit the day job, but apparently the day job hasn’t quit me. I stumbled across a job opening recently that sounded too good to pass up. And with practically no commute at that. So, I applied for the job, and miracle of miracles, I got it!

So, as of this past week, I am working at a prestigious private scientific research laboratory here on Long Island. I’m not doing bench science (thank goodness!), but I am combining my science background with my passion for writing. And that’s amazing to me. I’m working in the laboratory’s library division as a science writer/science historian/science history researcher. The job’s a bit of a hodge-podge, which is great because it means constant new things and no boredom. And the co-workers so far have been amazing. I’m still getting settled in, but things are feeling great.

But what does this all mean for Matthew Shean, author, you ask? I’m still writing. It’s still my passion, and it’s still what drives me day in and day out. But now it’s been relegated to those times outside of 9a.m. to 5p.m. weekdays. So, my output will be slower. It’s already moving at a snail’s pace, and now it’s likely to me more akin to a snail trying to get through a streak of peanut butter. But forward progress, no matter how slow, is still progress. And I am still writing. That’s the key here. And I’m happy with my choice to go back to a position of external employment.

Big News Item the Second

SheanHQ is moving!

Alas, it remains in Long Island and not nestled on the side of an imposing volcanic rock face on a deserted Pacific island or sheltered among the faceless tracts of evergreens of the Pacific Northwest, obscured by low-lying cloud cover and a persistent, foggy drizzle. No, we remain among the overcrowded LIRR-bound throngs, just this time transposed about 15 miles in an East-Northeast direction

We are, however, moving into a much more fitting lair. A lair with views of geese and a pond. And a writing loft. Not only is SheanHQ moving in the xy direction, but it is also climbing in the z-direction, up from its basement depths to an above ground, above-garage loft. Di and the kidlets will be much less cramped than previously, we’ll have the kitchen we finally deserve, and the kidlets will have access to amazing opportunities in the new school system. All major plusses.

So rejoice, for things are going very well here! Now, if you’ll excuse me, it’s getting late on a Sunday night, and I need to be up early in the morning to head to work. So I need to get to bed.

Here I Go…

Matt