The Independent Stitch

Those hands look awfully familiar . . .

Spinning cotton and cigar-box charkhas

The new issue of Spin-Off (Summer 2008) arrived yesterday. It's got a lot of good stuff in it. One of the especially good things is Carol Rhoades' article on colored cottons. As I was reading it, I noticed a photograph with the caption, "A cigar-box charkha is a portable spinning tool—perfect for spinning cotton on the go."

My first thought was that the cigar-box charkha looked like an old friend I hadn't seen in a long time, and I wondered if someone had submitted a photo of a charkha built from Marilyn Sult's instructions (published in one of the Spin-Off articles I edited a lot of years ago).

Then I thought, "That wrist bone looks awfully familiar."

The photo's printed kind of small. But . . . "Yeah, and the hands do, too."

My daughter walked in.

I said, "Take a look at this photo."

She glanced down.

"You don't wear that watch any more. That's your old one."

So there I was in Spin-Off again, demonstrating Marilyn's very own cigar-box charkha during a photo shoot to illustrate the original article.

1. The original article
2. The new article

Carol spun her colored cottons for this new article not on a cigar-box charkha but on a Bosworth attache charkha, a Timbertops Irish castle wheel, and a Greensleeves spindle.

They're all terrific tools. Timbertops wheels were available in 1996. I don't think the other spinning devices she used were.

If anyone's interested in building a cigar-box charkha, though, the detailed instructions are in the Winter 1996 issue. There's a series of three articles: "Cigar-box Charkha," by Marilyn Rishel Sult, and "Charkha Theory" and "The Charkha Road," which explain what I learned while building a charkha according to Marilyn's plans with the bits and pieces I could find locally. (Marilyn had a workshop full of collected miscellanea and tools to draw on. The article grew out of a meeting at Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival. Interweave has Marilyn's article online as a free PDF. The two supplementary articles are not included. There's a lot of useful information in them.)

It was one of the most complicated, and most satisfing, tech-editing jobs I've ever undertaken. I spent a lot of time at Downtown Ace Hardware, sitting on the floor, looking in the parts bins for objects that could be subverted to my intentions.

1 The Winter 1996 issue of Spin-Off
2 The Summer 2008 issue of Spin-Off

If you want a challenging project and you're at least mildly mechanically inclined, find the old issue and make yourself a charkha. It's terrific fun and I'm proud of what I made.

If you just want to start spinning cotton immediately, check out the tools other people offer—there are many more choices now than there were in 1996.

I now also have an Alden Amos mini-T-frame charkha that I love to use.

Reading: Burundi and Kazakhstan

While appreciating the fact that I am fortunate enough to have dirt to plant vegetables and flowers in, whether that dirt is predominantly clay or not, I've been reading a couple of books about places where people live in harsh circumstances. Both come from independent presses: the University of Texas Press and Atlas & Co.

The copy of the University of Texas book that I found lacks the flash-and-neon of most contemporary nonfiction titles (shown on the left in both photos). Here's a slightly more revealing picture that includes its spine:

It's From Bloodshed to Hope in Burundi: Our Embassy Years during Genocide, by Robert Krueger and Kathleen Tobin Krueger, with a foreword by Desmond Tutu (the web link shows its dustjacket, missing from the copy I read). My daughter recently sat next to Kathleen Krueger on a long plane flight  and on a call home she mentioned the book to me. Based on what she said, I requested it through interlibrary loan.

When the Kruegers were posted to Burundi, they fell in love with the people and the country even though horrendous events were occurring. Sometimes the only thing a person can do in the face of the unthinkable is bear clear witness. They did that, with humanity and wisdom, and now they've told the story in a format that can reach general audiences. There are pictures here in both words and photographs that I didn't want to have to hear or look at, and that I don't find easy to talk about, but the way the experiences were conveyed cherishes and honors some people who have not had anywhere near enough cherishing and honor . . . and also tells when, where, how, and by whom those people have been betrayed. It's an extraordinary book by two exceptional people.

The other book is Apples Are from Kazakhstan: The Land that Disappeared, by Chistopher Robbins. Robbins is a British writer who spent enough time in Kazakhstan to be able to talk about the history and the current situation. Each chapter unfolded a variety of surprising discoveries about this complex and promising nation. It's a book I was in no hurry to finish, because I enjoyed its company. Much of the story of Kazakhstan is problematic, especially many vestiges of its Soviet years. Yet the people are obviously by and large (and allowing for the human variability that's everywhere, of course) intelligent, versatile, and creative. (I haven't seen "Borat," which apparently displays almost zero knowledge of the real Kazakhstan.)

Thanks to Donna for the recommendation, and I hope the friend of mine who will be spending July in Kazakhstan will have a wonderful time there. It sounds like a culturally rich and diverse place.

And apples really are from Kazakhstan.

Too late for the copy editor

(Wigeon = a type  of duck. The addition of the D with reference to the bird seems to be a fairly common error. Common or not, wigeons aren't widgeons, even though both can fly. Other streets in this neighborhood include Hummingbird, Larkbunting, Goshawk, and Towhee, not Sikorsky.)

*

(Targhee =  a breed of sheep, a national forest in Idaho,  or a place where the Spin-Off Autumn Retreat has been held. As far as I've been able to tell, a "Farghee" has no identity other than in this misspelled street name. "No outlet" is right. There's a big clue in this picture about the naming pattern in this neighborhood, known as Brown Farm.)

+

(What copy editors do.)

On connecting with local foods (and other things)

I was in Denver on Thursday doing some errands, including buying a tripod so I can take photos of the swatches for the book that's coming out this fall (statement made with force and a determination to catch up, because I have to catch up).

For previous books, I've been able to put the swatches directly on the scanner. For this one, some of them are too big . . . and I've tried knitting them with finer yarn, but the results just don't look right . . . the finer yarns would be terrific for a knitted project that's to be used as knitting, but they don't meet the needs of the printed page.

So I need to be able to take perfectly square, clear photographs of swatches, some very long. Thus the quest for a tripod with a reversible center post, the ability to steadily support a minimum of 9 pounds/4.1 kg and some other attributes. I'd done a bunch of research online, but it was impossible to tell whether what I saw would do what I needed without examining an array of possibilities in person.

(By the way, the colors and specific yarns used to knit the swatches have been chosen to work well in black-and-white print reproduction. Also by the way, if the computers had not messed up repeatedly for just about four months I would already have printed advance reading copies of this book, which means I'd have already resolved this and a bunch of other challenges. Moving right along, there's been little posting around here because I've been making swatches. And doing a few rows on my dark-blue cardigan now and then, just to keep it fresh in my mind.)

Anyway, while I was in the city I didn't have time for WaterCourse or Jerusalem (or to make a new discovery), so I stopped for a salad-bar-and-muffin lunch at Whole Foods and picked up a copy of a brand-new magazine about local foods, called Edible Front Range, shown below with the tripod that promises to save my sanity and one of the swatches that's propelling me into solving yet another technical problem (because in the appropriate yarn it's about 3 inches/7.5 cm longer than the scanner bed).

A series of Edible publications is apparently springing up as part of a franchise operation throughout the U.S. Magazines are just being released or are in the works for other places I've lived (in no particular order): Seattle, Iowa, the upcoming Pioneer Valley, and close-enough-to-where-I-was Twin Cities and Chicago

Hmmm. I've been to all the places covered so far by Edible Communications publications except the Hawaiian islands, and I'm not sure I've been in Austin, although I've definitely traveled across Texas by car. Traveling across Texas (or Montana, or Kansas, or Saskatchewan) by car is something you don't forget (it's quite far across Ontario, of course, but there's more readily apparent variety en route; same with Quebec). The drive across Texas was so many years ago that I don't remember whether Austin was on the highways we traveled, and the city would have changed since then anyway. . . . The highways were still mostly two-lane. . . . I think I've been on Texas-crossing trajectories both farther north and farther south than Austin. . . .

These magazine launches all appear to be new. What a massive enterprise. It will be interesting to see when and how the variants develop their own characters within the format. These would be great resources for traveling, too.

(Here's how to get started with an Edible Your Place publication for an area that isn't being served yet.)
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My analysis of the first issue of Edible Front Range: Interesting articles and unusually good writing (by the estimable Claire Walter, among others). I actually read the whole magazine (I usually read like a skipping stone . . . ).

They need to work on their photography. Even the custom photos look like stock, and I definitely wanted to see more. Food is sensuous, but I didn't perceive much of that through the photos that were used, although they did a good job with composition and cropping on the images they did include. The personality and individuality of the foods and people just didn't come through, and the apparent lack of captions didn't help (if there were captions, I couldn't find them). My guess is that this preliminary issue was put together quickly, and photos can be challenging to acquire and process (see tripod discussion above). Fine writing goes a long way for me, and it saved the day here.

There's a whole cluster of local food-related businesses in a part of Denver that I've driven through many times. I wouldn't have known they were there. Now I do, and we'll be able to explore next time we're in the urban area. There's a winery, a bakery, a coffee roaster, a candy factory, and more. . . . All on north Washington. . . . I know where there's a winery closer to home, many excellent breweries (if I liked beer I think I would be blissed out by the alternatives), and several cheesemakers, and a bunch of dog biscuit outfits (I wonder if the Edibles will include critter crunchies?).

It would be fun to get involved in the Slow Food movement in this area, if I weren't spending so much time working on the Slow Fiber movement (I just made that up . . . it sounds a little odd).

On missing BookExpo America, and on the new IndieBound

This is the first year since 2002 that I haven't been at BookExpo America, the massive annual convention for the book industry. I like going, not so much for the mobs of people and the free books and the "scene" (which are all overwhelming) as for the people and the ideas. There are many people I don't see elsewhere that I won't be visiting with this year.

The convention opens today in Los Angeles, and I'm at my desk in my basement office, just as if today was a normal day.

The massive computer problems I've had this year ate up both my time and any cash I might have diverted to pay for the trip. I usually find a local hostel to stay in, so the big-ticket items are airfare and the pre-BEA educational gatherings sponsored by what used to be PMA and is now, more appropriately, The Independent Book Publishers Association. So it's a lot less expensive trip for me than for many attendees, but still out of reach this year. I need to be here working on the book that will be published in October (Ethnic Knitting Exploration: Lithuania, Iceland, and Ireland, by Donna Druchunas).

Nonetheless, I can read about what's happening at BookExpo.

This morning, Bookselling This Week, which arrives in my inbox on a more regular basis than I have time to keep up with, let me know that the American Booksellers Association has announced a new program called IndieBound, connecting independent booksellers to the "live locally" movement. Here's the gist of what they said about it:

• "Following a year of study and planning, ABA designed IndieBound to tap into the growing national localism movement, with fresh ways for independent booksellers and other independent businesses to better convey their core strengths —independence, passion, community—to customers. A community-based website, IndieBound.org, has launched today as well, and will serve as the gateway for the entire indie community, with access to The Declaration of IndieBound manifesto, book-related related content, and more functionality planned for the coming weeks and months."
• "The program is designed to unite booksellers, readers, indie retailers, local business alliances, and others in support of local activism and local economies and to lead an Independent Revolution."

Anything that brings independents together is a good thing. It's too easy for any independent business to feel like it's the only one swimming against the corporate tide, and sometimes our arms get tired and we want to rest for a while, but if we do that we'll end up being swept out to sea and drowned.

The project's website talks about the title and focus of the endeavor:

• "Each page of a book carries something totally incredible and unique, but when they are all brought together, they build something infinitely greater."

And here's a quote from a bookstore owner about the project:

• "An integral part of IndieBound's purpose, to bring together local businesses of all stripes, is what appeals to Kelly Justice of the Fountain Bookstore in Richmond, Virginia. 'The most exciting thing to me about IndieBound is being able to officially partner with my neighbor businesses in our pride and passion for the city of Richmond and the things that make it unique. . . . [T]his flexible, modular revolution allows me to focus on relationships with my fellow merchants and customers. . . . I'm ready to save the day in my hometown! Are you?"

I think, in lieu of a trip to BookExpo this year, I might splurge on a t-shirt. But which one?

Computer problems: Much better than a toothache

Still no pictures here.

Computer saga, with perspective

As Buddhist monk and simply wise-person-in-many-dimensions Thich Nhat Hanh observes, the good thing about a toothache is that it teaches us how nice it is not to have a toothache. I extend this teaching to the understanding that a mess of computer problems is also much less painful than a toothache, and working computers are much more convenient than malfunctioning computers.

To recap, with some updates:

• The original computer (code name A3) that was doing strange things was sent back to the manufacturer (after many days of online and phone contact with tech support and many drastic actions here). I've received an e-mail saying it will be back some time in the middle of next week, although no human communication to indicate what the problem might have been. The assumption is that the problem has been fixed. This computer will now become my daughter's, thus improving and speeding up her work with the Nomad Press images (she is using a nine-year-old P3, 448MHz, maxed out at 768MB RAM, code D1; she will have a two-year-old P4, 3.0GHz, 4MB RAM, that being A3).
• The replacement computer (A5) I ordered for myself arrived and after six days (including many drastic actions like restoring factory defaults three times) was shipped back to the source. I don't know whether that particular machine is a lemon or whether some of the non-essential software was interfering with the installation of the software I need to run, but PCConnection graciously agreed that it was time to give up on it.
• The exchange computer (H6) that I ordered was listed as "ships in 2+ weeks," which was really bad news but after another day of research it looked so much like the best alternative that I figured I'd just have to tough it out for another two weeks. The great news here is that my call to one of the manufacturers to ask questions about my specific needs connected me to a young woman named Cressida in the sales department. I said, "I do print publishing. I tend to have InDesign, Photoshop, and Illustrator open simultaneously, and I put together large files that may contain as many as 600 linked images." Cressida said, "Ah, I know your problem. I'm a graphic designer." ! She steered me away from both computers I was considering and toward another, saying, "THIS is what you need." It's no more expensive than the ones on my list. So I ordered it, thinking that I'd limp through the waiting period by installing the most essential programs temporarily on the laptop, which is a Linux machine but does have a small XP (Home) partition on it.
• However, the laptop (T4) has only 256MB of RAM (it was bought to run Linux, after all; it didn't need much RAM . . . which puts me in mind of my first computer, which did very nicely with 64KB of RAM, although of course it didn't multitask). Adobe Creative Suite 2 requires a minimum of 384MB to install. There are ways to force the Adobe installer to work with less RAM (as little as 100MB), but even if I did that it's not like I could then open an InDesign file for a heavily illustrated book. The laptop is upgradeable. The RAM for it, ordered at 3:30 on Thursday afternoon for overnight delivery (extra cost), will, through the peculiarities of order handling and shipping, arrive by overnight standard delivery by 3 p.m. on Monday. Oddly, if I'd chosen regular shipping (USPS, probably Priority Mail) it would most likely be here now. Oh, well. (According to the tracking number, it arrived in town at 5 this morning, but it's not like FedEx would let me drive out to the depot and pick it up. The depot is closed.)

I have written in my head, but not gotten onto this blog, several posts on how it's a miracle that any small business survives. This is just one of many of the amazing types of hurdles that small businesses deal with every day.

Taxes are due in ten days, too.

Knitting helps

So yesterday I left town. Sometimes it's good to just change the view completely.

I went to Denver for three other errands, listening to Thich Nhat Hanh while I drove.

Along the way, I got to visit A Knitted Peace for the first time, and there was a Habu trunk show going on. Very cool stuff, including two pieces I might even wear . . . although I don't get dressed up enough that I'd use them more than once a year.

I learned about String too late for a visit. Next time.

After my errands, I ended up at the Tattered Cover on the way-south-end of the metropolitan area for Stephanie Pearl-McPhee's road tour appearance. I sat near the back, next to Erynn and and Isaac and Isaiah, whose photos are on Stephanie's blog, as well as two Wyoming folks who'd driven 4.5 hours to be there (one of whom I knew from Cyndi Lee's knitting circles at the Yoga Journal conference in Estes Park . . . nice to see, and visit at length with, someone I knew!). I also got to briefly see Amy Clarke Moore and her daughter Hannah, a child whom I had only previously seen in photos. If there were a cutest kid contest and Hannah was in it, the other kids would all be very worried and might even go home, no matter how cute they were.

Stephanie is, of course, very talented both on the page and in person, putting together excellent humor and thoughtful content, and I brought home a copy of her new book, Things I Learned from Knitting (Whether I Wanted to or Not), which will be very sanity-inducing to read while I am waiting for my current band-aid computer (D2) to load Firefox (4 minutes), move an e-mail message to a folder (30 seconds to 2 minutes) or pick up mail (20 minutes or more, although I usually leave the room during mail pick-ups).

During the Yarn Harlot event, I finished the hand-dyed rayon Landscape Shawl variation (based on Evelyn Clark's pattern), with 1.5 inches (3.75 cm) of yarn to spare. Photos when possible.

I have also finished my acupuncturist's cotton chenille cardigan. When I left for Denver, it was drying on a towel after its initial washing.

Sometimes knitting progresses when other things don't.

Shifting sands in the publishing world

In another development this week, Amazon is attempting to force authors and publishers who use print-on-demand (POD) printing technology to use the printing service that Amazon owns to produce copies sold through Amazon. If the publishers and authors don't agree to this change, their books' "buy" buttons on Amazon will be disabled. Amazon is also setting the pricing and discount structures for the sale of these copies. Although Nomad Press doesn't produce its books with this technology and is not affected by this move, we have been vulnerable to other Amazon policy changes. "Amazon is attempting" means, essentially, "Amazon is doing this." They do hold nearly all the cards in the game they're playing.

Some very good news conveyed by e-mail

My copy of Stephanie's book is unsigned. The south-end Tattered Cover is very far from my home, so I left without waiting in line, although I sent hello-and-hang-in-there-on-the-tour-blitz messages to her with friends. I got home before 11:30 p.m. but didn't turn on my computer. It would have taken most of an hour to retrieve e-mail.

When I fired up the old machine (D2) this morning, I discovered the following lovely message from my stalwart primary contact in the technical solutions (I think "solutions" is much better than "support") department at PCConnection, with reference to the "ships in 2+ weeks" exchange computer that was plugged into their ordering system for me late on Thursday:

• "Deb, The units are due in today. John"

! ! ! !

I think that counts as a miracle, right up there with completing the shawl and the cardigan within inches of the last of their yarns.

Adventures in TechLemonLand

I still have no pictures. I continue to limp along with the help of a seven-year-old computer that wobbles frequently but has not (knock on wood) completely lost its mind. Unlike the new system.

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No news on the original problematical machine, the one that started all of this.

I've just restored the new, replacement computer to factory defaults for the second time and am about to power it down and put it back in its original packaging, with all original papers and other bits and pieces, and ship it back to its source.

One should not have to be messing with the Windows registry just to install software. Or not more than just a very little bit.

After six days of full-time effort, a new computer should have on it at least one packet of owner data, or one user document. This machine did have a small handful of my actual files over the weekend, when I thought I was making progress even if by devious means, but they were eradicated when I restored the factory defaults the first time. This has been far too reminiscent of the days of CP/M operating systems and the need to know about hex codes to install a printer.

Note: I have bought a number of pieces of equipment from PCConnection over the years and have always been happy with the service. That's true in this case, too. The folks there have been very helpful, even though they've been as baffled as I have been by the weird goings-on with this machine.

A couple of days ago one of the tech support people (Mike) e-mailed me some ideas about how to manage the corrupt registry, and he included this quote at the end:

• As Henry David Thoreau once said, "Our inventions are wont to be pretty toys, which distract our attention from serious things. They are but improved means to an unimproved end."

It has helped preserve my sanity.

And last night, John at PCConnection sent me this wonderful message:

• "I think we, meaning mostly you, have tried just about every reasonable step to resolve this problem. I own a [computer name] that has given me very little trouble but that does not mean they can't have problems. . . . If you have a complete unit down to the packaging we can work on exchanging this system."

I have a complete unit. I even have the tiny screw that was rattling around inside the tower when the shipment arrived, and the plastic bag the box was wrapped in.

And now I have an RMA number!

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Other progress, in the cracks between computer-wrangling sessions:

1. Once I realized that appropriate computer channels would not be available to set up a freight shipment, I figured out how to do it through other means. Some time today Yellow Transportation will show up. I hope my daughter is here (i.e., has finished her shift at the bookstore) and will be able to help me move, stack, and shrinkwrap the 1800 pounds of books I've got organized and labeled in the garage. (We will both be glad to be able to open the freezer door again without raising the garage door and moving our two bikes out onto the driveway.)

2. I have almost finished the cotton chenille sweater for my acupuncturist! Can't wait to take photos of that. It looks pretty good.

3. I am making forward progress again on the shawl that is an invention on Evelyn Clark's Landscape Shawl concept (I'm making a shawl, but putting on the shaped ends of the scarf, and customizing the size and configuration to the amount of yarn I have . . . which I slightly miscalculated, thus the pleasure at making forward progress after some backward regression).
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Okay, I have a computer to put back into a box, and a bunch of other stuff that's running behind to catch up on because of that computer.

I'm such a grump about editing (it's a terrific book anyway)

Okay, here's the short version: Three Cups of Tea, by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin, is well worth reading.

(There'd be a photo here, except that I still don't have a computer that lets me process photos. I hope to be back in the loop by the end of the week . . . the replacement machine is due on Wednesday, and then I can start putting my software tools back in place.)

And here's the long version: I'm an incredible grump about language usage, and Three Cups of Tea is a splendid book in spite of, rather than because of, the level of care it received in the editorial process.

The basic positives

Greg Mortenson is the subject of the book, which is told in third person (about Greg Mortenson) by writer David Oliver Relin, who did an excellent job of tackling and relating a complex story. Mortenson gave Relin access to vast quantities of information, and the freedom to portray the subject in all its human and political complexity. Relin, whose background in both writing and life experience made him a superb collaborator on this project, constructed a sound narrative structure, got the chapters to flow well into each other, and incorporated background  information efficiently when it was needed. The more challenging step called developmental editing was successfully navigated by the author either working solo or in conjunction with a conceptual adviser (most likely, in today's publishing climate, the former). For that: bravo.

The story is worth reading and the work for which Mortenson is the catalyst is some of the most valuable (and gutsy) being done on the face of the earth. There's a lot here about following instincts and having faith and being flexible and not giving up--all conveyed through examples, not platitudes. Read it to hear about someone else's one-step-at-a-time mission to make the world a better place. Read it for tips on how to keep going with your own one one-step-at-a-time mission to make the world a better place, whatever that mission may be. (Mine, for better or worse, is writing and publishing, mostly about traditional textile crafts.)

The language grump's two-bits' worth

It's too bad the publisher's editorial department didn't take slightly sharper pencils to some of the important minutiae of the manuscript.

If the editors had done a bit more thorough job, the reader would have been spared some imprecise word choices. I didn't mark them while I was reading, but here are a couple of examples, one relocated and one just remembered:

• An airport scene: "But the level of panic in the stale air was palpable, as inaudible voices echoed through the terminal, announcing delay after delay." (Page 98.) While palpable comes from a root that means "able to be touched," the word's meaning has expanded to mean "evident" in ways that are not directly tangible; that word choice is marginal. The word that blows that sentence completely away is inaudible. Something that's inaudible can't be heard. If something that's inaudible does echo, no one will notice. I think, therefore, that the inaudible announcement of delay after delay would not increase panic. I think one possible word that might have worked better where inaudible appears is unintelligible, although even then people would not react . . . if they didn't understand, how could they? And I wonder: was it really panic that the crowd was experiencing? Admittedly, it was Christmas and people wanted to catch flights to see relatives. But were they caught up in "sudden fear . . . causing hysterical or irrational behavior"? Or were they perhaps experiencing a mix of frustration, anxiety, anger, resignation, and, perhaps in a few, despair? I would have taken this sentence back to the drawing board. The version that was printed was what I call a "placeholder": good enough for a working draft, but not for the final description.
  
• A reference to "the tenants of Islam," when I think what was meant was the tenets (opinions, doctrines, or principles) and not the tenants (those who pay rent to occupy a space).

The editorial staff might also have cleaned up overwrought, and occasionally mixed, metaphors. They might have straightened out sentences where modifying phrases had slipped out of position. These peculiarities might have been given an editorial pass as quirks of the writer's style, and it does take longer to edit this way than it does to just hit the surface of the text with a blue pencil. However, I think it would have been worthwhile to pay this much attention to the manuscript. I had to read a number of sentences more than once to untangle them, and I found that the personification of mountains and sky, in particular, distracted me from the story instead of enhancing my understanding.

A solid proofreading would have caught a handful of minor glitches, mostly missing letters that  left in place actual words that were not the ones that needed to be there (like "you" instead of "your").

Imprecise words, awkward metaphors, and typographical errors do, alas, cloud meaning and distract the reader from the important information that's being presented. Inaccurate word selection can, in the worst cases, threaten the plausibility of the story being told. While this is not a "worst case," the narrative in Three Cups of Tea deserved, and still deserves, the absolutely highest standards of diction and clarity.

I'm sorry the editorial process did not provide that.

I don't hold the author accountable for these problems. Telling a story of this magnitude requires an extensive set of skills, which he obviously has. He almost certainly wrote under pressure from a deadline that did not permit a lot of reflection (although he managed that) or revision. He reached (and sometimes overreached) for ways to bring the landscape and the political and human forces to life on the page.

Someone who does that and produces an integrated and successful piece of work deserves the help of an editorial staff that will give the project an equal amount of dedicated attention. I'm sorry that didn't happen.

Great story . . . despite the editorial lapses

The title comes from a statement attributed to Haji Ali, the chief of the Pakistani village of Korphe, where Greg Mortenson built the first of many local projects to bring education and self-sufficiency to people in rural areas of Central Asia. As Haji Ali explained, "Here we drink three cups of tea to do business: the first you are a stranger, the second you become a friend, and the third, you join our family—and for our family we are prepared to do anything—even die."

Mortenson traveled to the area as a climber, intent on summitting K2. Due to some of the main problems that can occur in mountaineering, he didn't achieve that goal. He ended up lost on descent, spent a night in the open, and became "found" again in the village of Korphe. He vowed that he would come back to build a school.

He kept that vow, and continues with related work in both Pakistan and Afghanistan, including areas from which even Doctors without Borders has withdrawn its services because of the danger (following the killing of five of its aid workers).

If you haven't read the book, do. You won't regret it.

N.B.: I'm not perfect, either

It's true, I've been editing stuff for decades. It's also true that nothing I have ever shepherded into print has ever been perfect (no, wait, there was one magazine article that was perfect . . . it was in 1998 . . . ). And it's also true that the attention to detail that I consider appropriate has not always been the level of detail that my employers have thought was necessary. (I sidestep this problem now by working for myself.)

However, it's also true that the standard I'm describing is always the one I do my human best to grab hold of and hang onto.

Creativity and equipment failure

As I wrote the last two posts on the increasingly severe and frequent computer problems I've been having, I clicked the "creativity" category in addition to "publishing" and "web/tech." I knew it felt right to consider this discussion part of "creativity," although obviously I haven't been talking directly about creativity at all. Yet the critical topic for me is creativity: access to the tools that I need to do the work I have planned, on the one hand, and the need to use creative muscle to get through the logjams, on the other.

Faced with equipment failure or health challenges (or both, as I have been), I could shift directions and be creative in other ways, of course; that would involve abandoning massive amounts of work already done and commitments to other people. My preference is to stay the course.

We need materials and tools, and sometimes we are tied to deadlines and a change of activities will result in major consequences down the road.

I've just ordered a new computer. In terms of cash flow, the timing leaves a whole lot to be desired. In terms of work flow, the timing of not having access to adequate equipment is worse. Fortunately, I just need the box. I've got the monitor and all the other peripherals in place.

I spent some time online and found a computer that was in stock ("ships in 24 hours"), was just a box (i.e., did not require me to buy a whole system), has the appropriate capacity now and some expansion headroom for the future, runs the operating system that I need (no small matter in the current market and not available locally), and, while not budgeted for, was quite a good deal, looked at from a long-term perspective. While it's true that my secondary, not-quite-seven-year-old computer gives me access to e-mail and the web and some basic programs, it's also true that I click on Eudora to pick up my mail in the morning and then go do yoga and have breakfast and read the paper and it might have displayed the messages by the time I get back.

Running an independent publishing company and being a writer are challenging enough. Attempting to do these things without a fundamental set of tools, even for two weeks, is foolish. When the other computer returns, hopefully with all its so-called brain cells intact, it will be moved to a new role, upgrading the image-processing aspect of Nomad Press . . . i.e., it will replace my daughter's nine-year-old desktop with one that's only two years old and still under warranty.

One thought that came up during this overly extended ordeal was that I'd love to take a week or two and make a couple of artist's books. I'll need to keep that idea on the back burner . . . well, maybe in the pantry, to be pulled out later. Right now, I have deadlines. But I should be able to progress with plan-B work options for a few days and then . . . oh, start loading software and fonts again. But onto a different machine.

Meanwhile, I'm looking forward to being able to process photos again. . . .

Computer returns to mothership

There are no pictures today. I don't know when there will be pictures again, although the camera is fine.

The primary business computer has just been boxed up and sent back to the manufacturer. I have learned what on-site tech support means: if the problem can be diagnosed from a distance and requires that an "expert" wield the screwdriver (e.g., replacement of motherboard), then an "expert" with a screwdriver will come here with the part and do that piece of work. If the problem cannot be diagnosed from a distance through the phone support system, the computer has to be shipped across the country for diagnostics. It travels ground and will likely be gone between 10 and 14 days.

I am not exactly sure how to run a business in the interim. I do have the old computer still hooked up—it regularly handles mail and web access—but it cannot manage the business-specific software. That's why I bought the other computer.

The problem at this point may be with:

1. video card
2. processor
3. motherboard
4. voltage issue

Today, working with two different phone support people, Harold and Nancy, I ran it through Stress Prime 2004 (again). It's called a "torture test" for the CPU. It can also test RAM, although we didn't use that version. Harold also had me download a program from Microsoft's web site and burn it to CD, and said when I called back we'd do something with it, but Nancy didn't know about that. I think that was supposed to test the RAM, but we've swapped RAM in and out since October, with no change in the erratic behavior.

The computer did come up with a few new tricks today. I still can't package a document in InDesign. However, in setting up to attempt to do that again I re-installed the font management software and prepared a set of fonts pertinent to the book I'm working on. Font management software is for people who keep many, many fonts on their machines. It lets us activate and deactivate fonts as we need them, so they're not using up system resources.

Anyway, there were 21 fonts in this set, which is a working set, not a final (it also doesn't include fonts that I keep activated because I use them very frequently). The fonts were things like:

    Arrows: Right, Left, Up, Down   
    Dingbats
    FFDingbests
    Gill Sans Standard: Regular, Italic, Bold, Bold Italic
    LTC Goudy Sans: Hairline, Regular, Italic, Bold, Light, Light Italic
    LTC Vine Leaves
    Okey Dokey NF
    P22 Chai Tea Pro
    P22 Tulda OT
    TF Neue Neuland Ornaments

When I opened the InDesign file, the system found the fonts it needed but could not locate the links (the images). So I spent about an hour fixing the link problems. I tried to package; the program failed. This forces it to close.

Next time I opened the document, it couldn't find the fonts OR the links. I fixed the links (not the fonts) and tried to package. Nope.

I forget exactly when in here I took a look at the font management software to do something other than just check that my set was activated. I went and looked at the fonts in the set. They were now things like:

    Bauhaus Light
    Bauhaus Bold
    Adobe Janson: Regular, Italic, Bold, Bold Italic
    . . . .

They were still fonts, but they had no relationship to what I'd selected. It was a random collection, and none of the fonts is used in any of my current projects (although yes, they are loaded on the computer in case I want to use them). And none of them was a font that was used in the document I was testing.

At this point, the malfunctioning software on this system included:

•     Adobe InDesign
•     Adobe Illustrator
•     Microsoft Word
•     ACT! 2008
•     Windows Updater
•     Bounceback Professional
•     FontAgent Pro

And the tech support person came back on the line after consulting someone elsewhere (several consultations today with someone elsewhere) and said, "We have other customers who have problems with InDesign and Microsoft Vista. Have you contacted Adobe about this issue?"

Me:"I'm not running Vista. I'm running XP Pro. The problem is not only with InDesign. I am using InDesign to test the system because it's the most important of my tools. All of this software has worked in the past. There is something seriously wrong here and the problem is not with the application software."

(Even though they have been performing a "torture test" on the owner and operator for five full days, I did not raise my voice. I think that's rather remarkable. The CPU didn't overheat and shut down while undergoing Stress Prime 2004, and I didn't overheat and explode while undergoing Stress Subprime 2008.)

After consulting again, they decided they needed to look at the computer. In Miami.

Good things:

1. The manufacturer is paying the shipping both ways. (It's not paying for packing, and of course I don't have the enormous original box any more.)
2. When I almost dropped the machine as I transported it to FedEx Kinko's for packing and shipment and the wind whipped the prepaid label out of my hand and toward six lanes of traffic, a woman coming out of Kinko's stabilized the computer while I chased the label. (Not working = their problem. Broken = my problem.)
3. When Kinko's didn't have the appropriate box (which they had described to me when I called ahead), one of the staffers helped me carry the computer back out to the car so I could take it to another Kinko's that they had called to be sure the right box was there. (The wind tried to remove the prepaid label AGAIN and take it out into the same six lanes of traffic . . . there has been a lot of gusty wind today.)
4. Although the other Kinko's is in a construction zone that has limited most access routes, it was possible to get there.
5. At the other Kinko's, another customer offered to hold the door for me when I carried the machine inside, so I didn't have to hit the handicapped access button with my foot as the staff suggested, and even closed the back of my car for me.
6. The computer is no longer in my office and I trust that I will not be spending the next five days either on the phone with tech support or doing things to the computer so we can test the next thing during the next call.

These are all very good things.

Now. Can I get done what I need to get done in the next almost-two-weeks with a seven-year-old computer onto which I can't load my most important software? Or can I figure out how to get a substitute computer in here and properly configured?

Things I will have to do without until I answer those questions:

•     Adobe InDesign CS2
•     Adobe Photoshop CS2
•     Adobe Illustrator CS2
•     Adobe Acrobat CS2
•     Quickbooks Pro
•     AnyBook (publishing order- and inventory-management software)

I can probably install on the old computer:

•     Remote-access software and security keys for checking distributor's inventory
•     Sweater Wizard
•     Knit Visualizer
•     Old version of Photoshop (ah! there's a cheerful thought! I still have the old version . . . maybe I can do pictures! . . . I have GIMP, but I don't find it easy to use for my routine tasks)

The old machine already runs Microsoft Office 2003, so I haven't lost that. I'll need to move the laser printer back onto to the old system, though.

Anybody who has an IT department that does its job well, this is what those folks are saving you from. You might want to bring them flowers or chocolate or something.

I look forward to being able to talk about knitting and publishing and fun things again.

THUD.

Well, I did not slow down and rest soon enough, much as I was trying to. I've been down with a cold for more than a week. A few things have gotten done; I did meet a deadline, but the work was 99 percent complete, and that was extremely fortunate because I only had to do stuff I can do with a mild, persistent headache and no oomph. I've read a bunch of books, which I'll talk about when I can process photos again (computer problems), and have watched at least one excellent movie.

The documentary Murderball was recommended to me almost exactly a year ago by, as I recall, Richard Cabe, who carves stone into wonderful forms, and Susan Tweit, who writes magically. Susan and Richard have restored a bit of industrial wasteland, making it into a bit of heaven that I got to visit last year when Donna Druchunas and I drove up into the mountains to give a presentation in a library (both of us), a workshop (Donna), and a couple of appearances in some high school classes (me). If it wasn't St. Patrick's Day weekend, it was just before or after. My calendar's not accessible right now.

My daughter has not wanted to watch Murderball . . . there's always another movie she'd rather see. So I asked her to bring it from the library for me when I knew she'd be out teaching fencing and I'd be home working on getting well instead of working at my desk. Her interest has been piqued now that I've seen it and told her more about it.

 Murderball is about quad rugby—a sport played by quadriplegics in specially constructed wheelchairs—but it's not a sports movie. It's a people movie. Well, yeah, it's a sports movie, But as Roger Ebert said in his 2005 review, linked above, "Although the sports scenes are filled with passion and harrowing wheelchair duels, the heart of the movie is off the court." It would be good preparation for the 2008 Paralympics. (Turns out there's also wheelchair fencing in the Paralympics. . . .)

As I've regained some energy, I've been working to resolve the ongoing computer problems, in large part because now the software refuses to prep a book file to go to press, which means the whole system is useless for an absolutely critical task. It's a good thing I haven't needed to send anything to press recently, but because I'm a publisher that's a rare and unusual situation and not one that can be counted on to last long. In this case, all I wanted to do was get a complete, neat, and tidy backup. In InDesign, which is usually my favorite piece of software, you can do that by "packaging" the document, which is one of the critical things that you do (in addition to preparing a set of specialized PDF files) when it's time to send a project to press.

But the software wouldn't package the book. It hasn't been willing to package a book since some time last fall. I can put together backups manually, and have been doing so since mid-December, but "will not package a document" is not a problem I can afford to have in a month or so. In fact, it's amazing I've made it this far with a tool of this magnitude—the layout software—broken to this extent.

Finally it occurred to me that the problem might not be with the layout software, even though I certainly thought it was and have had similar problems in the past and have noodled my way around them.

Yet if, over the course of about six months, you've experienced problems, from tiny to massive, that have affected at least four major application programs from a variety of sources, it might occur to you, while lying in bed looking at the ceiling and spending hours pitching compressed tissues at a wastebasket, that the problems could be the fault of something other than the individual pieces of application software just behaving bizarrely all independently.

In Illustrator, I sometimes lose (and cannot regain) the ability to alt-drag a symbol to duplicate it . . . which is really, really important to be able to do if you are making knitting charts. This has been happening since late last summer. I've been working around it, grumbling.

During October, InDesign began to have trouble displaying the laid-out pages. I thought this was because I'd begun using Illustrator files for the charts. I mean, the message I got said "out of memory." I thought that was what it was. I increased the RAM, and this helped somewhat, but not as much as it should have.

Yet since at least December, InDesign, as I mentioned, has not been able to package a document. It starts, but it never gets beyond about 20 percent on checking the links.

In mid-January, ACT! quit working and I totally lost the ability to open and use my address-book database. Gone, all access to phone numbers, addresses, and other pretty important information.

In February, I discovered that in Word, I can put highlighting on text, but I cannot remove it. And I can't access the "insert symbol" function.

Now in March I've been experiencing all of these problems, and I've tried everything I can think of. I've installed even more RAM in an attempt to get the packaging process to work (RAM capacity now maxed). I've uninstalled and reinstalled the application software, created new files, removed all extraneous data, and broken down big files into collections of small files, to see whether a smaller file would not invoke the problem or whether I might be able to isolate an offending image or other link that might be causing the hang-up. I've mostly done this type of experimentation with ACT! and InDesign, since those have been the places I've seen the biggest (although not necessarily the most annoying) glitches.

____

Possibilities, according to tech support:

1. RAM failure. (Already changed RAM. Problem persists.)
2. Corruption in operating system.
3. Incipient hard-drive failure.

Below is one of the exciting views that you will get to enjoy for quite a long time if you choose to wipe everything off your hard drive and reformat it (that's what's happening here . . . thrillingly entertaining) in preparation for re-installing the operating system from scratch:

So I did that. EVERYTHING gone from the hard drive: operating system (OS), applications, documents. Total brain-wipe. Reformat. Twice, for reasons I am currently forgetting. This took a while, and several bouts of booting from the Windows recovery CD while hitting the F10 key repeatedly (several times a second for multiple minutes) while the files were loading in order to access some menu that apparently can't be reached another way, or reliably that way.

Then I installed the OS. Then I installed the most basic drivers, the ones for things like the chipset and the graphics card. Then I ran checkdisk (CHKDSK) to see if the hard drive is okay (apparently yes). Then I installed more drivers, for things like the printer and the Wacom tablet. Then I started installing the application software again.

It takes a long time to re-install major software programs. After you install each of them from the original CDs, the newly installed stuff insists on retrieving massive update files from the web and letting them install (which repeatedly requires restarting the computer). Getting the operating system, Microsoft Office, and Adobe Creative Suite reinstalled and correctly updated (with security patches and bug fixes) takes a very, very long time. These incremental updates happen about once a week under normal operation and they're not a big deal. When you start back from the baseline again, they are a big deal.

It's also necessary for the operator to re-register each piece of software (look up long strings of characters and digits and key them in, then wait for the computer to connect to the net and confirm that yes, this entity still has a legal right to use this software). Fortunately, I've got a good organizing process for software and hardware additions to the system, and I have no problem actually finding the original installation disks and the registration codes. That's a blessing.

Late this afternoon, when I hadn't quite gotten to the point of reinstalling the fonts (fortunately backed up in a way that makes them relatively easy to put back in place), and definitely before I'd even begun to think about getting any real work done. . . .

The system started hanging again.

On attempting to install a piece of software, I was stuck for more than ten minutes with a message that said "checking space requirements." (I have to look at the screen during these reinstalls because most of them won't proceed if unattended. They keep wanting minimal but essential operator input. Windows open that you have to click buttons in or the whole process stops. I can knit a little bit on something simple. I can't read or do anything else.) When I tried to close down the installation with "cancel," nothing changed. When I opened Windows task manager and chose "end task," it wouldn't. Some additional auxiliary program I'd never heard of also wouldn't shut down with "end task," although about twenty minutes after the request it did, suddenly (I'd gone off to have dinner). And then the regular shutdown screen with "saving your settings" appeared but it sure took a lot of time for the setting-saving . . . .after a good thirty minutes of no change. . . .

I decided that enough was enough. Time for emergency action. I held down the power button until the system shut down and the screen went black.

And I drove to a coffeehouse and ordered a mug of green tea. I could fix myself tea at home, but I needed to be elsewhere. There's 24-hour phone tech support for the computer, which is still under warranty with on-site service (although I have no idea what good this is), and the folks I've talked with this week have spoken pretty good, if accented, English (Daniel, Stephanie, and Eric), but sometimes it's good not to call while you still feel like dropping the computer in a frozen lake.

A night's sleep may help . . . if it doesn't help the computer, it might at least help the person who juggles the CDs and pitches wadded-up tissues and just wants to get back to doing something that feels productive, like real work.

Maybe the next book I'll publish will be hand-lettered with India ink, and there will only be one copy, bound with handspun silk thread with marbled endpapers and a hand-embroidered cover.

And now I am thinking of Annie Tremmel Wilcox's A Degree of Mastery: A Journey through Book Arts Apprenticeship, which is a far better thing to be occupying my brain with than a recalcitrant computer.

Powering down for today.