Almost Ready for Christmas

The Christmas rush is not so bad this year. A lot of this may have to do with not putting up Christmas decorations, as I discussed in this post. We don’t seem to have as many seasonal events to go to, and all but one are completed. Tonight I plan on putting up the string to drape Christmas cards over. Based on the few coming in so far, I doubt I’ll need the second string this year.

So we are in better shape at this point in the Christmas season than normal. Or at least I am. Today we got the van back from the shop, a number of maintenance items done, including one that might have been a disaster (very worn tire) on the trip we will soon take. The insurance company replaced the cracked windshield, which is good. Also the insurance company is going to make major repairs to our house due to hail damage. The adjuster and the designated contractor are duking it out now over a couple of items the contracted feels are needed, but which the insurance company at first didn’t authorize. It should all work out.

Our Christmas letter is written. Tonight I’ll print it. Lynda said she would address the cards this year. I hope she will start tonight so that we can mail them by Saturday. That might be a first: to have all our cards out before Christmas.

Writing is taking up a lot of time right now. Or maybe I should say my writing career is. I’m not actually writing much at present. I’ve had some issues with the Amazon listings for my book. At first the e-book and print book versions for Documenting America were not linked. Through the CreateSpace help system I got that taken care of. But the print version page shows four people as translators of the book. How did that happen? So I’m trying to get that taken care of, through the CS help system again.

Today I spent a little time at Goodreads, editing and expanding my author profile. When I did that, then went to my author page, and it included a dozen books, none of which were mine! So I went to Goodreads tech support and contacted them. The auto responder said it might take three to five business days to address my issue, but I’ve already had an email saying the problem is fixed. Sure enough, my author profile now shows my two books, and only those. Note that the URL may not work, as they are going to change my author name to David A. Todd. If that happens, I'll come back and edit in a proper link.

This Goodreads thing is going to take hours to figure out. Actually, I’m not sure I’ve ever properly edited my CreateSpace profile or my Kindle profile. And I think an Amazon profile is a separate critter. Meanwhile I read some advice recently that said I should be using LinkedIn as a professional social media. I’m not sure I have the brain power left to join one more place.

Christmas is nine days away, and I’m more pleased it is, this year, than any year in recent memory.