What's the Deal with Blogger

I just noticed that I have reached the 200 post mark for this blog.  That is a lot of posts, especially when one considers how short many of the first posts were.  Barely a paragraph or so of text.  I can't be sure if this was the first or second of my blogs.  Whichever the other one was, I no longer post regularly for it.  The same can be said of my third blog, the literary one.  After I finished with my novella, or whatever I decide to make of it, I couldn't come up with any good ideas to continue it.  Now, there is only this one left.  I don't even feel really like much to write anything today.  In fact, I didn't come up with an idea for this post until I noticed I had reached 200 posts.  Since I started this blog, Blogger has changed greatly.  For instance, the interface has recently been changed.  I'm still getting used to how to deal with the new formatting features.  Most of them are the same, but they still feel different.  I don't think I have the large range of colors for text and backgrounds I used to have.  Another thing missing is the Icon app.  For much of the time I had this blog, I wanted to create my own icon to show up when people looked for this blog.  I even dedicated posts with preliminary looks I created using Pages from my Mac.  It was okay, but I wanted something more.  It took awhile to find an art app for free that I liked.  Then, I had to experiment with working with it.  Just as I started with getting a basic design for the icon for one of my other blogs, the update occurred and the Icon app feature was removed.  At least I can't seem to find it anymore.  Let's be honest.  I never really looked through all the possible features when I first set this blog up.  I didn't own a computer yet, so I was limited in both time and flexibility with what I could do.  Even after I got my Mac, I rarely went back to see what all I could now do.  I'm not sure what else has been changed that I have now missed out on. Even the counter that my Mac is on is getting uneven, causing me problems as I type.  I guess I should quit today's post while I still can.  I'm about an hour behind schedule today, and I really need to catch up as soon as possible.  See you next week.

The Case of the Missing Comic Books

As I have mentioned many times in this blog, I like comic books.  In fact, they are one of the main reasons why I was already reading by the time I entered kindergarten.  I still get a few a week, sometimes a lot, all but one or two a month from DC comics.  However, for the last two months, I haven't been able to get any, as there were none to be found.  Let's get into the details.  In the last week of March, just before I was able to pick up that week's pull, Diamond, the exclusive distributor of comics to the direct market, announced that they would be shutting down due to the disruptions of services stemming from the lockdowns sweeping the country, particularly those in their home state of Maryland.  While some of their warehouses nationwide had already started to get the following week's titles in, Diamond felt that this was the best thing to do.  It didn't hurt that the continent's main printing press for comic books, in Ontario, Canada of all places, was shutting down as well.  This meant that there would be no shipping of new products until the lockdowns were relaxed.  Many stores weren't even allowed to be open, although some did manage to get by with delivery of products already on hand and the small trickle of non-comic books merchandise that was still being shipped out.  There would be no new comics anywhere for the next few weeks.  Except at Walmart.  See, a few years ago, DC went into an exclusive deal to supply Walmart with special titles, with a mix of new material and reprints.  Many stores balked at this, leading DC to start reprinting special versions of the new materials to sell to the direct market.  In the following year, DC allowed for the new batch of Walmart titles to be sold to the direct market, a few weeks later and with a different cover.  This titles were still being sold at Walmart when no one else had anything.  (On a side note, I have been noticing these off-brand new comic books at Walmart.  I hadn't heard of the title nor the company that makes them, only that they are new.  I have no idea of what to make of them.)  Then, DC mad a major announcement in mid-April.  They were breaking their exclusive contract with Diamond, one they had helped to come up with that ultimately led to Diamond becoming the only direct market distributor of most comic books in the country, and started dealing with two new companies to provide product.  Technically, they weren't new companies.  They were actually start-up divisions of two major mail order subscription fulfillment services.  They would be splitting the country into geographically arranged areas to provide to any store that was still open and wanted to get in some new books.  DC was able to do this because they still had some of the overprinting from a few titles that they could use.  Naturally, this upset many stores, especially those that couldn't fully open.  Why would a store go through one of their competitors, just so they could sell a few comics? This announcement came just before Diamond said it would resume services in late May, albeit with an abbreviated schedule.  DC followed this with the announcement that stores would now be allowed to sell their product on Tuesdays, instead of Wednesdays, as had been the case for decades.  Supposedly, this would allow all of DC's products (trade paperback collections [tpbs] and original graphic novels [ogns], not just comics) to be sold on the same day everywhere.  Before this announcement, comic book stores would get to sell tpbs and ogns the day they came in, while book stores would have to wait until the next Tuesday, which is the usual on sale date for the majority of titles.  This way, all of DC's products would be on sale at the same time everywhere, with no one getting an extra benefit.  This new date would also apply to product received from Diamond, once they started back up.  The next shoe to drop, after so many, was that DC would be producing new product for the digital services.  The first lineup of titles was just the recent material from the Walmart comics, just repackaged without the reprint material included.  Still, it allowed DC to have 'new' product out for a long time before anyone else.  When Diamond then made the list of product available when the started back up, many of the title DC published early would be included all at once.  However, there appeared to be gaps in the schedule, for not DC but other companies as well.  It turns out that both Marvel and DC were delaying some bigger titles until more of the country had opened back up, so that everyone would get an equal chance at reading them.  What's more, Marvel would be shifting some new series, as well as an ongoing, to digital format only.  Reader would only get a physical copy once the series were collected into a tpb. DC would follow suit, with shifting the last few issues of two series to digital only.  Fans would have to wait a few months later to get the physical copy once the trades came out.  [Disclaimer:  I read the two series in question, one of which was already cancelled before this mess cam about.] This came on the heels of DC announcing a new digital series, which may or may not ever get a physical run.  This is angering many long time readers, many who prefer physical copies over digital, where ownership is difficult to determine.  The consensus suggest that this is all a plan of DC's parent company, AT+T/Warner, who would make more money on the digital copies than with the physical books.  The final straw in all of this?  The shipment of many of the DC titles that had already been sent out with the new distributors was delayed to Diamond.  This means that I won't be getting all of my late books this week, when the first shipment finally arrives.  I don't know when I will get them either.

Where, O Where Has My Google Account Gone; Where, O Where Can It Be

This past Tuesday afternoon, I went to check my email for the first time that day.  I usually do so earlier, but I was out that morning checking up on my store (which is closed for the time meaning) and doing some light shopping.  Instead of getting into my account, I received an error message suggesting that I was using an unfamiliar device and I had to verify my account.  This seemed fishy, as I had been using my MacBook all but exclusively for logging into my Google accounts for over a year.  Still, I began the verification process.  Unfortunately, I had a few delays in doing them.  So much so that it looked like I had failed.  I didn't immediately get my account back up like I thought I would.  I was frantic.  On Tuesday, I was expecting a very big preview of the Kickstarter project I was backing.  The preview would be available only through a link in an update email.  I was sort of scared.  As  a last moment tactic, I checked my Mac's Mail app to see if it still worked.  It did.  While I didn't have access to my email account, I still had access to my email.  Splitting hairs, but at least I could download my preview.  By Tuesday night, after various attempts to contact Google, I resorted to creating a second account, just so I could email them back with my concerns.  Turns out that I may have sent emails to a bot that doesn't reply to such things.  Anyway, I had one more thing to worry about that night.  I barely got any sleep from my worrying.  A neighbors porch light shining into the room didn't help, either.  The next day, I tried more things.  While I still had email, the rest of the Google suite was locked out.  This blog for instance.  Fortunately, I had a work around for this, at least.  My blogs, and Blogger account, actually started on my store's website.  With some minor tweaking, I found out that I could still post to my blog, even if I couldn't actually make changes to the site or access other features.  I may have been able to, but I stopped after the initial revelation.  I didn't want to risk anything else.  I still checked on contacting Google and tried more on my own, anxious about possibly losing access to anything I connecting to my original account.  Nonetheless, I had another sleepless night, even if a glaring porch light was the main cause.  I spent much of Thursday morning and early afternoon doing most of the weekly shopping, again checkin up on my store, where I currently had no wifi.  It was almost mid-afternoon by the time I could check on my Google accounts.  Still nothing, but I did try on last stupid attempt.  I tried logging onto YouTube, to see if I could merge my tow accounts. (I tried to do so with my emails the day before, but it went nowhere.). To my surprise, I found that I could link to my original YouTube account; from there, I could get back to my original account.  Aside from some security alerts, only one thing was different.  I now had the ability to have videos chats with others.  I almost wonder if my problem was the Google took the account down to add the new features without telling anyone. Or I could have done something wrong, like not signing out of YouTube properly or messing up the verification process.   Whatever, I have my original account back.  Now, I have a more pressing problem--what will I do with my second email address?

The Power of Friendship

    Thirty years ago, give or take a few weeks, when I graduated high school, I did not have any goals in mind.  I did, however, have a plan to figure everything out.  I was going to community college and explore as much as I could to find out just what I wanted to do.  I wanted to write, but I also wanted to do something more as a career to start out on.  I also had many other interests I wanted to try out.  A cornerstone of my plan was to maintain at least one friendship from high school until I could develop new circles of friends.  You see, I had a very sheltered childhood.  I was never allowed to do anything or go anywhere without my mother.  Since she didn't like to go much of anywhere, I was basically stuck going shopping with her.  The only exception was school.  It was only there that I felt free to be myself.  Even when I wasn't allowed to go to many outside school functions, I still felt freer there than anywhere else.  This meant I had no training in social activities.  I was hoping that with an old friend helping me out, I could finally become socially aware and acceptable.  None of this happened.  Due to some mix-ups, I never got the chance to explore many of my interests.  Almost none.  While I had a few friends who I wanted to be with, I was never able to get closet to them to ask for help, and I didn't make any strong connections with anyone new.  My friends transferred after one year, while I stayed behind.  It didn't really hit me until my last semester when I had a panic attack.  I seem to get them every few years.  I don't know how I managed to go to class that first day, trapped inside my own head and all of my fears.  I somehow graduated and was going to the University of Kentucky with a possible major in journalism.  I was hoping to finally explore those other interests and get out of my shell.  It didn't happen.  I was forced to cancel my plans and switch to another school.  That turned out to be the worst mistake in my life.  It was probably the only school in the state at that time that didn't have any student run publication.  I was forced to switch majors to English, the closest thing they had.  The school did not have the outlets I was searching for to explore my other interests.  I wasn't even told who my advisor was until the start of my second semester there, after I wasn't able to leave after my disastrous first semester.  Not only was he not in the English department, but I was never even able to meet him until the end of that second semester.  We never hit it off, and I barely ever talked to him.  I hated that place so much that I never did try to form any bonds with my fellow students or my instructors.  Don't get me wrong.  It was probably a good school for many people, it just wasn't the right fit for me on so many levels.  It was so wrong for me that I had I to go an extra semester to make all the requirements for my major and the school.  It was then that I decided to go to graduate school, since I didn't feel like I had learned enough.  Unfortunately, planning graduate school a few weeks before a December graduation is not a good idea, especially if one doesn't have the help of their school.  Suffice to say, I wasn't able to even halfway complete the application process before the deadline. After graduation, I tried to find a job, but without the proper training and experience. journalism was not going to be my field.  I had lost interest in my chosen profession, and I didn't want to pursue it anymore.  Someone had turned in a favor to get me a job.  I was forced to take it.  How they could ever think it was a good fit for me?  I didn't have the training, qualifications, or even any interest in it.  I left after a month for those, and other reasons.  A few months after that, I saw a wedding announcement in the paper about one of my old friends.  He had gotten a job and left the area and gotten married a few weeks previously.  It triggered another panic attack.  Here he was, well ahead in his life, and there I was, a big nothing, forgotten by everyone.  While I did try to find a job, I never found one.  I rarely left the house.  I never learned how to socialize, so I wasn't missing much besides my own life.  I did this for years, until someone offered me the chance to open my own store.  I didn't have the training or interest to do so, but I literally didn't have any other choice.  I tried to make it work, with the possibility of it leading to the path I really wanted.  Unfortunately, every time I thought I was making headway, something would happen that would take it all away.  I should have closed many time over the years, but I managed to stay open, mostly because I didn't have anything else I could do.  I had ideas, but the world around me was changing too fast for me to keep up and decide on any one choice.  After many years of barely keeping on, I decided to try social media as a way to drum up business.  I just wanted to create a page for it on Facebook, but I would up getting on it myself, my lack of any friends notwithstanding.  I waited a few months before trying to find any of my old friends, too scared to see what would happen.  But I found them, after some wrong turns.  At first, I was feeling many conflicting emotions.  I was angry that they seemed to have forgotten about me, even when I never forgot them.  I was jealous that they got to have a life, when I was almost jobless and without a family of my own.  I was miserable that I wasn't there to share in their lives and help them out.  I was crying randomly whenever I thought about what could have been.  But I was happy.  I finally got to tell them what they meant to me and what I felt should have happened in our lives.  One had recently went back to school so he could get a better job.  One had become a teacher, even though I never knew he any inkling of going into teaching.  Another was working in the administration at a relatively local university, well outside of what I thought he would be doing.  Then something crystallized in me.  I could go to graduate school, get my degree so I could work as some sort of instructor or author in residence at a university, since there is no way I could teach children. Then, I would have the freedom to write what I wanted without the fear of not having a job.  I was most comfortable in academic surroundings, and that could lead to finally learning about socializing.  It would be tough to get in, but I knew I could do it.  As a stopgap, someone suggested I take a few online classes at another school that I could get into quicker and easier.  It wasn't the type of degree or format I wanted, but I took them up on the offer.  I got in and did fairly well.  I was setting myself up to apply to the University of Kentucky and finally fulfill a childhood dream.  I missed the deadline the first time around, but I made it for the fall 2020 start.  Everything was finally going right in my life.  Unfortunately, I wasn't accepted.

    Now, I don't know what to do.  It will be a months to apply again and almost a year before I know if I get in.  In the meantime, I have no other plan.  I could try to apply to another school, but most of the creative writing programs I have found are residencies.  I need to be on a campus to get the socialization I need to progress.  Furthermore, the classes I have already taken probably won't transfer, at least of the schools I've seriously looked at. This means that all of the time and money I used for my online classes will have been wasted unless I try to get the regular English Masters that I wasn't planning on getting or using.  I could finish that program, but it will be hard.  I don't know if I can find enough classes that are integral to my goals and that I have enough interest in to become eligible in time to take my exit exam next spring.  If I don't, I might be forced to take it during my first semester at Kentucky, about the time of my finals. Even if I can take the exam next spring, I might not find a proctor to administer it with the outbreak in the background.  This doesn't even take into account if I don't pass it on my first try.  Furthermore, I had decided to finally close my store, the day before the lockdown was declared.  My store doesn't have the capabilities to function during the lockdown, so I haven't been able to sell off my inventory or even find someone to help clear everything away to put into some sort of storage.  Even when I would be able to partially open, I still might not be able to open under the additional restrictions.  I might have to wait until everything is lifted before I can officially close up.  Of course, I would want another job I could start waiting for me.  However, there isn't any job market at the moment due to the outbreak.  This is going to make finding a job much harder.  Compounding this is my need to find something that I am qualified for, interested in, and designed to further my goal.  Most of the jobs I'm qualified for, I have no interest in.  Most of the thing I'm interested in, I either am not fully qualified for or not really found locally.  I'm not even sure what would constitute a job best designed to help me in my goal.  Then there is the fact that I would have to leave after I year when I go back to school and leave the area.  Once I start back, I will need to be as much of a full time student as I can, hopefully working for the university on a form of trial basis or something.  It might not be fair to my employer without them knowing this, which could make it harder to find a job.  It's so stupid.  It took me thirty years to figure out what I want to do with my life.  I put off almost everything else trying to find this goal, leaving my life behind while the world continued to move forward.  Now that I have my goal, I'm not sure how I can get there.  I don't want anything else.  If I had only stuck to my plan, keeping my friends by my side, I would be a successful writer by now, married and worrying about getting my kids into college instead of myself.  I might not still have those old friends, but I would have newer ones.  I passed on so many opportunities, thinking I didn't need them or they weren't right for me.  Now, I'm afraid I'm too old to be starting my life, but I still deserve to have one.  I just want to be.  I just want my dreams to be fulfilled.  I just don't want to be alone.  I want a friend.