Finishing a Book

If you haven't ever finished writing a book, this is what you can expect if you ever do.

Step 1: Stare at the blinking cursor in disbelief. The mind floods with all sorts of chemicals that make you feel awesome and anxious at the same time.

Step 2: Like anything you create, you'll ponder whether or not it will teach others, make friends or just generally cause trouble.

Step 3: You'll want to print the darn thing out as quickly as you can, so you can hold it. The printer will (of course) be out of toner, so you'll have to go to the closest office barn and pay way too much for black gooey stuff for a machine to shoot out onto your paper.

Step 4: The darned thing will get printed out (finally) and you'll realize that you should have gone through it more first, added page numbers and other details that would help in the editing.

Step 5: You'll go and write something ridiculous on your blog or pat yourself on the back via Facebook, Google+, Twitter, etcetera.

Step 6: Suddenly, that sinking feeling will wash over you as you realize it's a first draft. Thousands of words you'll have to go through, over and over again, to make it right.

Step 7: The weight of a few thousand words rests a little lighter on whatever metaphysical force keeps you going. A little of what you were put on the Earth to do... is done.

Step 8: Smile.

Lenovo E420, Ubuntu + Windows 7

I grew tired of running my WP7 developer tools and Ubuntu inside VMs and decided I would start looking for a dedicated Windows machine. After my iMac died, I had to cut my usual six months of looking down to about ninety days. I wanted something that had a great keyboard and would seamlessly run Windows 7 and Ubuntu 11.04 side by side.

After some looking around I found the Lenovo E420 on Amazon for $499.99, provided by Tiger Direct. The specs on the machine were exactly what I was looking for, something running on fairly low wattage, great keyboard and cheap. I was reasonably concerned about dual booting Ubuntu and Windows 7 on it, even though everything should have led me to conclude that a Lenovo would work like a champ.

The only one that seems to have more Linux certified laptops than Lenovo was Dell. I did spend a fair amount of time on the Dell website, and found lots of machines with the right specs, but horrible keyboards and design otherwise. I decided at length to go with the Lenovo even though I'd read about people having problems with the wireless.

It arrived promptly. I was amazed at how light it is, even for a 14" laptop, it's very easy on the arms. I was surprised when I opened the box and pulled the laptop out. It clicked on and worked in every respect on the Windows side from the moment I booted it up. As I suspected from the pictures and reviews, the keyboard was excellent, even better than my MacBook Pro.

After I loaded Ubuntu 11.04 and updated it via ethernet cable, everything worked perfectly, except the wireless. Here's what I had to do:

I opened Terminal in Ubuntu and typed:

sudo gedit etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf

This opened the file in gedit. I scrolled to the bottom and added this:

blacklist acer_wmi

I saved the file and rebooted. Went ahead and peaked in the bios to see if there was a wifi switch built in. Someone on one of the forums recommended I turn that stuff off. It, of course, gacked my wireless abilities and I had to go back and turn them on. In the aftermath, the wireless popped on and everything worked in Ubuntu.

Disclaimer: I'm not a Linux guy and found that fix on the Ubuntu forums. That said, I would strongly recommend you avoid buying anything with the intent to run Linux if you're squeamish about getting into Terminal to fix things. As a writer I like Ubuntu for the customizable workspace and text editors, and use Gimp (image editor) every once in a while.

My experience with the laptop since has been pleasant. It's clunky and likes to PC-speaker-beep whenever you unplug things, the sort of fun and irreverent stuff you don't get from a Mac. There were other surprises as well.

The Good:

This thing never gets hot. Even running a pretty graphically intense game for a couple of hours, it barely even gets warm except near the vents. No heat comes through the bottom to your legs or through the keyboard to your hands.

The Keyboard is, of course, awesome, something Lenovo is known for. The only way to improve it were to make it backlit. Trackpad and old style pointer are the good you'd expect as well. Two-finger scrolling and such works just fine in both Ubuntu and Windows.

Battery life is decent for a 6 cell, particularly considering what I paid for it.

This thing is, for the most part, tough. All the ports are tight with no wiggle, no flex anywhere save a few places that don't really matter. It's very light in spite of feeling very durable.

For $500, it performs surprisingly well as a gaming machine. I don't have to have my games set to the highest settings to be satisfied though. It runs World of Warcraft at 30FPS with default settings at "Good" like a champ.

The Bad:

The screen has a terrible viewing arc. You need to be looking at it straight on otherwise it's washed out. The colors are very muted as well. A multimedia machine this is not.

The optical drive feels extremely flimsy. I wouldn't go using it as a caddy for your 20 oz. coffee mug, it'd snap right off.

No Bluetooth.

Other Stuff:

The speakers aren't bad. Better than I thought they would be for five hundred bucks.

The Lenovo bloatware isn't too obtrusive. I haven't removed anything except Norton Anti-virus because everything else hasn't gotten in my way yet.

Plenty of ports for what I do, and decently placed on the laptop.

For $500, I couldn't find anything that had the combination of features this device possessed.

The Writing Process

Step 1: Write a 5,000 word outline.

Step 2: Take three weeks using the outline to write a 75,000 word book.

Step 3: Take three months reading your own text and sharing with a few trusted folks to edit and revise the content.

Step 4: Agonize about the content, overburdening your psyche.

Step 5: Rewrite the one chapter you despise setting off a chain-reaction of plot inconsistencies.

Step 6: Spend considerable time assured that you've ruined the work and that it should find a dusty home with "the others".

Step 7: Consumed by the remorse a creative person feels having abandoned one of their children, revisit the work until you've fixed all the plot consistencies.

Step 8: Return to the version of the book written before you rewrote the chapter you hated. Y'know, the one that seems perfectly fine now, in the context of the unaltered plot that makes more sense having revisited the marvelous outline you wrote.

Step 9: Look for rogue and/or absent commas, punctuation and other minutia that 95% of the people who read the work won't notice are amiss.

Step 10: Gaze down upon the finished fictional work and wonder how the devil you're going to get it published and through whom.

Repeat.

Diablo III Debacle?

Got some work done today but I couldn't help myself. I've been caught up in some serious anticipation waiting for a new Blizzard game called Diablo III. I loved the first two.

I'm a fan.

The first two games boasted free online play with other folks, single player offline play, whatever you wanted, on your own terms. You couldn't pay real money to level a character or upgrade your features. The first two Diablo games were so utterly bereft of the bullshit and industry shenanigans that they are enshrined on virtually every computer I own, even if I don't sit and play them for hours like I used to. I loved the mods people put out that let you mess with the game after you'd passed it seventeen times with each class.

Diablo III will have none of that from what I hear.

Online Play Only.

Cash for Item Marketplace.

No User Modifications.

I'm an angry guy right now anyway, and maybe some of how I feel is misplaced rage.

Amnesia Project

Last year I wrote a novella about a guy with amnesia (yeah, another one) that turned into a Storytelling Sciences setting. I wasn't really sure what to do with it. Having spent the last couple of days going back through everything I wrote toward the project, I feel like it needs picked up again. After a short conversation with a couple of friends it sounds like I may have a couple of interested readers.

Aside from the clarity one gains looking at their work one year later, it's an enjoyable read. All the pressure I placed on myself back then to write the book in the first place has evaporated. Just me and the text.

The novella is ten chapters written from the perspective of the three main characters, each taking their turn to tell the story. I really like having to switch gears as a writer to do this, but I'm not sure my readers will agree. Even if the first book isn't that great, it'll help me firmly establish those characters in my mind and portray them better in subsequent books.

I may not even publish the first novella for that reason. Yeah, see my other posts about the preparatory writing one does to actually pen that commercial work. Given that each of the characters are so decidedly separate from your standard person made up of human experiences, the process has begun to make more sense in that regard.

I had hoped to have readable copies by tonight but I want to actually finish the novella. Comparing my outline to what I actually have, I'm something like 12,000 words shy of my target length, two days of work. Guess I'll have to see if anyone is up for weekend coffee and some cheesy science fiction.

Boise MacLife, Aftermath

I got up this morning and said a short prayer that my day would go well as I headed down to do battle with MacLife. I arrived at their downtown location with the intent to inform the technician to halt all actions relative to our service dispute until I arrived at their Overland (30 minute drive from my house) location for talks with their owners.

I entered to find that not one, but both owners were there, a suitably rare occurrence I'm told. Apparently their roof was leaking over one of their displays and an employee had called in with a Kidney infection. Behold the wonderful and terrible power of prayer.

It was clear to me they were not going to let me have the screen. They believed that the PMU portion of the logic board which regulated voltage had gone bad and that the machine was not long for this world. I accepted this explanation as that was part and parcel to my suspicions back on the 15th of last month.

I felt that I at least owed them a $49 diagnostic fee and nothing else because the remainder could have been avoided with an accurate diagnosis. They still wanted to make an attempt to acquire my screen and wrestle with Apple to that end. One owner felt it was worth a short while the other believed it was a lost cause. I tended to fall somewhere in the middle as usual.

I had a nice conversation with the owners, asked them about the new Macbook Air and bantered a little bit. Turns out they are really knowledgeable in that regard. Then, one of them helped me carry what remained of my iMac back to my car.

I think that the lesson I would take from all this is to listen to yourself more than you do anyone else. Had I followed my instincts and had the display removed before I took it home, I would have avoided a lot of trouble... assuming they still had my screen when they made the promise initially.

In the end I still have a computer I can't use for work and I'm light $49 dollars I expected to pay anyway. That they allowed my computer to leave their shop less functional than when it entered only proves they don't hold themselves to the same standards I would hold myself. Simply, I navigate this life attempting to do no harm.

I would caution anyone that wishes to use MacLife's services to get everything you are told in writing, make sure you ask lots of questions and follow your instincts. In the end, I haven't tried visiting the Apple Store in the Mall for service so I can only say that MacLife is likely the lesser of those two evils if you need repairs done to your Mac. If there is a third option for having a Mac repaired in Boise, I'd love to hear about it.

Boise MacLife, A Summary of Events

Arthur brings in iMac on 07-15-11

Intermittent display issues and the computer gets hotter, faster.

Sometimes the display freezes and won't come back up after more than one reboot.

Arthur is told by the MacLife Technician that it could be the Screen, Logic Board, Video Card or a combination.

Arthur returns on 07-20-11 (3 Business Days Later)

During that time the Technician has installed a new screen and is confident that this will correct all the issues. Arthur is skeptical, still believing that the Logic Board and/or video card are somehow involve and relates those concerns. Also, Arthur did not approve the repair, only the diagnostic work to determine what repair should be required. The Technician offers to put Arthur's screen back in, no harm done, if he doesn't want it.

The Technician says that he’s had the new screen in a couple of days and that he’s run my iMac without any problems.

Arthur and the Technician discuss the cost of a logic board noting that if that were required, it would be nearly $1100 to fix. That being put into context, Arthur agrees to take the iMac and try it out on the condition that he be given a refund and his old screen back if the repair does not fix all the issues.

Arthur takes the iMac home and discovers that it has dead pixels but that it fixes some of the heat and display issues. Freezing and start up failure issues persist in the wake of the repair. Arthur takes some time to troubleshoot on his own before giving up and returning the iMac to MacLife.

Arthur returns on 07-26-11 (4 Business Days Later)

The Technician was wrong in their diagnosis relative to the screen. The iMac is still having issues. After a freeze it needed to be unplugged for several minutes before it would come come back up again. Virtually same problem as before.

Arthur asks that the Technician do as he agreed, refunding his money and reinstalling the screen. The Technician says that he will "try" to find the old screen and refund Arthur's money. Not understanding the Technician's apprehension he asks him some questions. Apparently Arthur’s screen was sent back to Apple. Arthur is baffled, but assumes that they will honor their agreement and give him his iMac back whole and his money.

Not having received a call, Arthur returns on 07-30-11 (3 Business Days Later)

The iMac is not fixed.

Arthur questions the Technician and Maclife Staff discovering that the screen was an exchange part, as opposed to a stock item, and that his screen had to be returned to Apple within two days receiving the replacement. Apple will not return said part, the Technician says it’s already left their warehouse on it’s way to limbo.

The Technician contacts the owner while Arthur waits.

Arthur discovers that the owner is willing to give him his iMac back, without a screen, and $375 of the $500 paid originally. This essentially deprives Arthur of $125 and a $500 part on an iMac that was mostly functional and now useless.

The Technician states that he will attempt to call Apple on monday to see if they will refund the money for the screen, resulting in a larger refund but still no screen in the iMac. Arthur is angry beyond the point of being rational and departs to spend a day in contemplation.

Arthur returns to MacLife on August 1st, 2011. Stay Tuned.

Post-PC Depression

I've felt like there has been a computer shaped hole in my soul for the last couple of weeks. My iMac is on the blink, and I've been craving a dedicated Windows Machine for my work with Windows Phone 7. In my mostly late night quest to find the perfect machine to round out my workflow, I did as I always do. I read dozens of reviews, looked at hundreds of machines and did no small amount of contemplation.

As usual, I bumped into a lot of animosity toward Apple Inc.

It occurs to me that there is a lot of misunderstanding about why people buy Apple computers. Marketing magic aside, the Apple will appeal to the sort of person that takes a year to make a decision when buying anything over $1000. They have long activity cycles which completely infuriate the folks who want to buy the latest thing, right now, this second, as quick as it can be shipped. Apple tends to update their gear once a year, and that's roughly how often you'll have the latest and greatest hardware.

I bought all my Apple devices shortly after they were refreshed so that the hardware was current at the time. With my MacBook Pro it was simply happenstance (my Asus got hosed unexpectedly), but with every other device, it was purposeful. I bought them in such a state as to allow for some ability to upgrade later. Roughly the fifteen month mark was my plan.

I like to have a plan.

The production cycle for Apple is an important measure of whether and when you should buy their products. The fine folks at MacRumors have figured this out and concocted this handy buyer's guide based on how long it's been since a product has been refreshed. No other computer manufacturer seems to have this habit of creating expectation relative to their products. Most seem to update as soon as there is new stuff to through into the interior.

There was a certain infamous article written recently where the author charged Apple with trying to convince consumers that specs don't matter, and that's why the technical specifications often lag somewhat behind competitors. I would argue the opposite, those things matter a great deal to Apple.

Most people do not buy and use a computer in the same way as a tech reviewer. They seem to be writing those articles for each other as opposed to the average consumer of electronics. I think the people who write computer and device reviews have so much tech pass through their hands they quickly lose perspective on the sorts of folks that drive the market.

My mom's Toshiba that's so old you'd expect to shovel coal into it to keep it running? It's a viable device until 2013 when Microsoft ceases to support Windows XP. Sans the OS losing legacy support, it will have an activity cycle somewhere around a decade. My wife's G5 iMac will be no different, already six years old and still capable of running Apple's Lion OS when it comes out.

I think the majority of consumers keep their computer until the device simply gives out or falls apart. More than a few have a storage space full of old obsolescence they can't bear to git rid of. You know how you are.

Yeah, I constantly dream of getting new computers and devices (and bags to carry them in), but as yet none of the Macs I bought in 2009 are likely to be replaced any time soon. That's a bold statement considering I once purchased a new laptop or desktop every 12-15 months from 1999-2009.

I plan to keep and use my MacBook Pro as my primary device for the conceivable future. Such plans are the coleslaw at the side of a big plate of tech envy though. The industry keeps churning out wondrous devices, like the Samsung Series 9 Laptop.

Here's the rub: I have talked about selling my MacBook Pro to upgrade many times, and gone through what is certainly a habit cultivated over ten years of owning products from HP, Asus, Toshiba, and similar. In a nutshell, I get that itch to trade up because the little guy is going to die soon. 15 months of use in the hands of someone like me is something like 3500+ running hours. The screen on my iMac gave out before the guts did.

I think there is some part of me that actually misses the tech grind though. I've even found myself looking at the Dell and Maingear sites going through all the endless combinations of different devices. Oh, and I can't stop looking at Alienware. I've wanted one since before they were bought out, and I still think they're very cool.

I wonder if they have support groups for this condition I have, whatever one would call it.

Post-PC Depression? As my father often says, yeah, I know...

MacBook Pro - Solid State Drive

I own a 2009 Macbook Pro, a 5,5 MB991LL/A to be precise. It was the first Mac I ever owned and still my favorite. When my iMac started to act up I decided I needed to upgrade or buy something new to use as a primary. In the end, I decided to take my Macbook Pro from 4GB of RAM to 8 and add a 256 GB SSD.

I couldn't be happier with the outcome.

If you work with documents and projects of a size that require that you watch a loading bar a dozen or more times throughout your workday, a Solid State Drive is a good upgrade. xBench puts my MacBook Pro at 25 points higher than the average Mac Pro. Put into the proper context, my two-year-old Macbook Pro is a madman when it comes to most of what I do.

Aside from the performance boost, there were a couple of other bonuses I wasn't really expecting. First, my Macbook Pro is very quiet compared to before. It makes almost no sound whatsoever unless I'm playing a game and the fan kicks in. Second, it gets slightly better battery life now. Not a huge amount, maybe 25-30 minutes of additional operational duration.

If you are trying to decide between upgrading or buying a new machine, I'd take a look at an SSD as a possible option. Depending on your computer, it might be a significant performance boost for less money than a whole new machine. The difference with regard to my MacBook Pro was like night and day.

There's no Trim Support for the SSD I chose, but hopefully the release of the Lion version of Mac OS X will change that.

Without Duress

It's a turning point and a milestone when you are forced to reconsider your basic beliefs and live one's life differently. However, such a thing is also special when it is done without duress. It's rare enough in real life I have a hard time writing about in a fictional setting. Somehow it always feels sparse and contrived.

We spend so much of our time merely reacting instead of proactively engaging life. I notice that many of the fictional works that find themselves receiving a wider audience seem to include hapless folks in extraordinary circumstances.

In editing my first book there are many characters that are merely victims of circumstance. I've tried really hard to give at least a couple of the main characters the sense that they aren't merely reacting but working to create their own legacy in the face of adversity. Looking around in my own life it is difficult to find examples of people who are heroic without also being reactionary.

I blame the modern Christian faith for depreciating works of charity and acts of pious contrition. Much of what I think is pretty heroic is done by what would otherwise be idle hands and done out of some expectation rather than a pure measure of one's will. Trying to reach a US audience with these elements almost requires that your characters live in a strange vacuum or alternate reality.

Being righteous and portraying such an attribute in a fictional work is difficult without great care taken in both the language and the timing. While the act of writing such works should be a constrained mechanical process, the result must feel spontaneous as opposed to a reaction on the part of the protagonist or person.

Pushing past language to convey the intangible emotions associated with humbly aiding someone else is difficult. Most people have a pretty strict understanding of right and wrong they rely on instead of constructing that view case by case. I've read more than a few attempts to create these elements in a fictional work, most of the time I merely feel betrayed.

Like so many of the best things in literature portraying righteousness isn't done in a single sentence or paragraph. It is generally accomplished through the entire body of the work. Real life is no different I suppose, it isn't a single decision that makes us righteous, or one hundred, it is the sum of a lifetime.