Easy Update With A Social media Twist

Time for an easy update on what’s happening in my authoring world. First things first. I’ve now joined what appears to be a stampede to Bluesky the relatively new Social Media platform. It seems a little less contentious than Twitter and yes I know we are supposed to call it X, but I tweet I don’t X. I haven’t updated details on the whole EV. Its going well but there are lots of sites that cover this in more detail. I may add something if I get the time.

Social Media Posting

This post is now supposed to automatically be copied to various other sites including the new BlueSky. We’ll see if it works. I haven’t withdrawn or closed my account on X like I know many have done. I’ve also tried to increase my use of Facebook where I have a personal account the publishing account and the books of accounts. All confusing. This all supposed to increase my following, reader engagement and thus improve sales. Speaking of which a big shout out to CC Kline who is doing well with her narrations. She narrated three of my shorter books and did a great job.

Easy Update

It’s also time for an update on other things happening. I’ll be updating my coming soon status in the next few days. So what’s been happening. The biggest event has been my appearance at an inaugural book festival which seemed to go okay. That was back in October. Below is me getting ready to bore my audience….

Since then we’ve had family stuff including a trip up to Scotland for a week. Loch Lomond below

For the first time in several years there has been a lot of music in the house. We joined the U3A back in the summer and have been busy jamming since. This has necessitated some repairs to Saxophones for Lisa and Guitars for me as well as getting fingers to play the correct notes most of the time. Repairs for Saxophones were done by the world renowned Stephen Howard.

Guitar repairs to my ancient sentimental value Les Paul copy were done by Selborne Guitars. We added wireless capabilities for amplification and a new effects pedal for me. Amazing bit of gear ad very portable compared to my plug in GNX3000. Itself an amazing bit of gear but very complex for a strummer like me.

Instead, I’ve purchased a Lekato Tank-G mobile battery device which with Wireless transmitters gives lots of freedom. Plenty of learning and playing around to do yet.

Music Next Steps

Learning the pieces is the next step as well as switching guitars – I have 3 main ones to chose from – My go to Ibanez Classical (But with amp), My now repaired Les Paul copy or my Ovation Celebrity. Need to work on that as the action (Height of strings above fretboard) is too high. That requires a removal of the nut and some alleged shims underneath (I’ve watched the videos) as well as checking my bracing rod is correct.

All to avoid pain on fretting because of the pressure needed. In the past, I played guitar until my fingers bled. Don’t want to do that again. Of course getting fingers to go to the correct spot remains a constant battle. Age, flexibility, memory all cause issues! Lack of practice is the main one.

The great thing about the jamming session is that there is no pressure to perform. No concerts or gigs, just the fun of playing. Sometimes even in tune and time!

Easy Update – Writing

There has been some progress, but as I said I’ll update coming soon this week. Had a scare with one of my narrators being very involved with hurricanes. Tobey Alvarez is okay but his home suffered damage in both Milton and earlier with Helene. Not the only one and the shock of seeing the damage. We have friends who live near Boone in North Carolina and they also had issues; luckily no house damage just loss of water and power for a few days with landslides blocking local roads. New translations have been completed or are in production, Portuguese versions of the Sailing Clear Series, with two remaining volumes left to complete.

So for now, its back to writing not posting.