Month: July 2012

(I’ll take “Things that Don’t Normally Go Together for $1000, Alex”…) Last Wednesday night I taught a class at the Sacramento Public Library (Robbie Waters Branch) titled “Law for the Self-Published Author.” In reality, the class includes far more than law. We talked about Twitter, marketing, writing, legal issues and scam avoidance, as well as many other topics – hopefully of interest. When I speak to groups of authors, I frequently spend the next few days pondering writing. (The fact that I’m currently reading Stephen King’s ON WRITING probably doesn’t hurt.) Writing and the Olympics have a lot in common

Last week, our series on “Publishing as a Business” looked at how authors work with editors at a traditional publishing house. As always, the series now flips to the independent side of the publishing coin – but with an unusual twist. Both traditionally-published and independent authors can work with independent editors, and many do, regardless of the manner in which their novels are published. For purposes of this post, an “independent editor” is a person who offers editorial services on a “payment for services” basis. Friends, critique partners and others often act as formal or informal editors of an author’s

In case I haven’t mentioned it – I do not live in the country. I live about half an hour east of Sacramento, California, in a generally-developed suburban area with lots of trees and easy access to important staples like Thai food, aquarium stores and Starbucks. (Granted, I think most Himalayan villages have a Starbucks now.) Which makes it somewhat surreal for me to wake up on a Tuesday morning, walk into the kitchen and find myself face to face with a three-foot TURKEY staring in through the sliding door from the backyard. For the record, this redefines “peeping Tom”

Over the weekend, I heard a radio interview with , guitarist and arranger of 100 Riffs, A Brief history of Rock N’ Roll. Simply stated: this is the most amazing guitar video you will ever see. It’s twelve minutes of jaw-dropping awesome. Do yourself a favor and watch it from start to finish. I’d embed the video here, but I couldn’t find the copyright release and I’d prefer not to end up with infringing eggs on my IP lawyer face. This link is directly to the video on YouTube. This link takes you to the video as embedded on NPR,

Japan’s famed Tokaido Road runs along the eastern coast of the island of Honshū. The road connects Toyko (formerly Edo) with the ancient capital city of Kyoto. Originally, the road contained 53 post stations (plus the endpoints of Edo and Kyoto, for a total of 55 “stops”). The stations, often located in villages or small towns along the route, contained inns and teahouses where travelers could stop for the night, obtain fresh horses, and hire porters if necessary. Where the road passed from one daimyo‘s* territory to another, travelers often needed to show travel passes, identification and other documents. Some

Yesterday’s Independence Day observance leaves today – a Thursday – orphaned between a holiday and a weekend – not an enviable position for a day to occupy. This particular Thursday has all the appeal of Monday without the preceding two days of laziness to take away the sting. More so for those of us who hosted barbecues, and stayed up far too late enjoying company, fireworks, and the leftovers that we might have grazed on as we cleaned up the kitchen after everyone departed at midnight. Might have done that. Might have regretted it this morning. But most of us

In honor of Independence Day, allow me to share some of my favorite zoanthid corals – the colorful firecrackers of my reef. These are Jokers (No surprise): Lemonade, anyone?: A green unnamed Zoanthid that’s a favorite with the sexy shrimp. Nuclear green palythoas (a relative of the zoanthids), teal palys and a feather duster worm: Some zoanthids form a mat, like these crater polyps: And, last but not least, (Tesla’s favorite) Ring of Fire: The color and shape of zoanthid polyps cause many people to mistake them for flowers or plants, but like all other coral, they’re actually animals that

July 2 is official “I Forgot Day.” The observance gives us a chance to make up for all the birthdays, special occasions and other events we forgot on the previous year – a universal mulligan for those of us whose brains are more like a sieve than a safe.  (Unfortunately, public libraries don’t recognize the observance, so this doesn’t work as a “get out of late fines free” card.) Of course, the observance only works if you remember what you’ve forgotten – and in my case, that’s a somewhat iffy condition. In the interest of obtaining maximum advantage from the