Day 5....

This is day 5 without a car. We're managing well enough in the short run, but it's cost a lot more than just the repairs. I think Russ is going to cancel the class he should teach tomorrow in Omaha. He already had to cancel the trip to New York to do work there -- and that was the second time he had to do that, but they've rescheduled for the Labor Day Weekend. Potential income is better than none at all.

Both the Forward Motion and my Sff.net accounts are due. I have about half of it on hand. If one person pays me for some work I did, I will be able to cover them both without a problem.

I'm stressed, of course, and that never helps me. I've had one bad stress-related problem that made any kind of work miserable for the last few days, but I'm finally settling back down and reminding myself that things could be worse.

I spent a good amount of yesterday working on a blurb for Farstep Station which should be out in October. Yay! I am so looking forward to that one!

I am nearly done with Touched by the Wild, though I see some major changes I need to do before I'm really, really done. But it's been a good book to work on because it is already plotted -- and not a bad story, either, though it has a couple holes that need shored up.

I also completed a cover for another publisher and I'm waiting on word about it. We'll see how that goes!

Oh! And a major change to the photo catalogue collection. Russ showed me how Microsoft Office Picture Manager can take groups of pictures and make them into thumbnails. This makes a huge difference in what I've been trying to do -- and also allows me to use Access to input the data and afterwards manipulate it into whatever structure I want for printing. It took me half a day to get the Access database the way I wanted it, with some drop down lists and stuff, but now that I have it, entering the data will be much easier. I'm back up to about 200 pictures in the collection, and I expect to be able to do at least 100 a night without much trouble. As long as I keep the number of pictures I take per day less than the number I enter, I should eventually get caught up. Yes, it will be years....