per/Simmons

It’s been a decade since I’ve talked about this—or perhaps I should say “ten years.”

I’ve put up with a certain amount of dumbing down and outright misinformation on a variety of cultural fronts over the years but I’m old enough to qualify for “curmudgeonhood” now and I’m going to take a moment to indulge my inner pedagog.

Despite the onslaught of “A Look Back at the ****** of the Past Decade” specials, IT WON”T BE THE END OF “THIS DECADE” FOR ANOTHER ELEVEN AND A HALF MONTHS!

Look, folks, the New Millennium didn’t start until January 1st, 2001. We tried to tell you a deca—er—ten years ago but no! Everyone wanted to party big time in 2000. A year early. Okay. 2000: Big Round Number! I get it. Blow off the math and join in the world-wide celebrations. Ignore the nattering nabobs who tried to explain how the calendar really tallies time. It is/was 2000! Party like it’s (sorry, Prince) 2001!

But are we going to go off calendar every 10 years from now on?

C’mon. Count using your fingers. Or your toes. Whichever you prefer as long as they’re two complete sets of “five” each. Go ahead: count.

Did you go: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10?

Of course you did. (Unless you’re genetically damaged.)

It’s a safe bet you DIDN’T go: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9!

THIS decade (along with the new millennium) officially started in 2001.

The NEXT decade starts in 2011.

I know it’s a little thing compared to the Big Issues, the Crucial Issues, that we grapple with as individuals, groups, tribes, nations, species…

But if we ever want to negotiate so that we’re all on the same page…

…shouldn’t we try to all be living in the same decade?

WMS

P.S. Don’t start any non-Gregorian calendar nonsense with me. Mayan, Julian, Chinese, Persian, Hebrew…a decade is a decade is a decade.

And there was no such thing as the “Year Zero.”

With the exception of a 1962 low budget Ray Milland flick.

And “ISO 8601:2004.”

‘Nuff said.

The new website is up and running! The old URL (as of this afternoon) redirects surfers to the new site. It’s been a number of months since I started the process but work, health, computer replacements, and numerous extracurricular projects and requests intruded.

Although the new site is unfinished—more of a work-in-progress—the consolidation makes things more manageable. The Radio Kansas Fall Fund Drive ended last night so normalcy should start creeping back in within the next few days…

WMS

The laptop is back and seems to be working fine—though it took awhile to reconfigure all systems. There are still a number of “clean-up” issues—coordinating files and programs between the desktop and the laptop, catching up on emails (triple digits in my inbox, not counting the subfolders in Outlook), blogs and newsgroups, as well as catching up on related business in general. The “coordinating” issue is a bit complex as I want a certain amount of redundancy against future mishaps without confusing issues of primacy and document versions. As a writer, I edit and rewrite a number of documents where there is more than one version before finally discarding older efforts. In some cases I’ll toss a newer version of a chapter, story, or essay and return to an older version—on purpose. I don’t want this to happen accidentally. So I have multiple versions of documents, which offers a minor degree of file naming and organization to keep straight. It’s a little more challenging, however, when you’re moving between two machines.

On the related business front, I am reading manuscripts that were submitted to me several months back, working on my own manuscripts, and building a new website at my own “hosted domain.” The latter is a lot of work but offers the advantage a “private” area where I can post works-in-progress with password protections. This allows a select group of individuals to read and offer feedback without such postings constituting actual “publication” and affecting their status for future sales rights. I have just posted my first manuscript there and in the process of introducing members of my writers group to the new setup. It’s another project in process.

Blogging has always felt a bit awkward to me—a bit exhibitionistic. There are some great blogs out there…and then there’s a lot of blathering at the other end of the spectrum. However a number of readers and friends have convinced me that they want to know what’s going on with me (especially when I disappear off the grid for many months) so I’ll start posting again, figuring if folks aren’t interested, they don’t have to bother with it. I figure posting progress reports on my writing will help put me back on track, as well.

Now that I have WordPress in my new domain, I’ll be phasing out my LiveJournal account. I still have too many blog options with MySpace and Amazon and Project Shadow, not to mention my sff.net newsgroup. If anyone has technical insights into the multi-posting option, I’m interested…

–
Wm. Mark Simmons

http://www.sff.net/people/Wm.Mark.Simmons/
http://www.wmsimmons.com/
http://www.wmsimmons.com/Conversations.htm

The desktop and the laptop are both up and running, the wireless network seems to have stabilized, I’ve recovered a number of forgotten files, and found a lost cache of over 300 emails on a supposedly defunct server. The new and improved web domain is just a couple of weeks away from debuting!

WMS

On the other hand, not everyone is finding cause for rejoicing…

Hitler learns that the Avatar trailer sucks…

(Now if I can just figure out how to actually embed video)

And out of the starting gate only to stagger and fall.

After deciding to upgrade my website a couple of months back, I end up losing my laptop.

Well, not “lose” so much as got put on hiatus.  It’s now on its 2nd stint in tech support rehab in two months.  Two months of not having access to my email, newsgroup, and various other accounts, documents, and software!  I am limping along now on an alternate setup but it’s only a shadow of my usual operative status. 

Watch this space for further updates…

WMS