Greetings and Salutations -

Well, I got back from my vacation with my mom in sunny Florida to even more feet of snow. I think at this point here in Massachusetts the yard has four feet of snow everywhere, with many areas up to six feet. Walking to our cars is walking through a deep chasm cut into the snow. And the cars don't actually go anywhere. And we have more snow coming pretty much every day this week. Soon the tunnels will have roofs over them and be actual enclosed tunnels. The back porch snow is higher than the railing and the dining table on it is completely under snow. I posted some photos on Facebook :).

And in the midst of this all, my home computer has begun making some quite scary grinding noises. So this is a good reminder to us all to back up important files regularly. My hard drive could easily have just failed without giving me these audio warnings. I'd be pretty sad then. Back up early and often! Even if it's just tossing the most important files onto a CD manually. It takes ten minutes to do and it can save you a great deal of grief.

My pile of books-sent-to-me-by-publishers has grown into a tower, so I'll send out an email shortly listing them all. Whoever wants some can have some. Sure, it'd be nice if they related to your site, and those with matches would get first dibs on them. But if you see something you like, chime in for it even if you don't have a site-tie-in to write them up. You can always write about it for Amazon. And, really, with Penguin just deluging me with these books, even though I've asked them to please stop, I don't feel too guilty about finding them new homes to the best of my ability. Just so I can clear out some walking space around my desk. Right now I can't even roll my chair without hitting something. I need help :).

My inbox is up to 3700 messages because of the trip so I will work my way through those. Undoubtedly a lot are automated messages from various areas that I can dig through in bulk. I try to cancel all of those but as you know it's a long process sometimes.

I hope you guys are doing well and staying warm!

One last note - I just loaded up video instructions on how to turn your word DOC into an EPUB and MOBI file. I.e. how to make an ebook.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YFpOQI9oot4

Let me know if you have any questions! It takes five minutes and is a good skill to learn.

Sincerely,


Lisa Shea, owner
BellaOnline.com

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