Strange day off

I had an errand to run that ate up a chunk of my day off. It was a contentious point under my roof. It's time to drop off our taxes with the accountant. I tried to talk my wife into dropping them off after she got off work, and apparently, this was a ridiculous idea. The accountant is one block from where she works. As a result, I drove fifteen miles through traffic, spent 30 seconds dropping off the package, and another fifteen miles through traffic to get back home. I don't get it, but it ate up a chunk of my day and tainted my attitude.

I did some reading when I got back, then decided I had to do something progressive.

I uploaded a Lisa picture to Facebook to promote The Cock of the South to a couple of groups I joined. Nothing ventured, nothing gained and all that. I created a different one for Twitter that doesn't feature Lisa. Scratch off the fact that I accomplished something.

I spent a limited amount of time researching items for the stories currently underway. I avoided the Sirens this time. When I find time to write again, I have a better idea of what I need to include.

I decided to take a visual break and surfed for my next background. I downloaded four or five, because it's a struggle to get one to fit on the narrow edges of this blog. Images need to be free, and they need a strong vertical element to work best. Even then, I have to crop them to get the vertical element to the sides. With that many images, one should work well.

March arrives next Tuesday, and that's when my critique group meets again. I sent my submission out days ago, and could have worked on their submissions today. I just didn't. I'll probably get to it sometime this weekend. My next rotating day off is Monday, and that might be a good time.

This evening will bring more reading. If I need a break, I may work on a short story briefly. This one involves a return to Bergamot Holler, the key area in Will O' the Wisp. I have some fun ideas for it, and am excited to see where it goes.

Sales have been strange lately, and I'm getting a lot more pages read than actual sales. That doesn't bother me at all. I'm happy to have action. If you joined Amazon Prime, and want to check out my stories for free, please do. I have no idea why this happens. I haven't done much promotion lately other than Twitter, and the new Facebook stuff. I'm sure more promotion would net more results, but I can only do so much.

Right now, I'm stressed for writing time. I can post a Tweet with some decent hashtags and get it online in seconds. Writing guest posts takes a bit of time, and blog tours require monitoring. I'll be doing that soon enough, but it isn't in the cards right now.

It won't be long before I hear back from the beta readers. I'm anxious to see what they thought about The Playground. Working on that book will take priority at that time. Then I'll have to move toward launch, and get all the guest posts written. I already have a couple of them, but need to keep pecking away at them.

Somewhere in the middle of this, I have a fun new idea for this blog. I'm not ready to announce it just yet, but it's going to require some hours too. I'm looking forward to it though, and am chomping at the bit to get started on it. It will all happen in time, so I'm better suited to clear some other things off my plate right now.

Back to the plate clearing.

Another month bites the dust

The thunderstorms of June are gone now. Oh sure, there could be a stray one here or there. July is all about heat here in Idaho. The morning weather is predicting over 100° for Wednesday.

We’ll probably have to water our hanging baskets morning and night if they aren’t going to dry up completely.

It won’t be long before fire season takes a foothold. I decided the background for July should indicate the summer heat. It would have been easy enough to put up some fireworks for the Fourth of July. That just seems like the easy way out.

Enjoy the parched western desert from Death Valley as my July background.

The Monthly Makeover

We ran down the street to Sully’s Irish Pub tonight. The work week is over, and it was time for some food that’s bad for us. I added a couple frosty mugs of Smithwick’s and all is right with the world.

I decided to give the old blog it’s monthly makeover. Last month was mayflies. It would have been easy to load junebugs as my June background. It just felt too easy.

June has always been the month of summer thunderstorms. I decided to go with a cool lightning photo. I hope you guys like it.

I have some neat things going on for the blog this weekend. I have to post my writing process blog tour tomorrow. The blog update was just a little taste.

Now it’s time for Westly to rescue Buttercup, Inigo Montoya to avenge his father, and me to check out your blogs.

Blogging stuff

I surpassed fifty followers. (Yay 🎉) I heard this is pretty fantastic for such a short time. My next goal is over a hundred. The biggest thing is to be an active participant. I responded to comments, and visited lots of other blogs. I liked a lot of posts, but I was honest about it, and I followed anyone that followed me. I even left a few comments when it was appropriate. The secret is to be an active participant. I get pretty comfortable being a lurker, but that doesn’t win many friends.

I changed my background to something more reflective of December. I’ll give a Marvel No Prize to anyone that figures out what it is. ( Does Marvel still do this?)

I even activated the snow flake thingie in WordPress. I can’t see it on my iPad, so I ran to the Mac and checked it out. It works.

Blogging’s a blast. I did it to promote my eventual publication of some ebooks, but I should have done it a long time ago. It’s fun, without any ulterior motives. I’ve also made some pretty interesting online friends. Everyone should be doing this.

I really should steal a technique from Greg Urbano. He invites people from new countries to follow his blog. That would be cheesy though to borrow from Greg. Still, I would like to see some folks from Greece and Italy show up on my map. My newest novel, The Cock of the South, is a fantasy that covers those two countries.