The Mine-Laden Landscape of Publication... BOOM

People make mistakes.  I make a lot of them because reasons.  Unfortunately, the landscape of publishing gives one a boatload of opportunity to make mistakes... little land mines to step on and blow off an appendage.  Okay, nothing so tragic as that, but it does make one feel like a moron from time to time.

For instance...

Project Hermes is a freebie through the end of today. Friday, as I was trying to see where I was on the rankings and failing - which led me to try and figure out why this book had no rank (deep and unsatisfying rabbit hole there) - I noticed that the paperback version of this is not showing as available on the ebook page.  So, I go into the Bookshelf and then into the paperback details and things, and wouldn't you freakin' know it, the damn paperback that had been imported from CreateSpace many moons ago was somehow marked as a 'low content book' (basically like a notebook or sketchpad).   The only way to fix that is to delete the whole damn paperback and start over from scratch.  What a huge pain in the ass.  But after almost 3 hours (super slow internet and large files), I got it uploaded to Amazon.  NOW I have to go check every other freakin' paperback to see if that little box that marks it as a low-content book is checked.  Fark.  

I also noticed that when my books were imported from CreateSpace, the cover files didn't make it over, so Amazon just used the image they had from the ebook.  Basically, all my paperbacks just have a front cover.  Derp.  So, I'm doing that, too.  

Shame on me for assuming the conversion process was smooth and trusting to Amazon that it was done right.  I don't know if it made an ass of U, but it sure feels like it made an ass of ME.  Thankfully, no one has bought any of these wonky-cover paperbacks.  Maybe that's the reason they aren't selling. I have no clue.  

Anyway, this issue is getting fixed.  Along with any others.  If I find 'em, I'll fix 'em.  Until then... 

BOOM

JuLoWriMo - Day 7:
Starting Word Count - 9040
Ending Word Count - 10026
New Words: 986

Sunday Update - Week 'Time Change'

 Well, my computer says it's 5:51, but my brain says it's almost 7.  Stupid time change.  I just saw on FB where a local news station asked how people felt about the time change and like a dozen people gave it a heart.  Those people should be slapped.  Just sayin'.

Anyway, here's the week that was...

I finally got some editing done.  Last night.  One and a half pages worth.  Then my brain started with the whole 'I'm never going to get this done' and the 'even if I do get this done, it's still gonna suck and require weeks more work and pages more edit notes and even then it will probably still suck'.  It's rough inside a writer's head.

If you missed it, I now have four books in wide distribution.  Blink of an I went first, then I did all three books in A Model Curse.  I wish I had a universal link for the series as a whole, which would be so much easier, but alas, I haven't found a way to do that yet.  I still need to fix all the blog links so they point to the ULs for each book.  I've posted the links to FB though.  So that's something.  

This wasn't the most exciting week for reading, but I did finish one book, DNF'd one book, and made progress in the omnibus I'm reading.

In baking news, I made applesauce bread one day and chocolate oil cake yesterday.  There I was doing the oil cake and I fucked up majorly.  I sifted together the flour, sugar, baking soda, and salt.  Then I began adding the wet ingredients.  Stir stir st... this doesn't look right.  CRAP... I forgot the baker's cocoa in the dry ingredients.  I chucked it in and did my best to incorporate it.  Needless to say, my cake still has lumps.  I added chocolate chips to try and mask the lumps.  Then when I was making the frosting - chocolate peanut butter, by the way - I fucked that up, too.  After an interminable amount of time trying to get it right, I finally gave up and dumped it on the cake.  Except it was way too wet and started running over the edges of the pan onto the counter.  GAH!  I got the flood stopped and threw the whole thing in the fridge.  It ain't pretty, and it'll never win any awards, but it's pretty yummy, and that's what really counts.  And I was right, the chips hide the lumps.  Yay.

You know, when you're making frosting and you're totally screwing it up and it's like lumpy soup, so you add more powdered sugar, but then it's too thick, so you add more milk, but then it's too thin again, so you add more... Umm, I now have a heavily frosted cake AND a big bowl of leftover frosting, too.  I think it'll make a good ice cream topping.

On the activity front, I did 5 out of 7 days.  One day was a walk and the other four were throwing logs.  We have a sizable stack of firewood now.  Someone asked me if I was getting a woodstove for Christmas.  Umm... no.  For now, we're just accumulating wood.  It gives us both an activity where we're getting the hearts pumping and doing something constructive, so it works for us.  Weight hasn't changed: 181.6.

The big bucks are starting to wander through the yard lookin' fer love.  Magnificent.  Fingers crossed they make it through hunting season.  If they don't, here's hoping they lose their lives to people who hunt for food and not for trophies.

I think that's about it for me today.  There's probably more, but it ain't coming to me at this time.  What's been up in your world?

Super Fudgy Chocolate Frosting

Okay, so I had a box of yellow cake in the cupboard - a leftover from Easter when I planned to make pineapple upside-down cake and didn't.  Sunday, I got a wild hair and decided to make the cake.  But I had no frosting in the house.  The last time I made chocolate frosting, it didn't turn out so well.  This lead me to the internet where I located a yummy looking recipe for chocolate frosting.

baking cocoa
powdered sugar
butter
milk
vanilla

Easy peasy.  Right?

I knew I had all the ingredients. Would've been nice if I'd checked the amount of the ingredients before I started making the frosting.  The recipe called for 3 cups of powdered sugar.  I didn't have quite that much.  :shrug:  Powdered sugar... powdered cocoa... dry ingredient = dry ingredient in the whole scheme of things, right?

So, there I am, melting the butter in a saucepan.  I put the powdered sugar into a big bowl and began to add the cocoa powder.  Then I got the wild idea to mix the last 1/3 cup of cocoa in with the melt butter.  Cool.  I sifted together the 2 2/3 cups of powdered sugar with the 2/3 cup of cocoa powder while I waited for the butter to melt.  Then I added the 1/3 cup to the melted butter.  Then I looked at the recipe again.  Whoops.  I was supposed to add ALL the cocoa powder to the butter and THEN stir it into the powdered sugar.  :shrug:  Too late now.  I beat the melted mixture into the dry mixture until it was smooth, then I put in the vanilla and mixed that together.  Then I went to the fridge for the milk.  Whoops.  Not much milk left and Hubs does like his cereal in the morning.  But wait!  I have heavy whipping cream leftover from when I made potato soup the other day.  That'll work.

I dribbled some into the bowl and beat it in.  Added a little more, beat that in.  Added and beat until I had the consistency I thought would work for frosting a cake.  Damn and whoa, there was way more frosting than usual for a standard frosting recipe.  No matter.  I slapped it all on the 9x13" cake. 

OMG.  It was awesome.  Never have my mistakes worked out so well.

Okay, so now that you know how I put it all together, here are the measurements:

2 2/3 cups powdered sugar
1 cup baking cocoa (divided 1/3 & 2/3)
1 stick of butter
1 tsp vanilla
approx. 1/4 cup heavy whipping cream

Have fun!  And enjoy!