Been a little run-down lately. Stress from at-home situations, general lack of restful sleep (or sleep in general), some ill health.
I’ve been reasonably productive, reaching my wordcount goal (2500 words, now that I’ve come around again to setting a goal), some of which output seems actually usable in the real world. I’m working on anthology-targeted pieces as I think I need more presence to get to the level of “respectability” that I crave. The only other way is to trad-publish one of my books…the trad-published have a real thing about self-publishers, and it’s hard to be taken seriously by other authors when you do it. One has to have a really outstanding body of work in order to pull it off, assuming one has pro-level skills (and, hubris aside, I’m assuming that. You may feel free to upbraid me for my error if you wish.)
Musically, I’ve done very well. Nineteen new tracks in the last 12 weeks, including a brand-new blues track each of those weeks. You can hear them at my Reverbnation account. The track listing is alphabetical-so each track above “Adventures in Time and Space”, which is the first track of the “older” listing is less than three months old.
There’s a good diverse group of prog, rock, blues there, I think. Starting to feel a little samey to me. I need to rethink form a bit-I notice repeated motifs. But good listens, tight ensemble playing from my collection of mes, crisp production. *pats self on back*
That’s all pretty good stuff.
I’ve had an ebook out on the market since last November. I’ve managed through persistence and opportunism and a heap of dumb luck to move 1,133 copies of the thing since its Smashwords debut, at 99 cents a pop. That enabled me to pay for half of the cover paintings for my next dozen books, and I crowdfunded the rest. The overhead’s all paid til next Christmas.
I was just gonna run “before Crazytown” for a lark, to see what kinda figures I could get. So that’s all good. I’m not going to pull it off the market as it has established a certain level of usefulness to me.
So I decided to augment the publication with a trade-paper option, through Createspace. The edit wasn’t the best I’ve ever done, and Amazon was complaining about the spelling, so I pulled the thing off-shelf and got to work.
A couple days later, I was done, and re-uploaded the file. It’s been a week, and Amazon hasn’t reinstated my book yet. No telling when it’ll happen. Waiting for the email complaining again about my spelling again. It’s like teaching a calculator non-Pythagorean theorems.
Le pfui.
They may force me yet to go all trad again and get respectable. Amazon apparently only has one form insert for lack of availability and now thinks that they initiated the process based on their own insert.
Complete bullshit, and the kind of thing that happens to me from time to time.
Murphy is my patron saint and the catch of the day is 22.
Yay. Just another day in the wonderful world of the self-underemployed.
Moving day is in two weeks. I have one place and am going to apply for a different one while the window is still open. The possibility of increased productivity is a major reason for the change in residence. It’s really hard for me to work to other people’s schedules, especially when I’m not always in the loop, or when the proposed window doesn’t open long enough for me to be effective (I don’t assume I’m peculiar in that regard. It takes a couple of hours for me to really get going, to get the words flowing with the quantity and quality of expression that I require.)
While I care for the people I live with, I don’t necessarily want to live with them any more. We’re on different paths. I need space of my own, freedom from chronological ties, a lower noise level. Right now I sleep on a recliner in the family room, surrounded by my guitars, two rabbits, and ten birds. Any access to the doorways or the kitchen is through my area. The primary breadwinner gets up at @4 ayem.
So am I. *yawns* Sometimes I get back to sleep. Sometimes not.
The child gets up at 6:30. So do I. *yawns again* Sometimes I get back to sleep. Sometimes not. That breathing trick that’s supposed to work, a variation on “smell the flowers, blow out the candles,” doesn’t.
What sometimes works is that I take my meds and download a cup of strong coffee. The coffee raises my blood pressure and then, when the meds chill that, I drift off.
Dangerous to depend on that, though. But I do have to take those meds every day.
Aaaah, pfui. Go Cubs.
RetroGrade A 