Happily Ever After
Life in The Rural Retreat with a beautiful wife, three cats, garden wildlife, a camera, a computer – and increasing amounts about running
Earlier posts can be found on Adventures of a Lone Bass Player, where this blog began life. Recent entries can be found here.
A Glass Half Full
by admin - 17:34 on 19 February 2011
One aspect of my character that sometimes irks Matchgirl the pessimist is my tendency to see the glass half full, so it was no surprise to her that I soon found a few positives in The Great Binding Disaster.
By the end of the evening I'd even devised A Cunning Plan which enabled me, Andrew and Dolphin James to produce a thousand copies of The Bumper Book of Black Isle Snappery with only slightly more initial outlay than that required for two hundred. And a little more risk.
We meet tomorrow morning to debate the plan's pros and cons, although my partners, it must be said, at the moment are cautiously unenthusiastic. However, even if they were gung ho the last word will be with Norman, for my scheme involves a certain amount of credit and instalments. I hope to see him on Monday.
The advantage of a thousand copies is that they'd be litho printed, not digital. This means even better quality in the images and a stronger binding. I won't bore you with the technical reasons. I'm quite excited by the idea. Bassman Books, the pretend company I created to buy an ISBN and put an imprint on the book, is in danger of becoming a real publisher.
That was one of the reasons why Matchgirl and I browsed the monthly Culbokie community market this morning – the first time we'd visited this Black Isle event, I'm ashamed to admit.
It features a roomful of stallholders who offer all sorts of local produce, from the edible to the crafty, and where a tasteful display of Bumper Books would be right at home.
During our tea break we fell into conversation with another shopper who'd heard about the book, and how good it is, and who was looking forward to buying one. News travels fast on the Black Isle.
Brambling and chaffinches in The Seed Volcano
A small snappery session took place in the afternoon when I was able to capture my first displayable pictures of our bramblings, although the camera shake isn't impressive. My search for a cable shutter release begins next week.
Another remarkable sighting today was a treecreeper. He favours The Nutella Tree (I've seen him flitting about a couple of times in the past), so he's little more than half-a-dozen shaky pixels in the centre of the snaps I took – not good enough for public display but enough for me to confirm his species.
A good day was capped by a phone call from Vivienne, remarkably honest owner of The Emporium in Cromarty, with a price for three boxfuls of Matchgirl's discarded books. She declined to take an eight-volume set of history encyclopaedias I've owned for around forty years because they're too valuable, according to her internet research. Her advice is to sell them myself.
I knew I'd make money from books one day.
An "optimist" with experience!
:-)
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