Yeah, I really should write some kind-of update here. It is getting on toward the end of the year, and I don't think I've written many journal entries or news updates. I've been doing more micro-updates on Twitter and Facebook, which aren't really that interesting. Movies I've been watching. Books I've been reading. Word count updates. Oh, you have to go to Goodreads for the books I've been reading updates.
So, yeah, little drips and drabs, but nothing much terribly coherent. As if these journal entries tend to be overly coherent, but that's as much by design as accident. I mean, I never set out for these entries to be coherent. The only reason I didn't label this section rant rather than journal was out of a certain amount of self-amused pretentiousness and rant just has a certain connotation that I didn't want to get into.
I'll refer to these journal entries as rants as much as I like, but I just don't feel like calling the whole entire category by that name. As stated above, journal entry just has the right amount of amusing pretentiousness that appeals to me something awful.
Anyway, not much time for doing much of anything these days, and writing journal entries to keep my old website updated has fallen way, way down my list of things to do. The primary concern has been to keep working on my wonderful little piece-of-shit keep my hand in Shakespeare Project. Actually, it is kind-of a surprise that I haven't written more journal entries while working on this project. While working on The Etymology of Fire, I felt really fired-up to keep the journal updated, or at least, that's how I remember it. I think part of the reason I don't have that same drive with the Shakespeare Project is because of how reluctant I am to talk about this project.
It's really hard to describe without mentioning which play I'm adapting or the ways in which I'm adapting it, and I've been really paranoid about the possibility someone could work out what I'm doing and beat me to it. No, really. How hard is it to do an adaptation when you simply don't care and just want to get to the end? That was the idea I started with. I was going to write something I didn't overly care about and already had a pretty strong structure. Of course, me being me, I've made some rather radical modifications. Just as an example, none of the characters have the same names as their source characters from the play.
As for plot and structure, reading the book is going to be more like occasionally being reminded by bits that resemble bits from the play. So, I suppose I could talk more about it; however, if anybody was bothering to pay attention, realized what I was doing, realized that it would be possible to crank something out quickly, they could then claim I was copying them or some such nonsense.
Anyway, I'm feeling particularly paranoid, and I've become fascinated enough by my little piece-of-shit endeavor that the thought of someone beating me to the end and then being able to claim I'm the copycat would just make me shit something awful. So, yeah, not much interest in keeping this updated.
Also, not so much time or energy to work on all these little projects. Trying to keep the writing going. That's the important bit. I don't always know what I'm doing from writing jag to writing jag. I frequently sit at the computer, writing this pretty exclusively on the computer, and realize that I basically have no idea what should happen in the next scene. This does not stop me from then proceeding to write something. It usually works out. I haven't had to delete any text yet; although, following me on Twitter should actually be fairly amusing, as the tweets tend to be along the lines of describing the writing in fairly unflattering terms.
There's a lot of people are either going to love this or hate it tweets. When I look back over what I've written, I most definitely fall into the this shit is awesome camp, so at least I'm entertained. That's the main thing, I guess. It's not like I force people to read my shit or even require people to pay for the privilege of reading my shit. You just have to know where to get the available to read for free copy complete with the little bit about paying for a copy if you like what you read. Yes, I'm weird that way. No idea how I expect to make a living at this kind-of thing and finally junk the time-consuming, soul-crushing day job if I keep making my shit available for free. Oh, well. Just relying on the kindness of strangers, I guess. Okay, you can stop laughing now. Told you I was weird.
Other little projects include redesigning the website. It's sort of done. I mean the basic layout is done. It's more a matter of getting around to finishing the transition from the old to the new. Really, the main difference is a slightly modified color scheme and everything is centered rather than crammed into the left edge.
I'm also very, very slowly updating the String Finger Theatre files so I can finally produce an ePub version and maybe even a Create Space dead-tree version. This project seems to be incredibly low on my list.
Of slightly more interest to me is a redesign of the ePub copies of the books. Sigil is all the way up to version 0.6, which has some nice interface improvements, and LibreOffice 3.6 can save HTML files fairly cleanly. Oh, speaking of which, version 0.6? Version 0.6? I don't get that at all. If you've unleashed it on the general public or otherwise stuck it somewhere people can download and install and use, then isn't it version 1? I mean, sure, you don't want to claim it's done and all of that, but if people can download and use, then it's version 1, by definition. It's freaking version 1. Yeah, I don't get it. Don't get it at all.
Oh, right, digression over, I'm completely redesigning the formatting of the ePub books. It's greatly simplified code. I have no idea how it will look on the front end. I mean, it could look exactly the same on the front end, but the back end will be completely and utterly different. You'll actually be able to look at the xhtml code and be able to understand it. None of this crap that automatic conversion tools throw in there for absolutely no good reason I can understand. Oh, sure, maybe the conversion tools are just being thorough or otherwise just being stupid, but that's not my point.
It's still amuses me greatly that electronic books use the exact same code as websites. Don't know why I find it so amusing but there you are.