One Week to Go! (The Book Will be Sent up for Publishing)

     I've done a few things today, and it's not quite bedtime.  I decided to take down my GoFundMe. It wasn't working; no one donated other than my very good friend Karen Treadwell. If you know why, you know why. Karen owes me her life, you know. She can't breathe without me! (I'm laughing...she's laughing) Anyway, there's only one donation in 24 days, so it's not going anywhere. The last thing I need is for people to know I'm a loser. I don't care if they think I am -- but seeing it in real time sucks, and I decided to end the misery of it all.

    I believe my books are worth it, so I'll have to find another way to promote them; I'll end up praying about it, and that's a better plan anyway. If God wants them to be successful, they will be. After all, Exodus 14:14 is still in the Book. It's not going anywhere anytime soon.  The verse reads: "God will fight for you; all you need to do is be still."  I love that.  Since God can't lie, it must be true.

    I finished writing "Stratford", too, and I'm going through it and fluffing it. I'm stuffing it, too. I'm putting it in order, formatting it, and aligning it. Tomorrow, I'll finish the fluff and start reading it to be sure I have it all lined up and that I've used enough adjectives. I find myself adding a few here and there to ensure I can come across as innovatively original and productively prolific as I imagine myself to be. It may or may not be true, but I like to think it is; let me dream.

    Like everyone else, I'm off on the 25th, but I have to return to work on the 26th and 27th. I'll try to get the book read on Christmas, but it may be the 28th or 29th before I send it up for publication. I won't have it available for purchase until I order one copy, which will take 2 weeks, so by January 15, I should have it re-read, re-corrected, and re-published so that it can be sold online around the 16th of January. That's the newest of timelines. We can hope I stick with it.

    This book wasn't even supposed to be written. I just threw it out there because I was so very angry at the people of Stratford; I needed to write it. It was quite therapeutic, believe me. I do feel better.  I really do feel a lot better!! I may only sell 10 books, but there are 9 people besides my mom who will know about the mishaps of that small town!  Mom already knows; I complained to her about Stratford years ago. 

    I decided to dedicate the book to the memory of a man I knew who lived in those times, and he actually knew the Governor I wrote about. He was a political newspaperman named Irvin Hurst. He and I wrote insurance policies for New York Life in the 90's. He was in his 90s when we worked together. He had his office on the same floor as I did, and we took breaks and lunches together. I learned so much from that man. He's waiting on me up in Heaven, and I can't wait to hug him again.

    Well, that's all for now; I have to get ready to snooze. I don't have to set my alarm tonight -- yea!! I love the weekends. 

    

Photo Credit: OKJournalismHallofFame.com

Irvin Hurst!  Doesn't he look like a newspaperman?

STRATFORD -- Is DONE! (For the first round)

     The way I write my books may not be the way others write their books, so I can't say this or that about them, but I can say that I am done with the crucial and critical first part of my book in that the 329 pages so far are written, and I have about 80,000 words squeezed out of my keyboard and into the file. Yea! It is done! 

    There are 31 chapters in this one. Most of my books have about the same amount of words, about the same number of chapters, and about the same number of pages. I did make "Of Kilted Pleasure" a 6x9 book, but the others are 5x8. I like that size better for reading. Then again, I prefer Kindle, so when I'm ready to get this one prepared for actual sales, I'll pay for the EPUB version as soon as I've made the final corrections.

    I've written the book. That's phase 1. Now, I have to go through it and add the stuffing and the fluffing, notes from when I was beginning the book, and things I jotted down during the writing that I want to add somewhere in the pages of the thing. I come up with a phrase, or a thought, a picture in my mind that could be advantageous.

    Right now, just a few minutes ago, I went through my list of words that friends and family members gave me so I could add those words to the book and then thank those people for giving them to me. It's a fun and good way to add them to my creative work. I like saying "Thank You" when I can.

    This book has several of my co-workers in it, too. They are mostly good people, but one decided to be a bad girl -- in the end, she assists the cops, so she's not entirely bad.  I think it's fun, too, to add people who want to be a part of your work and who will get a kick out of telling other people that they are in a book! Who wouldn't want to be a fun character in a fun book? C'mon.

    I am going through it this week to put all the pages in order, get the chapters even, and have the words "Chapter 1" and so forth in a different font and of a different size, just to give a little design to the interior. There are no photos, you know, it's just a novel. The only photo is the front and back cover and my photo on the back.  I have created the cover already and look forward to adding the book to my published achievements soon.

    Phase two is to go through it, line it up, size it up, format it, and get all the fluffing and stuffing done. I also go through it for mistakes, corrections, spelling issues, and trying to get my Scottish man's accent correct, as I tend to go back and forth with him. But at least in this book, he tells people that he's trying harder to use more American terminology so he doesn't stick out like a sore thumb. (We'll never see Eoghan MacRae turn too far from his original roots. No way, he's too adorable.)

    I'll send it up in phase three for publication with Ingram Spark, but it won't be for sale yet. I'll have them print me a copy so I can go through it and make corrections. After I've done that, Phase 4 is the final phase. I accept it, and it is made available for publication and purchase on Amazon.

    You can easily pick up one of my novels online, but there will still be issues. I can't find them all; I've really tried. I do take solace in knowing that I've found mistakes in the words of the greater authors than myself and in those who are just trying to get published for the first time. We all make mistakes. I hope to find the big mistakes, but it happened at least twice. After a solid year of being available to the public, I found huge errors in one of my books and had to pay to have it pulled and corrected. GEEZ!

    Well, that's the thick of it. I'm done. Stratford is written. I'll add the fluff this week, and by next weekend, I'll send it up for the print portion. I'll order a copy, get it by New Year's, read it, make corrections, and put it back up around the 10th of January. Woot!! By then, I'll have started the new new novel. I'm writing a creepy drama for the first time -- I'm trying to get myself outside of my own box. I won't do evil, but I will do creepy and disturbing. It will make people question if I'm really as genuinely likable as I know I am...Yes, I really am, but swimming among the cobras for a while will be fun since it's all fiction, and I can't really get bit by it.

    "The Grange" is an area in southern Edinburgh, Scotland, that has a great cemetery. My character lives in a family crypt, refusing to leave, and with the law on her side, she doesn't have to. I won't tell you more, but writing will be fun. It should be out around March 1, and then I'll head back to Poshville to write installment 6 of the Thriller series. The title is "Cask" and will also have a slight Poe flavoring. Come to think of it, my 7th Posh book is quite creepy, too -- wow.

    I may end up liking the new genre in my life.

Photo Credit:  Flickr.com  (Oklahoma 1933) 

So, I Nearly Died Today.

 So, yeah, I nearly cashed it all in today, and when that happens, and I survive, I feel the need to at least tell people who may actually read my blog because they will at least know that I care enough about them to think about them in these moments. I'll be really honest, I wasn't thinking about any of you when it was happening. I was too busy being really upset about my stupid body reacting the way it does.

    First, the wind up. I'll tell you what I do every day, and by every day, I mean I'm out there doing what I do, and if it gets done, it gets done. There are times when I think I do something when I actually haven't. OK, so I take supplements on what should be a daily basis. One of the ways I take them is by eyedropper -that is, the liquid supplements that I take. I take (or took) green tea extract this way.

    This morning, I took the same dosage as I typically do. Still, the extract decided on its own, and with intentional malice, to attack the back of my throat so violently that my esophagus closed up, and I was in the ravages of what some may call "dry drowning." I saw this on Quincy, so you know I know what I'm talking about. The good doctor warns people about singing in the shower, saying you should do it with your back to the water since the water can hit the back of your throat, and your throat then tries to protect your lungs by closing. This is what I think happened.

    My damn throat literally shut, but my body wasn't having it. I began hacking, not choking; there is a difference. I could not stop hacking, and it was deep drawings from my lungs to push the opening and to get whatever (felt like) liquid out of my throat, but this went on every 15-20 seconds for literally 30 full minutes. It slowed down after the 15th minute, and I only coughed every 30-40 seconds, but the cough's deepness was still causing me back pain.

    I sat on the couch, all the while assuring my daughter that I would be OK, though not really knowing if I was lying to her. Brave, brave soul that I am, I managed to stand up between coughs and go to the "important paper" box that we stored in the cabinet. I pulled out the insurance policies and set them on the cabinet next to the coffee machine so she could at least find them if she needed to. I'm so considerate! I am also the biggest dork on the planet, but at least I am cognitive. That really matters to me, too.

    The dogs were there, of course, laying beside me and licking my clothes and face and hands to let me know they wanted me to stay alive. They don't have opposable thumbs and can't pour their own dog food or get their own water. They do have Laura for that, so they're OK.  The cats looked at me as if I was a bother. I couldn't stop getting angry at my body for the way it was reacting. I was glad it was reacting, mind you, I knew what it was doing was trying to right what had gone so wrong, but you'd think after a few good coughs, it would all be alright. 

    Anyway, after all was said and done - and Laura was assured that she would not have to file for beneficiary benefits, I put the policies away and drank hot coffee until my stomach protested, asking me to switch to tea. Again, my body really needs to do what my head wants it to do; that's just me, but it's so annoying! I was praying during the time I was dying, asking God if this is really the way I should go out - it just seems so ridiculously common. He helped me. He always helps me. I love God.

    So, here I am, an hour later, still now and again clearing what seems to be lingering in the back of my throat, hoping I never have to go through that again. Like the dork that I am and embrace, I've thrown out the liquid supplements. I mean, I could put them in coffee or tea, but that may make them taste funny, and that, too, would annoy me. The things I do to remain unannoyed and/or uninconvenienced are amazing. 

    There you go—I'm still here, still writing. I hope to be so for a while, but if I'm not, and you see Laura's post stating that I've gone to see Jesus, I do hope you realize I am not coming back! Nope! If I cross that line, there is no return for me. I will grab onto whatever I can over on that side and refuse re-entry! I can't think of anything being better than being with my Lord -- so yeah, it's not that I mind dying, but the method of exit is a problem at times for me.  At least if I did die, I would go up in the rapture that much faster since the dead in Christ rise first!

Woot!