StanleyWheeler

Naturally, my wife was curious to know how things went when I returned home after spending part of the evening in the arms of another woman. She (my wife) didn't get too excited about it when I told her that everything went fine with the play. We just finished the first week of this production. We have one more week to go. I haven't broken a tooth yet. Still, that wasn't the highlight of my day. I'll get to the highlight shortly. Here's a hint.

While putting on my shoes this morning, I found myself whistling Gordon Lightfoot's "Ribbon of Darkness." I can't remember the last time I heard that song, but it's still lodged in that tape deck in my head. Apparently an auto run program was tripped. It must have been something like, "Mind idle. Search the musical memory banks; play random selection. Repeat until manual override is initiated." So it looped for a while. 

I had to pull the vent covers from around the exterior foundation, and mow the prolific jungle that my yard has become. If the grass, weeds, dandelions, and baobabs were allowed to go another week, I would probably have to have an environmental study completed before I could even lift a machete against it. 

Problem: The mower stared me dead in the eye and told me it was going on strike until something changed in our relationship. My wife, fortunately, is much easier to get along with than the mower--that has nothing to do with the mower story, but my wife is great. I entered into negotiations with the mower. For more than an hour, I engaged in some tough techniques that had brought victory in the past: intense questioning, verbal threats, pleading, live electrodes applied to sensitive areas,  but the machine had me over a barrel between a rock and a hard place--if it's permitted to combine those metaphors--and I finally had to concede. I caved to the demand and made the change--of battery. $36 later I was maneuvering the machine like a skilled mahout with a hard working tusker. 

Following the clearing of the wilderness, I turned to a task that I had been excited to complete, but for which I hadn't found the time. Smoke is now available for pre-order. The picture above is the cover. Youngest daughter chose the title font from some options that I presented; it had the most smoke-like character while retaining that most important quality: legibility. The background picture isn't what I had originally anticipated. Although it includes some important elements from the novel; it lacks a seductive female, and the coils of smoke rising from the cigarette. My photography skills and resources are sorely limited.

Get your pre-order in today for Smoke. Or not. You know you want to. It will be very satisfying. Just do it.

Let me know what you think of the cover.