Spring cleaning ... sort of

I’ve been away from my blog for a few days, not because I’ve run out of ideas or topics. It seems my laptop decided to take its own little vacation—a long one. Fortunately, I am a backup fool so everything I’ve fed into the trusty Toshiba was duplicated on my nifty little removable backup drive that ensures the safety of all my files.

When I retrieved my folders, documents, files, photos, illustrations, and other sundry items, I decided to do a quick count of all the notes, articles and stories I’ve fed to my computer in the last three years. The final tally? Six-hundred and thirty-two.

Sadly, my documents folder looks about as cluttered and messy as my bedroom closet.

Some of the contents had very weird titles. I had to open more than a dozen just to see what was going on in my head when I composed them. I trashed three and combined four into a single file of notes. I don’t even remember writing a couple of them. Two went into the trash.

There’s a good part to the whole exercise. I found some gems, some thoughtful and insightful paragraphs that will fit nicely into a current project.

There’s also a downside to this experience. In order to figure out what many of these files have to say, I’ll have to open them one by one, read them, and decide whether or not they have value. (I guess this is akin to—gasp--spring cleaning.

I just hope when you read this, you’ll remind yourself that your writing is important and you’ll make sure you back it up… often.

Great used, collectible and antiquarian books in Las Vegas

On your next visit to Sin City, think about taking a break from the tables and machines to visit one (or all) of these great book emporiums. You won’t be sorry.

How I learned to love Amazon and why that might change

From the day Amazon first appeared on the web, I disliked the company. I didn’t care for the whole concept of selling books at a deep discount. I had this smug “principle” thing going; I believed Amazon was out to destroy the independent bookstore.

I guess the attitude came from my youth.

Many years ago, folks in my hometown bought their meat at the local butcher shop, their vegetables, their baked goods from the side door of a house where a little old lady baked things daily, their bread from a local baker who delivered by truck every day, and their canned goods and other foods from the locally owned market. One day a big sign went up three miles away, on the main highway, announcing the groundbreaking for A Big Supermarket. This was a huge deal for a small town. The advent of a one-stop shop with low prices was the topic of conversation for months, and the words were not always encouraging for A Big—at least the words from the mouths of the butcher, the baker and the little bread maker and friends. The people feared their personal relationship with the local vendors would disappear because A Big would drive them out of business.

They were right.

Sales at the A Big were slow to start but within a few months, residents were driving the few miles every couple of days to purchase all their food. Not long after, the butcher closed his shop, the bread maker laid off most of his help, the general grocery too, and the baker stopped baking. (To be fair here, I think she died but some blamed A Big for that.)

In essence, A Big drove the independent businesses out of business.

I missed getting a free cupcake; I missed watching the butcher make sausages in the middle of the store; I missed the handful of red cherries the grocer let me sample while picking up our orders. I missed walking to the store every day.

Then something tragic happened.

A Big decided traffic in their big store wasn’t good enough. After about two years, they closed the store.

This is why I disliked the idea of Amazon.

Smugly, I relished every report of losses Amazon suffered in the beginning days, months and years. I hoped the experiment would result in a total failure.

Of course, that didn’t happen. Bit by bit, the company grew, diversified, grew some more and eventually turned red ink into black, making investors very happy.

And bit by bit, as Amazon flourished, independent bookstores began to fade into the proverbial sunset.  And turned to Amazon for titles my local library didn’t carry.

Eventually, I learned to like Amazon. Good prices, great selection, fast delivery—what’s not to like, especially when there’s no independent (new) bookstore in this city? 

Then, I read an eye-opening blog post about how Amazon is “banning” books. Well, not books, per se but ebooks, and not banning, exactly. These aren’t necessarily the kind of books I would read but the idea of removing them from inventory doesn’t sit well with me, especially since this is being done without clear guidelines or reason.

What’s even scarier to me is that after delisting certain titles, Amazon might also have removed the titles from consumer kindles. (This information came from a comment on the blog post noted above so I can’t confirm that it actually happened. However, kindle owners know they are just paying to borrow their titles.)

I know. I know. Amazon is a business and as such can decide what to sell and what not to sell, and that’s what they’ve done. They’re not banning; they’re just not selling.

But that doesn’t mean I have to like it.

If I want to read any of the delisted titles, I’ll surf over to Barnes and Noble where the authors report their Amazon-delisted books are selling better than ever.

A new use for an old word

Sunday evening, after dinner with friends, I learned a new word. Actually, I knew the definition before I knew the word it to which it belonged. We were discussing how people in groups interact with each other and I wondered how we might interact with a person in our own group who recently had fallen into our disfavor. One of my friends suggested that our next get-together, I should use the sociogram to see how the evening plays out.

(By the way, I’m not the only entity that didn’t recognize the word sociogram. Microsoft Word noted it as a mistake but couldn’t find an alternate suggestion.)

I thought this might be an interesting experiment.

Take all the characters in your manuscript. Without regard to seating arrangements and without your own preference, put them at a table. Then see who focuses on whom, who speaks to whom and who seems to float alone without interaction.

I think this might point to some better plotting and character development and might point out some flaws in your writing.

Then I thought of taking the experiment to the next step – rearranging the seating according to how the characters actually interact in the manuscript. Who would choose to sit with whom (and why)? Who would avoid whom (and why)? Who might eventually stand up and exchange his or her seat (and why)? And who might not even belong at the dinner (and why)?

(It's rather pricey, but here's a book that goes into great detail about the

sociogram. It might be useful to writers.)

I have a feeling these two experiments will prove useful. Any thoughts?

Zane Grey and my brother

In his youth, one of my older brothers was an avid reader. I should qualify that. Paul read and read the same books over and over, constantly.

I can picture him still, decades and decades later, his skinny body perched on a wooden stool next to the refrigerator, his feet set firmly across the rung, his head down close to the paperback in his lap and his fingers close to his mouth. (He was a nail biter.)

It’s not so much the image that evokes memories as it is my brother’s focus on his reading. He read nothing but Zane Grey novels and it didn’t matter if this was his first, second or fifth reading. There was no way to divert his attention from that damned book – short of smacking him somewhere.

We could call his name, ask a question, call his name louder, make a statement, call his name even louder, ask another question, shout his name loud enough to wake every baby in the complex. Paul never heard. (That's where the smack came into the picture.)

Thinking about this now, there’s a lesson to be learned. I realize I have to read something by Zane Grey. I have to find out what it was about Grey’s characters and his plots that consumed Paul to the point of deafness to the world.

Amazon has a number of Zane Grey titles in print version and for the kindle. (I’ve already selected two.) Now, all I need is the time to read them. (Sigh.)

Finding time to write

I’m guessing that a lot of writers don’t have my problem – too much writing? Right?

I read a half dozen writing-related blogs regularly, as in daily. At one time or another almost all the bloggers covered the subject of “how to find time to write” in detail. This concept stymies me. Even when I worked two jobs I found time to write. I might not have been pounding the keys on my laptop but I did write.

Until I got smart and started carrying both a tablet and a recorder, I’d find myself jotting notes on the back of grocery store receipts while waiting for a traffic light to change. Once, while standing in line at the bank, the people in my head were engaged in this lively conversation and since I didn’t want to put the words on the back of my deposit, I actually jotted them down on the palm of my hand.

I keep my laptop powered up at all times but if I’m involved in another project in some other area of the house and an idea or thought materializes, I can’t just dump what I’m doing, run to the computer, and put it down. Besides being inconvenient, this move can be counter productive. How many times do you go from one room to the next to take care of a task but forget what the task was when you arrived? My solution?

I keep three things in every room of my home, a radio, a notepad and a pencil.

The radio isn’t too germane. But the other two items are.

In essence, the notepad and pencil mean I can always squeak out a minute to write.

My crazy method might not work for everyone. I just point it out to illustrate how I worked around the problem of finding time to write.

(If you're still searching for your own solution, try these books.)

I made a cartoon video of my last post

This site is a hoot. It lets you make a video ... free at first but you can dress the videos up if you register and pay a fee. I edited it three times and ran out of free publishing minutes so the final product is in the can but not ready for release.

Take a look.