Yes, the Name Game is Back

There are six books in the second arc of the Paladin League. I thought I had all the names right, but (as it turned out) I was close, but not quite.

It all happened when I started thinking about Baggs' story. I know his heroine, I know her name, and I thought I had Baggs' first name, too. He'd been hard to pin down, but we'd settled on Cullen.

I will admit I had some unease. It felt right, but not right. I know that makes no sense, but it was one of those feelings of I don't think this is right, but I couldn't figure out why I felt that way.

And then I started getting pieces of the story. I heard Baggs and his heroine talking and she wasn't calling him Cullen. She didn't call him Cull.

She called him Cal.

I tried to re-imagine the dialogue and have her use his name. She wouldn't. That's when I knew I'd been right to feel uneasy. His name was not Cullen. It was something that could be shortened to Cal.

It didn't take more than a minute to get the real name. Callum. But everyone calls him Cal, except for his teammates who use his nickname of Baggs.

Mystery solved. That's why I was able to think Cullen was correct, but still feel uneasy. His name was very, very close, but not quite that. The uneasiness is gone now. This is the right name. And thank goodness I hadn't written his first name yet in any of the books.

Callum Baggnell and his heroine are book 4 of 6 in the second Paladin League arc.

I Got Nothing

 

Once upon a time, I used to blog every day. Sometimes I even posted more than once a day. How did I come up with so much to talk about?

I'm sitting here, trying to figure out what to write and I have nothing.

Part of it is because I used to blog about my stories and ideas and I don't do that anymore. Mostly because so many of my plans and the ideas I wanted to write, well, I just don't have time to write them. I think it maybe disappointed people, especially when I talked about ideas for more books in my Jarved Nine series.

Another part might have to do with being more tired now. I work ridiculous hours at the day job because of how bad the traffic is, and I'm done when I get home.

It's funny how I get ideas on topics to blog about while I can't write them down. I tell myself: Remember this for later! Only I never do.

I took a few minutes to look back at old pictures from posts. There was the one with the fountain pen--I don't use fountain pens anymore, although I like writing with them. I found the picture from when I discovered my latest favorite pen brand (EnerGel) and it's still my favorite. There's a picture from when I tried to make my mom's plum pirogis and failed. And the stray cat I fed on my patio until it disappeared.

And there are so many pictures of notebooks and planners--which I still talk about.

Too Many Ringy Dingys

My house still has a home phone. I needed it for my dad because his cell phone was 1) always turned off and 2) he wasn't adept at using it. And because of his hearing loss, he had a phone with transcription technology so he could read what people said.

It was also his way to keep in touch with his friends and it was my peace of mind, knowing he could call out if he needed help.

Now that he's gone, the only time my phone rings is when someone wants to buy my house.

It's getting old.

So old, that I unplugged the cordless phones and turned off the ringer on the other phone. There was literally one day where that phone rang at least ten times. It's ridiculous.

I don't plan to keep the home phone indefinitely. I only use my cell phone. But I need to make sure all my contact information is transferred to the cell phone. I'm pretty sure at this point that all my dad's friends know he's passed away, although there is one woman who called to wish him a Happy Easter.

But the home phone is on short time. And the nice thing about my cell phone is I can block callers.

The Tote Bag Saga Continues

If you've been following this blog, you know I've been on The Great Tote Bag search for a while now. Too long.

The problem is that I found the tote bag that fits me exactly right. It has everything I need and want. And LL Bean hasn't sold it since I bought it. I check regularly. My tweet at them went unanswered.

I thought about sewing my own tote bag--I even bought a pattern and some fabric to make it--but I'm still a beginner and this project seems daunting.

And so I continue to hunt for the best replacement bag.

There is a brand I've seen advertised on Instagram that looked intriguing. I order the bag that fit the size I wanted, but it was arranged so it was narrow, not wide, and the opening was so tight, it made it difficult to use.

Maika had another tote bag, though. The Carryall bag.

I didn't order it originally because I knew from the dimensions it was too big. Around Christmas/New Year time, though, they did a mystery bag sale and the price was marked way, way down. The only catch was that I wouldn't know which fabric I was getting. That's why they called it a mystery bag. My guess is these are bags they had too many of and they'd just grab one of the overstocks and send it out.

Spoiler alert: I got the Carryall in the fabric I wanted. Not all the fabrics were available. I believe there were around half a dozen there was a chance to receive. I lucked out here.

I was right--the bag is too big. But even though it's not right for a work tote, I still use it all the time.

It's roomy, with a large opening which makes it easy to get things in and out.

 

It has three interior pockets and a key leash, exactly what I wanted.

And I still don't have a new work tote because this is just so big! The company just came out with a new tote bag and it intrigues me because it might be close to the right size. I'm not ready, though, to test it out when the bags are more than I want to spend when they're full price. (Although have you seen the price of tote bags now?)

I'm kind of hoping they put the new bag on mystery sale this upcoming Christmas. That would be my ideal way to try it out. In the meantime, I'll keep using my old tote bag.

Oooh, OneNote!

I have an extensive series bible for my Paladin League series. It consists of an Excel workbook and a massive OneNote notebook. I've blogged about some issues I had with two versions of OneNote on my laptop, but today I am excited.

I finally asked the question: I wonder if I can link my settings list in Excel to the matching page in OneNote? I have a list of every setting I've used, but I don't describe them very well because I have images. Lots and lots of images. So one quick online search and I discovered yes, I can link a cell to a particular page!

Since I already knew how to link a cell in Excel (for the day job), all I needed to do was figure out how to get the OneNote page information. That turned out to be easy.

I'm excited, but also there's one thing I don't like. It opens OneNote on the web, not the app on my computer. It's also a little slow making that page open, but overall, I am thrilled!

Mostly.

Now I have hundreds of cells in Excel that are not linking and I'm not sure it's worth my time to add them. At this point, I know exactly where to click in OneNote to find the place I'm looking for.