Crazy, or something.

I’ve been a busy beaver this afternoon.

I typed up the new story – it’s probably going out to the flash market, I’ve also been going through all the finished stories.

I’ve now earmarked 12 for next year.
Oh yes, NEXT year.
12 have been chosen for release, they are of course subject to change.
More stuff will be written before the end of the year no doubt and may replace them if I feel they are better or more suited to a specific month to release in.

I’m normally never this organised.
The fact that I’ve not only got 12 stories ready BEFORE next year but I also have 8 spares that can go out to the flash markets too.

The stuff for next year has all been allocated to each month, covers will be done eventually in slow time.

This much is certain, there WILL be at least 1 release per month next year.

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Wha’ ‘appen?

I’ll start by getting that title cleared up, it’s a reference to a song by The Beat (or The English Beat to Americans). (Correction, it’s an album)

Right now I am getting ready to type up a short I wrote in bed last night before going to sleep, I’m feeling incredibly crappy (I think it’s a combination of the meds I am taking right now) and I am quite surprised to be awake this early. Anything before 11am is early, these days.

If I can hold it together long enough to get some food down me and keep it down me and stay out of the toilet long enough then I will get this story typed up before noon (it’s currently 10:19am according to the PC clock). That’s a good intention that will probably slip away from me, I have last nights extended QI to watch (one of my guilty pleasures, plus it’s very educational and generally pretty funny).

Anyway, I’m writing or will be at some point later today.

Another first

And a bit of a sad one I think. My first takedown request filed.

I won’t name the offending site (who were hosting all e-versions of my entire free catalogue) but they have been contacted as have the people they poached the material from.

I’ll let you know what happens.

The Least Haunted House In The World; a free flash fiction story

The Least Haunted House In The World, a flash fiction story by Ray Daley.

That was exactly what the realtor sign said that stood on the front yard, “The Least Haunted House In The World”.
Obviously I had to call them to find out more.

“I’m outside it now, tell me more.” I said to the realtor.
“It’s got no ghosts at all sir. In fact the property is so unhaunted, there aren’t even any living people there.” he said.
“So it’s just a regular house?” I asked.
“Yes, just marketed in a very unusual way. We’re looking for offers around 25k.” he said.
“Would you consider 20?” I asked.

The line went silent for a few moments before the realtor spoke again.

“Sir, I believe you just bought yourself The Least Haunted House In The World.”

THE END

Kindle reading stats

I’ve been keeping a log (on my door calendar) of how long a charge lasts for on my Kindle (K3 keyboard, wifi only) and I’ve been doing that for over a year now. This month I decided to try and do a more precise breakdown and logged how long I was using my Kindle for on a daily basis.

So I noted what time I started reading, when I stopped and noted those down in terms of minutes.

Initially the Kindle was charged for 12 hours.

It was used over a 25 day period before the “please recharge” warning started appearing. (Please note, you CAN continue to read after that message appears, anything up to 5 days more. There will be another message, when you see that you’d REALLY better recharge unless you want to lose the Kindle)

In that 25 days, 6 days were 0 (zero) usage, ie:- no reading time at all. Probably the days I was really tired.

Over the course of the 25 days I read for 1389 minutes or 23 hours and 15 minutes.

On average this was reading for 55 minutes and 56 seconds per day over 25 days.

This is on a Kindle that is almost 2 yrs old, is charged for at least 8hrs when it needs to be recharged, is kept in good working order and protected from the cold (as cold will MASSIVELY sap your battery life VERY quickly as I discovered late this month when the cold kicked in and I lost almost 1/3 of my battery charge in a day) as best as possible (I recommend wrapping it inside something warm like a wooly hat or scarf so it’s not sitting in an ambiently cold room) and does not have an excessive amount of books loaded onto it (I recommend having no more than 800 titles or the indexing feature will sap your battery right down).

Hopefully these figures will be useful to other Kindle owners. Let me know?

Health Update

Nothing related to writing or much else, I know some of you reading will see my references to visiting the Eye Clinic/Hospital all for my glaucoma.

Today I had a Visual Fields Test, wasn’t good according to the Consultant.

Results are VASTLY different from over a year ago so she’s booking me in for an MRI scan.

On my brain.

I’ve had one before (about 10 yrs ago when I was having major issues with cluster headaches) so it’s not a big new scary thing to be doing. It’s just different to the normal tests and treatments I go through for my eyes.

Hopefully they will get me in and scanned sooner rather than later, I hate waiting for things like that.
I’ll report back when I get an actual date for it. Or after I’ve had it done.

Second October release is now available!

http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/369270
http://www.feedbooks.com/userbook/32538/service-provider

Releasing a little earlier than expected, this months 2nd free quirky horror for Halloween! If you like it, tweet me @RayDaleyWriter

Day 13

It’s now been 13 days since I last wrote anything new or started anything new. 7th Oct was the day I typed up “Fourth Generation Explorers” having written it in bed the previous night.

The only stuff I’ve done since then was write the ending for my Doctor Who fanfic that I felt wasn’t finished but had a rough idea for and some proofing on other releases for next month and December.

It’s getting a bit annoying now. I want to write something but have no desire, I’m at the bottom of the cycle again.

I’ve been meaning to type something up (which is unfinished and never will be) but had no desire there either.
I get the feeling I should go through my handwritten stuff and see what sparks my urges, if anything.

Right now I couldn’t be further away from wanting to start on anything.

There is no light at the end of the tunnel, the spark went out.

The RAF. The flying one.

This is an update purely for me, if it’s useful to you in any way then that’s totally cool.

So I was looking through my RAF documents again, this time checking everything out that they sent me.
A heck of a lot of contradictions.

So I was lied to about where I worked when they “moved” me from Command Supply. Apparently I was still officially working for them in April of 1991 when I was promoted to SAC. This means my Warrant Officer lied directly to my face. And I always thought of him as a friend, I guess you really don’t know people ever, do you?

It looks like ASR were forced to take me after the CRE incident. The job I was doing didn’t exist before I arrived, they had to establish it especially. So I wasn’t filling up a gap, I was creating an entirely new one. Again, I was lied to.

As far as the mishandled discharge, a lot of people backpeddled, retracted statements and generally bullshitted their way through that. All of which I have the proof for. I may well approach the RAF again to get them to retroactively fix my discharge conditions.

End of message.

Writing update

ALL covers for the rest of this years ebook releases now finished.

In order those are:-
Mid October release.
5 weekly November releases.
1 December release.

Oh, and 19 completed stories ready for next year.
I’ll start planning those out after I’ve done the December release.

And that’s how ahead of the game I am right now.