Meandering Monday about How I’m Dealing with Change

2020 is not shaping up as my favorite year. We’ve had the health impacts and self-inflicted economic disaster of Covid-19, followed by the anarchy of not-so-peaceful protests (folks, it’s called RIOTING AND ANARCHY.)

Then last week – SURPRISE!!! I was informed that I no longer have a day-job – specifically that my job had become a casualty of a reorganizational activity that’s been in the works for some time. Well – this was not quite unexpected, but I did not anticipate this particular result, either.

I am not here to say POOR ME – not hardly. I know there are a few million people dealing with the destruction of their livelihoods by unrealistic people in government (the same sorts who believe that money is a magical thing that grows on trees), and they all have it far worse than me. My situation has nothing to do with Covid (it really was a functional reorg), although it helps a little with my shopping – there are stores who kindly offer their seniors special shopping hours to help avoid exposure, but a couple of those were impossible to take advantage of because they were set squarely in my work day. Well, that is not an issue anymore… (does Bill REALLY see that as a silver lining? He must be desperately out of his head. But hey, what else is new?)

This has had an impact on my ability to write. Between the effort to wrap things up in the 2 days before my day-job became my FORMER day-job, and the fact that no matter how calm I thought I was, my brain was FRIED, last week was pretty much a wash when it came to writing (which will be reported Wednesday, as always).

Another complication is that I had become accustomed to doing my writing and ePublication with certain tools that are not available to me now – a Windows 7 laptop, MS Word to do my writing, MS PowerPoint for my book covers, and a couple of FAIRLY up to date browsers. As I meandered last week, I am a creature of habits, and I needed to change what I was writing with.

We have a decent computer, but it’s there for My Significant One’s use, and I don’t want her to be deprived, so I pulled out our previous computer (the one that we thought was dead until after the new one was built to replace it, and then a friend discovered that “oh, look, someone forgot to connect this to the power supply”.) So I connected the cables, a wired mouse and keyboard, and miracle of miracles, it booted up. I now have an old e-machine (let’s call it Eeeee!) loaded with Windows XP and Internet Explorer 8, which is having a very hard time interacting with the internet – some sites seem fine, others it can’t get to at all. I finally managed to download Chrome onto it, which seems to work better than IE8, but it still can’t handle some of the sites that I need to access (because Chrome can only update so far before it can’t work with the ancient and unsupported Windows XP.)

These browser issues are an inconvenience, but I can always use the new computer whenever Eeeee! can’t get me where I need to go.

Then  there’s the issue of a text editor – Eeeee! was loaded with WordPad (which is inadequate) and OpenOffice (which is better, but still not up to snuff), but once I had Chrome I was able to go to Office 365 on OneDrive Live(which I forgot I had available with my MSN subscription), so now I have access to a Word and PowerPoint – I have yet to discover what the deficiencies are compared to the desktop versions, but so far, so good.

So I continue to explore my brave new world. On the plus side, I definitely have more time to write now (we’ll see how well I take advantage of that.) Having been working from home for over three months, it won’t be unusual to be home all the time now. My Significant One has even observed that this is our opportunity to spend some QUALITY TIME with each other.

 

So, what could happen here next? I don’t know, but I’m going to fight my change-resistant instincts and make the best of whatever comes along.

Just saying…

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Fate is neither something to run away from, nor something to run towards.

The first bright-eye to be seen on the mountain in living memory, Sandrik didn’t want anyone to think of him as they did the ominous Aurae of legend, so he had worked hard to keep his special abilities hidden. But there was more to Sandrik than even he knew. Now that it was time for him to enter the ancient ruins of Taernfeld and be declared a man, what other changes might he be forced into?

Swordsmaster – my first novel – is available at several online retailers, including, but not limited to:

Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/954501

Amazon:  https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07WNK79FM

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William Mangieri’s writing, including “Date Night” (another of his Writers of the Future honorable mentions), as well as another 80-some-odd short stories (plus his collections)  can be found in many places, including, but not limited to:
• Smashwords:  https://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/NoTimeToThink
• His Amazon Author page:  http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B008O8CBDY
• Barnes & Noble:  http://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/william-mangieri?store=book&keyword=william+mangieri

To CONNECT WITH HIM (and LIKE and FOLLOW), go to
• His site on WordPress:  https://williammangieri.wordpress.com
• “William Mangieri’s Writing Page” on Facebook at:  http://www.facebook.com/NoTimeToThink
• His Goodreads author page:  http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6893616.William_Mangieri
• Or on twitter: @WilliaMangieri