Choices

Does anyone else out there get scared by the choices we make? You know when there is the chance to play safe but instead we just launch right out?

No Steve, this is not a time to mock safe. Safe and easy sounds really good to me right now………Could have a bit of that.

Easier ways to live? Yes please.

Might well regret writing this in days to come but that’s the risk I take………..O dear there I go again……..risk taking

The psychologists would say that risk taking is addictive. Keep looking for the next fix-the adrenalin rush………………..not much adrenalin around right now.

Just shit scared that’s all.

You see sometimes choices broaden out options which is great………other times they narrow them down.

Saturday evening is not the time for this. Need to go and have a smoke, that will help. Draw deep…….very very deep. Deep does call to deep. I know; in fact anyone knows who has reached down into the dark places of the soul………….which most of us who have any integrity have.

You know tonight I could have blogged on the Eurovision Song Contest. In fact it’s there in the draft folder. Seriously……….could right now delete this and substitute that. Would have got more hits cos thats what you do to get profile.;post on whats on TV or in the news etc………….only got as far as the title though…………….could not find anything in me to say about that stuff.

Dirt, grit, authenticity, up from the streets, no crap-the real stuff.

There you have it…my post for today.

Night.

PS Just discovered that its national story telling day today.

Very weird.

It’s the weekend!

Time to slow down.

Realised this morning that this last week I had missed the gradual flowering of an Amarylis on our stair window.

Now for those who know nothing about flowers, you cannot miss an Amarylis! It is no ordinary flower and can stand to almost a metre tall.

I missed it.

So busy inside my head with other stuff……..

Wonder what else I missed?

Time to slow down; take my head out of the basket and ease into time with the people who know me best………..those who accept me completely as I am.

So glad I have people like that.

Anyone else got a basket on their head this evening?

Take it off……….please.

Social unrest and imperialistic lockdown

I have come up with a solution to publishers imperialism and in so doing could keep me from becoming a baskethead . My solution to our own challenges here at SFTS will have the added benefit of giving hope for  every goverment worldwide seeking to cope with the growing social unrest that economic meltdown is already producing.

• Firstly Gordon Brown sends his own chauffeur driven car to collect our 100 books and take them to Eastbourne. Whilst doing so he should get on the phone to Gardners, (I can supply both a name and number) telling them that the goverment will cover the 60% (see yesterdays post).

Once the books have been safely delivered the Downing Street car should head straight to North London, picking up Banksy; that is after looking at this awesome video of the man at work. He should then be paid whatever fee he charges to train up a whole load of graffitti artists to decorate the huge numbers of high street shop fronts becoming vacant right now. Local people should be invited to come and write whatever they like on these new public galleries.(Far better that than a missile aimed at the riot police)

And lastly, anyone else with grassroot credentials looking to give voice and expression to the growing numbers of families and individuals that are right now dealing with the pain of emasculation receive immediate government funding and red carpet treatment.

Social unrest is rising, from Reykjavik to Riga, Moscow to Paris and Athens to Bulguria.  Okay the anticipated strikes today in France have not quite reached the fury that was predicted but the warning signs are there.

To put another slant on my spring dance through the woods yesterday listen to this alternative take on the promises of spring. A lecturer from the London School of Economics was recently quoted as saying

“The tipping point will be this spring. It will be caused by the rise of general  awareness through out  Europe, America and Asia that hundreds and millions of people in rich and poor countries are experiencing rapidly falling consumption standards, that the crises is getting worse, not better and that it has escaped the control of public authorities, national and international’ 
 

The answer? Give people a platform! Make room for the voices from the edge…………and open up a way for our books!

Steve………….in severe danger of becoming an emasculated baskethead.

The Publishing Empires

Lest any of the Directors or Investors in Stories from the Street are reading this let it be said that I did manage some work today………yes I filled in the application to be an offical supplier of Waterstones. That therefore means that should they accept my application then I can negotiate with a local Waterstones bookshop to sell our books……all well and good so far.

However the process would be as follows.

Local Watersones bookshop in Leeds says yes we will stock 100 of your books on sale or return. However as all their books go through Gardners, the Distributors in Eastbourne, these 100 books have first to go down to that sunny part of the south coast.

Once we, the publisher, have delivered the said books, they will then make the return journey to Leeds for sale in the shop just 6 miles from where I live. No they will not allow direct deliveries, (though the smaller book retailers, Borders, currently do)

So if you take into account the 60% cut that Waterstones and Gardners take on the deal, plus the transport for getting the 100 books down to Eastbourne and the actual production costs of the book, what is left would not make a dogs dinner.

That’s what happens when empires flex their muscles, driving to the margins those who cannot compete at the highest level.

Now they would say that the proliferation of self publishing has forced them down this streamlined path………….Probably so. Nevertheless the end result is the same the world over. The market steadidly narrows down to the few players…………seen in another form within the world of top flight football….the Premiership.

So we will continue to work the fringe. At the moment I know of five towns or cities seriously considering their own volume of Stories from the Street. I know of another five who might be drawn.

To take the words of a friend of mine……we do not need to become a Goliath to compete with one.

A Hint of Spring

Today is that sort of day when Spring is in the air. The trees are  bare but the sun is out and the sound of bird song drifts across the airwaves. A day for shirt sleeves, running through the woods, sliding down mud banks, jumping through the puddles and getting completely off your head on the wonder of life and the possibilities of springtime.

So that’s what I did! Yes i know I should have been writing to Womens Own and other such gripping publications. Instead I went out for a walking run through the mud and the winters debris-careering my way down crazy paths, leaping over gurgling springs and running until my lungs were bursting for air.

It felt so good, as did the cards, emails and comments I’ve had from a few friends these last 24hrs. Friends who I completely respect and draw strength from, people who in their very different ways are risk takers to-people like myself who could no more spend a day writing to Women’s Own than flying to the moon. 

 Soon I will be on the school run and the primary challenge will be can we make it back home without stopping off for some sweets on route! You see Thursdays and Fridays are sweet days; that makes Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday living hell………….for the length of the school run that is, whilst every act of bribery and manipulation known to that vast nation of China is employed to make me change my mind.

What fun!