My apologies

For those who noticed, or at least thought they noticed; yes, yesterday's post was late. For those who didn't notice...it was still late. I apologize. This was the second time in 115 posts. I don't offer that as an excuse, just to let the newer readers know that they can count on it not happening often. I would come up with an excuse or three, but I'd rather save my creative writing for a better use.

Speaking of newer readers, the great accidental success of last week seems to have settled out with the reader base slightly more than doubled. There is also the good possibility of building more as people catch up through the Dusty Tomes site and join the current adventure here. For the moment though I am calling it settled and moving on to my next attempt at expansion.

Since there are so many new readers about the new plan for expansion is really just redoing a couple of the older ones. First off, just asking a favor. Everyone tell your friends about this site. I get comments all the time from people who do not play Morrowind but read this journal, so if your friends don't play tell them anyway. If nothing else they might gain a little insight into why you play.

This is what is known as a permalink:
http://timsup2nothing.blogspot.com/2004/12/day-one-my-arrival-in-vvardenfell.html
It connects directly to the first day, the beginning of the story. Feel free to go there and cut and paste to your heart's content. Post it on bulletin boards. E-mail it. Print it out and leave it on the table in the waiting room of your doctor's office. Anything you want, just be sure to provide instructions for how they can find the rest of the story. Please don't sell them the rest of the story one day at a time, or offer to provide it in some way that they don't have to come to this site to get it. If you have a good friend who has no internet access and you want to print it all out for them, e-mail me. I will give you permission, but that's how I maintain my copyright. So that's promotion.

Next topic the long term folk will recognize but the new readers need to hear; need to hear for my benefit anyway. It's the money topic, and it does have a new piece so please even those who have been here from the start read it. The ad strip down the left side provides my compensation, in a monetary sense, for the time I put in writing this. I get tremendous satisfaction from writing and publishing this journal, and in fact wrote probably the first sixty days before it ever occurred to me to look for an occasional nickel...but now I really like the occasional nickel, so please click on the ads. They are 'pay-per-clicks', not obnoxious pop-ups or banners and such, and I have no desire to throw junk like that at my readers...but I sure appreciate the clicks. I'm also really curious sometimes about stuff I see over there, but my agreement with Google prohibits me from clicking on them. There does seem to be good stuff so I don't feel bad asking you to check them out. So the new piece in the money topic is a question...sort of a survey. Multiple choice.

If Tim put a 'Paypal' button on this site I would:
a) sponsor him like the ancient kings took in artists and musicians and consider myself a patron of the arts
b) give him the purchase price of the average novel
c) kick him a buck for his efforts
d) ignore it
e) be offended and stop reading his stuff

If there are even a couple of 'e's I probably won't do it, but having a Paypal account will make some other aspects of my life easier and this is the most commonly known place for me to put such a thing. My other blogs are nowhere near as well known. On the other hand, one person saying 'a' will override a whole bunch of 'e's.

Let's see...apology, check...promotion, check...money topic, check...ah...comments.

Thank you to everyone who has been leaving all the nice comments. They forward to my e-mail and I read every one. I even have a file that they stay in for rainy days when I don't feel like writing. One thing though that has something to do with the influx of new readers. I'm getting lot's of 'this was a great entry!' comments, and unfortunately when they forward to my mail it doesn't connect what entry they refer to. So here's the deal. Think about what entries you have particularly liked, whether you commented on it or not. There might be that one that even stuck in your mind that if you were to actually meet me face to face you would say 'hey that time Arvil did this was really great...' Of course there might be some 'hey that time Arvil did this was really lame...' Either way, think it over, and you don't need to go find 'day number whatever. Next week I'm going to ask for those comments so I can see where I'm doing well...and where I can do better. I want to wait though so a few more of the new people can catch up.

Last, and most, not least...thank you all...I treasure every single one of you...and believe me, I'm counting.
Tim