Letters to Friends

Does anybody read old blog posts? Let’s find out.

You may have noticed that this blog is not quite what it used to be. That is because I deleted most of it. You might not have noticed any such thing.

About a year ago a publisher or editor or somebody approached me about writing a book. He saw this blog, showered me with flowery compliments and offered me a deal. I said no. I’m not a writer. The lifestyle does not interest me. I do not want to spend all day isolated in a room somewhere. I like being around people and being outside. I would be a terribly miserable person if I spent all of my time online trying to market and sell some book in a world where fewer and fewer people read books.

I have come across a few writers online and they all seemed obsessed with finding new ways to promote their book. I suppose if you are JK Rowling or whoever wrote all that Twilight crap then you rarely have to worry about it. But I’m sure that 90% of authors are lucky to sell enough copies of their book to buy a book.

A month or two ago an editor approached me about writing a book. She saw this blog, showered me with flowery compliments and offered me a better deal. I said sure, why not. I like the idea of having something to look at long after Blogger has made it impossible for people to use without their Google browser.

With a little effort this blog became a book. Or about half of it did. Rather than simply be lazy and publish the blog as is I went through it all and did some heavy editing. The book is roughly half of this blog with brand new extra special additions and a bunch of ravings I always meant to post but never got around to. There are also bits that I thought too personal for a blog. So I put them in a book that might still be around long after the blog is dead.

The first draft was entirely too long. Apparently your first book is supposed to be about 60 000 words. Mine was closer to 225 000. My editor politely set me straight. The conversation went something like this:

“Nobody wants to read a 900 page book.”
“People read War and Peace.”
“Most people don’t.”

She had a point. But my blog will never be considered one of the great works of Russian literature. For several reasons.

So I settled on a theme. The blog is pretty random. The book has a narrative. More or less. Telling a story made it much easier to decide what went in and what got cut.

They did not want what they are trying to sell to be available here for free, so I deleted a good deal of the blog. Even though there are many differences between the two. I also don’t want to deal with issues of plagiarising myself. Each post is now an excerpt of what it used to be or what is now available in book form. Depending on your point of view. I kept the post pages so I can put it all back when this book fad wears off.

My editor wants me to write a book about climbing Mt Everest. I’m not sure I can do that. That seems like the kind of thing that would take up a great deal of time. Climbing the mountain is hard enough. I don’t want to be typing on a computer whilst doing it. And it would probably take years if I wrote it all after I got back.

The current book is supposed to be an introduction to me so that the Everest book sells. A book about Mt Everest by somebody who has never written a book is not likely to attract any readers other than people who read Everest books anyway. The theory is that if I already have something available and have built some sort of following then there will be a larger audience for the Everst book. Just like in any other field, the people who are the most successful have the most success, thereby making them more successful.

The problem with all of this is that I’ve not actually gone to Everest yet. It is impossible to predict how it will turn out. And there are more than a few scenarios that are not book friendly.

Right now I feel as though I might as well give it a go. I can always make whatever I come up with a blog post if I do not have enough material for a book or I abandon the idea altogether.

Letters To Friends is currently available in pretty much every electronic format known to man.

Kindle versions are at Amazon.

The Nook version is at Barnes and Noble.

The iTunes version is at Apple.

It is at the Sony store. I am not even sure what the Sony version of a digital book reader is.

The Kobo version is available here. I’ve no idea what Kobo is but it exists nonetheless.

I am not sure what the format is, but it is at Bookworld.

Kindle, ipad, nook, kobo and a million other formats are available directly from the distributor but you have to have an account with them to buy anything. I think that is stupid since they sell books, but they mostly sell to booksellers and not to individuals. Anybody can create an account but it just seems an unnecessary extra step when you want to buy something.

I am part of a programme that makes books available to libraries for free but I have no idea which libraries will have my book.

On the Road and Hanging By a Song

The future husband and I leave for Nepal on Thursday. I understand that the people of Cyberia hang on my every word and wait anxiously for my next update but you are going to have to do without for a little while. I can pretty well guarantee that there shall be no updates while we are climbing the mountain. We will have internet access almost the entire time. Nobody goes up Everest without all of the latest satellite navigation and positioning systems. It is also very important to have up to the second weather information and a reliable way to play Solitaire online. But I will be otherwise occupied.

I have a big announcement that I’ll post in the next day or two, but after that this blog will be as dead as objective reporting on TV news. At least until we get back. Then I’ll have a bunch of mountain stories to tell until everybody is sick and tired of hearing them.

So if you think I am not the most prolific blogger in the world, you ain’t seen nothing yet.

Mother Superior Jumped the Gun

So a rabbi and my mother walk into a bar.

My mother has just announced that she and her rabbi are dating. Nobody is more surprised than I. Or my sisters. Or my grandmother. Or everybody who knows my mother.

I’m sure somebody knew about it, but I was completely in the dark. I have never heard my mother talk about him other than in a rabbinical context. She always had nice things to say about him but she is not the sort to say bad things about her rabbi anyway.

For anybody unfamiliar with arayot, there is nothing untoward about a person such as my mother dating a person such as her rabbi. His wife died several years ago. Her husband died 10 years ago. There are no halachic restrictions on their dating, hitting the sheets, shacking up or even being married. A rabbi is generally considered a good catch and more than a few mothers have been known to hit great lengths to have their daughters marry amongst the rabbanim.

We are all supposed to be married at a younger age and remain married until both partners die hand in hand of old age in their bed. But that does not always happen. It probably rarely happens. People live a lot longer than they did a few thousand years ago and not everybody can stick around as long as everybody else. My father was 59 years old when he died and my mother was only 53. She could theoretically live another 40 years and it is unrealistic to assume that she would remain unmarried for the rest of her life.

An interesting point here is that if they are to marry, when will this happen? Weddings are a pretty big deal in my family and right now everybody is talking about mine. I’m finally marrying. Everybody always puts the finally in there. Will my own mother’s wedding steal some of my spotlight? That’s probably not something most people think about.

Not that I mind. I like the idea of taking some of the focus off of me and letting everybody ask her a million questions every day. I have absolutely no objection if she wants to marry before me, after me or even on the same day. Though a double wedding with my own mother might be a little more than I can tolerate.

Of course, they are only dating. Talk of marriage might be premature. But people like my mother who are my mother’s age do not date lightly. To her mind the sole purpose of dating is to check the horse’s teeth before you buy it. I would be very surprised if she simply rides him around the stables a few times only to mount another steed.

Which brings us to sex. Are they getting any? I’ve no idea. But I am morbidly fascinated with the idea. My mother has been celibate for the last 10 years. To the best of my knowledge. She was something of a hellion in her younger days but she likes to pretend that was a lifetime ago. Given her frequently vocal disapproval of my loose morals it would be hypocritical of her to sleep around like a TV doctor.

What is it like to get some after a 10 year drought? I hope I never find out first hand. They say the longer you go without the easier it is to go without. I have found that the longer I go without the hornier I get and more willing I am to do things I just might regret later. Fortunately I’m recently engaged. This is probably the most sex I will ever have in my entire life. I am happy to report that I’m starting to walk funny. Everybody who has ever been married in the entire history of the world will tell you that there is far less sex after marriage. Entire movies, sitcoms, comedy routines revolve around this concept.

Should my future husband die far earlier than I do, I can’t say that I would ever be married again. But I can’t imagine I would deny myself the fleshly needs of human contact. It took me 31 years to find the first man I wanted to marry. How old would I be by the time I found the second? Or do you lower your standards with age? At 20 I had a very wide selection from which to choose. At 80 just finding a man who can breathe on his own is a plus.

My sisters and I are very happy for our mother. Her rabbi seems to be a nice enough man. My older sisters know him far better than I do and they approve. Our grandmother is more relieved than anything else. She thought her daughter was going to remain alone for the rest of her life.

It’s supposed to be a serious adjustment for children when one of their parents remarry. But we are all very much adults and our father has been gone for a long time. We have no fear of any man replacing him. We know that he was the love of our mother’s life and you certainly can’t accuse her of not observing a respectful mourning period. We also know that a companion for the rest of her life would be a positive thing and no future husband can ever make her forget about our father.

My future husband joked that at least she can’t have another child. That would just freak me out.

Take a Cruiser with All Hands

Many Americans cheered when Osama bin Laden was killed. Some people said that was in poor taste. Osama was a bad guy to most of us. He was a terrorist. He was responsible for the murder of thousands of people. Sane people would not mourn his death. But openly applauding the murder of a fellow human being is a bit much for some.

My personal view is that people can cheer his death as much as they want. He was evil. Plenty of people are vilified and characterised as evil but he truly was. I did not applaud his death but I do not mourn him either.

Many Brits are now cheering Margaret Thatcher’s death. Some Americans say it is all in poor taste. Maggie was a bad person to many. She was not a terrorist by any stretch of the imagination. But one could argue that she was responsible for the deaths of hundreds of people. Though I doubt she ever ordered anybody to strap on a bomb and blow up children.

I will not mourn her death. She was the leader of a country with which I have no special connection. I reacted to news of her death in the same way that I reacted to the death of Roger Ebert. Neither was a particular surprise.

A glaring difference between Thatcher and Osama, other than the terrorism and democratic elections, is that one of them was the active leader of his group while the other had been out of power for more than 20 years. I can see rejoicing when Thatcher left office. But there seems little point in gloating at her death. If you think she was a terrible leader who ruined your country, fair enough. But she stopped doing that a long time ago. Dying changed nothing.

Americans, those people who were called gauche when Osama died, rejoiced when Richard Nixon resigned. I don’t remember any of them cheering when he died. Perhaps the British could learn something from their backwoods cousins.