Category Archives: letters

America, Carlyle, letters, movies, reading

Holiday Weekend

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Saturday, I wrote two letters, printed them, and made them ready for mailing.  The plan was to mail them on Sunday when we drove by the post office going to and coming back from church. In doing so, I totally forgot that Monday was a federal holiday and the P.O. wouldn’t pick up the letters. No matter; I got that little task done.

So here it is Monday of Memorial Day weekend. I’m caught up with my correspondence. I set out chicken to thaw for supper. Rain continues to fall, with occasional breaks, so outside work isn’t easily possible.  So today will be an inside day of work and relaxation.

With some remembrance of those who fell in battle, fighting because out country asked them to. In our family, Lynda’s great-uncle, Lee Thompson, died on the first day of fighting at Guadalcanal in 1942. He is the only one that I know of in her family and mine that died in battle. Others served with distinction but lived to rejoin civilian life after war. I take this moment, as one who did not serve, to salute Lee and those others who gave their lives for the USA.

As to filling the day, I started with some work on my deceased father-in-law’s letters. He was a letter writer and saver (as I am) who spent lots of time in his last three or four years writing long letters on his computer. He saved them in notebooks and on floppy discs. At some point we need to get rid of one or the other of these, so I’m taking time to organize the notebooks. Possibly I’ll computerize them, then get rid of either the hard copies or the discs, or possibly both.

Last night I updated my book sales spreadsheet. As I did so, I learned it’s become somewhat unwieldy and needs revamping. Not sure if I’m going to do that today. But today I plan to update my financial spreadsheet, something I let drop after my seizure back in December. I need to see where I stand financially overall. I also hope to update my checkbook. Since my handwriting is still very difficult since my stroke in September, I now keep my checkbook on a spreadsheet. And, yes, I still keep my checkbook, probably an anachronistic practice in this electronic era.

I have a lot of papers scattered over my work area in The Dungeon. I hope to, if not reduce them in number, to at least better organize them. That also goes for a few 3-ring binders on my shelves. We are very close to finishing with deciding what to do with the mass of photos from Lynda’s dad’s family. We could finish those today with an hour or two of effort. I’m anxious to see that completed.

But otherwise, I will mainly read. About 15 minutes is all that’s left on one magazine. It would be good to get more than my 10-page quota read in the literature and missions books I’m reading. Maybe the evening will find us watching an Agatha Christie movie on Britbox or U-Tube. And, the Carlyle Letters Online are always there should I need something to fill up a half-hour. As is my too-long neglected journal.

expatriate life, family, letters, self-publishing

The Saudi Years In Letters

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The work is nearly complete on this non-commercial project. My proof copy should arrive by Wednesday next week.

Family, friends, and regular readers of this blog know that we lived in Saudi Arabia once upon a time. That was in mid-1981 to 1983. Our children were 2 1/2 and 5 mo. when we first went there. The company I worked for at the time, Black & Veatch, had lots of engineering work in the Saudi Eastern Province, and I was one of those sent there for civil-environmental engineering work.

At the time, the Iran-Iraq war was in its second year. The country was still rather primitive. The road network was good, and rapidly being improved. The shops were full of the world’s goods; you could find almost everything you wanted (except when all shipments of peanut butter were held up in customs for a month). Plenty of other expatriates lived and worked nearby, and we struck up fast friendships. And we had a church to go to, meeting with permission of the Saudi government on the condition that no evangelism of Saudi natives take place.

But the one thing we didn’t have was a telephone. That infrastructure was way behind in development, and only offices, stores, government offices, and probably a few wealthy Saudis had phones. We could go to the B&V office and make calls (frightfully expensive), or, if previously arranged, receive one.  So to keep in touch with the home front, we wrote letters. That seems almost anachronistic now, but a fair amount of our time was devoted to writing letters. I wrote about this before concerning our years in Kuwait from 1988-1990.

Transcribed in 2020-2022 and published in 2022, this was my first collection of letters to publish.

Back in 2020 to 2022, I spent a lot of time transcribing letters from the Kuwait years and making a book out of them. It was just for family members. I think a total of four copies were bought (3 by me) before I removed it from sale. My second-oldest grandson read it and seemed to like it. He enjoyed reading errors in his mother’s letters. She was 6, 7, 8, 9 years-old at the time. His family’s copy of the book is on the bookshelf in his bedroom.

Having completed the Kuwait years letters, I took a break for a while, other than bringing our letters-in-hand to a better state of organization. Then, in early 2024, while recovering from my first stroke and not getting out much or doing original writing, I decided to transcribe the Saudi letters. I had almost all of them done by September when I had my second, bigger stroke and my open-heart surgery. In October, our daughter visited us and began the process of selecting photos to illustrate the book and scanning them.

The letters, along with my 1983 travel journal.

I completed the scanning last month and cropped them and loaded them into the book document over the last two weeks, taking time to arrange the photos in some logical way relative to the text of the letters. I finished the process yesterday. A quick pass through the book showed that my pagination was acceptable. So, this morning I “slapped” a cover together and uploaded the book to Amazon. One photo needed adjusting, which I got done. The Zon then said the book was acceptable. I ordered a proof copy. I’ll use the copy to doing any proof-reading needed, and will have the finished product ready in a month, maybe less.

This book is more richly illustrated than the Kuwait letters book was. I’m coming to learn a little about working with photos and how to use the tools at my disposal. I’m far from an expert, but I’m for sure better at it now than I was three years ago.

I’m scheduled to make a presentation to our letter writers group on letter collections when we meet on June 10. My voice has not fully recovered from the stroke and seizures, but I think it has enough to allow me to make myself legible. Thus, I think I will present this rather than one of the letter collections I’ve read.

Bible study, Health, letters

Where Do I Go From Here?

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Our son snapped this picture just as they called me to begin prep for surgery.

As the title of this post says, I’m somewhat uncertain about what my life if going to be like in the future.

As to the heart surgery, I’m healing well. I’m being careful to follow the discharge instructions the hospital gave me. I’ve been seen three times by home health, once in clinic for blood draw, and once in clinic for the post-op appointment. Almost every day I sense healing happening in my body. Yesterday, after working with our daughter putting one bedroom back together following down-sizing activities, I had my first real time of pain at the incision point. A Tylenol was sufficient to help control it.

As to my stroke of 3 Sept, progress on the lingering impairments is slow. Typing has started to improve, but remains both slow and painful. Handwriting is also slow to return to normal. It takes me a long time just to sign my name to anything, and the result is barely legible. Writing anything takes much more time it ought to.

But, I’ve been able to do some light writing tasks. I began work on the next volume of my Bible study series. Not actual writing yet, but creating the book files, loading the scripture in and dividing it by chapter, and planning the subsections. I think I’m perhaps a day away from completing the preliminaries and beginning the writing.

The other writing project is the book of family letters from our years in Saudia Arabia. All that’s left is adding photographs. That involves scanning to digital, resizing, loadings into the books, then formatting the pages. As I’ve said before, the words are written. I scanned some photos previously. But the scanner is in the basement and I’m still not allowed to do stairs. Our daughter did a lot of scanning. I have at least 40 scanned photos to go through and load into the book. I will work on that some this week. About the time I finish that, I’ll be at the point using stairs again, and can complete the scanning.

So healing is happening, and writing tasks are getting done. Hopefully on Friday, I’ll be able to report increasing progress.

Danny Tompkins Short Stories, expatriate life, letters, self-publishing, Short Stories, Writing

August Progress, September Goals

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Vol. 2 may be published this month—if I can make my goal.

Well, August was another strange month, as I continued to recover from the two freak household accidents I had in July. While my output was certainly affected, I wasn’t shut down from some progress. Here’s how I did relative to my goals.

  • Blog twice a week, on Mondays and Fridays. Did this. I had lots to write about.
  • I’m not making a goal of attending any writers meetings, partly from not knowing how my surgery and illnesses will lay me up, and partly because one meeting may be cancelled due to lack of a venue. I went to one meeting.
  • Complete two editorial passes through A Walk Through Holy Week, Vol 2. I managed to do this. Actually, I made three editorial passes through and have declared it “Done”. Publishing tasks to follow.
  • Figure out any final changes to the latest Danny Tompkins story, then finish and publish it. Did this, and published the short story on Aug 5. Made changes to it over the next few days.
  • Complete the commentary between letters. If I can get that done, begin selection of photos and insert them in the book. Did this. Completed commentary, Introduction, proofreading the letters and commentary, and started selecting photos.
  • And, one more for good measure: Make a start at outlining Vol 3 of A Walk Through Holy Week. Nope, did not work on this at all.
Hopefully, I’ll come very close to finishing my next book of expatriate year letters this month.

September will be an odd month. My heart surgery will be on Sept 30, and I have lots of pre-op stuff before that. So I don’t plan on any writing this month. Publishing tasks will take precedence.

  • Blog twice a week, on Mondays and Fridays.
  • Attend three writing group meetings. I present at the one on Sept 10.
  • Complete publishing tasks for A Walk Through Holy Week, Vol. 2 and publish it to Amazon. I may have to do so with a temporary cover.
  • Complete adding photos to the Saudi years letters book. A really stretching-it goal would be to do enough formatting to order a review copy.
  • Spend at least a little time organizing Vol. 3 of A Walk Through Holy Week.

That’s it, and it may be more than I can accomplish. But it’s better to have a goal that requires you to work hard and efficiently.

letters, Writing

One Project: The Words Are Done

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This is how I’m storing the letters—at least for now. Not sure if I should find a more permanent container.

A week ago I wrote a post about the two projects I was working on. I’m pleased to report that I finished one of those on Saturday.

But I need to qualify that. I finished the words part of the project. And I did a small amount of proofreading on Sunday, so I guess I should say Sunday was my completion day. I’d better explain.

The project was the book of letters during our years in Saudi Arabia, 1981-83. As I explained before, we didn’t have a phone in our apartment, had limited access to the office phone for personal calls (expensive and inconvenient), so we wrote letters home. Our parents, grandparents, and others kept most of them, and now we have them. In addition, we have some that were written to us from home. We must have brought those back with us when we were repatriated.

Here are the little darlings, collated in their box.

The collection, as it currently stands, is 191 items. I say “items” instead of letters, and “currently stands” because the collection includes a few things that aren’t letters, such as envelopes of receipts from some of our travels. Also, we have a number of empty envelopes in our files, addressed to a parent. The letters themselves were removed and are presumed lost. Or are they around the house somewhere?

This project actually began somewhere arounds 2008, I think it was. I gathered all the Saudi letters together, collated them, and began to transcribe them to a Word document. As I did, I left the letters out of the envelopes and put them opened flat in a folder, thinking that was a better way to preserve them. Later, as I studied how letter collections were gathered and preserved, I realized they should be left in the envelopes. So a few years later I returned them to the envelopes.

The Kuwait letters book served as the prototype for the other collections I’ve put together.

Or did I? Problem is, I remember finding the folder and seeing the letters laid flat and the envelopes on top, but I don’t actually remember ever putting them in the envelopes. Did I do it? I don’t have a list of which letters I transcribed, and the computer file is long gone from various computer upgrades. It makes me wonder if that folder is still there, buried beneath a pile of other things, waiting for me to do my work.

No matter right now. Today I have set aside some time to look for that folder and see if there are other letters to collate and transcribe. I don’t think there are, but we’ll see.

This was a fun, if often tedious project. The document I’ve created is over 109,000 words and spans 190 8.5×11 pages. It includes a four page Introduction, a list of the letters, and a list of correspondents. The only words that are missing are those that will go on the Copyright page. Well, that, and whatever captions I add to pictures once I get them added to the book.

Yes, I intend to publish it. It’s just for family, a way to preserve some of our history. But I’ll publish it as a paperback to Amazon, print off a few copies for family, then un-publish it. It will remain on my Amazon author’s bookshelf, ready to be re-published should some family want more copies (such as my grandchildren when they are older).

So the next step is to generously illustrate the book with photos. I plan on using some time in the afternoons over the next couple of weeks to go through the mountain of photos we have, select 50 or so good ones (maybe more), scan them, load them into the book. Then all that’s left is converting the Word file into the correct size pages for publishing, moving the photos to the right place, adding captions, make a suitable cover, and publish it.

And I did it with this collection as well, though it had only a handful of illustrations.

No, that’s not a quick and easy task. But I’ve already done that once with the letters from our years in Kuwait, so I sort of know the drill. Moving photos into place is actually kind of easy. The final sizing and positioning takes some care, but it’s quite doable.

That’s my afternoon job over the next couple of weeks.

My morning job? The will be picking up again A Walk Through Holy Week, Volume 2, and doing the next round of edits. I’m not really sure how long that will take me. Could be a week, could be two. I’ll also have to decide if I need another round of edits before moving on to publishing tasks.

I felt a great weight fall from my shoulders on Saturday when I typed the last words in the Saudi letters book. It’s good to see it reach this milestone.

books, letters, reading

How An Editor Sees It

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At over 900 pages, this promises to be an interesting book that I can digest in small junks during hospitalization.

About a week ago, when I thought my heart surgery would be today, I began going through books that I would want to take to read. It may be a pipe dream to think I can read much while in the hospital, but I want to be prepared. I’ve picked out one book on prayer and two books of letters. These are print books. I have a fair number of e-books I can easily pull up on my phone.

One book of letters is The Letters of Virginia Woolf. Vol. 3, 1923-1928. I picked this up used quite a few years ago and kept it on a basement shelf, waiting for the right time to read. Well, that seems to be now. It’s a thick paperback to be holding in bed. But the letters are, for the most part, short. I’ve read 40 or 50 pages into it to make sure it’s a suitable volume to read in my circumstances. So far I find it is.

I read a couple letters yesterday, and found an interesting item.

Importunate old gentlemen who have been struck daily by ideas on leaving their baths, which they have copied out in the most beautiful, and at the same time illegible handwriting, dump these manuscripts at the office, and say, what is no doubt true that they can keep it up or years, once a week, if the Nation will pay £3.3 a column. And there are governesses, and poetesses, and miserable hacks of all kinds who keep on calling—So for God’s sake write us something that we can print.

I need to add a little context. Virginia Woolf and her husband, Leonard, were part of a literary group known as the Bloomsbury Circle, or Bloomsbury Set, who had great political and literary influence in the first two or three decades of the 20th century. Leonard had just been appointed literary editor of The Nation and Athenaeum a magazine that dealt with British politics and English Literature. Virginia was, at that time, heavily involved in the Hogarth Press, print a variety of books. Leonard was also involved in that.

Thus, they were busy people. Virginia wrote a letter to Robert Fry on 18 May 1923. Leonard had been less then a month in the editorship, and the couple had just returned from a month-long holiday in Spain and France. Leonard’s plate was full, with coming up to speed at the magazine and dealing with book publishing. Complicating this appears to be a glut of unsolicited submissions to The Nation, submissions that Virginia, in her letter to Fry, considered as from “miserable hacks”. And she begged Fry to “write us something we can print.”

I find it funny almost that this is the same complaint editors have today. Too many submissions from unqualified writers crowding the mail and e-mail inboxes. Given the universality of typing now, they don’t have a lot of “illegible handwriting” to decipher, but reading those many submissions is not easy. Nor is it a good use of time. So most of those submissions go unread, or get shoved off to an intern with instructions such as, “If you’re still reading it after one page, put it in my inbox; if you’re still reading after three pages, bring it to my office right away.”

This should make all authors take some time before they make unsolicited submittals. The editors probably put you in the category of know-nothing writer, and expect nothing of publishable value from them. You’ve wasted your time submitting like that. Instead, take a long time to hone your writing skills, study the market, study the publishing outlets, study the realm of literary agents. Then, after however many years that takes, start submitting in a smart way.

I found it interesting that, in 1923, the problem editors faced was that same as they face today—with illegible handwriting thrown in. Technology makes the process easier, but the problem remains.

Bible study, letters, reading, stock market, Writing

On Again, Off Again Journal

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For several years I’ve been keeping a journal. I’m not very regular with it. My typical time to write is in the evenings, after everything else is done and we are watching TV.

  • Up at 5:50 a.m. Weight 202.0; blood sugar 117.
  • Walked 2 miles, my fourth straight day to walk that distance, and my tenth day of morning walking in an effort to improve strength and stamina ahead of my surgery.
  • To The Dungeon, without coffee. Devotional reading (currently in a book on prayer) and prayer.
  • Begin work on the Bible study I’m writing. My goal was to write one section, about 600 words. I was able to do that. Had time left, so began work on the next section. It was a good time of writing.
  • No book sales when I checked early.
  • Reviewed the stock market and made one trade.
  • Upstairs for breakfast of sausage-onions-peppers-eggs-cheese on pita bread, then outside to do some light yardwork.
  • Checked on two home improvement items. Our propane company did change out the hardware on the propane takes as I asked. Someone called me about it a couple of weeks ago but the reception was so bad that I couldn’t understand him. And, I called the plumbing supply store about the replacement toilet seats I wanted to buy. They had never called me. I learned they couldn’t find one of the right size, material, and color that I need. So I researched and found one on Amazon and ordered it. Let’s hope the color matches.
  • Worked on scanning documents to save electronically and then discard the papers. I got rid of three stray genealogy papers and a number of writing site papers. I only need two more days at that pace to get rid of one more notebook.
  • Read in the sunroom. Cloud cover made it easy to do today. May have napped a little out there.
  • Lunch of leftover pizza, crackers, and blackberries.
  • Made a blackberry cobbler to give away.
  • Back to The Dungeon for a few more computer tasks, including managing correspondence.
  • Looked through some books to choose a couple to take to the hospital with me.
  • Rested upstairs in my reading/TV watching chair. Worked on crossword puzzles but fell asleep.
  • Read three letters in the Carlyle Letters Online.
  • Had supper of leftover taco salad, still quite good on the fourth day. Dessert for me was, you guessed it, blackberries with a little sugar sprinkled on them.
  • Wrote a letter to my second grandson, which I’ll mail tomorrow.
  • Remembered I needed to write a blog post for tomorrow, and so started writing this.

Well, that seems to describe a full day. Maybe I’ll actually find time to write this in my journal.

books, letters, reading, The Forest Throne

Something To Read

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Elijah enjoyed this as I read it to him. I enjoyed reading it again. Found a few typos I’ll have to fix.

I’m always reading something: a book, a magazine, whatever holds my interest. At least once a month I try to make a dent in my magazine pile, and I’ll take a couple of days to read three or four magazines.

But books are my main reading. A print book is nice, but I’m not against e-books. In fact, at some times I prefer an e-book. On a trip, or with a large book, having an e-book on my phone is definitely easier to read.

I’m usually working on two or three books at a time, which I read in different places, with one of those books being the main one. I’ll have another one I’m beginning to read to see if I’ll like it. I’m also reading a book more for research than for entertainment. And, I’ll have an e-book or two at the ready on my phone, to read in odd moments, such as in a doctor’s waiting room.

But as of late, I’ve had difficulty finding a book that I like. Here’s what I read or started lately, and a little about them.

  • C.S. Lewis’s The Allegory of Love. I just started it, and within five pages I found it very difficult to understand. This is one of Lewis’s scholarly works, and it reads like one. I suppose I’ll find a way to read it, but with great difficulty.
  • Jack London’s White Fang. I brought this book on our recent trip to Texas, planning to read it to our youngest grandson, Elijah. I had never read it. But I got through only one chapter, and Elijah wasn’t interested. I also found it a bit difficult. So I set that aside.  for the rest of the trip, and plan to read it on my own sometime in the next year.
  • I just finished two similar books: XIII Men, and The Master’s Men. They were among the books that belonged to my mother-in-law that we recently liberated from a box or shelf in the basement. The books were similar. The first read almost as creative non-fiction and the second as a Bible study. Two different treatments of the same subject, the apostles appointed by Jesus. They probably aren’t worth reviewing on the blog, though I’m thinking about it.
  • My own book, There’s No Such Thing As Time Travel. Elijah wanted me to read it to him, so I did. He hadn’t read it before, and he seemed to like it.
  • The second book in the series, The Key To Time Travel. Elijah and I got about 2/3rds of the way through it when our child/pet-watching gig was up.
  • The Letters of Cicero. Readers of the blog will know I love reading letter collections. I’ve had this one as an e-book for a long time, and I’ve been slowly reading it in those odd moments. I’m around 33 percent through with it. I’ve found it uninteresting, and have laid it aside for now. I plan on making a presentation of this letter collection at the September meeting of the NW Arkansas Letter Writers Society.

None of these books have been what I would call great reads. They aren’t the sort of book, for example, that I would take to the hospital for a week-long stay. I needed something else.

A few days ago, knowing I needed a book or two to take to the hospital, I started scanning my bookshelves. On a bookshelf tucked away in the basement storeroom are my literature and poetry books. I found several that looked promising. One was The Grasmere and Alfoxden Journals of Dorothy Wordsworth. I picked this up new many years ago, but put it on the shelf. Now, I pulled it out and began reading it.

A journal is kind of like a letter collection. The passages are short. The book is easily picked up at any point for a short read or, if time and interest allow, a longer read. So this looks like a good read for the days in the hospital. This will not be enough reading material, however. I have a few things on my phone, but will be looking for one more book.

How about you? What does your reading pile/list look like?

Bible study, critique group, Health, home improvements, letters

Busy, Busy, Busy

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I’m late with my Friday morning post. Chalk it up to busyness.

I won’t say all that’s going on that made the days busy, but here’s a little of it.

  • Monday I went to the hospital for a test, only to find out the test was no longer needed because a test they did back on April 15 covered the same area. $20 miles of expense just getting there, and about two hours I would never get back.
  • Wednesday I went back to the same hospital for a different test, an MRI to take a closer look at a small mass of “neoplasm” found in the April 15 test. While the final report isn’t complete, it appears to be just a cyst on my kidney. Nothing to worry about.
  • We had painters at the house Monday-Wednesday, finishing the work needed after repairs from water damage to the house. I think I’ve blogged about that before.
  • Yardwork continues, though I’m pretty much on top of it and need to do only a little every day. I hope to get in an hour today.
  • We are slowly putting everything back in place from the house repairs. Got some done last night.
  • We continue to sell a few things in our dis-accumulation efforts. Sold two items this week, and brought a bookshelf to the garage for work to strengthen and repurpose it.
  • I’ve been writing this week. Today I wrote the last two sections of Chapter 2 of Volume 2 of A Walk Through Holy Week. I feel good about the progress.
  • I’ve had several items of correspondence this week with other writers—some for our critique group and some just for pleasure.
  • Yesterday I finished transcribing letters from or years in Saudi Arabia. I still have a travel journal to transcribe, then I’ll start putting them in a book for family. No hurry on this project.
  • I have made great progress with scanning/formatting/e-filing the poetry critiques I did from 2001-2010, which I had printed and saved. I’m down to less than thirty still to do. No hurry on this project either.
  • I’m working on plans for three special events over the next two weeks. Not going to say much about them now, but will likely blog about it later.

So with all this to do, I sort of forgot about my regular Friday post. Still, I’m not terribly late with it. And I won’t be late with my Monday post, for it’s already written and scheduled.

Bible study, letters, miscellaneous

Writing Again

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Vol 1 is published, Vols. 4, 5, 6, and 7 are written and edited. Vol. 8 is written and edited one time. Vol. 2 is now underway.

I finished writing my latest book, A Walk Through Holy Week, Vol 8, on April 1. I set the book aside for a time of seasoning—not of the book, but of my brain. For two weeks, almost three, I concentrated on my two special projects: transcribing letters from our years in Saudi Arabia, and scanning/saving of the hundreds of pages of poetry critiques I posted at on-line poetry boards years ago.

On Friday April 19, with the two special projects making good progress, I decided to pick Volume 8 again and do a round of edits. I did one chapter that day. That felt good. I did this using Microsoft Word’s text-to-speech feature, which I am liking more and more. So on Monday April 22, I edited two chapters, then did two each day and finished up one chapter on Saturday April 27. The main problem I found with the book is what seems to be too much repetition.

I then made the decision to put the book on the shelf and let it rest until I’m ready to publish Volumes 2 through 7. That will allow me to publish them in order.

But that got me to the point where I figured it was time to get to work on Volume 2 (Volumes 4, 5, 6, and 7 are already written and simmering, waiting their turn to find the book pages of Amazon). On Saturday, April 27, I took about an hour to begin the outline of the book. I finished that on Monday April 29. That brought me to Tuesday, April 30. Time to begin writing.

And that’s what I did on Tuesday April 30. I sat down at my computer, outline in hand, and got started on Chapter 1. Each chapter has seven sections, and I decided to write just one this day.  I was able to do that in less than an hour, a little over 750 words. I also did some formatting of the Bible verses already loaded into each chapter.

One section a day is less than my normal production, which is two sections a day. But for the first day writing after a layoff of almost a month, that wasn’t bad. Then, on Wednesday and Thursday, I was able to write two sections a day. The target for today is two sections, which will complete Chapter 1.

If I could equal the production I had when writing Vol. 8, I would finish he book sometime in June, possibly even early June. But I have lots of interruptions ahead: medical appointments, home maintenance need, and traveling. I will be happy if I can finish the book around the end of June or even into early July.

If I put my special projects aside, I think I could finish this well before July 1, but I don’t want to totally abandon the projects for the sake of writing. The trick will be to write the book while still working on the letters and critiques. Tuesday was a trial run of that. After writing, I transcribed two letters and scanned and saved several critiques. What I’ve found about the critiques is that each file created needs careful proofreading to check for scanner errors, as well as formatting to make sure everything is in a printable format. The goal is to someday put these in a nice concise volume, or probably two, as a record of a large part of my writing life.

I thought I was done with transcribing the Saudi years letters. I searched for letters that might have been missing to match a dozen or so empty envelopes. In the process I found a batch of letters written to us in Saudi Arabia. These were mainly from our last two grandmothers, with a handful from others. I found 43 of these letters, then another eight. So far I’ve transcribed sixteen of these. Only 27 to go. And I don’t have many more places to look for what should have been in those envelopes.

But that won’t be the end of the transcribing project. That year I kept a detailed travel journal for our trip through Asia, especially China. That will take a fair amount of transcribing. After that will be proofreading the transcriptions, then putting them in book form for the family. I don’t think I’ll finish this project in 2024. The transcription—yes; the proofreading—maybe; but assembling them into a book? Not a chance—not unless I drop everything else.

So, busy times.