Well, dear readers, I’m two-thirds of the way through the proofing part – typos fixed, spacing fixed, em dashes inserted, some words deleted or moved around, a couple of word additions, all the usual things, but nothing major. So far, it reads pretty well to me. I’m divorced from the writing part so I’m just a reader now. I should finish proofing by noon today, then it goes to the real proofers. Meanwhile, Doug Haverty surprised me with twenty count them twenty different cover ideas. There were several I found intriguing and very interesting, but one specifically caught my eye – not sure about the title treatment font and we can always swap that for something else, and we’d have to add red to some portion of it, as red plays an important role in the book, but that’s easy and there are two super easy options for that. I’m sending all the options to Muse Margaret today to see what she thinks. Just had a snack and now must finish these here notes, since it’s after midnight already and I MUST let it all hang out. My internal clock is eternally getting me up at seven or eight every single morning no matter when I go to bed. So, that happened after five hours of sleep. I was up until ten, went back to bed and slept forty-five more minutes. I ordered a burger and fries from Islands, answered e-mails, and began proofing. Burger arrived, I ate it and the fries and went right back to proofing. I did eighty pages, shaved and showered, dozed off for an hour, then moseyed on over to the theater. On Thursday, we heard we only had fifteen reservations. The theater has struggled all of last year and this with light Fridays, except for the first two shows of the season – which included Drat! The Cat! Not sure why. But the good news was we ended up with close to forty. And they were a great audience. I did the pre-show speech and got a nice laugh by starting with, “Hi everyone, I’m Doug Haverty.” I kept everything short and sweet and got the HELL off stage. I was going to leave, but I watched all of act one. Big laughs on a lot of it, but some performances lacked the usual fun and energy. I left after act one and wrote the actors who needed those notes. Then I proofed another ten pages, got my snack, ate it, and now I am rushing to get these here notes posted so I can proof another ten pages before bed.
Today, I’ll be up by ten or eleven, I’ll send Muse Margaret the twenty cover ideas to see what she thinks, then have a conversation about them, especially the one I keep coming back to, and I’ll finish proofing and get the book to the two real proofers. After that, I’ll rest, then go to the theater, do the pre-show speech, and decide whether to stay or come home.
Tomorrow, it’s pre-show speech and I’ll probably stick around to see the matinee, then go have a bite to eat somewhere. Then this coming week I really need to rest up, plan the recording session schedule, e-mail my PCP and get him serious about me starting Zepbound within the next two or three weeks, and then we do week five of shows.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, be up by ten or eleven, send cover ideas, have a conversation about the cover ideas, finish proofing, get the book to the two real proofers, eat, do a pre-show speech and either stay or come home. Today’s topic of discussion: What kind of ribs do you like? Baby backs or big beef? What kind of barbecue sauce – sweet Kansas style or the smoky kind. Where is the best barbecue you ever had? Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, hoping we can settle on a cover sooner than later.