Every now and then I make a post like this, so my loyal fan(s) will know that I’m not a slacker. Well, at least not a big slacker; maybe just a little slacker. Over the last month I have been much engaged in publishing tasks, less so in writing.

As I’ve reported previously, I’ve been working with the graphics in the print version of my book The Candy Store Generation. This took up a lot of my time over the last two weeks. That’s now behind me, however, as our company’s graphic arts gal, Lee Ann Gray, volunteered to do the work needed. I worked with her. She had them all done, until I realized I had given her the wrong size for the book. So she re-did them.

But when I uploaded them, I realized I still had them a half-inch narrower than they could be. I didn’t have the heart to ask her to do them over, so I left them like that. I inserted them in the Word document, uploaded it to CreateSpace, did all the formatting stuff including on-line proofing, and ordered the proof copy. A few graph that were website captures are still at a low resolution, but I don’t care. I just want to get it published.

I also ordered a copy of the home school edition of Documenting America. I actually finished the edits to this a couple of weeks ago, but hadn’t decided if I’d bother with another proof copy or not. This book has also been frustrating in that I can’t seem to contact any local home school people for marketing purposes. I go to the websites of the groups, get contact information, send out e-mails, and either get no response or an auto-response that the e-mail address is invalid. I have no sales of it in electronic format, so have few hopes I can sell it in paper format. Oh, well, it will be available should I ever figure out how to market it.

I had conversations with two different cover designers for In Front of Fifty Thousand Screaming People. My son had said he would do it, but his life as a young professional and new homeowner is incredibly busy. Thinking he wouldn’t come through, I contacted another man. I told my son about it, and he came through with a draft cover. It’s a good start, and actually good enough if I never got another one. But he’s going to tweak it some. So I’m getting very close to publishing this, at least in e-book formatting. I have one mini-scene to add to the text, which I’ll complete today.

I have done some writing this week, on two different thing. I wrote a short story titled “Whiskey, Zebra, Tango”. I began it last Monday and finished it yesterday at about 6,400 words (perhaps 25 printed pages). My intention is to publish this as an e-book only, and attempt to do a simple cover myself. I want to get FTSP out first, then this.

The other thing I worked on is my spoof of the civil engineering industry. Titled The Gutter Chronicles: The Continuing Saga of Norman D. Gutter, E.I., I use situations from my career and put them in the life of the unfortunate Mr. Gutter. I had 11 episodes (i.e. chapters) written as of a few years ago. I never planned on publishing it, but lately I’ve been circulating copies of it to a new batch of CEI employees. That made me realize I had a bunch of words written that could easily be transformed into an e-book. I’m adding four new chapters, one of which is done and another of which is 500 words from being done. The other two are outlined, so completion isn’t far away, maybe three weeks or so.

So that’s where I stand. I hope the next four weeks can be as productive as the last four. If they are, my list of titles for sale will climb from six to nine.