Up and Down, Up and Down

[handful_ofdust]

Yesterday my period eventually started, explaining a bunch of things that had happened previously: My reactions to bad behaviour, bad behaviour of my own. This same chemical perfect storm may have been what provoked a personal wake-up call that I'm not going to discuss, but was fairly harrowing (particularly as it occurred in public).

Now I'm back on track, hopefully; making lists, checking stuff off. Downloaded, collated and entered all the Shirley Jackson Awards material I haven't gotten around to yet; did a bunch of correspondence; began to muck out my desk and bag. Two interviews and a guest-blog piece to start on, though I must admit, the fall-out from yesterday isn't exactly making me feel like promoting myself, let alone examining myself. I also have to do some inputing of notes, and really break back into "Lagan", which is still wanted by its original market.

And then there's the looming threat of A Rope of Thorns. As we already know, things are extremely behind to begin with, but then there's these subsequent formatting problems arising from programs not wanting to "talk" to other programs; I'm using Pages, which came with my MacBook Pro, but if I want anybody to be able to read a document I send them, I have to re-do it as a .doc file (and can't open it again afterwards, since the very act of opening anything on my desktop will transform it into Pages). Meanwhile, though CZP is also a Mac-based system, as far as I know, the .doc thing still isn't rooting out various weird translation fuckery (sections suddenly presenting in a different font and/or different font-size, stuff I know damn well I fixed still presenting as broken, etc.).

What makes this difficult is that I already know I have shitty habits I sometimes forget to rectify as I push myself through the initial puke-draft, and when I don't conform to their standards, I only make it more difficult for everybody involved. But...this formatting thing? I don't know what I can do about that. And I really have to slap myself to make sure I don't focus on feeling disenfranchised, resentful and hard done by, in return.

All right, whatever: I'm an adult. Back to it.

P.S.: A surprisingly level-headed entry into the whole "pirating for great social justice" meets "will you please stop talking about that CAAAAAKE?!?" quote-quote "discussion", here (http://kaigou.dreamwidth.org/404010.html). Few people seem to have found it so far, luckily, considering one of the things she's talking about is that being seen to enter the forum at all often invites attack. Which I guess means I should probably lock this entry, but...eh.

P.P.S.: Similarly, this may get interesting, later on (http://jimhines.livejournal.com/550450.html). Is there a point to being on-line, as an author? Is it necessary? Will you court fallout that can actually hurt you? Should you be required to keep your mouth shut, or open?

Comments

[kmarkhoover.livejournal.com]

I think the old axiom is true. Any publicity is good publicity. Ask E. Moon. Her sales haven't dipped any despite the shitstorm.

[handful-ofdust.livejournal.com]

As with the whole "show your ass on the Internet and that gives me justification to punish you by torrenting your books!" thing, I just get the feeling that these are the people who'd never read me anyhow. So I might as well just be who I am, and leave it at that.

[intertribal.livejournal.com]

Yes, I totally agree with this whole statement.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

I'm giggling now at the thought of being required to keep your mouth open: I'm picturing all these writers, walking around slack jawed, in perpetual amazement.

But I know what you mean.

[handful-ofdust.livejournal.com]

That there's an equal social pressure to weigh in on these discussions as there is a practical instinct to keep out of them? Yeah, that's what I meant.;)

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Sure: damned if you do and damned if you don't. I have definitely had the feeling in some cases (as with, e.g., not posting some meme or something) that failure to speak is taken as tacit support for the Bad Guys. But of course, if you do speak, you may well Do It Wrong.

[intertribal.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I agree with kmarkhoover. A few people talk-the-big-talk, but in the end it doesn't matter. Or, to quote System of a Down's best line: "The bottom line is money. Nobody gives a fuck."

Are there authors that I won't buy? Yes. But I am but one person. My goal is not to "take down the author," just to keep my own blood pressure low. But I've never had an "oh God I loved X's books but now I disagree with X's views" moment. I don't know how people manage to be so "taken by surprise," but I guess my writing is relatively political.

The piracy thing... I don't know enough to go there, but I will say I have a tough, tough time seeing it as an SJ-issue.

[baggyeyes]

Can you open it in Libre Office?

http://www.libreoffice.org/features/

You might be able to format it better there, and it saves in .doc format.

[handful-ofdust.livejournal.com]

Interesting! I'll try that.

[baggyeyes]

I don't know what's happened, but I hope it isn't as bad you think it is.

[handful-ofdust.livejournal.com]

Bad enough a cop got involved, if only for a little while. So...yeah, bad enough.

[baggyeyes]

:(

[moon-custafer.livejournal.com]

hug

[leahbobet.livejournal.com]

If you're still having formatting fuss, do you need an intermediate PC, maybe? I'd be happy to do some file conversion if it'd help.