Doesn’t he look adorable. This image was taken a few months ago while our son was still at University and I was using his bedroom as my office. It seems, like most cats, Nero likes cardboard boxes. If they are flat he tears pieces off and spits them out. If they are still standing then he sits and sleeps in them. Never mind his cat basket.
Since I rediscovered the TV and found I can play YouTube on it, I’ve been watching a lot of history and nature programmes. Of course my darling Nero had to join in. He loves the birds. About three weeks ago he was sitting on my chair with me watching the nature programme with me, the next moment he gets down and sits in front of the TV, head on the side, I presume a puzzled expression on his face. Eventually he walked up to the TV cabinet placing his paws and stood up watching the birds fly to and fro, patting the screen a few times when they chirped. Climbing on the cabinet he watched them and seemed to realise the birds flew off screen so off he went hunting. Moving across the front of the TV and around behind, his head poking out the other side until he sat down at the front again. I do wish I had a video of it. I was giggling at his antics. He ended up running in and out of the house for the afternoon chasing real birds and coming in to see how they others were doing on the TV.
On a quick not. Nero has found another person he likes. In the last 24 hours he butts her legs and though still a bit scared, will let her touch him and give him a bit of a cuddle. The young lady is my son’s girlfriend, Madison. This is a first for Nero. He doesn’t go near anyone for about a week, not even my son when he returned from Uni, nor a friend of mine from New Plymouth. He runs…
Sure has a great personality. Still snuggles with me at night, still claws me when he wants something and loves to play with little things he finds…especially wool…oh the wool…my poor wool…Messy toady cat. Love him to bit though.
Well, I suppose it was bound to happen at some stage. However, I’m still puzzled at how. Now you’re wondering what I’m on about.
Did you know that employers can see your FRIENDS Post? I thought they could only see PUBLIC POSTS.
If I am wrong about this, then how did they find and read the post. It was an ordinary plain post, nothing upsetting no real indication as to who, what or where…well except in replies which I should have taken into Private Message. Needless to say, it was posted for view to FRIENDS. I do this to protect myself after a few hassles. I’m not one to share my life story to everyone. Now I’m shuddering and wondering what others have seen on my Facebook Page which aren’t meant to be viewable by the public.
I went really quiet due to stuff like this nearly two years ago. Not wanting people I am not friends with to know all my business unless I needed or wanted to share. Then this happens. I’m starting to wonder if I should close down and go to MeWe.
I never name call anyone. I am always polite and rational with anyone with any discussion. If or when a person earns my ire I tend to grumble a lot, though I do step back and think about the situation which has arisen. I will help as much as I can or as the client will let me…One thing I am clear about is when a client has approved a final file then they will need to pay for extra work, whether the original job was a swap of skills, paid or a package.
2016 was a big year with a lot of changes. It wasn’t a good year on many fronts though I did have a favourite. Needless to say this year was filled with bullying clients and gossip in the local writers group which I didn’t know about for nearly two years. I was devastated by both of these. Luckily for me I have stong family support from my husband and children and some really great friend. Many of those friends were students from my Business Management Course and my Incubate Course.
There was one bully who I worked with. They were like an advisor, going to do marketing for me on a local scale, introduced me to a local reporter for one of the free newspapers. All of this was appreciated. In exchange I formatted their first book, pulled together a book cover – all to the best of my ability at that time – both ebook and print, assisted them set up accounts with createspace and kindle. Now if one thinks about all the time involved the different things I was learning, it was a lot of work. I can’t really put a price on this. They were happy with the result…UNTIL…They suddenly decided I’d not done the book properly(a word I now HATE) Thinking back I did two books for this person. The other was in exchange for a computer (desktop) he put a price of $300 on which strangley was raised to $400 during email discussions. It wasn’t acutally worth anything due to it’s age. Once again I did the second book plus two websites.
What I wonder now is if the second book was better set out than the first due to the growth in my learning…Would you redo a client’s book for free because you’ve learnt more about interior design?
One thing I will advise everyone with a small business…
MAKE SURE YOU KEEP ALL YOUR EMAILS FOR EACH CLIENT SO THEY CAN’T BITE YOU ON THE BUTT/ASS AT A LATER DATE!!
Even in those days, I insisted all clients to proofread their own books for any formatting edits. Bits that need changing or taking out etc. This person approved the final file. Six months later they complained I’d left their home address in the back of the book and I have the synopsis in the back as well. EXCUSE ME…YOU APPROVED IT!! Fed up with the ongoing emails, I redid the formatting which was once again APPROVED. Now we come to the end of 2016. They had decided to sue me…I presume at small claims court. They were going to win and take all my business/money etc.
WOW. Not only this, I had another client who disparaged my name (Yes I can still sue them for defamation of character) They contacted me for a meeting. I went into a deep depression and fog for three weeks…It was one of the worst time in the year for this to happen due to course work for Business Management along with trying to claw my way out of the fog and stabilise once more.
With the bully I was still getting emails. In the end I sent them an offer which most folks wouldn’t refuse. I got a unpleasent email stating I was to re-do the book, and upload it to createspace, and purchase 5 or so copies to be sent to them by a certain date. They had gone a step to far. I was now furious. Offering them one last deal. It took several weeks to prepare and over $500 out of my business…which is still a loss to this day. I printed off all their emails I met with my business admin who I had to pay ($75) to go through them and advise me if I was correct with my assumptions. That was another $300. Yes I was correct. If they sued me I could prove they were in the wrong, not only that, I could re-sue them for defamation of character. The email was sent. It wasn’t accepted. I still don’t understand why. The email was sent via my business admin. Their reply. “All I wanted was to have it edited” If a client has approved a final file then they need to pay for any further formatting edits. They also need to use the final file I sent them. I have about 4 different files with different words counts on my computer…Which is the right one? Why should I continue to edit their work for FREE when they had approved final files.
From this time one I went quiet on Facebook which of course, affected my business badly. This person was still on my friends list and in two groups I ran. It wasn’t until mid 2017 that I finally deleted them, unfriended and blocked them. This was all thanks to another online friend who is like a sister to me. The relief was immense, though with them still living locally I was real nervous going up town. Call it anxiety of thinking they’d verbally attack me in the street. This is also another reason few of my friends online know I went back to England.
PLEASE MAKE SURE YOU KEEP RECORDS FROM ALL YOUR CLIENTS AND ALSO ALL YOUR REPLIES. IT MAY SAVE YOU ONE DAY.
This same person also emailed saying they had paid for a membership to the Chamber of Commerce…NOPE they didn’t because I have my receipt. However I still wonder today if they paid for a second year – without my permission due to the fact I still received post from this group. I have never been able to find out.
SAVE ALL YOUR RECEIPTS!
As for the second person…They are still in the background, pottering along with life, asking me for coffee…well until they found out I was back in the UK…
The strange thing is that the only clients I’ve ever had issues with were all local males to were I used to live. All my online clients have been amazing and I have loved working and growing with them.
As for the Writers Group. I gave the then chairperson – who is an Editor, a printed out copy of my book to look through and advise. She came back that it wasn’t her style and a bit rude. Ok yes she is an older lady. What I didn’t know was that she’d told the rest of the committee and god knows who else that I wrote Erotica. The book at that time was called Malachy’s Unit – it is now called Hidden Secrets. It is not erotica or even erotic. It is murder, mystery romance with a bit of spice.
Nearly two years later I took my children’s book in to sell and show to the writers group. Girlie and the War of the Wasps. One of the gentlemen who approached me to buy a copy said. “Oh, I thought you only wrote erotica.” to my reply. “I don’t write erotica.” Once again I was as mad as hell. I never went back to the group. The thought they were all looking at me a a nonsense smut writer (yeah they were that bad) was beyond a joke.
The Best Part…
The best part of 2016 was assisting a client with three children’s book. ‘The Pottontots’is a set of three books with wonderful art work by the author. Keith Broad was awesome to work with and his stories are a great read for any child.
Why oh why is Amazon making it even harder to put up reviews for authors. First they curtail your reviews because you supposedly know the author or you publish the author or help them publish. Now Amazon is telling you to spend over $50 to actually put a review in place. That would be a years worth of books to me.
WHAT…. Yep you head me right. It seems they don’t want Indie Authors to be reviewed. If this really is the case then why are we all still selling through them? Why aren’t we using Lulu or Ingram Spark. Why aren’t we using Draft to Digital or Smashwords…they both do Mobi aka Kindle files. I’ve not seen or heard of Barnes & Noble or Kobo refusing your reviews so why is Amazon? What is their problem?
I have heard about biased reviews – nope I won’t give one to anyone let along an author I would call a friend. In fact I’m more inclined to be harsher on them than someone I don’t know. I’ve heard about paid reviews and farmed reviews. I wouldn’t use either. So coming down on people who are in the same social media group, chat on the odd occasion doesn’t mean they are great friends, after all social media is all about making connections. I mean you chat with your fans don’t you?
HERE IS THE ELIGIBILITY
Eligibility
To contribute to Customer features (for example, Customer Reviews, Customer Answers, Idea Lists) or to follow other contributors, you must have spent at least $50 on Amazon.com using a valid credit or debit card in the past 12 months. Promotional discounts don’t qualify towards the $50 minimum. In addition, to contribute to Spark you must also have a paid Prime subscription (free Prime trials do not qualify). You do not need to meet this requirement to read content posted by other contributors or post Customer Questions, or create or modify Profile pages, Shopping Lists, Wish Lists or Registries.
Maybe it is time we all left reviews about Amazon and how bad they are getting!
I have set up a WOOFU FORM for READERS who would like a copy of the Indie Publishing News. Please let me know if you need a Screen Reader copy of not. The Newsletter is usually sent as a PDF and is generally over 30 pages long. Inside you will find New Book Releases, Interviews, Poetry, Authors Supporting Charities and much more.
Yeah I know we’ve all heard this one before! However, it is strange we all still loose full or parts of manuscripts. Yes I have done it as well. This time I was ready to publish, book cover done and do you think I could find the whole manuscript…NO
DAMN! I am so mad with myself. I know why this happened, I even know when it happened. Right at the end of January 2016 when I accidentally wiped my computer. Yeah, I hear you all saying “DUH.” Problem is I didn’t realise until it was to late. How can this be, you may ask. It’s called Windows 10 and my computer is a Lenovo. That’s my excuse anyway. In reality it is technology which caught me out.
In the past when you have needed to go back to factory settings or find a spot to jump to in time on you computer – you did just that. I’m not sure if it is just Lenovo or if Windows 10 contributed as well. Anyway it’s not called Factory Settings anymore…NO, aha…not this time. So yes I accidentally wiped everything. HOWEVER I’M GOOD...Well so I thought.
I save my manuscripts in dropbox, onedrive some in google drive, send them to friends via email and chat or just email them to myself. YAY ME. Off I went asking all my wonderful friends to send me copies back. Which of course they did. The rest of my stuff was on back up Memory Sticks or in emails. So very happy. Well that is until the day before Valentine’s Day
Opening a manuscript and found the last part missing – DAMN. It was an older version. Never mind i’ll have to re-write it again and publish later. BAH HUMBUG. Then I noted another was missing the last bit too, not that it worried me since this particular novel hasn’t been finished yet. Today!!
Today I found my latest work to be published…and nearly cried. SOB. Not only was the majority of it missing, all I had was a short story instead of a novella and it was one of the few books…well never mind. It was a good story and I doubt I can re-write it as good as it was.
So what happened to them. It’s simple I never saved a FINAL COPY of the manuscript on drop box, onedrive or google drive. No copies on my memory stick or emails. So here I am sending out a warning to you all.
PLEASE SAVE YOUR FINAL MANUSCRIPT ON A MEMORY STICK/FLASH DRIVE OR ON A CLOUD BASED SITE
