Gripe

It's been a long time since I've whined about customers. Apparently someone noticed the lack because they decided to be especially obnoxious just to inspire me. Well, I can't really say that sort of thing anymore. I thought it was all about me, but it may actually be all about them.
So I get called for a carry-out and this gray-haired woman tells me she needs a couple of bags of fertilizer and three bags of bird seed.
On it.
While she goes on ahead to her car, I grab a cart and then wheel it to the pile of fertilizer. One, two. Then I go to the bird seed. Three 20 pound bags later, I turn around and hunt for her. Is that her? Nope, driving away. Ah, that must be her by the black car. So I wheel the cart to the black car.
She looks at the cart, somehow dissatisfied. "I forgot my garbage bags at home. Can you put the bird seed bags down first? They don't look too bad."
Ah, dirty bags. NP. I load in the bird seed, put the fertilizer carefully on top of them, and go back. But wait! There are a couple of extra carts, and there's some dirt that needs to be upstacked. So I do that, and then head back to the store.
Who do I run into on my way in? The lady.
"I wanted you to know that I complained."
????
"I went back and checked and those bags of fertilizer were the dirtiest of all of them."
"I'm sorry. I just grabbed the ones on top."
"I could see putting them in the back of a pickup truck," she said, apparently not realizing that I had no idea what kind of vehicle she drove in, and if she cared so much, why the hell was she picking up fertilizer in it? "But not in my nice car."
"I'm sorry," I say again, feeling slightly less sorry.
"I just wanted you to know I complained."
"I'm sorry," I say, when I really wanted to say well I guess you'll just have to have your slave vacuum out the trunk of your car for you. Oh, but wait, you won't ask them to do that. They have to magically know that it's not up to your standards.
"You should have someone come out here and wipe down all those bags," she added.
What. The. F ... never mind. "Okay," I said. Neither myself, nor anyone else in the store is going to come out here and wipe down every bag of fertilizer and every bag of dirt so that no one else will have this horrible experience that you've had. Oh, wait, you're the only one who cares who brought their 'nice' car to pick up fertilizer. Btw, if she'd asked if I could bring her a plastic bag, I would have. I could have also swept the dirt off with my gloves. But no. She let me load them up and then complained.
Also btw, I went back and checked. I should have given her the two bags with fertilizer caked on the outside of them in addition to the dirt, rather than the ones that had dust and bits of leaves. Those two were not in fact the dirtiest.
Missed opportunity. Next time I'll have to pay attention to which bags I snag.

Shameless promotion

I'm very happy to announce that Masks, the first book in The Lord Jester's Legacy trilogy, has been included in a PacNW book bundle called Legends and Dreams, featuring, as one of the ladies put it, eight women writers and one lucky bastard. That lucky bastard happens to be Kevin J. Anderson! He and Rebecca Moesta collaborated on a great series called Crystal Doors. I'm honored to be in a bundle with both of them.

Here's the extra-cool part. People get to choose how much they want to pay (with a couple of restrictions).

To go directly to the bundle, just click on the link above. I plan on getting the bundle myself, because it's such a good deal and I've been wanting to read those other books for a while. Plus, I just got a Kindle, so the idea of adding seven (I'm not going to count mine, that would be silly) at just under $2 a book sounds great! Oh, about that ... you get to choose how much you pay, but the minimum is $3, and to unlock various bonus books, you may have to pay up to a minimum of $13 to get them all. That's still less than $2 per full-length book.

This offer is only good for about 2 1/2 weeks, and the link may change after we become the top bundle. (Right now we're 'in the wings' while Writers of the Future finishes up their term.) So if the link on the image doesn't get you there, use this one instead before March 3rd, 2015.

Whew. I feel like I've been crowing for hours. Time to sit back, relax ... and then do a ton more writing. I had a big day in the garden, big enough to get a sunburn and blisters. Totally worth it. But now I feel like I'm behind on what I want to do with the story I'm working on. I haven't even got it switched over to my new computer. So, time to get that in motion. And tomorrow ... tomorrow will be another day.

I'm Back, I Hope!

I managed to get logged into my blogger account from the new computer. I don't know if I'll be able to repeat the process again (it was pretty arduous!) but I have hope.

So, tentatively, I'm happy to announce that this blog will continue here in the place it has since 2005, in a form with which you've all grown familiar.

Book announcement coming soon.

Thanks for reading!!

Blogger Issues

I'm trying to resolve some issues with Google/Blogger, and it's not going well. So if I disappear from here, that's why. I'll do my best to learn how to blog on my own real and actual website, kzmiller.com, sometime soon! There will be pages related to travel, which will include trips to the beach in the Pacific NW, Scotland, and maybe (keep your fingers crossed for me) the British Virgin Islands!! I promise to take lots of pictures. Also soon to come on the kzmiller.com website, my trips to Greece, Ireland, Victoria B.C., Gleneden Beach, pet drama, and stuff around the farm. It'll be much easier to navigate and explore via a website rather than viewing it all in blog form. But I will miss this.

I suppose I shouldn't give up hope. But right now I can only seem to access the blog through my old computer, and my old computer is going bye bye.

Thank you all for reading! I've been blogging since August 2005, and it's been a blast. I hope to keep going, if not here, than elsewhere. With the powers of the almighty and wonderful admin of my ISP, I may be able to archive and preserve this blog in another form someplace. This blog will probably not go anywhere, but ... nothing is forever, eh?

Take care, everyone, and thanks again for reading.

Kami