Good Luck With That:
Hubris in Pricing Indie Author's Books

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My wife belongs to several writing and reading groups on Facebook (as do I, of course) and she engages with many of them. She is constantly sharing with me the idiotic stuff some writers do and say. Recently, there was a conversation on one group where an author was selling a 90 page book for $18, and my wife, Melissa, pointed out that this was a ridiculous price. The author balked, and said that Melissa cared more about the price per page than the quality of the writing. My wife responded: Melissa Walker : here’s what it’s about to me…Let’s … Continue reading →

A Series of Things:
What I'm doing, not doing, and hoping to do

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Series writing has been a thorn in my side. I know the consensus is that books do better as a part of a series, but when you’re an Indie Author and Publisher with no employees, choices must be made. I don’t feel I can keep up anymore with my series, nor do I want to. I also don’t like feeling obligated to write something. I’d rather write what inspires me at any given moment. With this in mind, my intentions are to do one more book in each of my series: #3 in New Harbor Witches #4 in Rain Falls … Continue reading →

Sturgis and Beyond (Stupid):
Superspreaders Among Us

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We are fighting a war on several fronts, and I am no longer being nice. On Twitter, I often use the hashtags #GlovesOff and #NoMoreSnowflakes, because being civil and long-suffering, and accepting of the behaviors of others is a terrible strategy. Now, these behaviors are killing thousands of people. So, no more snowflake for me. Right now, I speak of the war with COVID-19 and stupidity and selfishness. More and more, it seems that Mother Nature is performing a culling. Darwin’s laws of evolution are in full swing, as well. Just to be clear, Survival of the Fittest is not … Continue reading →

Protein entrée, per USA

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Beef, chicken, pork. Why are there only three meat choices? Okay four, if you count fish. I don’t eat much fish, though, so for me, it probably doesn’t count. I like seafood, especially crab, lobster, shrimp and scallops, but not fresh water fish, except for the occasional pollock. Most fresh fish, ironically, doesn’t taste fresh to me, it tastes…fishy. Anyway. Meat is actually defined as “the flesh of mammals used as food, as distinguished from that of birds and fish” which means that poultry and fish shouldn’t be on that list anyway. That leaves two meat, poultry, fish. So. Still … Continue reading →

Laws We Need

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I’m starting a new hashtag (Is hashtag supposed to have a hashtag on it?) #LawsWeNeed Got a million ideas, but will start with: Rx drug companies are no longer allowed to advertise on TV. *Why are they marketing toward the consumer & not medical doctors? You know why. #RxDrugs #CyberWar is declared the same as any other war, with the same ramifications, legal, Constitutional, and otherwise. #LawsWeNeed #MotherEarth is declared a living being & accorded the same rights as humans. We cannot violate her without enforced legal consequences. (Because right now, she is being repeatedly gang-raped) #LawsWeNeed Every #ElectionDay is … Continue reading →

Furiously Happy:
My brain hungered for humor. Was absolutely famished for fun.

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I am very picky about the books I read, and it’s hard to find anything that doesn’t either piss me off or bore me. That might just be a product of having been an Indie Author, honing her craft for 30 years, or maybe it’s just me being too damn critical. But I never had problems in my younger years. Like say, my twenties and before. But then, I didn’t write my first book until I was 26. So maybe it really is that being an author affects my ability to enjoy reading other authors that aren’t top-notch. Garbage in, … Continue reading →

No Such Thing As a Protest Vote:
In which I dare to question a non-voting professor

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I don’t know about you, but I’m tired of being a snowflake. It’s well and truly time for Democrats to stop whining and being precious, and Board the Blue Choo Choo. We have many changes to make, and by now, we should all agree that those changes will never be made with a corrupted party in charge. My skin may not be black, but I know what it’s like to be a minority, and to be punished for it. I’m an Indie author. A disabled veteran. I’m not just a woman, but a gay woman, married to a woman. I’m … Continue reading →

“Defund the Police” is Misleading:
and an unfortunate choice of phrase

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Let’s be clear. The perhaps well-meaning “Defund the Police” movement (most notably on Twitter) is NOT a Democratic movement, nor WISE. It’s an extreme, and extremes are terrible choices. The most extreme among the Defunders want to eliminate cops. If there are no cops at all, what happens when your daughter or grandmother calls for help when a man is following her on a dark street? When someone is trying to break in? What happens when there’s an active shooter at a grade school? We need to maintain law and order, but that phrase has also been both usurped and … Continue reading →

Two 2020 Mantras:
Adapt or die, Vote or die

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ADAPT OR DIE. That’s the new mantra. Our world has changed, and don’t you believe for a hot minute the fairy tale that things will go back to “normal.” First, they haven’t been “normal” for the last three-plus years. Second, there is no way they ever will, because too much has changed, and there are things that SHOULD CHANGE. This is a flashpoint. A pivotal point in our history. We can take the opportunity now to implement all those things that got bogged down in various sociopolitical quicksands, and create a brighter future for us all. Or we can fuck … Continue reading →

This-Close:
another bitch of a ditch

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Change is good, they said. I believe that’s true, most days. Especially since I feel I’ve been in a bitch of a ditch for the last 7 years. Well, not the same ditch. Different ditches. But ditches, just the same. Trenches, maybe. Foxholes. Caves? Anyway, I was ready for those changes we were finally able to make. My wife was about to get a small inheritance. Just enough to get us where we needed to go, if we were lucky. But the inheritance was delayed by various machinations, a few of them due to some abject assholery perpetrated by other … Continue reading →

Goldilocks & the BlueWho Dilemma:
A Way to Think About the 2020 Candidates

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It’s obvious we have an unprecedented amount of indecision about who to choose for the Democratic candidate. This undecided #BlueWho thing really matters, and deserves some thoughtful and no-nonsense scrutiny. I believe that most of the undecided voters have the same antecedent. If we can’t know whether we have the Senate, too, we can’t gauge which candidate we can safely vote for, in order to unseat the Orange Little Dicktater. We no longer have the luxury of treating out political candidates like rock stars. We have to get over the idea that they have to be perfect, or check all … Continue reading →

Bad Knees & Deliveries

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Okay, so my day so far: Because the VA again dropped the ball on my healthcare, I had to order my own crutches, knee braces, and Kinesiotape to treat my MCL/ACL issues. I saw that they were to be delivered on Friday, not Wednesday. So I get on chat with Amazon (which I really hard to find. They bury it very well) and asked why I pay for Prime membership to get 2-day shipping, when the shipping always seems to take 5-days. They explained about warehouses and that it’s really counted from when it leaves, not when I order it, … Continue reading →

Yes I Want to Take Your (War) Guns

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First, I am a humanist and a liberal Democrat. I am also a military veteran. I don’t hunt, because I don’t have the heart for it, and would only do it in a survival situation. I do, however, feel better if I have a gun of some kind to protect me and mine against break-ins. (See, women are naturally like that, since we are the ones who get raped by men). I have no problem doing the gun ownership legally, and proving that I can safely own and use a firearm. Check my background. I have nothing to hide.   … Continue reading →

Wets Talk about Webby Witing:
Pantsers, Planners, and Plotting

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The argument begins like this… “When you write intricate plots, you always have to change things and rewrite and it’s hard to just write that story straight through.” “Not for me,” says the irritating pantser who goes from start to finish. You’ve probably guessed I’m not a pantser, but a planner. While I do allow creative things to take over, and do embrace that happy accident that solves a plotting problem, I am, at the heart of it all, a technical writer. I’m also whole-brain, and often my right brain and left brain are embroiled in hand-to-hand combat. While those … Continue reading →

An electrical meltdown looms: how can we avert disaster?:
Keith Harary

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by Keith Harary You might find your car dying on the freeway while other vehicles around you lose control and crash. You might see the lights going out in your city, or glimpse an airplane falling out of the sky. You’ve been in a blackout before but this one is different. In critical facilities across the country, experts predict that it is only a matter of time before the electrical infrastructure holding society together undergoes catastrophic failure. According to the most recent report of the United States Congressional Commission appointed to assess the risk, published July 2017, we face the … Continue reading →