Autumn!!!

I’m not very popular around here. It’s been dancing around in the 80’s these past few weeks, only dipping down in the 40’s overnight, and I’ve been WHINING ABOUT IT!

Seriously, people, it’s September. It’s Fall. I should be putting away the Summer clothes and pulling out the warmer stuff. Long sleeves, cuddly fabrics, darker colors. I should be able to wear a coat in the morning and NOT forget it on the way home. I should be sipping hot tea on the couch every evening, watching the leaves change color.

Instead, I’m still wearing short sleeves, taking a coat in the morning that I completely forget to bring home because while I drove to work in 43 degrees, I’m heading home in the 80’s and sweating! Instead of hot tea, I’m getting home and plopping ice in my glass. Lots and lots of ice.

Even my friend who moved here from Minnesota in the Spring, is wishing it would hurry up and start raining already. Granted, he might be singing a different tune when he’s gone 6 months without seeing the sky …

But I’m ready for it. I always hated this last-ditch effort of Summer, popping back into view when September begins. Putting off the coolness that is Fall for another few weeks. Every year this happens, and every year I whine about it. But it can’t last forever. Soon – not soon enough, but soon – it’ll be grey again. There’ll be a chill in the air, crisp and biting. The leaves will change from greens to oranges, yellows and reds. It’ll be dark enough, just dark enough, when I get off of work that I’ll need to turn on the headlights. The day time sky will be the same gunmetal color as the bay and the navy ships floating on it.

Soon I’ll get home at dusk, and hear the “pa-woof” of the gas furnace coming on. The new kittens have no idea that big grate in the floor brings heat – I can’t wait till they experience more than just the little pilot light for the first time. I hope by then they’ve stopped leaving all their mousie toys on top of it. The bigger boys can teach them how they worship at the edges of the Big Hot – Great Heat Giver in the Floor.

Soon it’ll be dark by the time I’m making dinner. I’ll have to close the curtains, put on the water for a pot of tea. Change into my sweats and a sweatshirt instead of the tank top I’ll have to wear tonight (ugh) Then cuddle up on the couch, grab a faux fur blanket for my lap if none of the cats wanna snuggle with me (and having done so, will then have at least 3 of them want to join me) and relax in the blanket of happy that is Fall.

Something new

Okay, so I’m trying something new here – we just finished our summer Art Festival, and I have a week off to relax, ride shotgun on the new kittens (did I mention the new kittens?)  and work on creating a new web store for our products.

So, being an Indie artist who is unwilling to pay fees or give commission to anyone, I refused to sign up with Etsy, and Artfire went from Free to Pay.  Which lead me to Storenvy.  I don’t know how it’ll work out, but I’ve signed up (for free) and uploaded a small collection of product.

I’d appreciate feedback, on the store, the images, the navigation, etc.  If I’ve done this correctly, you can find it here:

http://fables.storenvy.com/

There aren’t many products there yet, because I’ve just gotten it up and running today.  And I seriously need to work on my photography skills ! (made even more challenging by the assistance of three new kittens)

 

When Apples Attack!

I love my iPad. In fact, the only tech thing I have right now that I love as much AS my iPad, is my iPhone. And that’s saying a lot, considering the fact that I was a PC person from the start, and considering the fact that I try not to jump onto trends and ride the bandwagon.

But I love my iPad.

Which is why, on Friday evening, when I got home and realized my iPad couldn’t find my wireless network … I had a little panic attack. It had worked fine for me all day, but I wasn’t anywhere near a wireless signal and not on the ‘net during the day.

Sure, we’d had an electrical storm all that morning, and I realized when I got home that at some point during the storm, the power had gone out to my house. So before I even began to worry, I simply unplugged the wireless router, let it rest, then plugged it back in. Every now and again if the power goes out, the wireless router gets a little twitchy, and a simple power down and “reboot” is all it takes.

Having done that, I had to pay bills – and my bank only recognizes my PC – so I pulled out the laptop and plugged the iPad in for a recharge, figuring it would be just fine. I logged on the Interwebbies with the laptop without issue, and noticed also that my iPhone was on the wireless with no problems. After I finished up with my banking and some virtual errands, I put the laptop away and checked on the iPad … It couldn’t find the network.

In fact, it wasn’t able to detect ANY wireless in the area. Usually I can see the networks of a few houses around me, faintly.

That’s when I started to panic. If this was a PC, I could fish around, do some investigating, test a few components, dig around in the guts, root around the system. I’m savvy enough to find my way out of a lot of computerized paper bags, and can sometimes even follow the rabbit hole and dig up lost files or repair system registries.

But this wasn’t a PC. It was my iPad. My PRECIOUS! And I had no idea what to do.

I poked around the General Settings, afraid to mess with anything, but fearing I was gonna have to. I unplugged the router again, thinking I hadn’t given it enough time to work out the cobwebs. I even carried the iPad TO the router, holding it close in case it was simply having a low blood sugar. (stop laughing). Nevermind all the while the laptop and the iPhone could see the wireless.

Finally I realized I had to do something, but before I started touching something I’d regret, I hauled out the reliable workhorse known as my laptop and searched the trusty Web. There I found very simple instructions to “fix” this type of hiccup. All I had to do, it said, was erase my Network from the Settings of the iPad. Completely remove my home network. Delete it.

“Okay” I thought. “Can’t be that hard, eh? I mean, I’d set it up before, I can set it up again.”

So I did it. I found my home network on the iPad, hit DELETE, and held my breath. No more than a split second later, it did a search, found my network, and asked me if I wanted to join. One password later, and my Precious was back up and surfing 🙂

Today, my iPad. Tomorrow, the WORLD !!

Cheap Tweet

I miss Twitter sometimes.

There, I said it. Yes, I deleted the App from my iPad months ago and stopped Tweeting altogether, but recently I’ve been missing it just a tad, and today, while reading an excellent Guide to Promoting Your eBook at Smashwords um … guide … I was reminded what a good and useful tool Twitter can be.

Which got me thinking about why I quit Twitter and why I miss it.

First the easy part; Why I Miss It. Ego, pure and simple, from the eighth dimension. When Twitter first came out, I thought it was the biggest glob of egotistical mental masturbation I had ever heard of. Then I tried it, and realized that while my first impression might be true, it was also kinda fun. And a good promotion and information tool. And we Writers are nothing if not egotiscial self promoters. We have to be, it’s in our DNA.

Also I’m a chick, and at work all day I’m alone ninety nine percent of my day, and have no one to chit-chat with, so it stores up, all that verbal communication, and some days I think I’m gonna as’plode from the lack of human contact! (other days I’m reminded that I hate people)

Second, the more complicated part; Why I Quit. Retweets, pure and simple from whatever depth of hell they originated.

You know how Twitter works … you set up your account (free) and then if you wanna follow someone, you can see what they have to say. Your friends talk, you talk. Talking and sharing happens. Occasionally you’ll get a follower, or you’ll find someone to add to your list of interesting people you like to follow. Life is good.

Only then one of your friends starts to ReTweet posts from someone THEY follow, which means YOU have to see it too, because you follow your friend. You don’t follow THEIR friend, but you see it because YOUR friend retweeted it.

Get me? Pretty simple concept. Mostly harmless, until it reaches the point of being REALLY SERIOUSLY IRRITATING BECAUSE, DAMMIT, IF YOU WANTED TO READ EVERYTHING THOSE PEOPLE WERE SAYING YOU’D FOLLOW THEM YOURSELF, ONLY YOU DON’T BECAUSE YOU DON’T GIVE AN F WHAT THEY HAVE TO SAY!

Ahem.

So for a long while, I was having to virtually run around the planet BLOCKING all these people that I don’t even follow because other people were ReTweeting dozens of them daily. 1) if I wanted to read their Tweets, I’d follow them, but I don’t. 2) The person I was following never tweets their own thoughts, but retweets like it’s candy.

So the person you’re following isn’t hardly saying a thing, but they’re ReTweeting a million other Tweets from a half a dozen people you wouldn’t follow if you were paid to, but now YOU have this Tweet-box full of shite you’re scrolling through trying hard NOT to read because it’s either politically, personally or religiously offensive, and the person you follow doesn’t seem to give an F that they’re, by default, seriously annoying and/or offending you on a deep personal level.

*breath*

But, like I said, I’ve been missing it just a tad. Especially now that I have an iPhone, and could be Tweeting on the fly, as it were. Plus, I’m not just a Writer. There are plenty of artists out there, people who make and sell their wares online and at art fairs, who I’d like to share interests and ideas with, but I don’t because I quit Twitter. Did you know I’m a Lapidary artist? Probably because I’ve mentioned it before, but did you know I’m also a Chain Maille jewelry maker/designer? Did you know I’m setting up a new shop online? Or that I sell every year at an art show in Poulsbo Washington? Well, okay, I may have mentioned that one or five times before.

Still, there are reasons, such as those, that make me miss Twitter. I’d like to connect with fellow art makers, share designs and discuss techniques. Help them promote their work as they help me promote mine. And basically just chat with like-minded individuals.

But I hesitate, because of the blasted ReTweeting issue.

Do I reload Twitter on the iPad, and just ignore 99.8% of all the Tweets showing up just in the hopes of finding the one or two a week from the people I actually follow? I’ve even avoided following other people because my “tweet-box” is already flooded to the point of pissing me off with all the retweets that I just don’t want more messages getting lost in there. I suppose I could impose my own little rule – if anyone I follow ReTweets more than they Tweet, I un-follow. Or if they ReTweet more than four Tweets a week, they’re history.

Sounds really egotistical of me, doesn’t it? Sounds like I’m being an elitist snob. Follow my Rule or ELSE! Piss me off one time, and it’s Off With Your Head! But frankly, I got sick of it. I got sick of finding drivel all over my screen, insulting, offensive. Crap I had to scroll by in the hopes of finding something from an actual friend I was following. Sure, the world is full of crap, but we tend not to invite it in to our homes. And I tell you, when your computer (or phone) chirps to tell you there’s a message, and you happen to be sitting on the couch, a tad bored or lonely, and you check it only to find FIVE MESSAGES MOCKING YOUR RELIGION OR GENDER it doesn’t really make you feel warm and fuzzy.

I can hear some of you now – “well you’re just gonna end up with no followers, with an attitude like that”. To that I reply “I’ll still get up in the morning and pour soy milk on my multi-grain cheerios.”

Tweeting is mostly just a running journal anyway, like this blog. I don’t measure my worth by the number of followers I have, that’s juvenile. Most of your followers are auto-bots anyway. I don’t measure others by how many people they follow, either. In fact, if someone is following more than a dozen people, they’re just being ridiculous. How can you have the time to pay attention to the random things that many people have to say? Especially if those dozen are constantly ReTweeting things a few hundred OTHER people are blathering on about?

I am of two minds. There are interesting people out there, who have interesting things to say. There are also a whole lot of ass-hats.

The trick lies in following the interesting ones who DON’T just ReTweet the ass-hats.

Oh Siri, I didn’t mean it !

Needless to say, I LURV my iPhone 🙂 Just like I Lurv my iPad. Only my iPad didn’t come with SIRI.

Yes, yes, I know she’s not perfect. There’s a running gag on the radio: “Siri, tell my wife I’m leaving the gym.” “Texting your wife – You are sleeping with Jim.”

But if you keep to the basics, she’s very helpful. Only ….

My friend Pete likes to ask Siri strange questions, to see what she’ll say. I was all for that at first, when I discovered how to use her and how to ask things. But then I started reading the manual on the iPhone (yes, I’m an avid user’s manual reader). And it said that, over time, Siri will get to know you, your voice and how you speak, and the things you ask, and she’ll “grow and evolve”.

So that got me thinking, which is almost never a good thing, and I realized – I don’t want Siri to think I’m an ass.

When I play a video game, I never shoot the zebra. Or cow or dog or whatever else might be around in the scene. Sure, I’ll frag my teammates just to hear them scream, but I’ll never take aim on a pixelated pet. It’s ridiculous to a degree – it’s all fakebelieve, after all. Just a game. But deep down inside, not only does it go against my nature, I can’t shake the feeling the GAME itself will think poorly of me if I do it. That somewhere inside the machine I’m using is a moral compass, and I don’t wanna rock the boat.

Sure, fragging the teammates is fun. That doesn’t blip my radar.

and yes, I’m seeing the oxymoronicness there.

But still … while I can think of fun things I’d LIKE to say to Siri, I hesitate. I don’t want my iPhone thinking the worse of me. Like when you do something stupid and your cat looks at you and rolls his eyes. You know he’s thinking “Oh frabulous joy, my human is an ass.”

:/

Kicking and screaming (with delight)

Hello 20th century !

Yes, I know it’s the 21st right now, but that’s how far behind the times I’ve been. UNTIL NOW!

So the other day, my oldest sister was over, we were celebrating her birthday, and she shows us her brand new, husband-bought-it-for-her-birthday-present iPhone 4s. She’d had a crackberry for years, used it as a work expense so it was cheaper to manage, but when her hubby retired last Winter, she bought him an iPhone for Christmas. Previously where he worked, they were not allowed to bring smartphones on base for security reasons, so he was thrilled to finally have his first smartphone.

Anyway, she’s showing us her spiffy new phone, and we all get to talking about phone plans and costs and such. I was already pretty pissed off that I was paying for my phone and Cindy’s phone on a Family plan, with unlimited talk and text, and the bill was $107 and change a month … for what? I was paying a fortune and getting very little indeed. We didn’t have smartphones, we had special-needs phones, and no data plan.

So my soon-to-be-nephew in-law (wedding’s August 4th) said that for very little more, even with the two phone plan, we could get everything and share it. I told him I’d done some preliminary calculating and thought it was gonna be outragious, but he explained Verizon’s new plans because he’d recently gone to upgrade himself, and put my niece on his plan, and it wasn’t all that bad.

Well we shrugged it off. I mean seriously, who needs a smart phone? Why would you need to see the Internet while you’re out and about? Or get emails when you’re not at home or at work?

Sure, a while back Cindy and I were out trying to find a place and couldn’t, then realized NO ONE has phone books anywhere … we had no way of finding this place’s phone number or address – so we had to text Kim, who looked it up and texted us back. It was a little pathetic.

We admired her phone, then handed it back and thought very little of it … for about ten minutes. I’m not sure which one of us suggested it first – but Cindy did admit she really wanted to see about upgrading us to “grown up phones.” That’s when I admitted I was seriously jealous of our sister’s phone …

Long story short, we’re now the proud users of two iPhone 4s smartphones with shared data plan. I’ll now be paying slightly more a month, but getting SO much more than I had been. Unlimited talk, unlimited text, and shared 4g data. Plus when we’re at home, the phones connect via our wireless internet and use that, saving the data usage for when we’re not at home. I find that uber cool.

And yes, we have Siri. I was ignorning her for a while, but then my friend Pete suggested I give her a try, for a lark, and ask her really odd questions. I have to admit, she’s amusing.

Being slightly geeky, my sister and I Face Time each other 😀 It’s awesome, except the part about being able to see yourself on that screen … yipes.

And is it just me … or is that compass function a hoot?

So here I am, square in the middle of the 20th century, gazing at the 21st to see if it has anything interesting I might wanna get ….

What a dumb move

I’m one of those jerks you work with who never takes Leave, so it piles up and piles up and eventually I find myself in a Must Leave situation, where I’ve stored up the maximum allowable and have to use the remainder or give it up.

That happened years ago, which was my plan all along – store up enough Annual Leave so that every year my new hours are gravy, and I can take loads of time off without ever dipping into that Leave Pool I’ve built up.

Which is a long-winded way of saying I have a couple of days off this week (Thursday and Friday to be exact) and like an IDIOT … I thought “Hey, wouldn’t it be a good idea to schedule my yearly physical on my day off?” :/

So I’m sitting here all day long DREADING my day off because I have to start it out with my annual physical at 9:20 a.m. 😦 Sure, when it’s done I’ll have the rest of the day and the next to enjoy myself, but it’s all I can think of. And for regular folk who aren’t paranoids like myself, your annual wellness check isn’t something to dread. After all, I’m healthy enough, nothing’s really going on. It’s just that — I think of going to the doctor like going to the Principle’s Office. I’m only there because I was told I had to go, nothing fun is going to come from it, I’ll be given a lecture about everything I’ve been doing wrong, told to stop doing it, and sent marching down the hall to get a vaccine or something.

When did they stop giving out lollipops? Why do adults get the short stick? They take flavoring out of our cold medicines, they stop giving us a sucker after exams … and we have to pay for the privilege!

I’m going to have to treat myself afterward. I’m thinking of buying an iPhone, that might make up for it, depending on how the appointment goes !

To top it all off, I got a sunburn this past weekend. Like an IDIOT, I was outside all day, Saturday and Sunday, and every time I was in the sun did I have sunscreen on? Nope. Didn’t even THINK about it. Which is really freakin’ stupid considering how Scandanavian I am. So I got burned, both of my arms and shoulders, but mostly the right one. And it hurts like a sonofabitch. I haven’t been able to sleep on either side all week, and when they take my blood pressure tomorrow I’m gonna scream. Let alone getting that whooping cough or shingles vaccine :O

Maybe I can get those in the buttcheeks this time.

Thank God I didn’t burn my buttcheeks.

News you can Use

It’s been a crazy year so far – not really in a good way, just crazy. Which is a lame way to excuse how little I’ve been blogging lately, but life happens now and again and you just gotta deal with it.

Anyway, in an effort to simplify my online life, I’ve decided I no longer need a web page. I realized last week that I hadn’t even logged ON to my web page in a year – and my books are still selling every day, the world is still rotating (albeit one second a year slower than it used to) and life still crumbles along.

SO, with that said, I’m going to delete the web page during the Fourth of July holiday, and just use this Blog for talking, book announcements, news, blather, and falderal.

Let’s see … what else… Oh, I recently beat Pete in a Word Duel (again) but now we’re involved in a quiet little Novel War. I’m pretty sure I’ll win that, too 🙂 Oh, and I’m looking for a site to use for selling some product that isn’t Etsy. I think I found one I like, gonna have to take photos of the stock and sign up with the place (it’s utterly free to use) and see how it works, then I’ll come here to promote and such. It’s chain maille jewelry, btw. Added that to the lapidary work my sister and I already do. It’s ridiculously fun to do, and while I’m working on that physically, I can mentally work on my novel. So now I do stone AND metal – how very primal, eh?

It’s JULY!! Finally. In another four days our Summer will start here. Never fails. July 5th is when the sun comes out. And as much as I hate HOT weather, I will admit I’m really craving some sunlight. (remind me of this in a few weeks, when I’m complaining about the heat). I won’t bother whining about fireworks, since I do that every year. Though it’s been relatively quiet in my neighborhood so far. Just a few things going off here and there over the weekend. My cats are doing okay, they usually go to the window to watch, until it gets to be too much.

So anyway … in conclusion, the web page is going away – I removed Twitter from my iPad months ago, just couldn’t find a good reason to give a crap about that, but I’m keeping this Blog and hopefully if it works out, starting up a store front that I’ll talk about if and when.

Meanwhile, Happy Fourth of July to all my American friends – and Happy Wednesday to the rest of you 🙂

RIP Ray Bradbury

Martian Chronicles and Farenheit 451 are some of my earliest memories of Science Fiction.

So long Ray, and thanks for all the good reads.

The Trouble with eReaders

For the record, I have a Nook. The Nook Simple Touch, to be specific. But the issue I have with eReaders spans them all – the Nook, the Kindle, et al. (okay, so those are the only two I can remember the names of, I’m sure there are some et al.s)

And the problem is this:

It’s too easy.

They’ve made buying books WAY too easy. Back in the day (a few months ago) before I had my Nook, if I wanted a new book to read I had to get up, go to the car, drive 20 minutes to the mall where Barnes & Noble is (the only bookstore in town these days) and wander around the store putting up with the rampant slime people call “teenagers” who aren’t there for books at all, but rather to “hang out” in the cafe and make life generally irritating for the rest of us. Then there are the snot nosers Mommie parked in all the comfy chairs with toy blocks so she can visit the Cookbooks by way of the Romance section.

After putting up with all of that (this is assuming I could find a place to park and get inside in the first place) then I’m left to wade through the massive “Young Adult” section, bloated thanks to the popularity of Twilight and Hunger Games just to find the SF or Fiction shelves, now greatly reduced in size in order to make room for the ever growing DVD arena. (for the record, I’m not knocking Young Adult or Romance).

Then I get to stand in a narrow corridor of shelves with my head tilted sideways, reading the same spines that were there the month before, and the month before that, trying to find something new or interesting to glance at. If I’m lucky enough to find a few that interest me, I get to stand there (because the snot runners are all using the chairs) and read as many pages as I can before my feet scream at me, in order to decide which one of these I’m willing to shell cash out for and take home to read.

Thanks to the Nook, those days are behind me.

Now, whenever I want a new book, I just put my feet up on the coffee table (though I believe that’s optional) turn on the wireless, and wander virtually through the bookstore from the comfort of my own leather sofa. When I find titles that interest me, I download a sample – usually 25 or 30 pages – read them, and if I find something that strikes my fancy — Ipso Facto Hocus Pocus — it’s mine.

That easy.

When I find a book I want, with the touch of a thumb to the screen, I’ve purchased the book, downloaded it into my Nook, and it’s Mine, all Mine ! Easy as pie, I’ve just wandered the bookstore and purchased a new book to read, without so much as putting on shoes. (you thought I was gonna say pants, didn’t you?)

That’s right, folks, they’ve made it far too easy to spend money and buy books ! In the past two months, since being given this Nook, I’ve purchased more books than I did all last summer! And I’m reading a ton more than I have in a long while. I carry the Nook with me everywhere, in my purse, and whip it out whenever I have a few minutes of down time somewhere. I’ll even read in line at the Post Office or while I’m waiting for someone to make my take-and-bake pizza at Papa Murphy’s.

And while I can’t speak for the Kindle – the Nook has a lovely add-on bonus of in-store reading, for those days when I brave the snot-drippers and rampant slimes and want to GO to Barnes & Noble for a bit. I can wander the shelves to find titles, pull them up on my Nook using the free in-store wireless, and begin reading the entire book for free, for a full hour. As much of it as I can consume i one hour, free. With the option to buy it and take it home to finish, or save my place and come back the next day to read more.

The reason I went with Nook was simple – my sisters and my nieces all have Nooks, and we can loan each other books, one Nook to another. Awesome little bonus. Though I know people with Kindles who are just as enamored with them.

So, if you’re still on the fence – considering an eReader for yourself – keep in mind the danger to your bank account ! (and remember, some of MY titles are still free 😀 )