Got my full audio produced for the first reading of Fuel for my Vitual Book Tour. At the time I was recording the first two chapters for the VBT reading, it seemed like I had good energy, but listening to it now, I'm not so sure. Well, like any live performance, you never know what you're going to get, and you can't be too hard on a writer, when they first get going with their reading series, so I'm going to put it out there on my Podtopia podcast, submit to all the directories out there, and see what comes of it.
Still need to create a link to do advance ordering. I'll need to create that before I put the podcast out there, because there's no sense in hawking something (and I do hawk advance signed copies of the book in the podcast) if you're not going to let people buy it.
So, the podcast is going up there, probably next week, after Christmas clears out of the way. Sounds terrible to say, and it's actually not a true reflection of how I feel about the season, but in terms of getting things done and getting this VBT out there, it will be most helpful for Christmas to be behind us.
Plus, I'll be able to tap into all the folks out there who are looking for fresh podcasts. And as far as I know, I'm the only writer who has a virtual book tour being podcast.
The learninig curve continues. It's still a little steep, and I'm learning as I go... learning that I need to keep my energy up and not be shy in my readings. Learning that I need to really punch some of the lines, not just recite them like a lot of monotonic writers I've heard reading out there. Learning that if I'm going to tell other people how to do this thing, I'd better learn really well what works for me, what doesn't, and what the quickest, best way to get from Point A to Point Z is. That won't happen with the first podcast. It mght not even happen with the second. By the third or fourth, I may be proficient in all this, and then the documentation will come easily.
But first, I've got to nail it all down, myself.
Oh, I also need to reserve the domain name fuelbook.net (if I haven't already -- I can't exactly remember at this point, if I've done it or not) and point it to www,language-professionals.net/fuelbook/ or /members/fuelbook/ Probably the latter, so it's in keeping with the other urls of my other endeavors.
Thinking back to that fateful September in 2000, it amazes me, how much has changed just in the last five years. There were the WTC attacks, of course, which have completely altered the way we do air travel, and our expectations for what awaits us at the airport. Reading/editing my experiences in the airport again, I'm amazed at how petty our concerns were, in the context of the years since. Worrying about getting a seat on the plane, once upon a time, pales in comparison to the worries I have now -- you never know if someone will decide you look suspicious and drag you off to the side, and if you look really suspicious, they can detain you... indefinitely. And while I don't think it's very likely that the same sort of airplane attack is going to be used again (tho' you never know), still, the thought is always in the back of my mind, that there might be some "event" that diverts the plane or turns us all into hostages of some kind. Paranoia now looks a lot more reasonable, than it did in 2000. And for much more serious reasons than existed prior to 9-11-01.
It certainly is a different world. today, than it was just a few years ago. And looking back on those days, reading my carping borderline-bitchiness about the inconveniences at the airport, calls out how much bigger the worries of the world have become, since then. It's been a little difficult to muster the enthusiasm for retracing those steps, in fact, because of the relative insignificance of the "worrie" sof that time. After September 11, all the troubles I experiences I've had as an international traveler, put together, just pale.
But still, I keep my spirits up and moving. After all, the context may have changed, but really, the concerns evidenced and discussed, and the inconveniences endured, are still as valid today, as they were in 2000. Perhaps even moreso. Because after Katrina and Rita, it became increasingly clear that the Way of Oil is a looming dead-end. But like many other dead-ends, it's hard to see the end of the road. It just kinda comes up on you, and you have to deal with it as best you can.
Like dealing with too much luggage packed. Like dealing with the crazy work schedules that keep you constantly running-running-running, no matter what.
The more I revisit Fuel and re-read what I wrote, the more evident it becomes to me, that the book is as much about human fuel, as it is about petrol. It's very much a "period piece", being set in the context of the tailing end of the Internet gold rush. It's very much the product of that time and that energy, that had us all go-go-going, all the live-long day. Fuel is about people, as much as petrol, and it's as much about the waning of individual spirit, as it is about the dwindling of gasoline.
One of the big things that stands out with me, as I read over the first couple of chapters of Fuel, is how much running we were all doing in the web world, in the late 90's. At that point in time, we all thought that our invested time and energies would pay off -- either in stock options, or in the chance to say we changed the world.
Well, we did change the world, and some of us did get the stock options. But in retrospect, it just seems crazy, how hard we all workd, and how long we worked that hard. None of us knew in 1998, that the bubble was going to burst as it did. None of us guessed just how thin the latex was... None of us pioneers thought that we'd eventually be replaced by younger, cheaper workers (though we really should have guessed we would be). None of us guessed that our intrepid employers were going to bail on us, cut us loose, or -- worse -- turn out to be felons who fabricated the majority of their numbers for the sake of share price.
We should have guessed, I know. We could have guessed, I'm sure. We were probably just being a bunch of idiots at the time, throwing ourselves heart-mind-and-soul into our web work. But in those days, we really BELIEVED. Nobody had given us a reason (yet) not to.
I wonder, knowing what I now know, if I could ever muster the kind of enthusiasm for innovative web work, that I once had. I wonder if I'll ever get a whiff of that new car smell again. I'm not sure I'd trust it, if it plunked me on the head. I'm not sure I'd believe it, even if someone came along and said, "Look -- here's the Next Big Thing, and we're cutting you in on the action." I think I'd be plenty wary, and I'm not sure I'd be willing to muster the enthusiasm for launching into the Next Big Campaign, given the depletion that I've experienced before. I just went too far into the abyss, and almost didn't come out, to have yet another sky-dive look very appealing to me now.
And that's a problem, when I'm approached by companies that want to hire me, who are so very intent on go-go-going, one more time, and rekindling the spark of the late 90's for the sake of another gold rush.
I mean, it is a very different scene, now, than it was 10 years ago, and there are actually customers who understand and want the things we code and create, these days. But I have to say, after being so fried by my past experiences, that the prospect of working with yet another team of driven professionals who are all willing to do whatever it takes to get the job done, doesn't exactly have me dancing in the streets.
Surely, there must be a better way to conduct business, than signing onto the old Hewlett-Packard habit of creating an atmosphere of artificially induced urgency. No joke -- that's been their tactic for years. I'm surprised they're still around -- no, wait, they're actually teamed up with Compaq now.
See? There are some serious sustainability issues, here...
