When life decides to throw me a curve ball, it seriously puts some spin on it. How do I even begin with the last week and a half or so? Well, for starters, I found myself under the gun for time far worse than expected due to a deal falling through on the purchase of a car.
Not just one actually. Three. The first one turned out to have issues beyond what I had been led to understand. Not the least of these was a massive crack in the windshield that could never have passed any inspection in the North. The next vehicle would have worked with a few repairs, but failed to have a clean title for the purchase. Last came the hope of a deal for a newer car, but we writers are notoriously unsteady in our pay. Very few people are willing to deal with someone who only has a thousand to put down and a pay scale that can do wild swings from one month to the next. My credit score wasn’t helping matters either.
Through the unexpected assistance of friends, there was a last minute save and we were on our way. Cut to the first night of hotels and I realized that my old laptop’s keyboard had jammed up at some point while I’ve been using the desktop exclusively (loss of mobility actually seems to help keep me focused even if it does cost me the ability to work on things away from the desk outside of paper). There went five days plus another to get things set up again. No problem, there were still 3 days to keep my newsletter promise of publishing Nighteyes before the end of the year.
As the title says, Kaboom. As far as I can tell, I brought the wrath of God down on my family in the form of a stomach flu. I was the first and hardest hit, dropping me out for two days of violent sickness. Both of my children caught it while I was still half-sick on the second day. They seem to have gotten it a little less strongly than myself, but two children in a single night emptying their stomachs every half an hour doesn’t leave a lot of time for anything coherent. So that left… Not today, since I am writing this after midnight, but it left yesterday. One day to finish a /lot/ of work on the new website upgrades, final editing work on the book and full upload. I had to scrap plans for individual uploads to the different distributors. Still, I did get it online and purchasable for any and all who want it.
Even better, I managed to get the website up as well, albeit with a few bugs. Still, a zip file error and a few kinks to work out of the new contact form are pretty minor. I like to think it looks pretty good. If you normally come to the blog directly, go have a look at the main site. I think you’ll really like the new design. I put a lot of effort into it. Let me know if you notice any errors besides the two I already mentioned.
Of course, you can now also go pick up a copy of Nighteyes! It feels a lot tighter as a whole story now and has a higher degree of polish worthy of a for-purchase work. If you’ve already read the serial flash fiction here, there are three whole new chapters to expand on the setting and situation. If you’ve never read them, then this will be entirely new for you and you can compare the two to get insights into my editing process. As for me, I’m going to go pass out somewhere and finish recovering. New content soon on the blog, I swear. Maybe I’ll double up some to make up for lost time.