I’m all about taking classes to learn new things, embrace change, and keep my skills current. So, should I have taken the WordPress Full Site Editing class?

I ask this because the issue with my story not being visible required using the new editing tool. Hmm. I did everything I needed to do using the mechanisms I’ve been using for years and that story should have displayed as expected.

The reason I say this is because this post and the one previous to it that ranted about the issue I was having were created and published via the aforementioned mechanisms-I’ve-been-using-for-years. So, why is a page, the mechanism by which I display stories different?

Plus, that new mechanism? Displays with a little ‘beta’ icon and that tells me that this whole thing is still in testing mode. Perhaps it’s in acceptance test mode but a test mode is a test mode is a test mode.

To adequately test a process – any process – you need a script. When you identify a bug, you need to tell the developer exactly what you did to trigger the bug so the developer can replicate what you did and identify the piece of code that may have the defect.

Users tend to go off script all the time. When they do, they find inadvertent bugs – the ones that appear because a user did something no one intended them to do. I’ve watched beautiful code crash and burn because a user did something completely unexpected and the developer didn’t code a ‘for everything else, go here’ option.

All the paragraphs in this post are ‘blocks.’ The blocks can be moved around which means I can write cohesive paragraphs without thinking about how my thoughts flow. When I’m done, I can look at the entire post, reorder the blocks, and appear to have a nice orderly mind. I like that.

The mechanisms to publish this post are automated because I identified the post as a component of a structure called a ‘blog.’ The blog structure behaves according to a set of rules behind the scenes. I don’t have to do anything except ensure I am creating a ‘post’ rather than a ‘page.’

The menu item ‘Stories’ is a page. It’s a parent page with a bunch of children; my short stories. Each story is a page. I created my latest short story exactly how I’ve been creating pages since I started using WordPress. But, my site’s theme is now under Full Site Editing. So, creating the pages appears to require some extra steps. The ones I didn’t do.

So, I have a class to take. See you.

Have you ever found yourself blithering on at someone about an episode in your personal melodrama, or is icky personal, or isn’t yours to share? Yup. Me, too.

I think it comes from lack of practice. I don’t have the best conversational skills. I can’t blame it all on the pandemic. Isolation from the larger world is a big social deal. I write every day, but I’ve saved up a bunch of words to speak aloud.

I mean, a bunch of words. Clerk at the grocery store says ‘how’s it going?’ and I blurt out some absurd thing that’s been floating around in my head for two years. The mail carrier waves from her truck and drives off and I’m standing on the driveway with a finger in the air.

‘Hey, wait, I have something to say.’

Yeah, no I don’t. It’s just a friendly face and I haven’t seen one beyond family members in so long I want to chase the mail lady down and talk. It’s tough, I’m still masked, I use the self-check option, I order online and pick up at the store. Maybe someday I’ll be able to meet someone and, when they ask ‘how’s it going?’ I’ll say, ‘just fine, how about you?’

Until then, if I say something here that’s a bit too much, well, you understand. I still don’t get out much.

See you.

It snowed last week. I think it was what meteorologists call a ‘wintery mix,’ so it wasn’t officially ‘snow’ despite sticking to the lawn and garden. With it came the wind which reduced the actual temperature significantly.

With Spring arguing with Winter for its place in the here-and-now, nice weather days are making their comeback. The giant snow mountain across the street – courtesy of the city snowplows – is melting. We pulled up the snow stakes and sketched out the seed beds last week.

Yesterday, we went for a walk with our kids’ dog. She needed to burn off some energy and we wanted to continue our daily walks – weather permitting – that we jumped into just before the latest round of snow showers. It definitely permitted, but the wind chill was deeply cold.

Just after 8am this morning, the temperature was 14 degrees Fahrenheit. But, the sun shines through the office window. Yay! The wind, too, has died down so maybe, just maybe, our walk will have all the warmth we’ve been craving from the sun.

By the way, I started an avocado plant from seed last November. In five months, in the dead of winter, with a bit of help from a homemade hothouse, I got this:

The holiday cactus nearby was an experiment in cuttings I took from the kids’ more mature plant. It’s doing nicely, too.

See you.

I was going to post this thought in teeny-tiny print because I’m whispering to myself. Maybe there should just be a ‘whisper’ font that can be used for whispering.

The snow is melting.

It feels like yesterday that we threw snow off the driveway, but it was earlier this week. We’d had rain and then snow so the stuff was wet and heavy but, as always, doing the chore together made short shrift of the work.

Today, the trees in the backyard are rising out of leafy dirt rather than a foot of white stuff. This is a portent of things to come. In April, we’ll plant two new trees. My youngest granddaughter wants to help plant the butterfly bush seeds I bought. She also wants to see if her mint plants survived the winter.

I’m happy to have her around. She forces me out of the house and into the potential of a garden. Next year, she’ll be full time in school, so the days of enjoying her energy and her questions two full days a week are coming to a close. I will miss her.

But, I see the sun and realize winter is almost done and I can expect rain rather than snow and bright days ahead. I hope you enjoy this turn of the season as much as I intend to.

See you.

I spent time yesterday cleaning up my eBooks. Yes, I have two – an older Nook given to me by my husband the year we gave one another identical gifts, neither of which were asked for, and a newer version that became the tablet my granddaughters learned about technology from.

I have a lot of eBooks. Most of them cost me less than $3 apiece. But, the eBooks can only hold so many. Of course, I use Calibre to manage my books, so removing them from the books doesn’t wipe them out of existence. I can retrieve them whenever I want to.

Each book that I removed, however, I have to consider. Did I open it? Have I read it? Will I read it if I haven’t already? Why did I, didn’t I, will I, or won’t I? Since I’m writing a book, these questions matter to me.

I had an Aha! moment. Well, actually, two of them.

The first one was: if I didn’t read the book, or I didn’t finish the book, why not?

The second was: why did I buy it in the first place?

I realized that most of my books come from recommendations from people or businesses I don’t personally know. Businesses? I subscribe to BookBub and their business is to recommend books when those books are free or on sale. People? I read blogs, I talk to fellow writers, I subscribe to classes, podcasts, and advice. These are all avenues to book titles.

Not all free or sale books are my cup of tea. Not all books on someone’s recommended list are books I will like. So, I have to research them. Generally, that means going to my favorite eBook-seller and reading a sample chapter or going to a preferred reviewer and reading what others say.

You might call this doing research. I call it building bridges.

Each bridge is specific and personal. It can be a rope bridge across a wide chasm – like the one I built between me and Stephen King. I loved The Green Mile, but very little else. It can be a brick and mortar edifice across strong, silent river – like the one I built between me and Rex Stout. I’ve read everything he’s written.

Whatever type of bridge, it spans a divide; one I label Trust. Wherever I get the recommendation, can I trust it? Can I trust the writer, the reviewer, the critic, or the bookseller? Can I trust the friend or family member? Can I trust it always, sometimes depending on the genre, or rarely?

Is it easy to step out on that bridge and cross the divide? Do you approach the bridge with confidence? Do you believe in a smooth crossing? When you achieve the other side, are you glad you made the trip?

Writers don’t hit every book out of the ballpark for every reader, including their most faithful fans. When you read something that doesn’t hit the mark, does the bridge still stand as built or has it changed?

We build bridges to everyone in our lives. Our experiences measure the divide between us, determine if we want to cross it, and shape the bridge we build to do so. So, too, do we build bridges to books and the authors who write them.

I hope you’re building a bridge to me and my stories.

See you.

I stay on top of the news from my native state. A second generation native Californian – my parents were both born in California, but they both came from immigrants to California; one set from Washington state and the other from Scotland – I like to know what’s been going on since I departed for Minnesota.

So, yes, I was prepared for the storm system coming in from the coast. But, I guess the jet stream moved because the 1 to 3 inches of snow I anticipated morphed into 3 to 6. That range fell on our perfectly clear and relatively flat driveway and its path up the stairs to the front door.

The bulk of the work to clear that snow falls on my husband and his trusty snowthrower. He walks a mile, I’m certain, because the driveway is really long and he has to make a lot of passes. When he’s done, he uncovers a patch of grass for our kids’ dog. No wonder Rosie loves him.

My job, much easier by far, is clearing the path, the stairs, and the porch by shovel and broom. You heard me. Broom. Once you get the snow cleared, you can sweep the residue of snow and ice and it’s less damaging to do so. Plus, there’s a safety factor. You never know when someone needs to use those stairs.

Once all the snow is cleared away, the sun, weak as it is today, can do its job and dry the pavement. No ice is a good thing.

Hello, California. A simple wave of the hand would have been nice, but I’m grateful for any recognition that some of us live too far away for a chat over the fence. Sending us your rain was nice but I’d rather you keep it. You’ll need it.

See you all later.

If anyone reading this now has been reading my thoughts or my stories, they will notice that I have a new theme. The highlight of the new theme is darkness. It’s also devoid of decoration.

Hmm, you might think, is this a statement? No, it’s just me. When I was in grade school, my teacher wondered why I only drew in black crayon. He asked me.

‘Because it’s my favorite color,’ I replied.

That started a round of psychological evaluations that achieved nothing but a validation of a perfectly normal kid. Black is still my favorite color and when I found this theme, I was hooked.

It’s supposed to be easier on the eyes and I can say that it is easier on my eyes. It’s also supposed to be easier to edit. It has bells-and-whistles that are rolling out to WordPress users everywhere already included. I like that idea.

I’m still working on a process to write something here every day. Eventually, I’ll be posting another story – after the judging is over since it’s for a contest – and, when I’m satisfied by the direction my book is going now, I’ll post chapters.

In the meantime, enjoy the new theme.

I took time off – Christmas, family, fun times. Yesterday I decided to do the next assignment which required a few minor tweaks. At least, that’s all the assignment required. A nudge here, a small change there, and everyone would be happy.

Four hours later, after I fixed the stuff I tweaked and rearranged the posts and pages, I had done enough damage. What’s the difference between a post and a page? You can add a drop down menu to organize pages and you can use a blog template to organize posts.

I changed all the stories to pages and they each sit in a menu under the My Stories main menu item. That was fun in a traumatic way – opening extra tabs in my browser and suchlike. I created a blog page that automatically organized these posts by date. Restructuring the site took some time but, for the moment, I’m happy with it.

So, I’m going to rest today, shovel some snow, freeze in the wind, and otherwise do some manual labor. It should be fun if you like torture. I’ll let you know how it all worked out tomorrow. See you later.