Book sale: all books 99 cents

Patty Jansen is running her regular promotion this weekend.  My own Caverns of Mercury is one of the featured titles.  Check it out:

Direct link:  https://pattyjansen.com/promo/

All books are 99 cents.  These promotions are a great way to try out new authors without spending a lot of money.  Please browse the site and check out the books.  You might just find your new favorite author.

In the meantime, thanks for reading, and thanks for supporting independent authors.

Cold feet, hot head

Yeah, it's winter.  Vents are in the ceiling, which means the warm air stays at the top of the room and never makes it to the floor.

Four more months of this.  At least.  Depends on how early spring gets here.

Cold feet, hot head.  For the rest of the season.  :(

In other news, I've received the usual emails from my retail partners advising me to make any changes to my ebooks before such-and-such a date.  I've got changes to make, but I'll hold off on some of them until the new year.

I think I've decided on Christmas gifts for the niece and nephew.

I hate modern appliances.  More electronics = more things that can break.  I long for simple electromechanical things that just work.

Unseasonably cold

It's currently 40 degrees with 15 mph winds.  Windchill is 29.

And there's still daylight out.  Night is just beginning to fall.

This is February weather, not November weather.

*sigh*

I think I'm going to crawl in a hole somewhere and hibernate.  Y'all wake me up when it's April.

Stabbed my eyeball

It's not bad.  I was putting my contact lens in, and it went in sideways and the edge of the lens poked me in the eye.  The cornea's a little irritated, but no vision damage or anything.  This isn't the first time I've scratched my eye.

The bad news is that I'll need to go without my contacts for a couple of days to let the scratch heal.  That means I'm stuck with glasses, and I can't see as well with my glasses as I can with my contacts.

Anyway, it's yet another little annoyance.  :(

Progress report

Well, I'm still line-editing the current book, and it's looking less and less likely that it'll be out this year.  I hate that I keep pushing it back, but that's the way it goes.  When I try to rush, quality declines, and I'd rather delay publishing a book than publish something I know can be better.

On the positive side, I've sold a few box sets on Kobo lately, so the cover I bought for it has paid for itself.  Still no plans as of yet to publish the box set elsewhere.  For the time being, it's a Kobo/Walmart exclusive.

I ran a few promotions for Clouds of Venus last week, and I'm pleased with the results.  If any new readers are reading this, I hope you enjoy the book.

That's all for now.  Happy Thanksgiving, everyone.  :)

Roy Clark has passed away

One of the most talented musicians in American history has left us.

Country Music Hall of Fame member and versatile entertainer Roy Clark died Thursday at his home in Tulsa, Oklahoma,  after complications from pneumonia, his publicist said. He was 85.

Here's Roy with Johnny Cash:

Here he is performing Malaguena, one of his specialties:

Here he is on the fiddle:

On the banjo:

Here he is playing three different instruments in rapid succession:

He played mandolin, too, though I can't seem to find a decent video of him on the mandolin.

Here's a British guitarist reacting to Roy's appearance on The Odd Couple:

Here's a short tribute video from the Rock History Music channel:

R.I.P., Mr. Clark.  :(

I'm getting antsy

I haven't seen the sun since Saturday.  It started raining on Sunday, and it didn't stop raining until this morning.  It's still overcast.

The clouds are supposed to clear tomorrow, and then we'll have several sunny days.  I hope that forecast is correct.  I feel like I'm starting to go crazy.  I love the humidity, but I also need some rays on my skin.

In other news, I'm running promotions for Clouds of Venus this week, so if the book's rank seems unusually high, then that's why.  To any new readers: thanks for reading, and I hope you enjoy my work.  :)

Also, I finally finished line-editing the first boarding scene in book 3.  Man, that was a tough one.  I ended up adding a scene break because it was just too long.  I think the original scene was something like ten OpenOffice pages, which translates to about twenty ebook pages.  On the one hand, I want the scene to be somewhat exhausting for the reader because that's the mood I'm going for, but on the other hand, I don't want the reader to be so exhausted that he puts the book down.  Balance, trade-off, etc.  So I added an asterisk break.  Hopefully I made the right choice.

The bad news is that I'm still only about a third a way of the way done.  I'm going to have to really cook if I want to publish this thing before year's end.

And I haven't done a lick of Christmas shopping yet.  *sigh*

Man, I'm tempted

Not long ago, a new product was introduced in the air rifle market.  It's the ATI Nova Freedom. 


.177 caliber

.22 caliber


What makes this one interesting is the fact that it's a PCP gun (pre-charged pneumatic) with an integrated pump.  Everything's all in one piece.  No fussing around with scuba tanks or other such headaches.

When I first read about it, I was cautiously optimistic.  It seemed to have all the things I wanted in an affordable PCP rifle.  I wasn't going to drop a non-trivial sum of money on one, though, until I read some reviews by people who have actually used the things.

Well, the reviews are in, and this product seems to be a winner.

PCP rifles tend to be expensive since they offer the best accuracy.  (Including practical accuracy, i.e. not hold-sensitive like springers.)  The Nova Freedom is only four hundred bucks.  That's a deal by PCP standards.

Yeah... I'm tempted.

Cold and rain

Nothing but rain in the forecast until Friday.  Not kidding.  We're under a flood warning.  :(

It won't flood where I live.  I'm too far up the hill for that.  But those who live down near the creeks might have issues after four straight days of rain.

I've already entered the "cold feet" season.  The HVAC vents are in the ceiling, and that means cold feet all winter.  Warm air rises, so when the heat comes on, the warm air has to be pushed down.  Once it reaches the thermostat, though, it shuts off, leaving the bottom four feet or so of the house cold.  Turning the thermostat up only makes my head hot.

Vents belong in the floor or on the wall close to the floor.  Not in the ceiling.  Humans live in the bottom half of the room, not the top half.

In other news, I just finished emailing copies of Hostile Planet to the LibraryThing giveaway winners.  I hope they enjoy it.  This is my first time doing one of these giveaways, so I'm sort of fumbling my way around here.  But hopefully I didn't screw anything up.

Also, Stan Lee has died.  He was 95.  I was never much of a comic reader, but I enjoyed a few of the movies based on his characters.  He definitely left his mark on the world.  R.I.P., Mr. Lee.

Best wishes to those affected by the California wildfires.  I've seen the photos and videos, and it's just terrible.  Stay safe, folks.

The Eleventh Hour

Armistice: 100 years later

The "war to end all wars" was a disaster from which the world has still not recovered.  Today we remember the honored dead.

Another ant bite

At least this one's not on my hand.  I can use the keyboard without difficulty.  I'm having allergy issues, though, so watery eyes and runny nose are happening.  But when I can see, I can type.

The bite's on my foot, and now several square inches of the top of it are inflamed.  I've got an ice bag on it right now.

I really don't understand it.  These aren't fire ants or anything of the kind.  They're just ordinary little brown ants.  But they've got a real attitude problem, because as soon as they get on me, they chomp down.  And the only thing that helps the stinging and itching is ice.

Maybe I'll write a story where ants are the villains.  I mean, I need to get some kind of revenge, right?