Drunken Owls and Other Delights

As I've been mentioning hither and yon, I've got a new ebook out! And yes, it seems to be doing absolutely zip right now, as expected. I've been thinking about that the last few days for a few reasons.

One, I am absolutely terrible at self-promotion. I don't know what to do other than slather the news of it being out there on social media. I could spend a bit of money on advertising but that's money that I don't really have ready to wager on an avenue that may or may not provide results. I definitely would not make TikTok or YouTube videos because I'd be absolutely terrible at it. So what can I do? Put it out there and hope for the best. Try different avenues as I can. Just because it's out there and not selling doesn't necessarily mean it's a failure, especially if I'm not aiming for it to be a success. These are stories I want to tell and share, that's it. And I'd like to think that some of these novels of mine are worth checking out.

Two, and this ties in with that last bit, is that I shouldn't have to adjust my story in order to fit a specific sales pitch or style, because that's not the kind of writer I am. So perhaps what I need to do is find my own unique way to attract attention to them. It may work or it may not. And I'm not going to completely give up on the story, even if it's not a success. They're still out there, and just because they've been out there for a while doesn't necessarily mean that they've been glanced over and found wanting. I just haven't found the proper avenue to share them with, is all. Right now they're just...out there, along with all the other thousands of books being released.

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Another thing I've been thinking about lately is that next year will be the tenth anniversary of my first published novel A Division of Souls being released. This gives me about a year to plan and prepare for something to celebrate that. I was thinking that it's high time I did an edit and revision of the novel, as I'm sure there are a few things that could be fixed to make it even better. A new cover as well, perhaps for all three in the Bridgetown Trilogy. Which made me think: what if I came up with a special project for them? A multimedia thing, perhaps an ongoing celebration on my blog and elsewhere, sharing outtakes, in-canon stories and other things.

More to come on this as I sketch it out a bit more...

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It's that time of year again in which I suddenly decide I want to resurrect a story that's been in and out of my trunk for decades, the Belief in Fate / Decline and Fall novel. It's not that the story has never worked properly, it's that I've either been too emotionally close to the events that inspired it, or that I couldn't find the proper voices for it. I think I might have finally found a solution for it, however. We shall see.

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Theadia is progressing slowly but successfully, and I am quite happy about this. I just need to give myself more time to focus on it!

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That's my weekend update. How's your weekend been?

 It felt wonderful to sleep in until 8:30am, something I haven't done in ages! Granted, I was up until 11pm last night finishing off Shannon Chakraborty's The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi, which I'd realized early on was in fact a 'let's get the gang back together for one last heist' caper film, complete with bonkers action and wait-what plot twists, and just enough humor to make it a super fun ride. This new series is a lot less serious than her Daevabad trilogy, that's for sure, but it you loved that, you'll love this one as well.

Meanwhile, we walked to the park today and spent a little bit of time in the botanical garden, harvested some more of the red lettuce (there's still a ton of it left), then had a late lunch at the Richmond Republic, where I had a 10% APV beer that was super tasty and left me slightly spinny for at least two and a half hours. All in all a lovely day to be outside!

I'll admit I've been allowing myself to relax over the last couple of days, partly because my setting up Queen Ophelia's War for Thursday's drop date went so smoothly and quickly. I've earned it, dang it! I'm not entirely sure how I'll go about promoting this one but I'll give it the old college try, I suppose. That's something I'll be working on in the next six months anyway: figuring out productive ways to attract attention to my novels!

As for the day job, I'm doing a few midshifts this week (one as a register jockey, the other as a front end babysitter) with a midweek day off, which I've come to enjoy. the 1-2-1-3 variation on the day job schedule breaks it up so I'm not going full out for five days.


Hope everyone has a lovely week!

So today we headed down to Half Moon Bay partly to get out of the house and the neighborhood for a few hours, but also to watch the town's Pride parade! One of the last times we were there, we'd stumbled upon it with perfect timing, getting there just an hour or so before they shut down the main strip for their small but fun parade. It only lasts for about five or six blocks but it was really fun -- just a lot of people and local community groups celebrating. Just a nice and happy vibe all around!

We just chilled out the rest of the day, so nothing too much to report there!

I've got tomorrow off, so I'm probably going to be doing a bit of writing work and a few house errands like laundry, but that's about it. This week's schedule is the most normal and stress-free one I've had in a while -- one midshift on Tuesday and opens the rest of the week -- so I can't complain.

Meanwhile, I've realized that I REALLY need to get back into the habit of doing my daily stretches and exercises, because I've been so lazy about it for too long. I'm feeling a bit out of shape and achy again so I think I need to work a bit on that. [Yeah, I know. I'm getting older so some of those aches are age-related. But I digress.] I've never done anything major with them, no half-hour sweaty workouts. I'm talking simple things like leg and back stretches and stuff like that. I'm thinking I should start that tomorrow as well! 

It seems that one of the other managers set up the schedule for this week as they assigned me a Sunday (I almost NEVER work Sundays, basically because it's the only day A and I have off together to do things) and they were unaware that Main Boss always marks me off as unavailable on that day. Main Boss is on vacation however. I'm not entirely happy that they've given me a variation of a midshift by pushing it an hour later (12:30-9) either. I'm thinking that I really should sit down with Main Boss and ask what the proper protocol is for me to permanently list myself as 'not available Sundays' and perhaps get out of midshifts altogether. I've told them before that I can do one or two if needed, but those are REALLY starting to drag me down. I'm also thinking I should request that I'm also interested in being assigned for day stock or help in other departments out on the floor as well, and I ask that mainly because otherwise I end up doing forty hours a week up at the front registers and after two years of register jockeying, I am EXHAUSTED. I need a change-up. I don't hate the job (far from it -- I really like it!), and I definitely don't want to give up the bookkeeping work, but after seeing so many of my coworkers leave the front end constantly, I get this feeling like I feel abandoned up there, yeah? Especially when I'm suddenly the ONLY one up there.

But that's another personal issue I'll go into at a later time. 

ANYWAY. I have today off and I would like to do almost nothing except catch up on writing, drink coffee, and play with the cats. I don't think that's too much to ask.

It's been a nice couple of days here so we did a bit of gardening on Saturday and today we headed to Crissy Field for walking and lunch. [Pakistani street vendor food is super tasty, by the way, especially with a mango lassi.] Right now we're watching Dune Part Two and enjoying it just as much as we loved the first one. I figure I'll squeeze in a bit of writing work tonight after dinner!

I am very thankful that the odd schedule of the last couple of weeks is finally over. The week before might have been all opens, but it was five in a row with me waking up just before 5, and last week's was three midday front end managing shifts in a row, so by that third day I actually left a half hour early because I was so exhausted. Next week's schedule is back to the mostly opens with one midshift and a break in between, and that seems to be the best one for me. It keeps it interesting but it also gives me a rest.

We were thinking of what to do next weekend, though...go downtown to the Ferry Building and North Beach? Road trip somewhere? Good question!

So last week I did five days in a row of opens -- three shifts starting at 6am followed by two 5:30s (I open the store as bookkeeper those two days). As much as I love doing the morning shifts, which like in my Yankee Candle days allowed me a full afternoon AND evening to do whatever I want, I was often exhausted from waking up around 4:30am each day. The only other downside to the opens is that I'm often the only person up front until around 11ish, so five of those hours are usually completely solo until I call for help.

This coming week, I have three midshifts. Now those are definitely exhausting, physically and mentally. Working 11:30 to 8pm means I have to squish all my writing into the pre-shift morning hours and also deal with the lunch and dinner waves. I'm doing three of these in a row this week while the front end manager goes on vacation. Thankfully I have Thursday off to chill and recharge. The plus side is that I get to sleep until 6am, which always helps.

So yeah, six of one...

I somehow managed to walk five miles during my Friday shift (believe me, it can be done despite the fact that our store is quite small) so I was quite happy to have been given two days off in a row. So what did I do today?

I walked almost five miles. Again. *facepalm*

Granted, this was done for a good reason, in that we wanted to get outside for a bit, as well as zip up to our community garden plot to water it and maybe do a bit of cursory weeding. From there we walked down to Clement Street to the farmer's market and then back home. Now, usually we bus it back home because a) we're usually dead tired by the end of our jaunt, and b) I'm usually a bit tipsy from the stout I get at the Richmond Republic for our brunch. Our joke is that if we make it to Park Presidio, then there's no reason for us to bus it because it's only about a dozen short blocks from there. [And usually if we walk back, the buzz has worn off by the time we get home.]

So what am I doing tomorrow? Not much, really. Maybe go to the bank at Laurel Village to get quarters for laundry and stop at the pet store for more kitty litter. And work on my writing. And maybe NOT walk five more miles...? 

Today's exercise was spending a few hours at our local community garden. We're tasked with spending at least a few hours a year tidying up the various parts of the garden itself -- weeding, tossing out trash, turning over the compost pile, and whatnot -- so today A and I spent a good two hours getting stuck in. The border fence and wall near our plot was vastly overgrown with weeds and crabgrass so we pulled it all out and it looks SO much better now. I somehow managed to uncover two very large snails while I was at it, and they proceeded to start climbing up the wall for safety. [Sorry we hurt your field, mister!]

There was also a triangle-shaped spot between us and the woodchip pile that was quite weedy as well (there used to be a platform and a greenhouse there but had been torn down a year or so ago and it was all overgrown). I think the organizers were quite impressed by how much we managed to get done, considering A has a very green thumb and I've picked up quite a bit from all those episodes of Gardener's World that we'd been watching over the past few years. We're both a bit sore and dirty but it was really fun work and I'm looking forward to doing it again at some point!

So now it's time for me to finish washing the bedsheets and get a few blogs ready for the next few days...

Let me tell you, it felt wonderful to sleep in two days in a row (well, at least until 8), even if we were prodded by cat paws to get up so kitties could be fed. A couple of days with no huge plans other than a bit of shopping and walking through the park was something I don't give myself nearly as often as I should. Even on my midweek days off, I'm usually up the same time A is so I can have a full day of catching up with writing and other things.

Speaking of writing, I'm at another chapter that seems to be slowing me down. I think it's that I'm not allowing myself to get into the heads of the characters featured in these new scenes, even though I want them to be there. I'm pretty sure it's because I don't really know enough about their jobs as military, even though I am purposely NOT playing their characters as the stereotypical hardass Adonises with ridiculous firepower. That's not the kind of characters they are -- they're your aunt and cousin and brother who signed up and are decidedly not the Lee Greenwood Patriot kind of soldier. It's not a military sf story, nor is it a space opera, like I keep saying. It just happens to have some of that as background and plot.

Aaaanyway. It's Sunday afternoon and I'm chilling in Spare Oom listening to tunes and doing my Sunday chores (laundry, blogging, and so on). Tomorrow is an early open, followed by three midshifts (OOF), but I'll live.

Started the day off with a half-shift at work that was originally supposed to be a full eight hours, but managed to get the second half off as I hadn't expected to work today and had already made plans. Said plans of course were heading to Japantown to enjoy the final day of the Cherry Blossom Festival. We went primarily for the food, sure, but I also managed to pick up some manga that had recently come out. After that we took the bus most of the way to our community garden plot to do a bit of hoeing and adding of more compost. Then we walked the rest of the way home, picking up some iced tea on the way. All in all I walked a little over five miles today and I've been up since 4:30ish, so I'm feeling a bit loopy right now, heh.

Thankfully I have tomorrow off, so I get to chill a bit and get caught up on creative things! And it looks like I have Saturday off, so that possibly means that I might have the weekend off for the first time in who knows how long! Here's to hoping!