random thoughts from the insomniac zone

So, I'm having one of those nights, which has now turned into morning. I wrote a to do list, and now I'm too tired to do any of it. Well, one item was to post on Ye Olde Blogg, so at least that will get done.

See, I get these little odd snippets of things that run through my mind (hey, no grief from the peanut gallery), which by themselves hardly seem like enough for a complete post on their own.

Thus the brilliant idea to put them in one sort of catch-all post.

Except, I've forgotten what they were.

Sigh.

Oh, wait! I just remembered one. Damn.

I was reading a post on the kindle boards about how a writer had gone over his book like, a brazillion times, and it had been edited and went through beta readers, and he still found some typos. He was truly all torn up about it, and I see his point. It's especially important that us indie authors (we indie authors?) put out the best product we can, and finding yet another boo-boo after you've hit that publish button just sucks lint lollies.

But what are we to do? gnashes teeth  pulls out hair

Nothing in this world is perfect, not even books from the "traditional" publishers. I try myself to send out typo-free product, but I know there's something lurking in there somewhere, I just haven't found it yet.

My theory is that there are gremlins in all manuscripts, sneaky little bastards that hide until you take your eyes off the type, and then BAM! Those little buggers sneak out and tweak the words. I think they're especially fond of hiding behind ellipses, you know these things:  ...   So, don't use them. EVER. Don't say you haven't been warned.

There, now my good deed for the day has been paid forward. Whew. I feel so much better. (You don't even want to know how many times I had to retype this after those you-know-whats. Seriously, you don't.)

On the personal writing front, I've got a short story just about ready to put up. It's a ghost story that I had submitted to an anthology, but it wasn't quite what they were looking for, so I put it away to give it time to mellow a bit before any editing decisions.

I redid the original cover for it, which I like much better, although I'm having trouble with GIMP not wanting to do drop shadows. I'll have to give that another try before I upload the manuscript, but if it doesn't behave, I have other ways to accomplish my goal. You hear me, Mr. GIMP? Just saying.

This has gotten long enough, Gentle Readers, so I will close and go crash for a couple of hours. Keep calm and type on.