Mixes!

Got the mixdown from the engineer on Sunday. I have listened to it on 7 different players with headphones and without and in the car. I think there are five major changes overall, and we're good to go on this.

Clearing up The Ol' Schedule...

I finished all the work I can on a recording studio's site, on the machining site, on another recording studio's site, and on an Irish law site that I can until I get more information and/or feedback from each of them. In the meantime, I have to work out a quote for another client.

I got a sign for my business today. Four-foot by eight-foot sign that will go out front to advertise. I really feel like this will help bring in customers, though I do really wish my office was set up in the porch. However, that is not currently possible. Still, having a real office space would be really, really nice.

The tonsillitis appears to be clearing up.

I talked to the engineer the other night, and I hope to have a copy of the mixed tracks for the album by the end of the week. I really want to hear them, dissect them, and get this thing finished. I am still not decided about the CDs, though; still waffling on the black CD with vinyl coating versus a silver CD with a label silkscreened on that just looks like an old 45 RPM record. On the one hand, the vinyl coated ones will look freaking awesome and really professional; on the other hand, I am worried that they might not play, based on a black CD the kids had of a video game for the PS2. And I can't decide if it's worth the risk for the look.

Feeling A Little Better...

I went to the doctor yesterday and got antibiotics for the tonsillitis. I took one pill yesterday, and, today, I woke up for the first time in a week without excruciating pain at the back of my throat. Swallowing has been difficult and extremely painful, but today, I'm not even taking pain pills to get through the day. I feel almost human.

So, I had a night to myself on Friday night and wrote a new song rather than working. I am not in love with this song; it's a little like having an ugly baby, I guess. It's not bad. It's just not as good as some of my other songs.

Saturday, we had band practice, and that actually went really well, despite my tonsillitis. I actually sang decently (even if I didn't have my normal range), and we all played well.

Sunday, I went out to the studio to mix the recording. We got there about 1PM and didn't leave until almost 10PM. But, we got the mixing done, and the record sounds pretty darned good (I'd say "awesome" but I didn't get a copy to make sure).

Updates...

So, I haven't felt any better over the last couple of days, and I still don't. I am burned out, wiped out, and just plain tired. Since I have been sick, I have been having trouble sleeping.

Yesterday, I went into Spokane and got the tracks the were processed at the other studio. I also signed the contract to perform at the Coeur d'Alene Resort on the 18th and 19th of December, and I went to class. On theway home, we dropped the CD with the autotuned vocals off with the engineer, and, on Sunday, I am going into to the first mixdown session. I am not holding my hand over my ass that it will be the only mixdown session, but I really, really, really, REALLY hope that it is. I am ready for this project to be done.

We have band practice tomorrow, then I'm in the studio Sunday, Steelers play on Monday, and then I have a metric shit load of work to do. At least the class in Spokane is canceled for next Thursday, so I, in effect, have an extra day this coming week.

Ow

I banged my head REALLY hard tonight. I was cleaning up a bunch of papers on the floor that were just under the edge of the hanging shelves near my table. I raised up and smacked the top of my head but good. It hurt like the dickens for a long time. I saw stars. Kenny thinks I have a concussion.

Didn't do a shittin' thing today. Must rectify that presently.

I Am Not Feeling Well...

I wasn't feeling well yesterday when I woke up, either, but today, I feel even worse. Yesterday, I was having panic attacks, and today, my throat is sore, I have a mild fever, and I feel like my bones are hollow and filled with helium. I also feel a headache coming on.

Despite this, I have to work on the paper for school, start thinking about the next paper, read four articles and start preparing presentations for class in Spokane, work on content for four sites and prepare a quote for a fifth. There are other projects, too, but nothing that time consuming or pressing.

Busy Stuff

Things are about to get really busy school-wise. I have to go over the first paper from my Spokane class and get that turned in before next Thursday, and then the second (and longer) paper will be due a couple weeks after that. This is a problem because I have NO FREAKING CLUE what I am going to write about or what method I am going to use to dissect it. I have to figure that out by next Thursday. Otherwise, I won't have enough time to put everything together before the paper is due. Additionally, I am scheduled to present a chapter from the textbook to the class and I haven't even read the chapter. I also have to prepare a presentation for the class from the other textbook. These last two things are due November 19th. Then, I have to present examples from the second project the following week. So, a lot of projects are coming due all of a sudden. Luckily, the class is over Dec. 5th.

In the meantime, I have to finish the web site for one client, do updates to another site, prepare a new quote for a third client as to his SEO, build another site for a fourth client, and talk to a couple of local businesses about web sites they've expressed interest in. I also have to write content for two other sites (sites 5 and 6, if you're counting). Le sigh.

We Had A Show

Our show Saturday went really well. I'm sorry if you missed it. It was awesome. :)

Cool Video

MY BOOK IS IN PRINT!!!

I Am Having A REALLY Bad Day...

You know that car I got back yesterday? It's not driveable... again.

I drove myself to the studio tonight, and things went really well, I thought. I was singing only to ther rhythm guitar track, so the vocals turned out fairly awesome, I think. I guess the proof will be in the pudding, so the old cliche goes, when I get copies of the tracks so far.

Shortly after that, I went to leave, but my car wouldn't start. I could hear the solenoid running, and things try to turn on, and dome light would come on, but the starter wasn't getting any power. So, I had the engineer give me a jump start, but it was obvious there was something wrong with the alternator. So, I tried to drive home, anyway. But the lights were getting dimmer and dimmer by the second. While I am on the curvy, twisty Fertile Valley Road headed toward the 4-lanes, I meet this car. And do you know what that accident of nature did? He kept brighting his lights at me! Brightdimbrightdimbrightdim... and then... BRIGHT. I'm like, "M*****F*****!!! I already KNOW!!! DUUUUUUHHHHHHH!" I mean, seriously: what thought processes must have been at work there? "Oh, there's a car with really dim lights. I'll bright 'em and blind 'em."

Cheese and rice!

I eventually - creeping along at about 10 MPH - make it out to the 4-lanes, but, I don't get on. Instead, I stopped near the entrance to the road, and called Kenny to see what I should do. He said that I should wait there for him, and to put the car in a safe spot. I went to back up, and it died, and it would not be restarted. So, I opened the door and the dome light came on. I left it like that so people might have a chance of seeing me.

Eventually, Kenny and my cousin - the mechanic - showed up, and they got it started by jumping it again. Lights got dim really fast, and, by the time I hit Scotia Road, it was dying again. So, we pulled over, and jumped it again. This time, my cousin adjusted something in the alternator, and we all thought that it was going to work. No such luck. I got about a quarter of a mile on the Newport side of Diamond Lake, and it died for good. The battery would no longer take a charge.

By now, I had had it. I went to call a tow truck, but they didn't answer. Kenny called my other cousin who was at the house watching the kids while they were rescuing me, and had him bring my mechanic cousin's pick-up over to us to tow the freaking car home.

Have you ever driven a car with power brakes and power steering when it has no power? At night? With no headlights? On a chain? With only one very slow trip of being towed ever before under your belt?

Well, don't. It's not fun. I was so afraid that I was gonna hit that truck. I was standing on the brake with both feet the whole time, trying not to hyperventilate from the stress of chain towing the car that I had just spent $1,300 repairing... God... it was a HORRIBLE night.

While I was back on Fertile Valley Road, I prayed that God would help my car to just get it home. It died the first time just shortly thereafter as God gave me the middle finger.

I Got My Car Back!!

Good as new!

I am going to the studio tonight. I am doing the lead vocals. I listened to the demo tracks I did at that same studio in May for a metronomed demo to build the rest of the songs around. The vocal track on the May demo was clear, and about 99.9% in tune. When I did the tracks in May, I was singing to just an acoustic guitar, so I could hear the vocals really well. So, tonight, I plan to sing to just the electric rhythm track throughout. Hopefully, we'll get an awesome result that way. It won't hurt to try.

Grrr...

I guess I shouldn't be whining too much. I bought the camera in November of 2006. Still, only three years of sporadic use out of a camera? Seems a little on the "short-lived" side. Anyway, I've been having trouble with it, and suspected the battery as it was obviously some kind of power issue. So, I bought a new battery (at the cost of $18 for the battery and $20-some odd dollars for shipping). Mom brought it to me today; it was delivered to her place sometime last week.

Anyway, I charged the new battery and put it in the camera. Guess what?!?! It wasn't the battery. So, after football got over, I went to Kodak's web site and went through their troubleshooter, which, to no surprise from me, determined that it was a much more serious problem. After spending nearly half and hour trying to find the exact date that I purchased it, it turns out that it is no longer under warranty (again, cue lack of shock from me), and the site provided me with two options: either send Kodak the camera and $200 (plus $48 shipping) for maybe getting it repaired (they might send me a remanufactured one, if they couldn't fix mine) or getting $25 off an order in their store.

So, not willing to spend another $248 on a 3-year-old camera, I looked through their prices, and compared those with the prices at Dell, and found a Fuji 12x optical zoom, 5.7x digital zoom, 10MP digital camera with a 4GB SDHC memory card for $211. What a deal. According to the e-mail, I should get it October 1st.

Other things happening: my books are being shipped from the printer, so I am about to update the web site with pre-order stuff for A Night Borrowed. I don't know what it is with people, either, but, every time I tell someone that I wrote a book, they want a copy... for free. Exactly where is this kosher? Because, if I haven't spent more than a minute with you on the phone (and I called you), then we're probably not friends, and I am not going to give you a free copy of my book. I don't care who the hell you are. It's the same thing with CDs. For some reason, people seem to get it into their heads that, if they've spoken to me for 10 minutes at a bar that I somehow owe them a copy of my CD for free. Not happening. Same thing with books.

And don't get me started on "friends" wanting web sites from me... for FREE. I mean, honestly, unless I've offered to do something for you for nothing, then it's probably not going to happen for nothing. I do this for a LIVING, not to make friends and influence people. How would these same people feel if I asked them to part with their work for free? Yeah.

Still Really Busy...

I re-did the band's web site.

Thoughts? Does it look right to you?

Been Busy

I had a kinda bad day on Thursday. I had gone to bed at about 4:30-ish Thursday morning, and then got up at 10:30 AM. I made coffee, watered the lawn, got cleaned up and dressed, and then went to check e-mail. While I was doing that, Kenny returned from Cusick, where he had gone to get an application from the Tribe for a deputy position with the Kalispel Tribe. He only had Thursday to get it in, so he was going to do it online, but he had to have a resume in order to complete it. I had one on my external hard drive, so I went to get it onto my thumb drive so he could use the laptop to put in his app because I had things to do on the desktop computer.

Well, when I went to access my external hard drive, I got this error that said: "A file is corrupted. Drive is inaccessible."

So, I FREAKED OUT. I had just spent two months writing a book, and the ONLY copy is on that hard drive. Not to mention that ALL of my files for the sites I have built are on that drive. ALL of my billing files and Kenny's billing files are on that drive. All of my photographs, graphic work, and the pictures Hometown Digitals had taken for the band are on that drive. All of my school work and papers dating back to when I was getting my Associate's degree in 1999 are on that drive.

So, I try a few times to get into it and nothing works. I Google the error message and find a forum where a guy says to unplug this and that and re-plug everything in in a certain order. That didn't work. Found another forum where someone said to run a chkdsk on the drive. I did that, and the error went away, and all my files were accessible again.

But that made me paranoid, so I made back-ups to CD of everything that was on the drive, got Kenny his resume on the thumb drive, and got everything together to go to Spokane. While there for business-related stuff (collections... le sigh) and a class, I went and bought a new external hard drive, so, no fears, everyone! The book - A Night Borrowed - is still coming out October 1!!

Holy Frickin' Crap, People

I just finished writing A Night Borrowed. I cried when I wrote the ending.

The book is 433 pages, and 86,547 words.

YAY!!!

Still have 12,000 words to write to meet my goal, though. They'll go in Devil's Handiwork.

Word Count Status Update

I am so close to hitting 40,000 words for the month that I can smell it. I stayed up until 5 AM this morning to write my daily 4,500 words; I didn't quite make it, but that's okay. I finished a really important scene in A Night Borrowed, so that works.

Sleeeepyyyy

I just went over 30,000 words this month. I am tired. A Night Borrowed may be finished - for the most part - by the end of the week. Will have to go back and add some characterization scenes, but it is almost done. Only three major scenes left to do.

I honestly can't believe I have written more than 80,000 words since July 5th. Crazy. (And that's not counting work articles, e-mails, blog posts, tweets, or the update to my personal site - updated with release dates for A Night Borrowed and Moonshine Valentine.)

Well...

...I am no longer working for KGB. I checked the amount of money I made in 6 hours, and it came to a grand total of $12.85. Not worth it.

I have been practicing piano like crazy here lately. I am going in to record the piano parts on ten of the thirteen songs (as well as horn parts on one song and organ parts on another) on Wednesday, so the window is closing on practice time. I have tomorrow left to practice, and THAT'S IT.

I am up to 17,000 words in A Night Borrowed and Devil's Handiwork for the month of August. A Night Borrowed is up to 70,780 words total; Devil's Handiwork is at just about 60,000 total. I don't know if I will need all those words, but I figure that it is better to have more than you need going into editing; it's easier to cut than it is to create.

The cat that had the broken leg and the head injury last year is now missing. We fear that he is dead. He has not been around in 4 days.

I Am Semi-Employed...

I don't know if you have seen these ads for KGB. I found the one I've linked to there pretty funny, so I looked them up on the Internet, and it turns out, they were hiring. So, I went through several testing processes, and I worked my first shift for them tonight. My ass is tired. I remember now why I don't like shift work: I can't really get up and move around! I won't be taking any more afternoon shifts, I can tell you that.

I am going into the studio tomorrow afternoon at 1PM to record at least acoustic guitar tracks. I might do the piano parts, too, but I am not sure yet. It depends on who I can get to take me, as the piano is rather large, plus I'll have the stand, and the acoustic guitar. I kind of thought about video taping the recording of the piano parts, but I don't have a video camera and I don't know who has one, anymore.