For Christmas this year, Nate got me a Kindle.
The great things about it:
Download books pretty much anywhere and everywhere, with very little waiting. Download time is fast.
Holds up to 200 or so books, and more if you get an extra memory card. We're currently living in a small apartment, so saving space right now is a big plus for me.
Saves paper, if you're into that sort of thing.
You can download sample chapers to check out the book before you buy.
New books (currently in hardback) are typically $9.99 or so versus $20-whatever.
Convenient if you're a frequent traveler. You don't have to lug a bunch of heavy books around, and if you finish all you've brought before your trip is over, just download more.
You can "clip" sections and save them to refer to later. You can also bookmark.
You can also subscribe to magazines, newspapers, and blogs.
Easy-to-read screen and it's easy to use.
The not-so-great:
Kinda hard to share digital books. One of my favorite things is passing on books I think others will like. Even with my spouse it would be tough to share, unless I'm willing to give up the Kindle for a while.
It's an electronic device and my primary reading time is during lunch. I'm eating and drinking and trying not to drip. Not a deal breaker, by any means, but you have to be more careful with the Kindle than a paperback.
You spend a lot more money on books. This is good and bad. But with no waiting for a trip to the bookstore or shipping from Amazon, you get instant gratification. I'm glad I'm supporting writers by buying their books, but man, I'm spending a lot more money in this area than I normally do.
The buttons. The way the Kindle is currently designed, it's really easy to accidentally go to the next page or the previous page when you don't intend to because your fingers hit the buttons on the side of the Kindle. I've read that this design element is being addressed in the next incarnation, so eventually this won't be an issue.
Image quality is very poor. I would not buy a book on the Kindle that had pictures or other images that I wanted to study in detail. I also wouldn't subscribe to magazines where images are important, like say, an architectural or art magazine. The grainy images are frustrating.
Some libraries offer e-books the way they let you check out normal books. This isn't the case in Austin so this falls on the "con" side of the list for me. But if Austin offered this service, it would obviously go to the other side of the list.
Not all books are available on the Kindle.
Aside from these mostly minor complaints, the Kindle is pretty much the perfect gift for me. I love to read, but would never have bought this for myself due to the price. Right now I'm inhaling books and reading a ton more than I had in recent years. And maybe by making it easier to get books (in whatever platform, including iPhones) the publishing industry won't go down in flames the way it currently seems to be doing. We can hope.
Saturday
Sunday
2009, Resolutions, Writing
2008 was full, busy, and stressful. The first part of the year found Nate and I learning how to be parents, working full time, and making a few big decisions. In the spring of '08 shortly after an Easter trip to Austin, we decided to take the plunge and move to Austin. It was a decision we struggled over, but once it was made we kept going. We spent most of the spring getting the house ready to sell and then we started looking for jobs. I moved to Austin in June and Nate moved here in late July. We spent six weeks taking turns traveling to see each other on weekends, I got a taste of the single parent life during the work week, and we infringed on our friends' hospitality by staying in their guest room for a couple of months. We also worried our house wouldn't sell, since the mortgage industry started crumbling almost immediately afer we put our house on the market. But things worked out. Two weeks after we signed a lease on an apartment we got an offer (of course).
Nate and I are finally starting to relax. After so many months of struggle and stress, things have really calmed down. We're in a holding pattern until our lease ends. Since we don't have a house, thus no landscaping or home projects, most weekends we spend hanging out. We go to Zilker pretty often. We eat out an awful lot (probably too much). I think we're so used to stress, both of us are waiting for something bad to happen. All this ease seems deceptive somehow. But, I'm starting to suspect this easy time is what we "earned" after all that work. We're starting to have time for ourselves and our interests again.
So, one of my resolutions this year involves time. I get requests for freelance work randomly, yet regularly. I usually say yes because I have a hard time saying no. I also get a sense of security from it, because in these wacky economic times, it seems like it's a good idea to have more than one iron the fire. But ... it interferes with a lot of things. I'll start working out, then get a gig so I won't work out for several days because I have to do freelance after work and after Zoe goes to bed, which means I am up late. I'm tired, don't have energy, and all my free time goes to that gig. I meet the deadline and I start working out again, then the process repeats itself. What it means is I sort of start over and over, instead of being consistent and building up progress. So I've decided to stop doing freelance work. I just said no to editing a book-length manuscript. It was tough (the whole saying "no" thing) and it sounded like an interesting book, but I really want to focus on my health, my family, and my own work.
I've had the idea for my next writing project for a while, but like working out, I'd start dipping my toes in and then have a freelance assignment to do. So the no freelance will help on that end as well. I spend a lot of time thinking before I write so having free time is critical for me to work on something creative. I need a lot of time to daydream. Taps into a different part of my brain, I suppose.
That kind of brings up my old, completed project. I've been submitting my novel to agents when I have time. (Another thing not freelancing will help me do!) In my head I have a number of submissions I think it's reasonable to make. I don't know if that number is realistic or arbitrary, but it seems like a reasonable number to me. I am 40% of the way to that number. I have gotten requests for partial or full manuscripts to almost half of the queries I've sent out, which isn't bad since I haven't gotten responses to approximately one-fifth of those same queries. (Is all this math making your head hurt yet?) I had started getting some really nice rejection notes, which gave me hope that it was a matter of time and finding the right agent. Then the bad economic times hit publishing and Black Wednesday took its toll on the industry. I started worrying that it was unlikely I'd find an agent or an editor willing to take a shot on a new writer during such troubled times. But you know, Nate and I found jobs and sold our house in the middle of all this mess. Maybe my luck will hold just a little bit longer.
Here's my resolutions list.
Make my family the priority--spending time together, cooking nice meals instead of defaulting to our boring standards all the time, having fun with Nate and Zoe, loving on them a lot, and reinstating date night.
Continue looking for an agent.
Live like a writer: make my own writing, not freelancing, my goal during my free time. Write in my journal, work on my next project, go to readings, connect with other writers.
Take better care of myself. Be consistent with yoga and running, eat healthy more often, get enough sleep.
Get to know Austin again. Go to events, festivals, explore things I haven't tried here before.
Continue paying off debt. We've made a lot of progress on this front and just need to keep our momentum going.
Have more fun. After all the work we've done the past half year, I think we're due a few good times.
Nate and I are finally starting to relax. After so many months of struggle and stress, things have really calmed down. We're in a holding pattern until our lease ends. Since we don't have a house, thus no landscaping or home projects, most weekends we spend hanging out. We go to Zilker pretty often. We eat out an awful lot (probably too much). I think we're so used to stress, both of us are waiting for something bad to happen. All this ease seems deceptive somehow. But, I'm starting to suspect this easy time is what we "earned" after all that work. We're starting to have time for ourselves and our interests again.
So, one of my resolutions this year involves time. I get requests for freelance work randomly, yet regularly. I usually say yes because I have a hard time saying no. I also get a sense of security from it, because in these wacky economic times, it seems like it's a good idea to have more than one iron the fire. But ... it interferes with a lot of things. I'll start working out, then get a gig so I won't work out for several days because I have to do freelance after work and after Zoe goes to bed, which means I am up late. I'm tired, don't have energy, and all my free time goes to that gig. I meet the deadline and I start working out again, then the process repeats itself. What it means is I sort of start over and over, instead of being consistent and building up progress. So I've decided to stop doing freelance work. I just said no to editing a book-length manuscript. It was tough (the whole saying "no" thing) and it sounded like an interesting book, but I really want to focus on my health, my family, and my own work.
I've had the idea for my next writing project for a while, but like working out, I'd start dipping my toes in and then have a freelance assignment to do. So the no freelance will help on that end as well. I spend a lot of time thinking before I write so having free time is critical for me to work on something creative. I need a lot of time to daydream. Taps into a different part of my brain, I suppose.
That kind of brings up my old, completed project. I've been submitting my novel to agents when I have time. (Another thing not freelancing will help me do!) In my head I have a number of submissions I think it's reasonable to make. I don't know if that number is realistic or arbitrary, but it seems like a reasonable number to me. I am 40% of the way to that number. I have gotten requests for partial or full manuscripts to almost half of the queries I've sent out, which isn't bad since I haven't gotten responses to approximately one-fifth of those same queries. (Is all this math making your head hurt yet?) I had started getting some really nice rejection notes, which gave me hope that it was a matter of time and finding the right agent. Then the bad economic times hit publishing and Black Wednesday took its toll on the industry. I started worrying that it was unlikely I'd find an agent or an editor willing to take a shot on a new writer during such troubled times. But you know, Nate and I found jobs and sold our house in the middle of all this mess. Maybe my luck will hold just a little bit longer.
Here's my resolutions list.
Make my family the priority--spending time together, cooking nice meals instead of defaulting to our boring standards all the time, having fun with Nate and Zoe, loving on them a lot, and reinstating date night.
Continue looking for an agent.
Live like a writer: make my own writing, not freelancing, my goal during my free time. Write in my journal, work on my next project, go to readings, connect with other writers.
Take better care of myself. Be consistent with yoga and running, eat healthy more often, get enough sleep.
Get to know Austin again. Go to events, festivals, explore things I haven't tried here before.
Continue paying off debt. We've made a lot of progress on this front and just need to keep our momentum going.
Have more fun. After all the work we've done the past half year, I think we're due a few good times.
Thursday
Reform
Usually when I read about immigration reform it elicits an involuntary eye roll. Perfect example:
Every few weeks for nearly four years, the Secret Service screened the IDs of employees for a Maryland cleaning company before they entered the house of Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, the nation's top immigration official.
The company's owner says the workers sailed through the checks -- although some of them turned out to be illegal immigrants.
...
"Our people need to know," said the Montgomery County businessman. "Our Homeland Security can't police their own home. How can they police our borders?"
The whole article.
Every few weeks for nearly four years, the Secret Service screened the IDs of employees for a Maryland cleaning company before they entered the house of Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, the nation's top immigration official.
The company's owner says the workers sailed through the checks -- although some of them turned out to be illegal immigrants.
...
"Our people need to know," said the Montgomery County businessman. "Our Homeland Security can't police their own home. How can they police our borders?"
The whole article.
Friday
Life with Z
I know I need to write more often. Right now the gaps are so long that when I do write, I have way too much to say and it’s hard to figure out what to focus on. I’ve been using Twitter a lot more, so I find myself doing mini-updates there, but grandmas don’t read Twitter and they aren’t getting their Zoe fix.
The big Zoe news is that she has started using the potty, more or less. She’s 18 months old and I assumed we’d be waiting till around two before real “training” started. All we’d done was introduced her to the potty and let her sit on it whenever she seemed inclined. Mainly she treated it like another game and would grab her bath toys (which sit in a basket between her potty and the tab) and throw them in the potty and close the lid. But within the past couple of weeks she’d started playing a lot with her diapers doing things like this
and this
, and I started wondering if maybe she was trying to tell us something.
At daycare she moved up to the toddler class and she is one of the younger kids, if not the youngest. A lot of the older kids use the potty. I talked to her teachers and they said if I thought she was ready, they would take her, too. On the first day (which I think was this past Monday) she went and used the potty successfully with everyone else. So we started trying at home. Essentially we’re guessing and putting her on the potty at typical times we’d think she’d use it and we’re guessing correctly about two times a day. We’re not to the point when she actively tells us she needs to go. I think she is still figuring out how everything fits together. I guess I should probably read a book about this but after my fiasco with “sleep training,” I’m inclined to go with common sense. And until she learns what the sensation of needing to go is, and is able to communicate that to us in time to get to the bathroom, I don’t think we can make the next step. Next step in my mind is pull-ups or big girl underwear. We’ll see how it goes. I still think she’s pretty young and I expect a few bumps along the way. I’m excited she is even interested in the potty as something other than a receptacle for toys! Maybe I’ll break down and read some typical potty training advice but right now “experts” are bugging me.
In general, I’m really enjoying toddlerhood. Zoe’s communicating a lot more. She says please, milk, more, and shoe in sign language, for example and random words pop out, or at least what sound like words to me, like “that’s it.” She’s still hard to understand. Diaper is something like “die-puh” and hello is something like “hiyoo!” but we’re getting there. She’s very independent and wants to do a lot of things herself. She also has very definite ideas about shoes. Sometimes I’ll grab a pair and she shakes her head and goes to grab another set. Very often they do not match and she’s discarded the ones that would be really cute with her outfit, but I have chosen not to care. Moving on! Not going to argue with an 18-month-old over shoes, especially when I know I won’t win. At least not without a lot of tears and screaming and who needs that in the morning before you’ve had any coffee? She also occasionally shows us she’s ready to go to sleep by doing things like walking to her bed and lying down (lol).
She’s pretty fearless. She’s gotten into the phase where she wants to climb up on everything, furniture, boxes, whatever. She’s doing the same at daycare and while one teacher likes that Zoe is “rough and tumble” and admires the fact that she doesn’t cry very often when she falls or jumps off things, another teacher has asked us to remind Zoe that her “walking feet” belong on the ground so we stay safe. We’re trying to reinforce this at home but have had some pretty funny experiences at playgrounds when the child launches herself off equipment. And without fail she always wants to go down the biggest slide, try to climb the big kids’ stuff (and her little legs and arms are often too short to reach the rungs), and generally is pretty rough and tumble. She likes climbing up the stairs outside our apartment and will consent to having her hand held.
She’s also very affectionate. She gives lots of kisses and hugs. Sometimes I think I miss her infancy, when she was so tiny and I held her more. But this phase is pretty exciting, too. She’s now more than half my length (not that that’s hard, I’m a shortie) and developing more into her own person every day.
Next update: thoughts on my novel and publishing.
The big Zoe news is that she has started using the potty, more or less. She’s 18 months old and I assumed we’d be waiting till around two before real “training” started. All we’d done was introduced her to the potty and let her sit on it whenever she seemed inclined. Mainly she treated it like another game and would grab her bath toys (which sit in a basket between her potty and the tab) and throw them in the potty and close the lid. But within the past couple of weeks she’d started playing a lot with her diapers doing things like this
and this
, and I started wondering if maybe she was trying to tell us something.At daycare she moved up to the toddler class and she is one of the younger kids, if not the youngest. A lot of the older kids use the potty. I talked to her teachers and they said if I thought she was ready, they would take her, too. On the first day (which I think was this past Monday) she went and used the potty successfully with everyone else. So we started trying at home. Essentially we’re guessing and putting her on the potty at typical times we’d think she’d use it and we’re guessing correctly about two times a day. We’re not to the point when she actively tells us she needs to go. I think she is still figuring out how everything fits together. I guess I should probably read a book about this but after my fiasco with “sleep training,” I’m inclined to go with common sense. And until she learns what the sensation of needing to go is, and is able to communicate that to us in time to get to the bathroom, I don’t think we can make the next step. Next step in my mind is pull-ups or big girl underwear. We’ll see how it goes. I still think she’s pretty young and I expect a few bumps along the way. I’m excited she is even interested in the potty as something other than a receptacle for toys! Maybe I’ll break down and read some typical potty training advice but right now “experts” are bugging me.
In general, I’m really enjoying toddlerhood. Zoe’s communicating a lot more. She says please, milk, more, and shoe in sign language, for example and random words pop out, or at least what sound like words to me, like “that’s it.” She’s still hard to understand. Diaper is something like “die-puh” and hello is something like “hiyoo!” but we’re getting there. She’s very independent and wants to do a lot of things herself. She also has very definite ideas about shoes. Sometimes I’ll grab a pair and she shakes her head and goes to grab another set. Very often they do not match and she’s discarded the ones that would be really cute with her outfit, but I have chosen not to care. Moving on! Not going to argue with an 18-month-old over shoes, especially when I know I won’t win. At least not without a lot of tears and screaming and who needs that in the morning before you’ve had any coffee? She also occasionally shows us she’s ready to go to sleep by doing things like walking to her bed and lying down (lol).
She’s pretty fearless. She’s gotten into the phase where she wants to climb up on everything, furniture, boxes, whatever. She’s doing the same at daycare and while one teacher likes that Zoe is “rough and tumble” and admires the fact that she doesn’t cry very often when she falls or jumps off things, another teacher has asked us to remind Zoe that her “walking feet” belong on the ground so we stay safe. We’re trying to reinforce this at home but have had some pretty funny experiences at playgrounds when the child launches herself off equipment. And without fail she always wants to go down the biggest slide, try to climb the big kids’ stuff (and her little legs and arms are often too short to reach the rungs), and generally is pretty rough and tumble. She likes climbing up the stairs outside our apartment and will consent to having her hand held.
She’s also very affectionate. She gives lots of kisses and hugs. Sometimes I think I miss her infancy, when she was so tiny and I held her more. But this phase is pretty exciting, too. She’s now more than half my length (not that that’s hard, I’m a shortie) and developing more into her own person every day.
Next update: thoughts on my novel and publishing.