Page Publishing finally printed my novel. I was hoping to see a physical book in print being promoted by its publisher, though I am no longer confident that such a thing can happen. The more time that passes, the more I find out about Page being a scammer-type publisher. The mistakes they made in my work in editing were apparently on purpose. I think if I had more control over the publishing process, the book might actually sell. So my resolve was to do only the cheapest possible self-publishing. Amazon KDP came through with that, though I make practically nothing in royalties and have to promote the book myself.
My art, my writing, and my life are basically organic, growing and changing in dynamic and unpredictable ways. That is the biggest drag on living in this mechanized, grinding-wheels-for-profit world. I don’t fit into their neat and perfectly stackable boxes of officially sanctioned society. They have to chop the leaves and branches off my tree of creativity to make me fit. I am thoroughly tired of saw blades and wood-choppers of the metaphorical kind.
My swimming pool is now a grassless space for reading in the sunshine. I hope to grow flowers there. There need to be more flowers in this life.
My work is more real to me now than reality is. I intend to spend as much of my remaining time on Earth creating things, making the world of my mind tangible and viewable to others.
I finished a novel for my Tuesday blog posts. I am debating what to plug in there next. I discovered that the scammers at Publish America are being sued in a second class-action suit by authors. I might be able to score some money, even though I never paid them for anything. They have had the rights to my novel Aeroquest bound up in their publishing agreement since 2007. But my contract is long over. I can use that novel on Tuesdays with ample rewriting. And I have published it as four books so far on Amazon.
I have made peace with the idea of never having enough money again. Life continues to cost more than I make. I tried to sign up as an Uber driver for extra cash when I am well enough to drive. Unfortunately, I am only rarely well enough. And even more unfortunately, my Android phone refuses to download either the Uber or the Lyft driver apps. So I am all signed up, but unable to receive even one driving assignment. I just read a literary biography of Poe, though, and even though he was a better writer than I am, he lived in abject poverty for the majority of his adult life. Who am I to do better than he? For that matter, who is James Patterson? I don’t claim to better than him, but he is definitely not better than me. And that dude is a writing millionaire.
That, then, is my “So on and so on…” for today. Thanks for letting me complain. If you read this far through my ramble-brambles, you are a noble and worthy reader. I appreciate you. And I promise you, it gets better from here on.
Catch a Falling Star 
Cranky Old Coots Complain and Don’t Care
Yes, I am a coot. I became a coot in 2014 when I retired. I have the hair in the ears to prove it. I sometimes forget to wear pants. The dog is learning to hide from me on days when my arthritis makes me cranky.
So I am a practicer of the ancient art of being a cranky old coot. I have opinions. I share them with others foolishly. And I am summarily told to, “Shut up, you danged old coot!” And, of course, I don’t shut up because that would be a violation of number five in the by-laws of cootism. Obnoxiousness is our only reason for still being alive.
Lately, my group of coots on Facebook (who call themselves a “pack” like wolves, but, in truth, a group of coots is called an “idiocy”) are talking about politics… very loudly salted with firmly held opinions, beliefs, and bad words in several languages. I mean, it’s texting each other on memes we disagree about, but we do it LOUDLY, like that, in all caps. We also do it in such an infuriating manner because, if no one ever bothers to tell us to “Shut the hell up!” we will begin to suspect we have actually died and gone to purgatory where we are still being obnoxious, but nobody knows we are doing it. That is rubbing coot fur in the wrong direction.
The radical right (otherwise known as coot paradise) have been cooting up a storm about school shootings and gun control of late. They have more or less turned their ire on me because, knowing I was a school teacher, they have seized on the Coot in Chief’s notion of arming teachers to protect schools. Obviously, a majority of old coots agree that requiring a few “volunteer” teachers to conceal carry and learn how to handle a school shooter crisis situation with a gun instead of the way teachers are actually trained and practiced on handling such a situation, is the only economical way to defend schools from crazed lunatics with assault weapons. Of course, it is definitely more economical than hiring full-time police officers to handle security because “volunteer” teachers does not mean that they are necessarily willing to do it, but rather that they are doing it without pay. And of course, they shout at me things like, “Why don’t you just admit that you are too scared and unpatriotic to carry a gun as a teacher, and cowardly allow some female teacher with a big pistol to step in and do the job for you?” That is a very coot thing to say, and is hard to adequately counter, because if you try to argue using logic other than coot-logic, like the notion that since a majority of teachers in this country are female, you are asking women who are fierce enough to do the job (and I have known more than a few who would take it on no matter how hopeless their prospects) to take a handgun that the principal bought at Walmart with money from the Coke machine in the hall and face down a suicidal maniac with an assault rifle, you will not even be heard over the cacophony of coot braying and chest-thumping, let alone be understood.
And, for some reason, coots love Trump. Maybe because they feel he is truly one of them. He is older than dirt. He has an epically bad comb-over to hide his bald spot. He says bad words very loudly in front of women, children, and everybody. He says, “Believe me,” especially when telling lies. And he’s not afraid to fart in public and blame it on the dog. I admit to insulting Trump in front of them only because I like to see coot faces fold up in extra wrinkles, and coot heads turn various shades of angry red and apoplectic purple.
So, yes. I am a coot. Not proud to be one… that I can remember, but a coot nonetheless.
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Filed under angry rant, commentary, feeling sorry for myself, foolishness, goofy thoughts, grumpiness, gun control, humor, Liberal ideas, oldies, Paffooney, teaching
Tagged as coots, gun control and coots, obnoxious coots, old coots