Category Archives: aggravation

Apple in my Eye A good idea gone bad

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I’m done with you, Apple. You hear me? Done. I can recall the joy I felt when I got my first iPhone. I was thrilled with the phone, and I used it for everything, and it made my life so much easier. I was in love with it. Now, the honeymoon is over. The love didn’t just fade, it was like continued infidelity. Spousal abuse. After the last few years of Apple’s proprietary restrictions, the constant purposeful inconveniences. To wit: …repetitive requests to logon after every update, which happened whether i was currently using the phone or not, the inability … Continue reading →

Rocking the Boat Authors must defend themselves

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Don’t say anything. Don’t make a comment. It will make you look bad. That’s the usual advice in the publishing industry when someone posts a caustic review of your book, under the assumption that this is about some type of insecurity on the part of a writer. This is not insecurity. It is frustration, and in this case, it’s also outrage. In fact, historically, authors are expected to keep their mouth shut about these things, but I am a proponent of the adage Silence equals Death. This advice to stay mum strikes me as the same mentality that got that Orange Nightmare in the Oval … Continue reading →

Is it Goodreads or Badreaders? Mean-spirited behavior is a learned behavior. It can be unlearned.

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I’ve always believed that every ill in our society falls under one or more of three categories: Greed, Ignorance or Zealotry. I was faced with an example of one or more of these while updating my author page on Goodreads. I came across a negative review, quite by accident, of one of my earlier books. Against my better judgment, I read it, and was horrified. The reviewer, obviously, did not like my book, and that’s fine, in and of itself, but this reviewer made statements that were patently false. She claimed the character in my book was “helping a pedophile.” … Continue reading →

Workspaces & Tentacle Sex I've got a lot on the docket right now

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Since my surgery at the end of May, I have had to accommodate my recovery, while still getting my work done. The whole thing has made me feel old and decrepit. Our bedroom is now in the living room because it was just easier to put everything in one room. Especially after we realized the landlords weren’t going to cut down the dead trees and falling limbs just outside our wall of windows in the bedroom. We didn’t feel safe there, so the living room became our new bedroom. Only recently, could I sit in a desk chair as I … Continue reading →

Operation Homostead & Dooflingywhatsit Our decision to make homesteading our goal, had to begin with all the preliminaries. Where? When? How?

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While I’m battling The Change of Life, we are also dealing with A Change of Life. Major changes on the horizon, all of which we have chosen for ourselves, which of course, makes it easier to weather. Our decision to make homesteading our goal, had to begin with all the preliminaries. Where? When? How? We know we want to settle in central Wisconsin, mostly because Melissa is from that area, and around Chicago, and her family is all there. She needs to be close to her grandmother, who is well into her 90’s and has had some health scares. But Melissa has … Continue reading →

Drive-by Marketing? Really?

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A commenter on one of the sites I market to, objected to my promotions, (and I responded as forthrightly as I could)>. COMMENTER: I am seeing “Attachment Unavailable This attachment may have been removed or the perso who shared it may not have permission to share it with you” on both is post and the immediately preceeding two previous by Kelli Jae Baeil. Thefirst post by Kelli Jae Baeil, smells like drive-by marketing. -Three- posts following that promo post, each of which consists entirely of “Attachment Unavailable” makes it look even more like drive-by exploitation. I wrote the rant below … Continue reading →

A Bowl of Cherries Vs. Sucking Beetroot

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Greetings, Precious Readers. As most of you know, I’ve had a rather eventful few years. Yes, i found the love of my life, and we are now happily engaged to be married. But getting to this point was a path strewn with rocks and blocks and sharp pointy things, and quicksand and befanged beasts, attacking from all sides. Okay, that might have been a tad melodramatic. But it’s been really challenging. It’s harder than it seems to leave everything behind and start from scratch in another country when you don’t even like to leave the house, and you’re also an … Continue reading →

I Want to Break Amazon’s Thumbs

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Frustration If I had a shiny gun, I could have a world of fun Speeding bullets through the brains Of the folk who give me pains; Or had I some poison gas, I could make the moments pass Bumping off a number of People whom I do not love. But I have no lethal weapon — Thus does Fate our pleasure step on! So they still are quick and well Who should be, by rights, in hell. ~Dorothy Parker  “We are researching the issue.” It’s been a week, now, since my Amazon Royalties for US sales have been LATE. Today, … Continue reading →

Charcoal Thursday Sale

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I had stretched my budget to the limit at the end of this month, and wasn’t sure when my check would go in, but assumed I’d be spending Thanksgiving eating an avocado pocket sandwich, rather than something with turkey in it, to at least commemorate the holiday. But then, my check went in early, and I thought. “Hey, I should go buy some kind of turkey dinner now.” Well. It was a holiday, and I knew many things would be closed. I just hoped at least one of the grocery stores would be open. So I got in my van … Continue reading →

Happy Thanksgivoween

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NOTE: I typed in Thanksgivoween, as the title of this blog, while thumbing it into my iPhone…and the autocorrect made it Thank Gully Nig (sounds like a good title- who’s Gully Nig?–I’m sure I’ll come up with a story for that). So–Today I am thankful that I finally found the love of my life even though we can’t be together right now. I am thankful that I have a nice vehicle to provide autonomy and comfort, and a reasonably comfortable place to live, even though it’s just a lonely hotel and nothing more. I am thankful that I am able to … Continue reading →

Going Mainstream

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CAUTION: FRUSTRATED RANT HOVERING NEARBY. When you find yourself, as a writer, lamenting about why you’re even writing at all, and entertaining the idea of not writing any more, something has to change. I’m growing more and more frustrated with, and weary of, the lack of support from Lesbian Readers for what I want to offer them. I am sick to death of their constant praise of bad writing in the LesFic market, and their unwillingness to demand better, and try anything out of their narrow reading interests. It’s painfully clear that most LesFic Readers have literary blinders, and will … Continue reading →

Thatness & Whatness – being snarky

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Bound to happen….don’t know why I’m surprised. I’ve been publishing excerpts intended to market Supernatural Hypocrisy. Someone just gave me a pissy little review on one of them a while ago, so I went to his site and left one of my own. Amazing what people do. His review was on Thatness & Whatness, and only said “Review by: Brent Adams on March 31, 2013 : star Not impressed. Doesn’t seem well thought out or researched.” So I looked at his wordpress site, and it was one of those generic, newly made ones with all the defaults still up, and … Continue reading →

Irony-Fest on Giving it Away

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Welcome to the Irony-Fest, please sign in and wear your name tags. This topic has become a comedy of ironies. Herein lies the oft-repeated back-handed compliments and erroneous and mixed opinions we authors often deal with, in relation to our work. It seems that some readers just don’t understand nor appreciate what authors are offering, and why. And they don’t seem to understand the function of short works in this regard. Would that we could be treated with the same respect that other professions enjoy, without  suffering the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune. In one blog, Distracting Fiction: Brand … Continue reading →

Stupid, Honorable, High-Road Seeking Fool

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In a post from a few years ago (two posts, actually, under Going to Denver Because You’re Dead) I chronicled this transition of moving to Colorado to start a new life; again reinventing myself, with the hope of somehow finding my new place in this ever-changing, ever-challenging world.  I got rid of three-quarters of everything i owned, packed a U-Haul trailer behind my Cherryot, and off I went. A journey that lasted 30 hours on many days of little sleep. By the time I arrived in Denver, i was exhausted, lost, and had this sensation of being on another planet. … Continue reading →

If a Woodchuck Could Chuck YOU.

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Was meeting a friend at a local pub I like a lot, even though it’s often noisy as hell, and I picked out a booth to wait for my friend to arrive. The waitress gave me a glare when I sat down at the table that still had the paid ticket and the dirty dishes. I had never had a rude waitress there, so gave her the benefit of the doubt. Maybe she wasn’t looking at me. Then it took her a full five minutes to get over there and clean the table off, and I wondered. When I tried … Continue reading →