~ Tuesday, April 24, 2001 ~

 

3:10 p.m. I realize that I'd better write something -- now -- before I lose my abilities for the rest of the day. It's late afternoon and the sun is still up, so that might make a difference in slant and tone.

My little missives from the middle of the night are driving me crazy. Since they are the only thing left standing between me and the warmth and the peace and the general horizontal comfort of the bed, I tend to want to short-sheet them.

4:41 p.m. So, the daytime is spotty. Fragmented and diced. I've now gone as far as a sane human being can go with PageMaker and Acrobat Distiller and printer drivers and so forth and so on. Really. These programs should be labeled as "kits" instead of programs -- some assembly is definitely required. And they might as well enclose the proper L-shaped miniature wrench while they're at it.

But, I have persisted and I'm almost confident that I can create a nice new PDF version of my old cookbook, full of working hyperlinks, a competent contents section, and even an interacting index. That's the plan.

12:24 a.m. And now, here I am back at the beginning of the middle of the night. At least I am maintaining a consistent pattern.

I did some more weeding in the sun; I continued working at my desk, as per. Each day I creep a little bit closer to having virtual product on a virtual shelf. Today I solved some more virtual problems and even felt a twinge of virtual pride, but unless you go outside and look at the limp and discarded weeds at the bottom of the green clippings bin, you really wouldn't know that I'd done much of anything real.

But this little piece is real, and for that I'm real grateful.