There are some weeks when I am just tired. Last week was one of them.

In trying to reboot my painting, I have several decisions to make. That lead me, of course, to research to find tools that will help me and that, obviously, leads me to testing several different tools to see which one(s) I like.

What frustrates me is that I had a tool I liked. It had years of data in it. I did want to clean it up some, maybe divide the database. But because of changes in technology, the program doesn’t work quite right any more. The company that developed it still has a website that for the last two years has asked for patience while they update their systems — they want to move to a cloud platform. However, I’m not sure they are serious about that any longer. I have exported the artwork data from the program, but it’s not easy to import without a lot of cleanup, mapping fields, and making it fit a new program.

With that experience, I don’t want to start something else that could potentially disappear or become obsolete. Which makes me think about paper files — good until a fire, or flood, etc.

So, it makes me leery to pull the trigger on anything. I don’t want something I will just end up rebuilding in seven to ten years. I realize that technology changes and that we have to have forward movement, but it seems like everything always needs constant updating and when a business no longer wishes to continue, they just close up. No one wants to build for a legacy, only for the current moment (and dollar, though I’ve read that the average lifespan of a solid business is about 30 years). It makes me tired.

It makes me wonder how I can build a legacy when everyone else is a potential house of cards. Should I even care?

I had to get back to work so I wouldn’t spend all my time stuck in this indecision.

Also spent quite a bit of time working on my booth setup and testing the sound I was getting. I just couldn’t stop tinkering. I recorded the prologue to Manifest the Magic again and get it edited. It sounds very good. I’ve recorded the 1st chapter now too, and I’ll start editing it this week. I’m excited to see how it sounds.

I did also finish editing Oxygen last week. I want to give it a listen through from different headphones to see how it sounds before I upload it. Hopefully by next weekend I can get started on that.

Let’s look at the numbers:

Fiction words written last week:  4,662 words.

Blogs/Newsletter articles/non-fiction written:  907 words.

Daily word goal reached for 170 days! Weekly word goal reached for 27 weeks.

Writing month to date total:  21,589 words

Writing year to date total: 21,589 words

Drawing/painting last week: I started at larger painting and worked on a couple of the smaller ones. I finished an 8’x10″ and got several varnished up. I still having wiring to do before I pack them up for shows or placed them online. I think I’ll mat and frame up one that is on Bristol Board. But that may have to wait a little bit; I need to find a mat and frame that I like for it.

Audio: I spent 7 hours editing and recording audio. This doesn’t count a lot of time that I spent arranging equipment in my booth, researching and testing settings, and tinkering.