Hello, dear reader!
Yes, after an enforced week off, due to technical difficulties (a slightly broken laptop) I’m back! And, if you ask me, it’s not a moment too soon.
So, did you miss me?
Fan Zone
All in all I was without a working laptop for almost exactly a week. This wasn’t due to the extensiveness of the needed repairs (a good clear out of the fan and the internal gubbins and the removal of enough pet hair to knit a kitten—such is the price of having a dog and two and a bit cats). No, the issue was the lack of contactability of our usual I.T. specialist, alongside the backup choice popping off on holiday at exactly the wrong time. Something which, I would imagine, the bank holiday may have influenced just a touch.
With the aforementioned fan starting to do a decent impression of a lawnmower set to overdrive and let loose on the Amazon Rainforest, I erred on the side of caution and didn’t do much more than turn the machine on every now and then to see if it was still misbehaving.
And, of course, it was.
But, it being too late on a Friday afternoon to do much of anything, and with the bank holiday weekend looming, it was actually Tuesday that I grasped as my earliest opportunity to arrange a repair.
I made my calls, and the recorded messages told me it would be Thursday before my first choice would be open for business and a full week before the back up option returned to work. After a little vacillation, it was decided, between myself and my long-suffering lady love, Tina, to bite the bullet and wait for a couple of days rather than take the risk of employing someone with a Stetson, a six-shooter, and a horse called Trigger.
It was a long couple of days.
High Wires
You see, I’m not the most modern of men. I predate the internet as a domestic distraction. No, ‘in my day’ (and yes I feel old just writing that) a computer was something you accessed at work or in the college library. I’m old enough to remember the ZX Spectrum and the absolute age it took just to load a game of Ned’s Garden. I’m old enough to remember dial-up connections and the synthetic scream of getting online and of course I remember wired connections and the feeling of awe when I finally got a wireless laptop on my, uh, lap and found myself able to chat to people in different countries with no visible connections.
It meant that, as time flew by, I found myself more and more reliant on t’interwebs. My go-to hobby of reading began to slowly fade into the background. Facebook, Twitter (that’s proper Twitter, not this X cesspool), and YouTube became my diversions of choice, something I’ve taken some small steps to correct this very year.
You see, I had my aims for this year. Not resolutions. No, nothing quite as concrete as that. Just things I’d like to achieve or, at the least, have a good go at achieving. One was to publish the Noir Urban Fantasy Thriller that had been haunting my hard-drive for so long and The Heart That Died was indeed published through Amazon last month as paperback, e-book, and through Kindle Unlimited (the link is below if you fancy giving it a go). Initial sales indicate it won’t make me rich, but I’ve done it. Aim one, done!
Ready. Aim…
Aim two was to learn Turkish ahead of our holiday to Turkiye in September and, despite over a hundred days of Duolingo learning, that one is proving a little more difficult. It’s not so much the vocabulary; it’s the tenses and cases. Still, that’s aim two firmly in action.
Aim three was to read a book a month, and that one is firmly on track with The Last Death of the Year (Sophie Hannah), The Hollow Man (John Dickson Carr), The Murder in the Rue Morgue and other stories (Edgar Allan Poe), The Dose Effect (TJ Power), The Watchmaker’s Hand (Jeffrey Deaver), and Five Little Pigs (Agatha Christie) read so far.
Go. Go. Go.
Eagle-eyed readers with decent counting skills will probably realise that already totals six books in six months even though we are only three days into June. This is a direct result of having my online life curtailed to the small screen and awkward typing of phone use for a week. Cause and effect, eh?
So, did you miss me?
No? Well, that’s rude.
Fan Zone
All in all I was without a working laptop for almost exactly a week. This wasn’t due to the extensiveness of the needed repairs (a good clear out of the fan and the internal gubbins and the removal of enough pet hair to knit a kitten—such is the price of having a dog and two and a bit cats). No, the issue was the lack of contactability of our usual I.T. specialist, alongside the backup choice popping off on holiday at exactly the wrong time. Something which, I would imagine, the bank holiday may have influenced just a touch.
With the aforementioned fan starting to do a decent impression of a lawnmower set to overdrive and let loose on the Amazon Rainforest, I erred on the side of caution and didn’t do much more than turn the machine on every now and then to see if it was still misbehaving.
And, of course, it was.
But, it being too late on a Friday afternoon to do much of anything, and with the bank holiday weekend looming, it was actually Tuesday that I grasped as my earliest opportunity to arrange a repair.
I made my calls, and the recorded messages told me it would be Thursday before my first choice would be open for business and a full week before the back up option returned to work. After a little vacillation, it was decided, between myself and my long-suffering lady love, Tina, to bite the bullet and wait for a couple of days rather than take the risk of employing someone with a Stetson, a six-shooter, and a horse called Trigger.
It was a long couple of days.
High Wires
You see, I’m not the most modern of men. I predate the internet as a domestic distraction. No, ‘in my day’ (and yes I feel old just writing that) a computer was something you accessed at work or in the college library. I’m old enough to remember the ZX Spectrum and the absolute age it took just to load a game of Ned’s Garden. I’m old enough to remember dial-up connections and the synthetic scream of getting online and of course I remember wired connections and the feeling of awe when I finally got a wireless laptop on my, uh, lap and found myself able to chat to people in different countries with no visible connections.
It meant that, as time flew by, I found myself more and more reliant on t’interwebs. My go-to hobby of reading began to slowly fade into the background. Facebook, Twitter (that’s proper Twitter, not this X cesspool), and YouTube became my diversions of choice, something I’ve taken some small steps to correct this very year.
You see, I had my aims for this year. Not resolutions. No, nothing quite as concrete as that. Just things I’d like to achieve or, at the least, have a good go at achieving. One was to publish the Noir Urban Fantasy Thriller that had been haunting my hard-drive for so long and The Heart That Died was indeed published through Amazon last month as paperback, e-book, and through Kindle Unlimited (the link is below if you fancy giving it a go). Initial sales indicate it won’t make me rich, but I’ve done it. Aim one, done!
Ready. Aim…
Aim two was to learn Turkish ahead of our holiday to Turkiye in September and, despite over a hundred days of Duolingo learning, that one is proving a little more difficult. It’s not so much the vocabulary; it’s the tenses and cases. Still, that’s aim two firmly in action.
Aim three was to read a book a month, and that one is firmly on track with The Last Death of the Year (Sophie Hannah), The Hollow Man (John Dickson Carr), The Murder in the Rue Morgue and other stories (Edgar Allan Poe), The Dose Effect (TJ Power), The Watchmaker’s Hand (Jeffrey Deaver), and Five Little Pigs (Agatha Christie) read so far.
Go. Go. Go.
Eagle-eyed readers with decent counting skills will probably realise that already totals six books in six months even though we are only three days into June. This is a direct result of having my online life curtailed to the small screen and awkward typing of phone use for a week. Cause and effect, eh?
It underlines a point. Maybe I should curtail the mindless scrolling just a tad. Maybe, as with my new writing regime (two hours a day on book number two of The Charlie Durant Investigations, no excuses), I need to implement a little bit of structure to my routine and view online activities as a reward for work well done. Maybe I need to raise my head from the screen and, to coin a phrase, do something less boring instead (and if you get that reference feel free to feel old too).
Until next time!
#
Hey, there! If you enjoyed reading any of the above, why not take a look at some of my published work? Below you’ll find links to a number of short stories I’m lucky enough to have included in anthologies. I’d love to know what you think. My debut novel, The Heart That Died, is available now as both paperback, E-book, and on Kindle Unlimited, so I’m adding the link to that, too.
Oh, and if you like what you look-see, a nice, positive review would also be most welcome.
The Heart That Died
New Tales Of Old
Death Ship
Pestilence: Drabbles 1
Reaperman: Drabbles 3
The Musketeers Vs Cthulhu
Eldritch Investigations
Until next time!
#
Hey, there! If you enjoyed reading any of the above, why not take a look at some of my published work? Below you’ll find links to a number of short stories I’m lucky enough to have included in anthologies. I’d love to know what you think. My debut novel, The Heart That Died, is available now as both paperback, E-book, and on Kindle Unlimited, so I’m adding the link to that, too.
Oh, and if you like what you look-see, a nice, positive review would also be most welcome.
The Heart That Died
New Tales Of Old
Death Ship
Pestilence: Drabbles 1
Reaperman: Drabbles 3
The Musketeers Vs Cthulhu
Eldritch Investigations
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