Baby caught us by surprise. She was due near the end of January and was hitting all her tests and milestones just right, but she decided to make her surprise debut before the end of the year.
She’s technically premature but she has passed all the medical tests and she latches and feeds without difficulty. So it seems she really was ready to come out. She’s quite tiny, but so is her mama.
We planned for as natural a birth as possible, but since the baby was premature and in breach, we had to have a c-section. Mom is of course in pain but is recovering as well as could be expected. She and baby are cuddled up right now as I write this.
Neither of us has slept much, of course, though I’ve probably snatched more sleep than she has. We might be out of the hospital as early as tomorrow. Because the baby’s so small, she has to be tested in our car safety seat tonight. She’s a really calm baby, but the test will almost certainly make her fussy.
I am currently in the “completely bewildered” stage of preparing to self-publish my work, with the goal of releasing no less that five (three, absolute minimum) books next year. I’m considering several options, thinking about services I might need, looking at necessary or unnecessary software, and so forth.
I have just finished (?) editing the first volume of Jake and the Dynamo. This may sound like unnecessary fiddling, since the book has been edited and even published previously, but I am treating the next release as if it is the first, a complete start-over, and I want to present readers with the best, cleanest, most professional text I can. This new version is, at present, almost 3,000 words shorter, entirely because of improvements in style and grammar.
One thing I’ve thought I would likely do is purchase Vellum. Although it’s enormously expensive, it is more or less the only software that prepares a manuscript for multiple formats with minimal hassle. Its creators allow you to download it and use all its options, forcing payment only when you’re ready to generate the files.
Thus, I have been sitting here sipping a gimlet (one part gin, one part Rose’s lime juice, and nothing else, as Raymond Chandler explains) while familiarizing myself with Vellum and getting a handle on what it can—and can’t—do.
It is as user-friendly as it claims to be, but that seriously limits its abilities. Some formatting I have in Word, formatting I thought was quite minimal, has been stripped out of my Vellum file. For example, it doesn’t allow lettered lists:
An unordered list in Vellum.
This is a little disappointing, but I can easily envision a reason for it: The idea is maximum compatibility across readers and file types. I found some software previously that allowed for edting EPUB files in XML, and I originally thought that put me on easy street since editing XML is something I can do, but I soon discovered that editing files by hand was time-consuming and also produced unexpected results in different types of eBook readers.
Vellum, despite the claims in its advertisements, feels very limiting. It offers only a handful of styles with minimal customization, few fonts, and few layout options, but it also keeps you from inadvertently creating messed-up files that don’t work on major platforms. The few layouts it allows look good. Sme things I want, such as handwriting fonts in a few spots, aren’t possible—but then again, that’s the kind of thing that wouldn’t show up on most e-readers anyway, and eBooks are where I can expect the most sales. Kindle, for example, strips out all custom fonts and uses Amazon’s proprietary font in their place.
Also, in this first run, I experimented with Microsoft Word’s styles to produce the cleanest, lightest manuscript I could. A lot of what I did transfered straight into Vellum, and Vellum was even able to intuit some of the document’s features (most especially, its section breaks). Some things, however, did not transfer—particularly, text that was set to be in all caps (rather than typed in all caps by hand). To make sure everything is kosher, I probably need to make a few more tweaks to my DOCX file before I import it to Vellum again.
Fatman, written and directed by Ian and Eshom Nelms. Mel Gibson, Walton Goggins, and Chance Hurstfield. Saban Films, . 100 minutes. Rated R.
As it develops, every genre slides steadily from idealism to cynicism to nihilism, and the genre of Christmas movies is no exception. Reveling in how mold-breaking it allegedly is, Fatman is, in fact, predictable and formulaic, though that doesn’t prevent some good performances from salvaging what is overall a lackluster film.
Competent but unspectacular direction, silly action sequences, a dull script, and duller set design mortally wound what might have been a quirkily fun movie featuring heartfelt deliveries from Mel Gibson, Marianne Jeanne-Baptiste, and a scenery-chewing Walton Goggins. The movie strains for serious commentary on the implications of Santa Claus’s role as a commercial mascot but fails to make any salient points. I wanted to like this movie because I thought it had a lot of promise, and I laughed several times while watching it, but I still walked away thinking about how much better it might have been.
I can only pop in for a moment. Today is the day the wife and I are celebrating Christmas since she has to work tomorrow. We spent much of the day making Christmas dinner. It was actually kind of nice, it being just the two of us, because we’re still newlyweds and we thought of this as a trial run at cooking a large meal. Not having guests meant it didn’t matter if we screwed up.
We made a ham with a bourbon molasses glaze, mashed potatoes, asparagus with hollandaise sauce, and a pavlova. This is my third experiment with hollandaise sauce … and the first time I’ve made one that came out well, which might tell you something about my cooking skills. On the whole, it was a success, so maybe when we are able to have guests over, we’ll be ready for prime time.
I have a movie review coming soon, but I’ve had trouble getting to it. I spent today doing several needful things around the house, including assembling the crib for the new baby.
My wife, who’s a nurse, got an emergency call into work, so after she left, I went ahead and prepared the ham we’re having tomorrow for Christmas dinner. Unfortunately, she has to work on Christmas day, but she’s supposed to have tomorrow off, so we’re planning to have our Christmas celebration then. Of course, it’s just the three of us this year, but fortunately, we have a lot of fun together when it’s just the two of us.
Where I’m at, it’s well after nine now that I’m done with my tasks, so I intend to spend what time I have remaining on my manuscript, which has been time-consuming, but which is also nearing completion.
Part of the reason it’s time-consuming is that it’s increasingly obvious that my laptop is on its last legs. I’ve known that for years, but I’m probably not going to be able to put off replacing it much longer. It took about half an hour to get it to turn on without crashing so I could write this. Even so, one of my favorite shortcuts, Ctrl + Left Arrow, has mysteriously stopped working even though the left arrow key and the control key are clearly both operational … I might reboot again when I’m done writing this to see what happens.
Replacing this computer isn’t really in the budget right now, but even my wife has agreed that this machine is ridiculously slow and unreliable.
In any case, merry Christmas, and although I’ll have a review later, maybe on Christmas day, for now, enjoy this image of Christmasy magical girls.
I think it’s time to bring back this classic. Merry magical-girl Christmas to all!
’Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the town, Lots of girls were a-stirring, to beat monsters down. So they stalked all the baddies that threatened mankind, For to blast them with magic and kick their behinds.
They crouched in the dark by the chimneys with care, Or slipped across rooftops—villains beware! One might wear a kerchief, and one has a cap, But they all got short skirts, what you think about that?
Then at City Hall, there arose such a clatter, That Plum Fairy Lyssa soon checked out the matter. A monster showed up with a roar and a flash, So Lyssa transformed and got ready to bash!
When what to her wondering eyes should appear, But a slavering, fanged, and bloodthirsty deer? ’Twas Rudolph! Whose terrible, powerful nose, Had at last warped his mind with its horrid bright glow!
Our Lyssa, however, so eager to brawl, Quick leapt like a gymnast atop of a wall. “Stop there, evil monster!” she said with a scoff, “You’ve attacked us on Christmas, and that ticks me off!”
The Moon Princess blest her with power and might, That she might be quick to kick butt in a fight, To halt evil crooks in the midst of a crime, Or to battle vile creatures beyond space and time!
Now punch him, now bludgeon! Now blast him with pow’r! And yet his eyes glowed with a menacing glow’r! Now kick him, now stab him, now strangle and blitz ’im! That deer is no match for this young doe-eyed vixen!
At last Rudolph gasped and lay dead at her feet, As his bright ruby blood ran out into the street. “I’ve vanquished the creature,” the Plum Fairy mused, “But why then do I feel as if I still should lose?”
In leapt Marionette, the famed robot girl, With her magical pencil, which she gave a twirl. “Young Lyssa, my dear, you have fought well and brave, But killed poor Rudolph, whom you know you should save.”
“Well, no one has once taught me any of that,” Said Lyssa, perplexed. (On the ground she now spat.) “To fight off the monsters that threaten our world, Is the constant hard job of a magical girl!”
“We fight for mankind, that is certainly true,” Said Marionette, whose cold fingers turned blue. “But always remember that we serve the Light— Merry Christmas to all, and to all a clean fight!”
Sorry I haven’t posted in a while. I am working on preparing books for publication, and as always, these things take more time than I anticipate. In fact, in my available time, I have been doing almost nothing else. But that’s okay because I want to make sure I do this process right and get together everything I need for a successful roll-out.
My ambitious plan at present is to have five books published in 2021. If I can’t meet that, I should at least have four. I’ll definitely have three. The three is a given.
The first will be Jake and the Dynamo which will appear with a revised text and brand new packaging. The second will be its sequel. The third will be Rag & Muffin. I’ll announce the others later.
Anyway, one of my other goals is to post here more regularly, so look for consistent content as we move forward.
