The Ink-Pot and the Palette

Even though I don't come here very often anymore, and I don't know why that is*, I just renewed my paid account. I also don't know why that is.

I think it's the hope that someday, the warm community spirit of more-than-140-characters will come back to me, and to this place. It seems worth the thirty-five bucks to hang on to that hope for another year.

And I just saw this, which reminded me about my account expiry notice:



*it's at least in part, I suppose, because embedding other media here seems anachronistically iffy.

1. Coffitivity, the app I mentioned the other day that provides café sounds, is turning out to be something of a small miracle for me. On low volume, through earphones, it's like prosthetic concentration. I've been able to read! Really focus without skipping around, something I thought had been lost to me forever.

I sense that my mind is mildly but actively tuning out the pleasant babble and somehow kind of sequestering itself in a narrower space, where focused work can take place. Not only have I been able to get through boring work materials, but I'm seven chapters into Mike Carey's The Devil You Know--the actual written version. I'm very pleased about this.

2. Six days off work started this evening. A couple of them will be spent down at Lincoln City on the coast with my good pal roseambr. We always have fun at the beach.

3. An editing job has come my way. No pay--it's a swap: my time and talent in exchange for credit and referrals as I try to launch a side business. The manuscript is a health program based on some very interesting dietary restrictions. It's passionately presented by the healthcare professional who has designed it, but she's not a writer. I can see a future for myself in ghostwriting, frankly.

4. Is this pingback function on LJ new? For the first time today, I got an email notification that someone had mentioned me in a LiveJournal post. I like it! I hope DW is considering something of the same kind.

I'm testing it again right now: emeraldsedai

My DW account has been hit hard by a spammer, and I'm afraid that a number of people's comments have been replied to with those sincere-sounding, but strangely badly-spelled, ripostes from Anonymous X4&#KNB%$ that go, "I love what you said here and I would be honored to have your opinion about something else."

Prior instances have tended to hit a single post of mine with multiple comments, so I could just disable commenting on that post. This one is hitting all over the board.

It probably goes without saying that replying to one of these isn't a good idea. I'm sorry for the hassle.

elf, in a post entitled 6 Weeks of Dreamwidth, has begun a process of shifting operations entirely to Dreamwidth, based on the DW Beta One Year Anniversary challenge called Six Weeks For Dreamwidth.

The challenge is for fan artists to make content over the next six weeks that will be available exclusively on Dreamwidth. Since I'm in the very midst of posting my epic novel on AO3 (and have no other content), I can't really participate in it, but I like elf's alternate plan, to wit:

• Begin treating my DW Circle as my primary journal reading, and my LJ flist as secondary
• Remove from my LJ flist everyone who also posts on DW (if you're one of these, would you let me know please?
• Quit LJ comms that are replicated on DW, and be sure to join and post to them on DW.

I'm not mad at LJ, but I really like being part of DW. The features, the sense of new community, and the principles are more to my taste, and I want to do all I can to support them and help create content here.

I'll continue to crosspost to LJ while as I figure this all out. I'm paid up through September.

Meanwhile, if you have both a DW and a LiveJournal account, why not consider posting by preference on DW, with a crosspost to LJ? It's easy to do.

I am way overdue for a change to the old LJ layout, and I finally have time to start geeking around with it. If you view LJs in their own styles, mine must be looking a little nekkid at the moment, because I'm still casting about for a header image of my own, and a color scheme. You know, general New Year's spiffing-up.

(I'm using this base stylesheet.)

I keep thinking I should be expending these efforts over on Dreamwidth, but my community just keeps on not being over there. Sigh...so it's LJ with all LJ's little faults, at least for now.

Hope everyone's enjoying a pleasant post-holiday Sunday. Mine could only be improved on by a slightly warmer house. Brr!