The Vent and Rant Thread

[covingtoncat73]

*Sigh* I am a 9th generation New Orleanian but I don't think I can do another summer and hurricane season. However, I don't know how to get out.

I am getting oldish. I'm 44. That is young for some, particularly men, but I am a woman with some congenital health issues. Depending on what my aorta does, I may need open heart surgery 10 years from now or next year.

My hearing sucks. Two good hearing aids rather than the one cheap, now 3-yr-old one I have would be helpful but I can't afford them. I know I miss and misunderstand frequently. So, I don't know how long I'll be able to keep the hearing at a level conducive to working. As long as the cataract surgery fixes the vision, which it should, those are the two main impediments to working life, as far as my health goes. Still, even if I were to find a job in my profession in a state I want to live in, could I keep it?

Then there is my house and my mother. I bought a house 3 years ago because that is cheaper right now than renting in New Orleans, at least as long as the AC, roof, and foundation hold up. I would have to deal with that.

My mother has been living with me since my step-father passed. She will be 70 in January and is actually quite fit and vigorous. She would be happy about a move to the west coast but would freak if I did what I would want to do, which is liquidate my retirement to finance the move. She is selling one of her two rental properties and would pay for the move but she needs that money. For one, she needs to repair her other property from an outgoing awful tenant.

Finally, it too me awhile to land in my current job. I know I am lucky to have it and like my boss very much and, for the most part, I like my co-workers. I worked for 7 years in my first professional job under a boss that made me miserable. Having a decent boss is an eye-opener for me. I am reluctant to let that go. I'm pretty torn. I want to move to the west coast but, even if I could, which is unlikely, I don't know how it would work out.

[Rumpelteazer]

The quicky UTI test at the GP was positive. According to the doctor's assistant who did the test it is a "pretty bad UTI". Instead of emailing my prescription to the pharmacy so I could pick it up later in the day she printed it out so I could get it immediately. According to her the medicine should work quickly, so I hope I don't have to go to the toilet ever 15 minutes tomorrow when it's busy.

I've also got lemons so I can make lemon water tomorrow and yogurt for taking my pill at night (4 pills a day, need to be taken with food or yogurt).

[CRussel]

I can't tell you how _your_ move would work out. But I know each of mine has been a revelation, an opportunity, and a definite step forward. It's not about the problems (which are real, and can't be ignored), but about the opportunities. I have no idea what you do for a living, and don't need to know. I've changed _careers_ at least four times in my life. Each time because I saw an opportunity, and I grabbed it. Am I rich? Not hardly! Am I happy? Oh, yeah.

I was born and brought up in Detroit. Left school when my (first) wife delivered our son, and went to work as a chemical technician. The union forced them to give me a chance at an electrical technician job, and I went back to school nights to learn my new trade.

Got a job at Uniroyal when the company was coming off a 150 day strike and became a journeyman industrial electrician. When they finally closed that plant, I moved to NYC and got a job as a Road Car Inspector (ie, electrician).

When my father died, I picked up everything and moved to California, getting a job in the industry I swore I'd never work in again at NUMMI, the GM/Toyota joint venture in the Bay Area.

Got a chance to change jobs to become a full time IT Administrator when we were building a new plant, and stuck my hand up in an instant. Became a Manager, then a Director of IT at a string of small or startup companies. [ETA: And went back to school, AGAIN, to learn my trade.]

Quit my full time, _very_ well paid IT Director job to write full time. And in a couple of years of that, decided it was time to leave the Bay Area. We moved to Canada and as soon as they would let us, became citizens.

I'm now a 1/2 time IT Manager, and I've finally stopped writing IT books -- no money in it any more. I live in Paradise Falls (Canadian joke), work from home, and make 1/4th to 1/3rd of what I made as a full time IT Director in the Bay Area. But I am absolutely not complaining. Yes, I have to be careful about money. But every single move has improved something, and sometimes in ways I totally did not even begin to expect. I've learned many things over the years, but mostly I've learned to look forward, not back.

If you can't face hurricanes and flooding and muggy, stifling, enervating heat -- move. Perhaps not directly to the West Coast if that's a problem -- but I knew when I moved to NYC, I was ultimately moving to California. It's that FIRST move that enables the others. (And yes, I know, I'm white, male, and essentially healthy. That _does_ change the dynamic. But not the ultimate lesson, which is that if you're not happy, change what makes you unhappy.)

[Katsunami]

Here we are again with an open source related software rant, confirming that user-facing open source software will never be a thing for normal people, let alone professionals, if it is anything outside the realm of software or web development. (The one exception I've encountered is LibreOffice, at least up until version 5.3.x, which I've been using since 2007; to escape the Microsoft Ribbon. Whomever thought up that atrocity should be shot.)

As I wrote before, I've been jackassing around with GIMP to try and get some graphics work done. (Like: creating a map for a world I intend to write stories in.) The map is 12 megapixels, so I can print it at A4... and GIMP can _barely_ handle it, because it doesn't have any hardware acceleration. Have you ever seen quite a powerful computer (6700K @ 4 GHz, 32GB RAM, GTX 1070) that can run something like The Witcher 3 while half alseep, struggle with moving a layer of pixels? No? Don't. It looks ridiculous, as if moving a window in Windows 3.1 on one of the first 486 computers in the early 90's.

Can't wait to test Serif's Affinity Photo 1.6 when it appears with its new light GUI (I dislike dark interfaces). I did find ONE thing I need (want) that it doesn't do, because they (Serif) think it's a differentiating factor between a raster package such as Affinity Photo and a vector package such as Affinity Designer: Photo can't draw paths nor put text on them. Designer can. I need that function for lettering maps and drawing banners.

So, I looked into Inkscape to see if I can use that for this one feature. Well... it's at version 0.92 right now, and hardware acceleration is planned for version 1.5, due for release somewhere in 2068, if the current development speed is maintained. This piece of software will be as slow as GIMP. Besides, it needs tricks left and right for positioning text, where programs such as Illustrator allow you to just drag it.

You know? I'm going to re-install my old Photoshop CS5 version (from 2011) to tide me over until I've tested Affinity Photo and Designer, and if like them, I'll just get both of them if there are no major roadblocks. I'm not going to torture myself any longer with GIMP or Inkscape.

[Katsunami]

Crap. Spoke too soon. I've been using GIMP to resize and crop images only, and edit the occasional picture here and there. It's been five years since I touched Photoshop CS5.1. Just installed it, and it's fast when scrolling and moving large layers, compared to GIMP, but it feels completely alien for some reason. When I installed Affinity Photo 1.5, I was off and going in about 10 minutes...

Maybe it's because of my five year boycott of everything Adobe creates, since they moved to subscription only (except Digital Editions 2.0.1, because without it, I can't even buy books) that made me forget everything I ever new about Photoshop. Almost can't believe it. I worked with it from 2002 (Photoshop 7) up to 2012 (CS5.1); even used it professionally as a part-time photographer from 2004-2011.

Sometimes I feel such a noob.

edit: In the end I just removed all the panels from Photoshop, and re-arranged the workspace to the custom one I've become used to in GIMP (as much as possible). Back then, I changed GIMP's shortcuts to those of Photoshop (as much as possible)... so now, they are similar enough that I don't have to flounder around.

Trying to make Photoshop's layout into GIMP's, while the entire internet seems to want to go the other way around. Maybe I'm just contrarian or something.

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by wodin

Imagine what would happen if a solar kill shot or an EMP attack took out the whole grid.

I would prefer not to. That sort of thing is a popular apocalyptic gimmick in SF novels (especially EMP bursts), and there are all sort of books with survivalists trying to cope. Cory Doctorow wrote a short piece called "When Sysadmins Ruled the World" where various bio-warfare events left the grid at least somewhat up and running, but killed off most human beings that didn't happen to be inside in places like data centers.

My comment on things like that is "If something happens that is capable of taking out all of Google, not being able to get to a website is the least of your problems..."

I had quite enough fun coping with a localized power failure affecting a few thousand customers in a comparatively limited area.

(I also have fond memories of the great Northeast power blackout. I was at least able to gracefully shut down servers in the computer room at my then employer. And the land line phone had its own power supply separate from the grid, so I could keep ion touch with HQ, know when the power was restored in my area, and go down to the office to bring things back up again.)
______
Dennis

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by badgoodDeb

I wonder if that was the string of pickups towing boats, that I saw a video of on Facebook. It seemed like such a good idea ....

I saw one of a monster truck performing towing services, though I'm not sure if that's what you saw. When the truck has tires taller than you are, you need a ladder to climb into the cab, and it has a monster engine to power it, you laugh at a couple of feet of water in the streets, and you can tow just about anything.

I'm told there is an association of monster truck operators, and the local authorities got in tough with them about volunteering to assist. The truckers were tickled to do so, especially when told the local authorities would supply the gas.
______
Dennis

[Rumpelteazer]

I really like watching films and TV series, I like a lot of genres but I don't like comedies (I don't mind if a film has funny moments, but I don't do comedies) and films that are mostly marketed for women (rom-coms, friends on a trip, etc). On Facebook I follow some horror and thriller writers, I follow films as It and series such as AHS, The West Wing and The X-Files.

Which film does Facebook keep recommending to me? Girls Trip. Nope, just nope.

[Hitch]

I'm sitting here, trying to figure out how to make this as short as possible; in some ways, I wish this V&R thread was in the bookmaking subforums, because they'd know what I'm kvetching about.

Woman chats me up, via our chat box, about 10 days ago. She had a PDF for a print book and a MOBI file, for Amazon, made by Createspace. OK, fine. Apparently, because she opted to switch, from CS to the new "Kindle Print Beta," ("KPB") CS is declining to make edits to her file. (Book was published about 2 months ago.) I don't know the internal workings of the CS-->KPB relationship, but from this, I think we can infer, not so great, right?

Thus, she has TWO final files, neither of which is made from anything like Word, etc. The PDF was made with InDesign, and the MOBI was, apparently (I discovered through my investigation) made from an ePUB that was built by CS.

She emails me, back then, and then says "oh, never mind, I found a guy." Fine. This also happens all the time.

(time passes).

3 days ago, Tuesday, she pops up again, I say something like, "I thought you had someone," she sort of says it's not working out, and sends me all the files. The PDF she got from CS, all the files this other guy (read; bozo) made, etc. The files from Bozo are appallingly bad. He apparently took her PDF, either ran it through Adobe Acrobat "save as Word" or used AbbyyFineReader (although Abbyy's outputs are usually FAR better than this) and the PDF and MOBI files he's given her are the dog's breakfast. I mean, the PDF is dreadful--double-spacing between paragraphs, the wrong fonts, just...it's not remotely, REMOTELY ready-for-prime time. She tells me that she's overwhelmed with all these files, etc. (I stupidly feel sorry for her, right?)

She sends me a MOBI, twice, saying it's the one she got from CS, but it's not. It's patently not. So, I finally get that from her, and it's a perfectly good mobi, so there's some good news.

I tell her, after viewing everything, that CS asking her for just shy of $300, to remake the print interior file, is cheaper than we would do--after all, this isn't an edit. It's a new, from-scratch build of a print interior--but that I'll help her out, and make the edits to the eBook, and give her a new MOBI and ePUB, for a measly $25.00. I mean...trust me when I tell you, because she apparently has ZERO understanding of PDFs, how they're made, whether or not they are editable, etc., I have nearly 10x that in TIME, in emails, trying to explain all this to her. To say this again: I'm trying to HELP HER.

Oh, meanwhile--she's posted on the KDP forums, asking "where she can find someone to do this" for her--this is AFTER we're talking, mind you. She gets the usual responses from the usual suspects about how EASY it all is, and I post that they are assuming that she made her own PDF, etc., and clarify what she has--whereupon, of course, they all shut the hell up. This one poor bastard had offered to help her--for FREE, mind you--and I said to him, "that's very generous of you, and I know she'll be appreciative, as it's so much work." Right? (Granted--I knew he had no idea what he'd done, but still...)

I get this email, last night. I'm still absolutely boggled. It starts out with a rant, about how come NOBODY can take the Word file that she got from Createspace, and "just" make a few edits, so that she can be on her way. That if the (Word) file that she got from CS, isn't "good enough," she's going to head on over there and DEMAND that they give her the "right one." (The CS Word file is apparently pretty much what she gave them. It's unstyled, no fonts, even has Comic Sans in it, etc.) THEN, she tells me this:

I talked to KDP staff and he said that if I have a word file set up by Createspace, I should be able to make simple edits in it without ruining the format.

As for the kindle file, he said that KDP recommends against mobi files for books without photos etc - just simple text.

What? WHAT? At what point, in the last decade, did the KDP suddenly decide that they don't WANT MOBI files--their preferred format? Yes, they're now creating KFX, but that's an output format--not an input format. Now I'm wondering who the HELL she's talking to, right?

And she--and the moron at the KDP--are obviously BOTH clueless about the godd*mn Word file that she got "from" Createspace, too, as trust me, it's no closer to being a print interior than the contents of the sandbox, in my cats' boudoir...

But then, she goes on to point THIS out to me:

I just looked at amazon's page about free software for converting documents to be used for kindle -
https://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.ht...cId=1000765211

It seems to be software for converting word docs to kindle format that works on Amazon.

Right. That's the ticket, 'cuz, you're so competent that you don't even have Word, much less the first clue on how to Style it, for an eBook.

But the capper--the absolute capper, after I have repeatedly, and gang, I mean, REPEATEDLY tried to explain to her that you cannot "edit" a PDF, (exchanging say, 222 characters for 145, as opposed to a simple "there" for "their" type edit) is when I get to this part:

I can pay Createspace and I guess I will. But if you're in this business, it seems like you could compete with Createspace and edit both the paperback and kindle versions.

I lost it. I totally, I think, for the first time since 2009, completely and totally lost it.

No good deed goes unpunished.

I flatly told her that she was a self-centered and ungrateful a$$. I mean, literally. Told her never to contact me again--the arrogance and rudeness and STUPIDITY of the whole mess, is all her doing (god FORBID that she bother to ask, at the KDP, about possible consequences of switching from CS to KDP PB, right? Or bother to educate herself about what it takes, to actually create or edit a PDF if it's been created in a source format, for which you do NOT have the files? InDesign?), and she's blaming EVERYONE ELSE, including the ONE person who was trying to help her, rather than taking her for a ride, financially?

Boggling. Absolutely boggling to me. I mean, even IF she decided that I was some incompetent boob--which, obviously, she did--why the hell would you be that rude, that (ridiculously unwarrantedly) condescending to someone TRYING to help you?

UNfreakingBELIEVABLE. Every time I get stupid and try to help someone for little or no money, I get bit in the a$$. EVERY godd*mn time. Just UNBELIEVABLE.



Hitch

[doubleshuffle]

You know, I've got a .prc file here that I got from a PDF made from a .lit file and I want to put it up at Amazon, Kobo and iBooks. Wonder if someone here could help me out.

[CRussel]

Oh, Hitch, my dear Hitch. You need a padded room, a large intoxicating beverage of choice (I can recommend some good single malts!), and a bit of BC's largest agricultural product. And hanging in the middle of that padded room, a large piñata shaped like a book that you can beat on! And when it breaks open, it will spill out USB sticks with nothing but perfect ePub, mobi, and docx files on them.

My sincere sympathies! Even a noob like me knows that PDF is the FINAL format, not the starting point if one has any choice at all. But to jerk you around, go to try and undercut you, and then jerk you around some more? It's probably a good thing that your business is online.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by doubleshuffle

You know, I've got a .prc file here that I got from a PDF made from a .lit file and I want to put it up at Amazon, Kobo and iBooks. Wonder if someone here could help me out.

Snort. You know, a request like that--at least you know what the formats ARE. You know it's a crazy request. THAT, I would look at doing--really. :-)

Originally Posted by CRussel

Oh, Hitch, my dear Hitch. You need a padded room, a large intoxicating beverage of choice (I can recommend some good single malts!), and a bit of BC's largest agricultural product. And hanging in the middle of that padded room, a large piñata shaped like a book that you can beat on! And when it breaks open, it will spill out USB sticks with nothing but perfect ePub, mobi, and docx files on them.

What's BC's largest agricultural product? I know that I could ask Google. But, I'm lazy, like everyone else.

My sincere sympathies! Even a noob like me knows that PDF is the FINAL format, not the starting point if one has any choice at all. But to jerk you around, go to try and undercut you, and then jerk you around some more? It's probably a good thing that your business is online.

I was absolutely speechless. As you can tell, I'm still angry, yet today. (sigh).


Hitch

[Cinisajoy]

Originally Posted by doubleshuffle

You know, I've got a .prc file here that I got from a PDF made from a .lit file and I want to put it up at Amazon, Kobo and iBooks. Wonder if someone here could help me out.

I suppose you want a custom cover too.

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by CRussel

Oh, Hitch, my dear Hitch. You need a padded room, a large intoxicating beverage of choice (I can recommend some good single malts!),

Which ones?

As it happens, I run a group devoted to such things.

I'd recommend Bowmore Black or Glen Grant paxarete, but both are effectively Unobtanium these days. The Bowmore was distilled in 1969, and a bottle, if you can find one, probably goes for five figures now.

The regulations governing such things changed, and Glen Grant can no longer legally make scotch the way the paxarete was distilled.

Because I know the right people, I was able to sample both. The Bowmore Black was part of a flight including the White and Gold expressions. I was part of a virtual tasting for a whisky podcast the next day. I gave the same relative ranking to what was tasted as the others did, but my numeric score was lower. I explained that I'd had a chance the previous day to sample the Bowmore Black and my taste buds had been re-calibrated. When I actually tried the Black, I held up a hand and said "Don't bother me. I'm having a religious experience!"

The previous best ever had been 30 year old Macallan, but the Glen Grant might just have been better, and would give the Bowmore a run for its money.

These days I might suggest Tomatin. It's relatively little known because it's primarily bespoke production for blenders, who use it as a base in blends. But it's a sherried expression comparable to Macallan, and an 18 year old can be had for about a third of what Macallan 18 would cost me in NYC.
______
Dennis

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by DMcCunney

Which ones?

As it happens, I run a group devoted to such things.

I'd recommend Bowmore Black or Glen Grant paxarete, but both are effectively Unobtanium these days. The Bowmore was distilled in 1969, and a bottle, if you can find one, probably goes for five figures now.

<snippage>

These days I might suggest Tomatin. It's relatively little known because it's primarily bespoke production for blenders, who use it as a base in blends. But it's a sherried expression comparable to Macallan, and an 18 year old can be had for about a third of what Macallan 18 would cost me in NYC.
______
Dennis

Well....sadly, or...well, happily, I guess, if you were to know me, I'm a FOB (Friend o'Bill's). The demon rum is no longer something in which I'm able to indulge. (sob). Wish I could--and I was a single-malt girl, before I quit, but...ixnay on that. My genetics say NOPE to that. Or, rather, a really loud YES that doesn't have an off switch, so...back to NOPE.

:-)

Hitch