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Journaling

I started this post in October of 2022. I was planning to write about writing today (to get points for writing for Finch — maybe I’ll post about Finch later!). My therapist wants me to actually *write* in hopes of getting a writing career going, so let’s resurrect and finish this post. All through my childhood, I was told that if I wanted to become a professional writer, which I did, I should…

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We're Planning an Out-of-Town Trip. I Hope.

So. I’m writing what I hope will be my first novel (or maybe I’ll finish it and then put it in a metaphorical drawer somewhere on my computer for my grandchildren to find after I’m dead). So far I’ve come to the conclusion that I need to make a sort of fanfiction-esque thing out of this novel. Much like Smallville or Harry Potter or Dark Shadows or any of the other properties that I’ve written…

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Today was the Annular Eclipse

My dad, Alex, and I were planning to walk to the park around the corner for the eclipse, but that didn’t work out. It turned out to be chilly and my dad has a very low tolerance for cold, so he backed out. Alex and I offered to stay home with him, but he waved good-bye and so we left. We ended up deciding to go to Eisenhower Park, which is in the foothills of the Hill Country and so it has a…

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Writing Prompts -- Technology

I need to get writing again. Again. I looked up a site that gives random writing prompts and this one was “Write a story set in a world where people are controlled by technology.” And, well, almost everything I’ve written is set in a world where people are controlled by technology. Because nearly everything I’ve written is set in a world with electric lights. Science is just now discovering how…

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Dictated Blog Post & Book Blogging

I recently downloaded the Samsung Voice App so that I can record my book reviews for the YouTube channel. I have a subscription to Dragon Anywhere, but in this economy, I think that I could use that $15 for something else. So now I’m trying the speech-to-text feature for the first time. My first attempt at this paragraph is in the footnotes. I couldn’t figure out how to make it into a block…

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YouTube Channel -- Book Reviews

This is going to be a fast one. I hope. I think I probably need to prewrite my book reviews for my YouTube channel and then record the vocals and have Alex edit them together with images of the book (and my arthritic hands!) in the park I’m using for the video. I’m seeing figures of 150 words per minute for voiceover. I guess that means that a 10-minute book review (I need to refresh my memory,…

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I've Had an Epiphany

Well, sort of. I just realized that these old photos are good for more than (a) my own curiosity and (b) potential use in YouTube videos. One of my back-burner kids’ books is a steampunk book about a pair of siblings traveling between San Antonio and Chicago on a train. Why San Antonio and Chicago? Because I’ve lived in both places and so I think I can get more of a feeling of what it’s like to…

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Will I Be Remembered in 100 Years?

I was frittering around on, I think it was YouTube, but maybe it was Facebook a while ago and someone asked if “you” would be remembered in 100 years. And I had to answer with a resounding,”Maybe.” I mean, for one thing, define “remembered.” If you’re asking if anyone alive today will still be alive *to* remember me in 100 years, well, if Evelyn’s daughter makes it to 100 years and six months,…

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Thoughts on San Antonio Historical Photo Project

I’m in the Ds now going through the photos on UTSA’s website. In fact, I’m skimming photos that start with “Dr.” right now. One of the things that makes me pause are photos of historic houses that were taken in 1968. I always go, “Ooh! That house looks old! Oh. Never Mind.” You see, when they were planning the World’s Fair, San Antonio wasn’t actually that big. For some reason, when the city…

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Search Engine Optimization

I guess that if I’m going to try to make money at either writing or YouTube or TikTok or whatever, I probably need to figure out how to work an algorithm. Crap. Where do I even start on this? I’ve toyed with those on-line keyword tools, but they keep giving me basically garbage. One tool, for example, suggests “blog search” as a keyword for this blog. I talk about travel, books, and history…

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Current Project -- Historical Photographs!

I will probably wonder until my dying day what happened to the photos Thomas and I took between our wedding and the purchase of our first digital camera, which I think was a Sony Mavica from 1997. I mean, they should be around here somewhere. Right? What I really would like is pictures we took of San Antonio in 1993 through 1997. I don’t know where our earliest digital photos are. I suspect…

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YouTube Channel

In order to monetize my YouTube channel (I would like to make money here, but I am starting this YouTube channel specifically to make money), my videos need to be a particular length. My first attempt is going to be a longish short. I think I’m going to have Alex stitch the short pieces together and just post it as-is, then once I’ve had a year or so of posting under my belt, I’m going to try…

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My First Novel

I’ve been working on something that I keep hoping will be my first novel. I keep bumping into the problem that I don’t know who the characters are, and therefore don’t know what they’ll do. I’m thinking about cheating and making my characters original characters in a fanfiction story. I’ve had pretty good luck with that technique. I’ve created love interests, friends, family members, all sorts…

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Decluttering Project -- Yarn

So. Much. Yarn. This story starts in 1974. Ish. 1973? Maybe? Anyway, my aunt was pregnant and my mom decided to learn to knit so that she could make something for the baby. So she bought two skeins of yarn and a pair of #4 knitting needles and started taking knitting classes from one of her friends. Turns out she couldn’t make heads or tails out of what Lois was telling her, so she gave…

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YouTube Channel, Part II

So I took my first stab at recording for the YouTube channel. I got downtown an hour and a half before I was supposed to be meeting Ray and decided to get footage from the River Walk side. I started out filming the river side of the area where the Veramendi house used to be, because that is where Ben Milam was killed. I was keeping one eye on the ground while I filmed with my cell phone. Maybe I…

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I'm Thinking About Making a YouTube Channel

A lot of the stuff I write about, as you may know if you’ve seen other posts, is history and public parks and the history of public parks. So I’m thinking about maybe kinda starting a YouTube channel about the history of parks that I’ve visited. Ones here in town and others that I’ll visit in the future. Like if I can ever get the time and money, and Alex can get the time, I’d like to visit…

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I Got My Flu Shot on Saturday

And my arm’s still a little sore. I didn’t have any side effects, though, so there’s that. I only have had side effects to a flu shot a couple of times. However, COVID boosters usually leave me flat on my hind end, so I figured that scheduling my flu shot for a day when I had the next day off would be a good thing. And since I didn’t have a reaction, I got to run errands on Sunday. I took an…

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