Share button?

It's a brave new world for this Luddite. What's a Luddite, you ask? The origin of the word goes back to 19th century England and mechanization of the textile mills. People fought that for a bit. These days it generally means someone who's not really ready to embrace EVERY piece of new tech or EVERY Internet app or EVERY upgrade of software that comes down the pike.

One of the comments on my last blog entry came from Lynn Crain - why not try a Twitter share button?

Egads. A share button. What the frell is that?

I went and looked it up and it seems harmless enough on the surface. I mean, how bad can I mess it up?

So here it is. I guess my only option is to give it a shot and see what happens.


Tweet

Beautiful Light

It's a common problem, I'm sure. We love digital pictures. We collect them from everywhere - our phones, email, the Internet, old-fashioned cameras. One little click and they're saved on the hard drive for posterity. And then what? 

They're stored on the hard drive for posterity and they're in one big messy folder marked with some series of numbers instead of when we took the photo and what it's supposed to be.

Maybe it's just me who does that. 

It's a beautiful late September evening here so I strolled around my corner of the world. In mere days the leaves will change and summer will truly be gone. The light was just right and I had a moment of deja vu, that it had been that way before and I'd captured the image. I came inside and started to look through my photos. (I really need to do some organizing!) I found the image of beautiful light and thought I'd share it with you. 

Rayne
website

A new contract - it's been awhile

Life moves at a pace we have little control over. Oh, we think we do. We make plans and we scurry about, but in the end, it all unfolds much as the universe pleases. I've come too far in life to believe I'm in the driver's seat. There are times you just know everything has come together as it was meant to and your actions were all part of a bigger plan. 

I'm very pleased to announce that I've signed a contract with Whiskey Creek Press Torrid to publish One Summer. I don't know the release date yet, but I'll pass that along as soon as it becomes available. 

It feels pretty good to get moving in this direction again. Being older and wiser, I'm more relaxed and certainly more capable. I think that's a good mix. Heck, I might even have to resurrect my Twitter account! 

Rayne

website: http://www.rayneforrest.com

Rayne's Ramblings: Baseball in Heaven

I always think of my grandfather when I read this "oldie but goodie" joke. Pop played baseball in the local bush leagues and was an avid Orioles fan. I hope he’s pitching next Tuesday in a game somewhere, too.

Rayne
***

Baseball in Heaven

Two ninety-one year old men, Moe and Sam, have been friends all their lives. It seems that Sam is dying of cancer, and Moe comes to visit him every day.

"Sam," says Moe, "You know how we have both loved baseball all our lives, and how we played minor league ball together for so many years. Sam, you have to do me one favor. When you get to Heaven, and I know you will go to Heaven, somehow you've got to let me know if there's baseball in Heaven."

Sam looks up at Moe from his death bed, and says, "Moe, you've been my best friend many years. This favor, if it is at all possible, I'll do for you."

And shortly after that, Sam passes on.

It is midnight a couple of nights later. Moe is sound asleep when he is awakened by a blinding flash of white light and a voice calls out to him, "Moe.... Moe...."

"Who is it?" says Moe sitting up suddenly. "Who is it?"

"Moe, it's me, Sam."

"Come on. You're not Sam. Sam just died."

"I'm telling you," insists the voice. "It's me, Sam!"

"Sam? Is that you? Where are you?"

"I'm in heaven," says Sam, "and I've got to tell you, I've got really good news and a little bad news."

"So, tell me the good news first," says Moe.

"The good news," says Sam "is that there is baseball in heaven. Better yet, all our old buddies who've gone before us are there. Better yet, we're all young men again. Better yet, it's always spring time and it never rains or snows. And best of all, we can play baseball all we want, and we never get tired!"

"Really?" says Moe, "That is fantastic, wonderful beyond my wildest dreams! But, what’s the bad news?"

"You're pitching next Tuesday!"

Rayne's Ramblings: Old blogs and sneaky advertisers

Having a fascination with reading the headlines is a vice that doesn't cost much. I like it that way. Because I'm tight. I save money, not spend it. Clicking on an article is cheap entertainment as well as educational. But today I clicked on a headline and got an unpleasant surprise. Shine wanted to track my location.

Why?

This makes me instantly suspicious because I know why. They want to inundate me with advertisements to entice me to spend money.

Sorry. Better luck next time.

* * *

On another note, Twenty-six Keys is latest in a series of blogs I've had over the years. I started out on Live Journal, tried Wordpress but didn't stay with that, had a newsletter blog called Forrest Whispers, had Rayne's Ramblings for all things not writing, and a regular blog.

I was looking back through some of the older entries (I wrote them in a word processing program and then pasted them in) wondering if any of them had withstood the test of time well enough to be re-published. For the most part, that's a no, they didn't.

The next question was should I delete them? Again, no. Those old blogs are part of my history as a writer. I see how far I've come since the early days, and how far I need to travel to make it back to actively writing as Rayne Forrest. It's all good. Just another season in my life.

Rayne

Ch-ch-changes!

This turned out to be the Saturday I updated my website. The site needed it so it was time well spent. But why stop there? I decided to change the look of Twenty-six Keys, too.

Change can be good.

Now if Blogger would only get their "compose" option fixed.......

Rayne

When least expected

Life has a way of handing you the unexpected, and it's not always a bad thing. Sometimes it's something you've wished could happen. Or maybe it's something you planned to work towards and never quite got around to it, being absorbed with the busyness of the daily grind. And I've certainly been busy.

Yesterday, Super Bowl Sunday, marked ten years since I sat at the computer and began to write my first book. While that story remains unpublished, I've had what I consider to be great success with my writing career. After all, I never set out to have a writing career. I set out to write a novel just to see if I could.

I guess I got my answer.

As for the universe talking to me, yes, it did. I've long pondered what to do about my older stories, the ones which had limited runs at publishers no one ever heard of and never became mainstream, or were at houses that closed, or should have closed. Today, a simple email was a signal it's time to move forward and get those books back out.

The epublishing world was a lot different back in 2003. It's matured, and, thankfully, so have I. It's going to take a little time to go through those stories and apply those things I've learned in the last ten years, but I think the stories are worth it. My technical skills are better and it's important to me to do the best I can in everything I do.

So I suppose I'm climbing "back on the horse." We'll see how it works out.

I think it's going to be fun again.

Rayne