How the last three days have started for me:
8:27 am -- Roll over, look at the bedside clock, wonder why in God's name I'm awake. Hack. Get up, wander into office, launch mail program.
8:32 am -- Send daily SpamCop report (85-100 messages). Hack louder.
8:53 am -- Open InDesign and begin to format more of the 2004 Newberg Texas Rangers Bound Edition.
8:54 am -- Realize that there's no way in hell I can do this without caffeine. Trudge downstairs, make coffee. Clomp back upstairs, format a few more pages.
9:08 am -- Begin to call Ranger beat writers for newspapers like T.R. Sullivan and Sean Horgan, who I have to keep an eye out for since I have to format the name of their paper, my friend. "Oh, look. There's my friend Jim Reeves." Make mental post-it note to book therapy time.
9:27 am -- Remember there's coffee downstairs.
9:43 am -- Answer two calls in a row from creditors looking for the schmuck who had the number before us. He was a naughty, naughty boy.
10:30 am -- I've done three chapters by now, and gone through the first batch of coffee. I'm mostly awake. (For those of you wondering about my quality of work while half-asleep, including the author of the book I'm formatting, this is the time when I try out design ideas I've had while sleeping. It's how I solved the stat table issue that was giving me nightmares over the weekend. Yes, I have nightmares about this book. Doesn't mean it's nightmarish.)
10:45 am -- Begin playing music to motivate me to keep plugging.
From here on, it varies. I'll usually take a break from formatting to write a SwampLog entry, since I've had a couple of ideas rattle around in my head while working. Marty will get up at some point between 11:00 am and noon. I'll have made a second cup of coffee. Edison will have screamed loudly numerous times from downstairs for attention. Stuff like that.
Just got this e-mail from The Great Ja:
> Attention all Texans: Let's recall Rick Perry and elect Willie Nelson Governor!
This is easily the best idea I've heard all fucking week.
Speaking of my favorite word, yesterday the FCC made program directors across America really nervous when they ruled that Bono wasn't being obscene when he said "fuck" on this year's Golden Globes broadcast. It seems that, as an adjective or an adverb, 'fuck' is acceptable. Only when it's a verb does it tread into the totally naughty zone. We are quite amused.
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