JChase Writes-at 80 if I knew then what I know now...

 Did you ever feel like though you were moving and thinking 90 miles and hour you felt like you were some how standing still? Well, that's where I'm at right this minute. Seems like there is so much for me to do and I'm moving as fast as I can, while I'm still standing still. So many things I'm waiting for so that I can proceed are going to take some time and thought and my head knows that but...Even at this moment it's happening, I'm standing still.  Laying back in my red leather recliner there are things for me to do and those things are not due now or anything, but they are talking to me. I reached for my trusty laptop and here I am, writing because it's time but not because I have something truly terrific to share. I've been very busy collecting, pricing and making things sell-able. In the meantime, working on a friend's apartment as her decorator. She decided she wants a horse theme. She lives in a 1 bedroom apartment. I'm soliciting a c

  I decided that rather than submitting a selfie, I should find someone to take pictures of me, they would have to be better than the ones I've been taking. This picture is a selfie, one of the better ones. I've already sent three in....and then.... An old work friend called me and wanted to have coffee. We did and, in the conversation, she mentioned her daughter was doing some photography and building a portfolio. Well! don't you know that I jumped on it and asked if her daughter would be open to taking some shots for the back cover of my book. We met in the cool of an evening at a newly constructed parking garage that was well landscaped on one side and that's where multiple shots were taken. I will get them in about a week after the photographer has done some editing and hopefully some airbrushing. I can hardly wait to see them. The picture I have placed here is taken before I met with the photographer so I'm in the same outfit but of course those pics won't

  Though some days it feels like my life is all about the book. BTW, I really like my cover design. I'm pretty sure the publishing cover team will find something better but until then this is it.  Anyway, as I was saying, the things I've been asked to provide haven't been that easy to accomplish. It has more to do with graphics now than writing and though I use to be pretty good at figuring things out when it comes to making pictures look good, etc. not anymore. It's all way outside of my understanding. So, it takes all day just do one thing and that's the least amount of time. It's a good thing I like figuring it out until I can't! I wanted to put my goose painting in, but it doesn't fit their software so now I'm considering doing a black ink drawing in a small enough size that it can be used. Gonna work on that this evening and see what I can come up with. It'll be on multimedia paper. There is more of my life that the book though, really. Ther

 Can I get any more awed than this? The book is now in the editing stage at "my publisher"! Working with the pros to get it ready for print, etc. And then I get this phone call see...and it's from the director of a non-profit. He was a friend of my husband so a friend of mine but, besides that, the request I made to the foundation result, came to me through the phone call and the gift given is $2,000 minimum. The publisher is a self-publishing publisher so there is a fee for getting a book published. Vanity publisher is what they, all self-publishers, were called. Things have changed in that realm of getting a book out there and it's because the 5 big publishing houses are so hard to even get your manuscript seen that the self-type has become the now, apparently, way to get a book published. I did my research on this. The publisher I chose is among the least expensive with the most all around means of printing and marketing. And a most important part of this for me i

 Tomorrow I will go over the agreement with the gentleman that I've been talking with over the past month. If all is in order I will initiate with a small payment and the publishing process will begin. I will post again tomorrow. I've talked with several other publishers over the past few weeks and each one has been gracious and actually fun to talk with. Finances is always the deal breaker up until now. So many varied offers that it's a bit difficult to decipher. So, during this time I've had to pay attention to details and almost read between the lines in some cases to be sure I'm getting what I want in each category. Getting the book out where people can find it is the big deal. Just because the word distribution is in there doesn't mean it will be distributed and in some cases it's talking about the author doing the distribution. So when I visit tomorrow that's a box I will need to pay attention. In fact, I'm going to make a list before the call