Constitution of The United States of America - Article VII

Article. VII.

The Ratification of the Conventions of nine States, shall be sufficient for the Establishment of this Constitution between the States so ratifying the Same.

The Word, "the," being interlined between the seventh and eighth Lines of the first Page, The Word "Thirty" being partly written on an Erazure in the fifteenth Line of the first Page, The Words "is tried" being interlined between the thirty second and thirty third Lines of the first Page and the Word "the" being interlined between the forty third and forty fourth Lines of the second Page.
Attest William Jackson Secretary

done in Convention by the Unanimous Consent of the States present the Seventeenth Day of September in the Year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and Eighty seven and of the Independance of the United States of America the Twelfth In witness whereof We have hereunto subscribed our Names,

Constitution of The United States of America - Article VI

Article. VI.

All Debts contracted and Engagements entered into, before the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be as valid against the United States under this Constitution, as under the Confederation.

This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.

The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.

Constitution of The United States of America - Article V

Article. V.

The Congress, whenever two thirds of both Houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose Amendments to this Constitution, or, on the Application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several States, shall call a Convention for proposing Amendments, which, in either Case, shall be valid to all Intents and Purposes, as Part of this Constitution, when ratified by the Legislatures of three fourths of the several States, or by Conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other Mode of Ratification may be proposed by the Congress; Provided that no Amendment which may be made prior to the Year One thousand eight hundred and eight shall in any Manner affect the first and fourth Clauses in the Ninth Section of the first Article; and that no State, without its Consent, shall be deprived of its equal Suffrage in the Senate.
 

Everything I learned in English Class

Has been forgotten.

I have a new critique partner, which is awesomely wonderful. He is very honest, giving me the good, the bad, and the ugly about my work. Exactly what I asked for and needed. With his input I'm sure I'll be able to get my writing to that level needed to be worth publishing.

However, I've realized everything I learned in English classes in high school and college has left my "building". I've had to look up Protagonist and Antagonist again to get a more detailed idea of where I'm missing the mark. Being a techie, my writing revolves around user interfaces, system consoles, ROI and cost-benefit analyses, not fictional writing.

I find myself wondering why I "think" I'm a writer. But then something funny, odd, somewhat hysterical happens: characters invade my space with story lines, new problems and genres I rarely read let alone have the vocabulary necessary to write a story that will pull the reader in.

For example, Hallmark Channel was having a Christmas in July movie-thon and I was listening (and swearing profusely at an uncooperative server), when an entirely new character sauntered into my brain, plopped herself in a comfy chair and snarkily fed me a story line. A romance story line no less. I believe she actually belongs to Simone Anderson, but for whatever reason this character has decided I'll be the one to write her story.

That's when I remember why I think I'm a writer, because I have to write. Sure, I don't know all the rules or remember all the terminology, but it's the only way to shut up all of the people in my head.

Constitution of The United States of America - Article IV

Article. IV.

Section. 1.

Full Faith and Credit shall be given in each State to the public Acts, Records, and judicial Proceedings of every other State. And the Congress may by general Laws prescribe the Manner in which such Acts, Records and Proceedings shall be proved, and the Effect thereof.

Section. 2.

The Citizens of each State shall be entitled to all Privileges and Immunities of Citizens in the several States.

A Person charged in any State with Treason, Felony, or other Crime, who shall flee from Justice, and be found in another State, shall on Demand of the executive Authority of the State from which he fled, be delivered up, to be removed to the State having Jurisdiction of the Crime.

No Person held to Service or Labour in one State, under the Laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in Consequence of any Law or Regulation therein, be discharged from such Service or Labour, but shall be delivered up on Claim of the Party to whom such Service or Labour may be due.

Section. 3.

New States may be admitted by the Congress into this Union; but no new State shall be formed or erected within the Jurisdiction of any other State; nor any State be formed by the Junction of two or more States, or Parts of States, without the Consent of the Legislatures of the States concerned as well as of the Congress.

The Congress shall have Power to dispose of and make all needful Rules and Regulations respecting the Territory or other Property belonging to the United States; and nothing in this Constitution shall be so construed as to Prejudice any Claims of the United States, or of any particular State.

Section. 4.

The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened), against domestic Violence.

The Confederate Flag

I'm okay with the Confederate Flag. Some folks may take umbrage with this statement. But I'm okay with the flag. Just as I'm okay with the Pride Flag, that gorgeous rainbow flag that represents LGBTQ communities across the globe. I'm even okay with the other countries flags being displayed - as long as none of them are flown above the American Flag. No need to insult our veterans who have fought and died for the American Flag, our right to say our minds, and our safety.

Banning the Confederate Flag (how many times can I type that?) won't resolve the underlying issues. Banning it also has us running the risk of forgetting what it represents. We should never forget ANY part of the Civil War. I happen to be old enough to have a grandmother who was old enough, with a grand-father (my great-grandfather) still alive that had fought in the Civil War. He told her the ugly stories of the war, glorified nothing about it, and made sure she, her siblings, and cousins understood they needed to share these stories with their own children and grandchildren. Because, as he said "We never, ever want another drop of blood spilled on this soil as a result of an internal war." My family had family on both sides of that fight, as so many families did. But ours is a country that fought to free people from slavery and we should never forget that.

Rather, we should teach our kids about our flags. Teach them what they stood for, the truth about the wars fought on this soil, no glorifying either side, and let them think for themselves about what it means to have war on our own soil. Let them know how fortunate we are, that we are not a perfect country, we have work to do still, but don't forget where we've been, how far we've come and how far we have to go.

So leave the flag. Don't drown out or water down the history of our bloody Civil War, or the Revolutionary War, or the Indian War. To do so begs us to forget the lessons learned and dooms us to repeat our mistakes.

So Many Device Sizes, So Many Formatting Woes

(Note: this is a repost from my post at GRRWG)

I suspect that a "simple" novel or short story will not create the same pain as trying to convert a complex format book (such as my cookbook) into an eBook readable on multiple devices. My cookbook is my lesson in self-publishing and yes, I worked with a layout person the first iteration through. Even then, the format varied in success depending on the size of the device. Also spacing , paging and text formatting wasn't consistent across the various devices I used for testing. I'm not sure what software they used, as I didn't get a source file back, just a .PDF.

Since I wanted to add a new recipe \to my cookbook I decided to update the Kindle version first. Without the same software or source file, I had to start over with the .doc file I'd provided to my layout person, basically a Word document. The added recipe and reformat has been a trial and error project with lots of lessons learned. I figured I'd share what I've learned with you.

Lesson #1

Take full advantage of the Styles in Word (because Kindle only accepts .doc and .pdf formats) and save yourself the headache. I have repeating text layouts for things like ingredients lists, equipment lists and directions. This also comes in handy when using titles that you don't want to include in the overall table of contents. Styles allow you to make a universal change to a chunk of text and come in handy when have to go back and forth between reviewing the imported file and the .doc file.

Lesson #2

Don't use tables unless you actually want the borders to be the same across the board and show up. The spacing is consistent but no matter how hard you try, those borders will show up.

Lesson #3

Give up on trying to view your book on every device you have that can view the book. Go with what the previewer shows you and realize that the reformatting on the fly can have a funky effect on the layout. Just paging back a page in the previewer will give you a different result than what you see moving forward in the previewer.

In case you didn't realize it, Kindle and Nook both have free apps that can be used on smartphones, tablets, and PC's (yes, the term PC includes the Mac line as they are also Personal Computers...don't get me started on computer history!). PCs/laptops/notebooks can have average screen sizes from 10" and up. Since the applications will size to the screen size in use, the paging can change drastically. You'll go crazy trying to make sure it works "perfect" on every screen. Changes are it won't anyway, so save yourself the headache.

Lesson #4

Hard page breaks are you friend. The best lesson I learned was to use a hard page break between each recipe and chapter page. I removed the rest of the page breaks, so in that sense the layout is very similar to a traditional novel which would only have a hard page break at the chapter end.

Lesson #5

Leave it alone for a day or two. When you think you have it "done", walk away for a few days. Come back and review it again. You'll be surprised at what you may have missed or find that you are ready to finalize the copy. Either way, give yourself a break.

Last, but not Least

Select the DRM (Digital Rights Management) opton when setting up your eBook the first time. You can't change you mind after you publish. Without DRM, your eBook will be pirated even faster. Make it a bit harder for them to pirate, select DRM

I hope this doesn't scare you off from creating your own cookbook for your friends and family. It's still worth it if they're scattered to the four corners of the world. That's exactly why I set mine up as an eBook. With friends across the globe, it's the easiest way to get the book distributed to everyone.