(Apparently, this was the top of the charts the day I was born.)

A few minutes ago, I hit publish on War of Nytefall: Loyalty.  The sale site should be up by the time I finish the morning appointments and errands.  That means I’ll be sitting down this afternoon to get all the promos sent out and started.  For those who volunteered to help, I’ll be sending files that have Word and HTML versions inside as well as the cover art and author photo.  My priorities for the set up is going to be:

• Promo sites (Goodkindles, Goodreads, AskDavid, etc.)
• Guest posts (Never too late to ask for the ‘Book is Live’ post or a personalized topic)
• Weekly tweet set up
• Run through scheduled posts to add the Amazon link

The ‘Book is Live’ post won’t be up until tomorrow though and I’ll be scrambling to reply to things.  The reason is because Monday is my birthday, so Sunday is the only day I have to see a movie (Ready Player One) and go out for dinner with the family.  I don’t like throwing up the post and walking away, but timing is iffy.  Part of the issue was the timing of my son’s Spring Break.  Releasing at the beginning of that would have meant I’d spend the first week away from my computer.  This means only the first day of the release is chaotic.

Speaking of the Spring Break, it was rather exhausting and didn’t do my nerves any wonder.  The whole thing started with Passover and I didn’t finish the final edits before the whole thing started.  It took a few nights of to get that done since I refused to edit while exhausted and I lost last Thursday through Saturday.  Think I managed to finish it on Wednesday night?  Things became a blur because of the weather and my son’s 3 hour martial arts camp didn’t give me enough time to comfortably edit a chapter.  We watched ‘Justice League’ after that.  Had a play date with friends and the rain destroyed the other days’ outdoor activities.

Frustration did set in a lot of times.  Bought my son a new Lego set with four characters (Flash, Reverse Flash, Cyborg, and Killer Frost), but found that NONE of the characters were in the sealed bags.  Even the decals were missing, so we had to rush back to the store and do an exchange.  At first, I was told that they couldn’t exchange Legos, which got a ‘OH, MAN!’ from my son.  They found out they could since I was switching it for the only other one in the store.  That had the pieces and he’s been happy.

The other frustrating thing was playing Lego Indiana Jones with my son.  We were playing Lego Batman for a while, which is apparently a lot easier.  He also had gotten used to being invulnerable, which we haven’t unlocked yet.  The thing with Lego Indie is that you have to build, dig, and solve puzzles while getting charged by an endless wave of bad guys as well as deal with booby traps.  An 8-year-old doesn’t understand the traps and the puzzles weren’t as straightforward as the Batman ones.  So, the times he took a level, I was yelling directions and ending each ‘adventure’ with him patting me on the head and saying that I tried.  Keep in mind that he’s thanking me for trying to direct him.  The most common phrases:

• “Go left!  That’s the right!  Left!  Not up!  Left!  Cliff!”
• “Stop switching to Marion and jumping around!”
• “Why are you literally running in a circle?”
• “Break and points!”
• “Bad guy . . . Bad guy . . . BAD GUY!”
• “Please stop making the llama poop.”

He had a blast, but I was drained because we were trying to save up points for an expensive extra.  I’d learned on the first run that he didn’t like ending a level with less than 10,000 points and you lose 2-4 grand every time you die.  Hence, me yelling like a maniac and trying to do it animated enough that he found it funny.  I really can’t figure out how Batman came out easier than this one, but the bad guys with grenades and rocket launchers definitely make a difference.  After all, he never seems to notice those characters are around.

Next week is going to be low key for me.  I need a week to recover my energy, especially with these panic attacks getting worse.  It’s only really at night too.  Actual birthday is Monday and Tuesday is a parent/teacher conference, so I wouldn’t be in the mood to dive into a new book or editing run anyway.  I’ll probably set up posts for June, outlining some other stories, and look for more sites to help push War of Nytefall.  Really hoping this series comes out strong.  Haven’t decided what the background noise will be since being cooped up in my room might not be that appealing.  Can’t watch anime downstairs where everyone is hanging out either.  I might give a look around Netflix and Amazon Prime to see if there’s anything that my wife isn’t interested in.

Plans for the week?

1. Release and promote War of Nytefall: Loyalty
2. Birthday movie, dinner, and possible outing for a drink or two.
3. June posts
4. Look over War of Nytefall: Tempetation outline.
5. Outline more of the Sin stories
6. Watch an anime
7. Finish reading the Dragonball Z manga
8. Possible pizza reward depending on bday dinner
9. Sleep a bit more

As stated, feel free to request the HTML ‘Book is Live’ post that will be up tomorrow.  Help is always appreciated.