Not really.
But that's what it felt like. There was a broadcast. And it was live. News burst forth.
*
I'm editing Lady Injury by Melissa C. Water. Last night, she put up a link announcing a live streaming video event. I was waging war on supper, and spotted her announcement minutes before she was due to go out into the ether.
So I battled a baguette.
*
At the same time, I navigated the murky waters of yet another social media site: YOUNOW. Where, now? All was not lost. I could sign in using the Twitter, AND fight a baguette.
This is the concept of war on two fronts - the first front being the front of your jumper, down which a river of crumbs cascades.
Twirl your Twitter password as a master-key, and enter other sites. Open, Sesame Street! (No one has misappropriated the contents of my fridge as a result of app authorisation.)
*
I was demolishing a baguette. Earlier. In the kitchen. The baguette fell apart. I took the opporchancity to create two baguette feasts out of the wreckage. There was a dash of egg mayonnaise left, and that went to the wreck of the bow section. The stern lifeboat was already filled by chicken.
Which to eat first, the chicken or the egg mayonnaise?
*
Coffee served as the torpid wave carrying these two boats. The meal unfurled into a slow crumb-festooned affair.
*
This was no boating accident. I struggled, manfully, with baguettes and unfamiliar social networking sites. Finally, Melissa was announced by the YOUNOW digital butler.
I tuned in.
*
Melissa spoke of many things, for many questions were asked of her. A live video question and answer session...didn't quite feel like that, to me.
No. To me, this was a live news broadcast from our roving reporter in French Canada. Soon, Melissa dealt with questions concerning her book, Lady Injury, and the steps being taken to bring out a second edition.
She announced the news. Melissa was working with a really great guy...
Wait.
What the fudge?!
Rewind.
Is she talking about me?!
Damn it, I am grumpy and curmudgeonly and evil. I have my own Top Secret Volcano Base - it says so on my Twitter profile. No one believes any of that. But it's true, I tell you. It's true - I snarl at kittens and burst the balloons of small children.
Except for that last part about the kittens and the children. But I genuinely have a large tank filled with rippy fish. It's on Pirate Google Maps.
*
This event of Melissa's was a news broadcast about publishing activity. Instead of going through the highways and byways of the process with her audience, Melissa gave out her character appraisal of me.
Her broadcast was a show. Not quite TV, and not quite radio. Internetty. As in...interconnected and interactive. I sent a message saying she'd destroyed my grumpy reputation...
Though, in fairness, she's not the first to have a go at dispelling my grumpy online persona.
I told her audience that, yes, we were working on Melissa's memoir. She told the viewers that I was watching. Then she said I bore the brunt of the editing work we collaborated on.
To me, it's a sound participatory process. Writer and editor are not adversaries, knocking chunks out of the surrounding landscape from the safety of our giant robot suits.
No. We combine forces to lift a book into place. Well, she was very nice about it all in saying that I was very nice about it all.
Her show gradually mutated into a wildlife documentary. Parrots featured. Melissa covered her usual topics: self-harm, eating-disorders, advice on therapy, medicine...
She made the time in her hour-long chat to chat for longer than an hour, celebrating with the audience member who was free of self-harm, discussing musical tastes, and sharing knowing comments with her sister.
I'll link to Melissa's YouTube channel below.
*
What is the news, concerning her book? After stopping and starting for assorted reasons, we are now near the end of primary editing. Once that is out of the way, there are technical considerations to deal with.
We'll both go in and look at the book from some distance - that's one of the reasons for stopping and starting. You really need to sit a work aside and let it cool.
Anyway. We are getting there. The second edition will be out this year. From our chats, I know Melissa would like to publish a paperback version at the same time, using CreateSpace, but I've been concentrating on the Kindle copy. I can't guarantee a simultaneous launch.
*
Now I must take my leave of ye, to feed the rippy fish and work on my evil laugh. My balloon-popping skills are growing rusty - which is for the best, if you are evil. Rust adds to the terror.
*
Image of Melissa C. Water is copyright to her, 2015, and is used by kind persimmons. Find her YouTube channel HERE.
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