Some things I've been working on are taking much longer than I expected. Much, much longer. There are other projects I'm anxious to restart and really dig into but I can't until I've dealt with my current frustrating work. It keeps me awake at night, but today I took a deep breath.
I'm not as successful or prolific as some authors I know. I don't have a 'big' contract with a traditional publisher. No writing conferences are asking me a year ahead of time to be the keynote speaker. My laptop is old and slow, my desktop older. My printer has some trouble pulling the paper in. It really doesn't like the expensive stuff.
But, I have numerous contracts for my romance books with a pretty great small publisher, New Concepts. I have been invited to be part of an author panel at a local independent bookstore. My laptop is still kicking and I'm buying more memory for it. And I don't really need to print out much stuff so I'm not investing in a new printer anytime soon. Things are going okay.
Sometimes I overthink problems when the solution is simple. My new mind set is to keep it simple, step away when I get frustrated and ask for help more often.
On the good news front, I read in our local paper today that a 'Books A Million' is taking over the location of our late Borders. I've never been in a BAM, but I'll be thrilled to have a bookstore close to my house again(and a coffeeshop).
Can any of you tell me about BAM? What's your most recent simple solution?
11 comments:
Hugs, hon! I tend to over think a lot, too, and I stress myself out to the point of physical pain. I'm dealing with a really bad foot cramp because of it. You're doing what you can do and plugging along so that is great. I'm plugging along on an old desktop too. I don't even have a laptop. :)
BAM is pretty great, they have a huge selection. Not a personal touch so much, but maybe that's just my particular location. It'll be great to have book store, though. :)
Duct tape fixes all! Now it comes in decorative colors, even pink and lavendar for the ladies.
Duct tape is the universal answer. Don't recommend using it on your computer though unless you intend to hold it hostage.
Books A Million is lame in our area.
People with Big 6 contracts have troubles too. Tomorrow Ruth Harris is posting on our blog about the horrors of getting what you wish for.
I very much relate to slogging through with ancient technology. My 9 year old desktop turns into a brick whenever McAfee starts "updating" anti-virus stuff without warning. It can take 5 minutes to load a website. I've been working 14 hour days for months, trying to get two books finished and three others launched. I know my days would be more like 11 hours long if I had a faster computer. But I've gotta hope that one day those books will make enough money to buy me a new one. Maybe even a Mac that doesn't have to run anti-virus stuff at all.
Good luck on all of it. And yes, I love me some lavender duct tape!
WD-40 is awesome. So is duct tape, actually.
I've never been inside a Books A Million--I've only heard it mentioned on blogs. Hope they have good books. :)
Hate BAM! So disorganized and the employees are book people. Every single store is exactly the same, too. They are also extremely difficult to get into for author appearances. We have one in our town but I refuse to go there.
The only BAMs I knew were in Beaumont and Houston, TX and I loved them. They were huge and clean and I'd spend the whole day there browsing.
Now I live in the middle of nowhere and would settle for ANY bookstore.
Keep on chugging along, Sue! You'll get it worked out.
I love that flow chart. So true.
I've never been in a BAM. Hope it'll be a good addition for you.
Just found your site. I am no one important, but, do you have a small sample of your work?
John, you can download the first 205 of The Keepers of Sulbreth at Smashwords. Hope you enjoy it.
Love the flow chart.
I too just found out that Books A Million is coming to my town too. I've never been in one so I'm curious to see what they have to offer.
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