Saturday Reading Wrap-up - 7/5/25

Not the most exciting of reading weeks here.  Eh, it goes like that sometimes.

No new books.

Books Read: 

I didn't finish any books this week.  Well, not free-standing books.  I finished Murder on the Orient Express in that omnibus of Poirot stories, though.  It was awesome, as usual.

DNFs:

7/4/25 - free SF humor - OMG, this was so poorly written I just couldn't even.  It seemed like every single thing a writer can easily catch and fix during edits was missed by this person.  And that was only in the first few pages.  It really bummed me out because I was actually excited about the premise, which is why I downloaded it.  =o\

Currently reading... a different SF humor.  This one is good so far.  I'm over halfway through, so I hope it doesn't take a turn for the crappy.  

What was on your reading plate this week?

Happy Independence Day!

Happy Independence Day to all my American friends.  Actually, all my non-American friends should celebrate, too, because us being independent helps make the world a safer place.  And we're getting back to being the place we need to be... i.e. a shining example of liberty.  

Anyway, because I'm free to do whatever I want, I'm going to do exactly that today.  It'll probably be nothing, but that's okay, too.  

Oh, and here's an art pic I made of some kids on their way to watch the Independence Day parade where we used to live in CO.  I just loved the little red-headed trio, so I snapped a shot and then played with it until it looked like a painting.  It makes me happy.  Hopefully, it'll do the same for you...

 

Thursday This n That

 Alligator Alcatraz...  First off, I just saw some liberal chick whining quite incorrectly that it was a wildlife sanctuary and how dare we all celebrate it because it's cruel.  I also saw a cute cartoon of some alligators talking and one says 'did you hear we get to eat them if they escape?'  Which reminded me of this prison just outside Marquette, Michigan.  It's across the street from Lake Superior and it butts up to some of the nastiest, craggy woodlands you'd ever want to see.  Back when I was in college, it had the highest walkaway rate of any prison in Michigan.  But the escapees were rarely ever seen again.  You see, it was filled with criminals from places like Detroit and Flint.  City boys who probably had never taken a survival course in their lives.  The way I figure it, the missing criminals either went into the water and drown, or they went into the woods and died.  Win win, in my book.

Soon, I will be able to kick Brightspeed to the curb.  The VoiP is in place and working smashingly.  I called Mom on it yesterday.  Unfortunately, the Starlink router only has 2 ports, and we have 2 computers to plug in, so I needed a splitter.  It came and after some massaging, it's working, too.  The true test will be calling Mom through the splitter this morning.  Keep your fingers crossed.  I have a temp phone # until my regular # transfers over to the new service, so don't try to call me at this time.

Better internet... check.  Better phone... check.  Next up, replacing the satellite TV with something like Roku.  Woot.

Man, Wallyworld was a zoo yesterday.  Totally spasticness.  

What's with this new crap here on Blogger?  This morning it has a notice at the top - some crap about upgrading something - and it just offered to insert links into my post for me.  Why the hell would I want links inserted into my post?  Wouldn't a link take people away from READING my post?  Derp.  Makes no sense.

My tomatoes might almost be trying to make flowers.  Fingers crossed.

My black walnut tree got root rot and died.  I guess they aren't meant for growing in a pot.  Next time I have to transplant a volunteer walnut, I'll find a place in the woods for it.  =o(

I almost put in -o(... That would be a cyclops, I guess. Rawr.

Okay, that's about all I've got today.  Feel free to drop some this-n-that yourself before you wander off.  Have a great day!

Marketing Monday, or Lack Thereof

 There won't be any marketing today.  I haven't been sleeping well and I just didn't have the drive to create a sale.  And I knew I wouldn't be in any shape to do morning marketing today.  (We finally slept last night, which was good.)

The problem with not marketing is with no marketing comes no sales.  I mean, I'm still getting some page reads, but nothing to shout about.  :shrug:

Unfortunately, even with the marketing, I'm only averaging about $20 a month.  I keep hoping something will take off and fly, but so far, nothing has.  When I look at the amount of effort versus the return, it really makes me not want to market.  

This, of course, is all free marketing.  As in, no money is going to to accomplish it.  On the other hand, I'm spending a lot of time.  We won't go into how many hours I spend to make $20 a month, okay?  That's just depressing.  I get paid more than that for working on a single spreadsheet for an hour.  

Anyway, I know that if I paid someone else for marketing, I'd trade cash for time.  The problem with that is the last time I paid for ads, I made an 11.06% profit.  In 2019, I paid $355.31 and cleared $39.31.  Not sure if 11% profit is awesome or pathetic, but there it is.

With FB being a turd about how much I can market, I'm definitely going to need to start delving back into other sources.  I've started that, kinda.  At least, I've gone through and determined which newsletters are defunct, so I have a good list to use when I start back up again.  Bleh.

Tomorrow's post will be of a personally relevant nature, as opposed to a writerly nature.  Maybe I'll talk more about this marketing thing on Wednesday.  For now, though, it's time to get to my morning routine.  Have a great day, wherever you are.

Screwed by the Liberals Again

In case you missed it, the liberal government passed some new health insurance laws again last year that went into effect this year.  (https://help.ihealthagents.com/hc/en-us/articles/20207003806871-New-Short-Term-Health-Insurance-Law-Rules-for-2025) 

Let me set you the stage for how this effects me (and possibly you)...

For the last several years, I've been using short term health insurance.  It bypasses the Obamacare mandate, which makes it way cheaper.  I can't afford health insurance any other way, so there I am.  It's not great, but it's better than nothing.  Every 6 months, I would have to sign up for a new policy.  When I got the email saying my insurance was expiring, it seemed like it was the wrong month to renew, but I shrugged and got on with signing up.  That's when I noticed that all the new policies were 3 month with a 1 month extension.  I guess when I signed up in March for my new policy, I missed that fact.  Okay, fine, whatever.

I went into the site, did my thing, found my policy, and went through the process of getting my new policy.  5 days went by while I waited for my acceptance.  Instead, I got an email saying my application for new insurance had been 'withdrawn'.  Unfortunately, I got the email right before I went to bed, so there wasn't anything I could do about it (which didn't stop me from obsessing over it all night).  And time was ticking because my current policy would run out on the 30th.  

The next day, I contacted the company that manages this crap - ehealth, I think it's called - via chat message on their site.  The gal told me she couldn't help me and I would have to call.  So, I called.  I got a really nice lady who calmly explained to me that the law had changed last September and, in addition to the policies only being for 4 months each, they cannot be from the same provider twice in the same year.  They withdrew my application from United Health because I can't have them again this year. 

The only other companies offering short term insurance in my state... because, ya know, Obama fixed it so we can only have certain companies offering insurance in our states... are unheard of to me.  And either of them only offer indemnity policies instead of regular policies (PPO or EPO).  

I picked one and submitted a new application, because what choice do I have?  Even if I could afford to get a regular policy, you can't sign up for one of those outside the month of November.  (Obama again... although in all fairness, it's not just him. It's him and his cronies.  And Biden and his handlers.)  

So, as long as my application got accepted, I would have insurance.  Until 10/31.  (It was accepted, btw. So yay, I guess.) Then I'll have to go with the other unknown indemnity company for 4 months before I can go back to UH.  Lather, rinse, repeat.  On the upside, the new policy is cheaper with better coverage... except for the indemnity thing where we'll have to pay out of pocket and get reimbursed by the insurance afterward.  

While I was doing this, I accidentally ended up in the section for regular insurance quotes, and discovered that the cheapest of those was $750-ish a month.  Almost twice what I was paying UH and more than 3 times what I'll be paying the new company.  That's like half our monthly income.  

Yes, I know some of this is my own damn fault, right?  I could crawl to Obamacare and beg for alms, but my hypocrisy only goes so far.  Come November, I might have to debase myself and do that or choose to go insurance-less.  

I'm a healthy gal.  I can go without insurance, right?  (Don't worry, I'm not that stupid.  Bad things have a way of happening, especially when you temp fate by going without insurance.)

Sunday Update - Week 26

I almost typed Sunday Ypdate.  Yip.  LOL. Yeah, this is what comes of too little sleep and then waking up late.  

Anyway...

I wrote words!  5269 of them.  I gave myself a good talking to mentally and Monday night, I just started adding words to DN3.  I took Friday off because it was a mentally draining day and I just wasn't in a place where words would come out.  Then yesterday I wrote over 1800 words, which kinda made up for the day off.  The point is, I'm averaging over 1000 words a day, which is good.

And I even did some editing.  I stopped writing one night and as I lay in bed, I realized that something needed to happen between where Duke was and where Duke had been before, so I went back... a thing I almost never do while I'm dirty drafting... and fixed it.  The writing really started flowing after that.  Woot.

No Marketing this week.  I'll see what I can come up with this week for a new offering.  It's hard to muster the urge when I have to fight FB every step of the way, but if I don't market, I don't sell.  And I like selling books.

The reading... well, you can see that in yesterday's posts.  I'm not blazing any trails here, unless it's the trail to DNF.

Yesterday morning, I made a half-batch of cinnamon rolls.  They turned out pretty good, even if halving the recipe took some mathing.  

On the activity front, I did something active 6 out of 7 days, so woot.  I only walked three of those days, so 3.5 miles (37.4 total).  I meant to walk 4 days, but I was wandering in the yard before setting out and I got stung by some kind of baby, bastard hornet.  Hurt like a bugger and put the kibosh on that day's walk.  (It's all better thanks to Benadryl gel.)  Now that it's hot, I decided to start dancing in the living room again.  So I did that one day.  And I went grocery shopping.  Weight: 172.0

Look for more information on Friday's drama this Tuesday.  (The post's already written, I just need to schedule it.)

On a gardening note, my tomato plants are huge and they all look like they're getting the beginnings of flowers, so that's something.  My green pepper plants are still tiny, but they're making progress.  Some of my trees are looking pooky, though. I think they need replanting in bigger pots or in the ground.  Ack.  I have no more bigger pots and they're not ready to combat the deer yet.  We'll see how that goes.  I may go pick up pots today.  Also, the blackberry patch I've been watching down the road is getting close to being ripe enough to pick.  Cross your fingers I make it there before the birds do.

Okay, so that's about all I have for you today.  How was your week?  

Saturday Reading Wrap-up - 6/28/25

Hello!  Thanks for stopping by my Saturday Reading Wrap-up!  I hope you find something fun or at least interesting while you're here.  Unfortunately, it wasn't a banner week for finishing books.  

I picked up 8 ebooks this week - all free, of course.  In there are 2 SF, 3 UF, 2 thrillers, and a YA action/adventure.  Should be some fun reading in there somewhere... I hope.  No new hardcopies. 

Books Read:

26) Sweet Harmony by Noel Bailey (6/25/25) - magical romance*# - 4 stars.  New to me and underappreciated.  Found this for free off the Kindle Freebies I found Today Facebook group.
Review: "This was a fun story. I loved the premise and, being a former band nerd, the heroine's problem raising money for the music program. But I wasn't 100% keen on the hero's dilemma. I mean, he took care of it, but I think he needed to be more forceful with his father. Be the hero his lady needed him to be. Right then and there. :shrug: It's probably just me."
Additional note: This was a 'magical romance', but there was very little magic or mention of magic in it.

DNFs:

6/25/25 - post apocalyptic - free.  It jumped from 2055 with one MC to 2075 with another MC with no clear connection and then to yet another MC.  Too much in too short a time made it really confusing.  Like I need more confusion in my life. LOL

6/24/25 - suspense - free.  I really wanted to like this.  I'd read several things by this author before and I was thrilled to see this one offered for free on his Facebook page.  Sadly, it read like he either didn't bother to edit it or he ignored his editor's suggestions this time.  I tried, but after a while, I couldn't take it anymore.

6/23/25 - suspense - free.  A suspense is supposed to be quick and... well... suspenseful.  This?  It seemed like the author put every sentence through the 'quotable sentence' generator.  For good story telling, snappy sentences should be sprinkled throughout, not poured on like hot fudge.  (I like hot fudge, so it's over EVERYTHING.)  I gave up after a few pages of slogging through that.

Currently reading... I'm in the middle of Murder on the Orient Express in that Poirot Omnibus I'm reading.  When I finish it, I'll hit the ebooks again.

What was on your reading plate this week?  Yummy things or brussels sprouts?  ;o)