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Test Drive: Radio Systems RS2 Noise Reduction/Phase Correction System

The decode modules contain the phase correction circuitry as well as the Dolby S decode circuitry. The encode modules obviously provide the encode circuitry. Both modules incorporate control circuitry utilizing a 500Hz cue tone which is recorded onto Dolby encoded carts and then detected by the decode module. In the "automatic" mode, this allows the unit to automatically switch back and forth from an "on line" state to a "bypass" mode, thus enabling the mixing of encoded carts with regular, non-Dolby recorded carts in the same cart deck. The RS2 engages the decode circuitry when the 500Hz tone is detected, and bypasses the decode circuitry once a cart is removed, stopped, or fast-forwarded, depending upon how it is installed.

The front panel of the encode card consists of nothing more than a bypass switch, input/output level controls for each channel, and LED level indicators for input and output. Two lamps indicate whether the unit is in the Dolby mode or bypassed. The front panel of the decode card has the same controls with the addition of an Auto Detect button which, when turned on, places the unit in the automatic Dolby detect mode described above.

Also on the front panel of the decode module is an on/off button for the phase correction system. This particular system uses single-ended technology and analyzes common channel material to detect a phase shift between left and right channels. The phase correction system will correct up to 90 degrees of phase error at 5kHz in real time. A green LED phase meter indicates the amount of phase correction occurring. If the center LED is lit, this indicates no phase correction. As the LEDs further to the left and right of center illuminate, this indicates phase correction up to plus or minus 90 degrees.

One final item on the front panel is a row of six LEDs connected to the power supply. These illuminate when the power supply is working properly and go out when there is a problem -- nothing more than a handy tool for troubleshooting.

The back panel of the RS2's mainframe is bare with the exception of the power cord and a fuse. All audio and control connections are on the backs of the encode and decode modules. All audio ins and outs are managed with a standard 9-pin connector, one for the stereo input and one for the stereo output. A third port, a 15-pin connector found on both modules, handles the connections to the cart machine's cue tone audio input and output for recording and detection of the 500Hz cue tone. This connector also handles several other control functions which enable the RS2 to function properly with cart machines.

We connected the RS2 to an ITC99B cart machine. Setup was very quick and simple. As with the 363-SR unit we reviewed a couple of years ago, we found the new S-type noise reduction to work exceptionally well. At normal listening levels, the tape hiss essentially disappeared. We conducted A/B tests with some voice tracks as well as some classical music and found no reduction in the crispness of the audio nor any audible distortion of any kind when playing back the Dolby encoded versions. We then handed the unit to our trusty technical advisor, Paul Strickland, and asked him to check out the specs on the unit. After a while, he returned and said, "it does just what they say it does!"

Speaking of specs, the ins and outs are balanced. Frequency response (encode - decode back to back) is 20Hz-20kHz. Overall harmonic distortion is at .5% maximum at Dolby level. Typical dynamic range using 7.5 ips tape is 90-95dB. Crosstalk between channels is better than -75dB, 20Hz to 20kHz.

As of Feb. 1, Radio Systems has dropped the price of the RS2 significantly. The mainframe, which houses the power supply and holds up to three encode/decode modules, dropped from $695 to $495, and the encode modules went from $695 to $595. The decode/phase modules remained the same at $595 each.

Yes, there are a lot of digital cart machines on the market now and in use at many stations. But the number of analog cart machines still in use is a much larger number. For many stations, the prospect of "going digital" is still in the distant future. Many stations are now playing CDs in the control room, but the commercials, promos, IDs, etc. are still being played from carts. In this case, a system like the RS2 is ideal for getting your promos, jingles, spots, etc. up to par with the music you're playing. For those stations still carting music, especially FM stations, noise reduction like the RS2 is practically a must. Furthermore, as we get closer to digital broadcasting, you'll HAVE to do one or the other -- go digital or bring in the best noise reduction money can buy.

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I’m still here!

This has been an unexpectedly long time away from blogging that I’m hoping to end with this post. Not that this post in and of itself is going to be especially deep, or especially funny, or especially thoughtful. Really, I just want to break the silence and say, yes, I am still here.

Since last we spoke:

I was prescribed Paxil, which my insurance refused to cover; so I was prescribed Prozac, which my insurance was asking a 100% co-pay for (how…is that different from just not covering it?) which I then opted to simply not pick up.*

I tried weed to see if it would be helpful for acute stress/anxiety, but had a really poor reaction to the THC, which sucked a whole damn bunch.

My mom bought me CBD oil, which is working wonders for her and my dad (chronic pain), and I pick that up tomorrow.

Bear started K2, all online. He’s been pretty into so far, honestly, and has been doing pretty well behaving during the Zoom meetings, at least as well as I would expect a five-year-old to.

And… I’m working from home.

Holy fucking crap on a cracker. Let me tell you. The instantaneous relief I felt from that phone call felt a lot like euphoria; weeks and weeks and goddamn weeks of relentless anxiety and uncertainty, gone.

I mean, to be replaced by the daily anxiety of trying to juggling homeschooling a kindergartener synchronously while simultaneously teaching a class via video conferencing myself, but hey. That will eventually become routine.

I have a job. I have an income.

I….have not done any art in weeks. This is going to a long road back to feeling creative.** Actually, it’s going to be a long way back from feeling anything but exhaustion, I think.

But I’m here. We’re here. And we’re doing ok.

* The meds were a new prescription, I’m not just ditching my meds. Don’t just ditch your meds, guys — talk to a doctor first. Also, I’m not anti-med by any means, I just feel like in my situation, I’ve got a handle on the chronic anxiety, to the point where it’s really just background noise and not really something I feel like I need a daily medication for (and with the work-for-home allowance, even the acute anxiety has lessened considerably. I’m actually feeling functional again).

** I will be participating in Drawtober in October and NaNoWriMo in November, so at the very worst you’ll see me working then!

Another Work/Life Update

I have some reassurances that the things I am concerned about at work (don’t you love how vague I am?) are being considered.

Ok, so, namely — I need to work remotely. We live in a “red zone” city, and my son is on mandated remote learning, which means the child care inherent in in-person schooling is gone (and honestly, it would have been disasterous to put him in school even if that were an option, with something like 4000 active cases in our city). Also, if I enter the building, I will not be able to bring him to my mother’s house — they’ve let me know, in no uncertain terms, that they cannot take him, and I one-hundred-and-ten percent agree. Both my parents are nearly 70, my mom is asthmatic, physically disabled, and partially sighted (complete blindness in one eye and partial sight in the other), and they share their home with two people who are also immunosuppressed. I could not and would not take that chance.

So my options are COVID Emergency Leave or remote work, which I parroted back more than once to HR, my building principal, and my department head. My department head (and two of my co-teachers) did say that I was specifically requested by certain teachers to do remote work with some of our specialized population via the remote learning academy, and that the schedule will be out “soon;” I’ve heard nothing from the building principal, but this is her first year as principal and literaly everything is a shitshow, so I’m cutting her slack. The gist of this is, I have hope that I’m being heard and my needs are being met, which is better than I’ve had in several weeks.

I woke up this morning to a full Twitter inbox because someone tagged me in an art photoset — they’d used my modelling photos from FatPhotoRef! It was really cool! I’ve never been used as a model before. My wife and I are going to take some photos tonight based on requests from the Discord, so hopefully I’ll have another set up there in the next few days.

Ugh, fate willing, I will have more fun things to talk about than continued work drama soon.

Stay safe and sane, everyone.

End of Summer

We are in a lull between a string of storms making their way across New England. The first batch barely left an impression; about an hour ago, I noticed a notification from my weather app that I had missed timestamped at 11:55 am that notified me rain was starting in five minutes. If that happened, I didn’t notice it. Actually, no; I left the house at 1:30 with Bear in stocking feet, and the ground was dry, so it definitely didn’t touch us. The second one was pretty firece in terms of rain, with a couple of good peals of thunder, but over within an hour. The sky looks like another might come through soon, but right now it’s still. I’m hoping the humidity will break when the last one rolls through.

It’s been a quiet summer in terms of storms; I remember childhood summers where we spent days upon days watching the weather channel, monitoring rain moving through the area, being shepharded downstairs by my mother on the days when they worst of them rolled through. When we were slightly older, I remember distinctly sitting out on our three-season porch with my dad as the storms came in; my mother hated it, which, I think, is part of why we did it (I mean, honestly I think that’s part of why my dad did it, too; my mom was insufferable when bad weather was coming through, talking incessantly about nothing else, harrassing people into bunkering with her, etc.) I still love the smell of ozone, and that strange moment of perfect stillness right before the first major wind whistles through the trees. There hasn’t been much of that this year. Not for us, at least, and here we are at basically the end of summer.

Melissa texted me this morning that a work friend brought her a pumpkin coffee this morning, and that, for me, is one of the surest signs of imminenet Fall. There is a part of my brain that’s still stuck perpetually in March, when time existed and I had a rhythm and a life outside of this house (and a tight, tight circle of other people; though how grateful am I for those other people). Seeing September on my calendar already seems like a joke, thought I hesitate to call it a cruel one. It means time is passing, and — for me at least — faster than I could have anticipated. I thought this situation was going to drag, but it actually hasn’t. We’re moving. Time is passing. Things are changing. However long it will be before we see an “end” (and an “end” is going to be a gradual thing anyway, not a one-and-done set point in time, but regardless), we are moving towards that “end.” We have not stopped. We have not stood still.

I hope you are all still moving forward. I hope you are all still pursuing whatever ambitions lit your flame in January. This is not the year I had envisioned, ot by a long shot, not by any stretch, but I have made more progress towards some of my goals than I thought I would even back when we thought that was going to be an “ordinary” year.

I hope you are finding joy in moments, and in the increments of progress you are making on your ambitions and projects.

Stay safe and sane, everyone.

What I Miss

I talked to my friend Melissa via Discord for the first time (with the exception of “you still ok?” texts) since December.

We’ve been friends for eightteen years, so long stretches of not a whole lot of talking — because I have a kid, because she works a weird retail management schedule, because we both have anxiety (which is incredibly mentally draining) — is not unusual or particularly upsetting. With COVID, though, this absence from each others’ lives has been longer than intended or anticipated. So chatting was good; more than good.

She mentioned a post that popped up on Facebook Memories that morning, of a beach trip she, I, and my sister took, nine years ago (holy shit); we reminisced about how drunk we got, and walking back from the bar to our hotel, how worried all of us were that she was going to run into the sea “to make sweet, sweet love to the waves, as was her wont.”

Oh, God — I miss the beach, I said.

I miss going out and getting buzzed, and I miss streetlamp lit walks back to our hotel, and the smell of saltwater and the crash of waves in the background. I miss bad karaoke at La Bec Rouge, and free Sour Apple shots on Ladies’ Night, and mind-numbingly hot waitresses, and seductive indie guitarists playing on the patio.

I told her how, every once in a while, I get struck by how badly I miss something that COVID has changed, or taken away, and how I keep thinking I should write about that, even though it seems like everyone and their mother is writing about it, and I couldn’t possibly add anything exceptional or new to the mix.

You should, she said. It’s good to think about. It’s good to keep in perspective, and to aknowledge an appreciation that you never really considered before.

So, here are the things I miss that I’d never really appreciated before.

I miss stopping to grab a latte at Dunks before an all-day shopping spree with my wife.

I miss calling my mom up in the early morning and asking if she wanted company, then packing a bag with stuff for Bear and heading to her house to spend the day there.

I miss impromptu McDonalds run with my sister and her kids.

I miss propping open the front door, and letting Bear play with the neighbor kids (as long as I could still hear them!) until dinner time.

I miss standing outside my son’s school with the other parents, waiting for the janitor to open the doors for afternoon pick-up.

I miss listening to podcasts on the treadmill at the gym.

I miss piles of air matresses on the floor, hard cider, and old I Love the 80s reruns at sleepovers with my friends.

I miss clandestine cigarettes out on my sister’s back porch after the kids have gone to bed.

I miss stocking up at the grocery store for supplies for a weekend potluck.

I miss scrounging through clearance racks at the change of seasons.

I miss sitting and reading a magazine in the Children’s Room at our library while Bear plays with the hand puppets and Thomas the Tank Engine activity table.

I miss rainy nights in the Boston’s Theatre District, and long walks between the restaurant and the theatre before a show.

I miss the early morning anticipation in the admission lines for Comic-Con.

I miss cosplay meet-ups in Boston, I miss conventions, I miss packed-to-capacity panel rooms with a hundred nerds in costume.

I miss midnight movie releases and line parties.

I miss my sister stopping by hours early before a party with alcohol and baking supplies.

I miss sending my son to school on field trip days.

I miss crowding around a computer with my mom and brother to play an escape-the-room game.

I miss knowing my wife has something wonderful planned for our birthdays, or anniversaries, or whatever special occassion she’s remembered (the day she gave me my ring, the day of our first date, the day we met it person, etc.)

I miss impromptu hotel stays with fancy dinners when my wife thinks I’ve been too stressed lately.

I miss… the freedom of not having to plan for my every move, to take into account every possible precaution to make sure I’m not bringing home a potentially deadly pathogen. I miss being able to be impromptu. To be spontaneous. I missing being able to do, without having to mentally measure physical distance or remember to bring masks or stock up on hand sanitizer.

I miss being able to write my chronic anxiety off as “excessive.” I’m tired of my fears being vindicated. The novelty has worn off.

I made my first trip to a store today, set foot inside a retail establishment for the first time since March 12th. It was terrifying, even though everyone wore a mask and kept their distance (though that was really encouraging to see). I have my first social event tonight that isn’t just with my family, in the form of an outdoors, socially distanced get-together for the 4th — nine people including us, BYOB, some food but all single-use disposable serving utensils and all disposable plates and cutlery, plus a bevy of sanitation precautions for bathroom usage and hand sanitation. It makes me feel a lot more comfortable going somewhere where I know we and the other guests and interested in mantaining all the safety protocols, but man, I miss not having to worry about safety protocols.

I miss the days when the biggest social safety protocols I had to worry about was keeping my wallet and drink close by and arranging a designated driver.

But if we keep living like this, we keep… living. And honestly, I will trade conveience for peace of a mind and a chance to safely see my friends. I hope all of you realize that that’s a worthwhile trade off.

There’s a lot to miss, but there’s a lot we can still do if we’re just conscientious about it and follow the experts’ guidelines.

Stay safe and sane, everyone.

Life Update

So life has been kind of a lot lately. Not bad — I don’t want to give that impression; we remain incredibly lucky — just a lot. It’s a combination of things that are so minute they don’t warrant individual examination and things that are simply not my right to divulge at the moment, but either way, life has sort of gotten in the way of creative endeavors.

I mean, not entirely. I have three #DrawingPride sketches that are in the works, I have two other sketches I’m slowly puttering away on (one in the planning stages, one that’s in an early draft in my sketchbook), I still plan on doing the Tarot set, and I’m working on setting up a few hopeful side hustles for the summer and beyond.

Working, I guess, has not been the issue, but feeling capable of the focus needed to actually see anything through to completion has sort of dwindled and died.

Temporarily, at least.

Things I’ve Been Doing Instead of Being Creative or Productive

  1. Solved our first Hunt a Killer case! One month and probably about sixteen hours of work later, 30s theatre icon Viola Vane has been laid to rest. No spoilers for the case, but I will say the hunch I was so certain about for the last couple of boxes was way off. We’re already mid-way through Class of 98 (box-wise, though I feel like I really need to go back and comb through the evidence more thoroughly), and we’ll be getting the first episode of our next serialized case shipped tomorrow.
  2. Started (sort of) rewatching Adventure Time. I don’t remember what spurred me on to decide to start the rewatch, but I’ve been picking and choosing old favorite episodes for a couple of days to revisit. I’m seriously considering starting a full, linear rewatch very soon.
  3. I’ve read 20 fics for The Fanfic Summer Reading Program. I did a deep dive back into House and Sherlock fandoms for my first week of summer challenge. I’d forgotten how much I loved both of those fandoms, and I might wind up continuing to read in them despite my Nostalgia Week being over.
  4. Realized that because of quarantine-induced lack of personal purchasing, my personal budget for June is $300. I’m not looking to go and blow it for the sake of blowing it, but I am looking at potential “just for me” purchases to brighten the days.
  5. Started playing Dream Daddy. Woo, boy, am I late to this game, but I’m having so much fun. This game is hilarious, and it makes me so happy that you have the option of being gay or bi and of being cis or trans. So far I’ve completed Joseph’s track and Robert’s and… I’m pretty sure I got the “bad” ending for Joseph, but I think… I think I got the best ending I could for Robert? I don’t know. After I go through the whole game once I’ll prob restart it and try to get different endings.
  6. Bought my son his summer wardrobe. If any of you have kids, go see if The Children’s Place summer sale is still happening, because man. I got the Bear eight shirts, six pairs of shorts, and a pack of underwear for about $67.
  7. Brought my sibling-in-law in to expand our Dungeons & Dragons party (via Discord and Tabletop Simulator). They’re playing an existing character that they’ve made and played for other campaigns. Bear loves getting to talk and hang out with his entle, and after yesterday’s hour-and-a-hald D&D session, they stayed on the call chatting and hanging out for another four hours.

I’m hoping you all are doing well, holding tight and preparing to ride the (sigh) “second” wave of this virus (we never saw the crest of the first wave, but let’s not get into that). I have read that with proper precautions and a slow and responsive reaction to medical data we probably can do a slow reopening without seeing a major spike. But again, that requires people to act responsibly and… well, you all know how that goes.

But all of you are cool, responsible folks. Right??

Stay safe, sane, and inside. Cheers. Hope to have some cool art stuff to show you all soon.

Missing Work

Today was the first day in a long time when I did nothing art related. Well, I’m doing a massive Reeves paint-by-number that my sibling-in-law gifted me back when they were downsizing in prep for their temporary move to Sweden, but nothing as “authentically” creative as my own drawing, sketching, or designing.

Part of that was time constraints; I had synchronous (video) classes today at 8:30, 9:30, and 11:30, with 10:30 being occupied by a trip to the school to retrieve some essential belongings. Being back in the building was bizarre. The hallways were all one-ways, with designated up and down staircases; half the classrooms were torn apart for the summer cleanings, so the hallways were packed with all sorts of classroom detritus, doorways to classrooms with newly waxed floors were hung with caution tape; signs and posters for upcoming events and club meetings that never got to happen were still hanging on the walls. It wasn’t “burst into tears” sad, but it was “dull ache deep in my chest” sad.

I’m glad I brought my keys as sort of a last minute whim, because when I got to the room I needed, it was locked. Opening it was like opening a little time capsule. Krissy’s umbrella was still hung up behind her desk. Stapler and paper puncher still on the table where Patty, Kyle, and I were sitting when news of the closure came in through e-mail. When I opened the cabinet where I usually kept my laptop and found it empty, I had a moment of panic until I realized, oh, wait — the day of the closure, I’d spent some time on my laptop, at the desk in the back. The laptop and bag were still propped against the filing cabinet under the desk where I left them, 11 weeks ago.

My mail box was empty, but my cap and gown had come in, for the graduation ceremony that would have been June 1st. The ceremony that I would have carpooled with Kathy and Patty for.

It’s weird, and I don’t think I realized it at the time, but man, what a difference it made just… seeing people’s faces? Only a few — they were tightly controlling the number of people in the building, and only at a distance — but just seeing other human beings in person, who don’t live in the same house as me? I’m not really a “social” person, I don’t make friends easily and I’m uncomfortable in most social situations that don’t have clearly defined rules and roles, and I have managed to completely take for granted how significant of a role in my social needs fulfillment that this job — full of people I’ve worked with for years in an environment and role that I know like the back of my hand because I’ve worked here for nearly 40% of my life — fulfills. How much stopping into a classroom and chatting about TV, or my son’s latest escapades, or school gossip, actually meant, how much it actually bouyed me along and helped me feel tethered to something.

Quarantine has not been bad, honestly. I am incredibly fortunate to be in isolation with people I love, incredibly lucky that I can do my job from home, incredibly privelleged that we have not lost income. But there are moments and days when I’ll think I’m totally fine, and then I’ll get a work email or see a video the kids put together, and I just lose it. I just utterly lose it.

I miss commiserating with people I feel comfortable with. I miss the kids. I miss sitting around the tables in the learning center and shooting the shit once the last kid leaves. I miss faculty meeting where all the teachers act like goofy middle-schoolers and our department head surprises us with donuts. I miss hiding out in the vocational office during a free block, or running copies as a favor to a friend.

But so it goes. We’ll see what the fall brings us. When I do finally find myself back, I know we’re going to celebrate. I’m looking forward to it… whenever it is.

Stay safe, sane, inside.

Before & After & Dungeons & Dragons

I’m still fighting some hefty art block; I went from having a running roster of ideas at the ready to spending hours doodling and gesture drawing just to come up with something.  I know that I’m going about things the “right way,” i.e., actually sitting down and going though the motions to unblock myself instead of swearing off drawing until “inspiration stikes,” but it’s still frustrating.

That being said, I finally went down to the basement and grabbed my Inktober 2018 sketchbook, and, again — wow.  There actually wasn’t a ton of stuff in it analogous to anything I’ve been drawing lately, so I just took the two drawing that were full-face portraits and am comparing it to a drawing I completed last weekend, on Mother’s Day:

So… that’s encouraging. I still have a long way to go, but holy hell, did I come a long way already.

Today was a low-key day. I finished a drawing (which I’ll upload later), puttered around the house a bit, called my mother, and embarked on what is sure to be a journey full of ups and downs — started to learn how to play Dungeons & Dragons.

Bear has been asking my husband to teach him for the last few weeks. I’d like to say it was watching my husband run his own D&D and GURPS campaigns over the last three years (twice a week, from out home via Tabletop Simulator and Discord voice chat), but no. No, it’s because he’s overheard us listening to Dungeons and Daddies1 (not a BDSM podcast) for the last six months, and has decided it’s the coolest thing in the world. So my husband has essentially been shown up in the eyes of his son, by four fictional (and debatably competent) dads on a podcast very much not intended for children. I think we’re going to win an award for parenting some day guys, I really do.

The first stage of the campaign was character creation — Bear decided to be a Fighter hill dwarf (or “dwarb,” as he says) and I’m a Druid halfling named Veerle. Bear has apparently heard and retained enough of the aforementioned podcast that he began wildly casting spells that a. he cannot cast because he does not have magic, and b. did not apply in any way to the situation:

Bear: I Rage!
Me: You rage?
Bear: I Rage at them!
Me: You don’t have Rage.

Bear: I cast Speak with Animals!
Andy: You can’t. You have no magic, and there are no animals here.

Bear: I attack with a spell!
Andy: You… you have no magic. And there is no one here to attack.
Me: We literally just arrived in town. We haven’t even seen any people yet.

Eventually I just looked at my husband and mouthed “I cast Magic Missile!,” because I feel like playing with him is going to be stuck in a very innocent version of the Dead Alewives skit.

Sketch is from ’96 (I remember it from high school) but this animation is cute.

All in all we played for about two hours; Bear’s first time in combat, his first roll was a crit hit and he took great pleasure is describing how he cleaved a goblic clean in twain; I, uh, crit failed at least one of my rolls and by all rights should have been permadead, but we fudged the rules since I was the only other player and Bear didn’t want to play alone. He got a kick out of it and is looking forward to playing more tomorrow. It would be nice if this could become a weekly thing, but we’ll see how long this holds his interest.

Hope today was a day of some rest and relaxation. Stay safe, sane, and inside.

1 Highly, highly recommended. I often re-listen to it at night before I go to sleep, and I’ve woken my husband up laughing on even the n-th re-listen.

Busy Hands

I think I’m going to recommit to learning American Sign Language this week.  It’s been ages (I don’t even know how long, honestly) since I’ve gotten any practice in.  I stalled out at Lesson 13 sometimes in probably February and just haven’t gotten back to it.

I know a lot has been said, including by me personally, about not feeling pressured to be “productive” or to emerge from quarantine with a bevy of new skills in tow.  But my anxiety has been hovering around baseline (with a lot of restrictions on social media consumption), and if I’m in a headspace conducive to pursuing an interest, I might as well — I certainly have the time to fill.

Even though it’s been a while since I’ve pursued any ASL studies, I remember feeling about it the way I feel about drawing now: how strange and unfortunate it was that I put off practicing it for so long under the baseless assumption that I would be no good at it.  And not just “no good” to start — everyone starts out not being good — but never any good.  I had somehow convinced myself that I would never get any better at either skill, because I had this perception of myself as being uncoordinated.  Which, to be fair, I am; but there are different kinds of coordination, and coordination can be improved with practice.  Within a couple of weeks of starting sign practice, I was remembering and recalling signs, able to show some dialectical variations; I was actually learning.  I was getting better.

So I’m going to start setting an alarm for 2:00 pm each day, and take an hour or so to work on ASL.  My work is done for the day by then, and any chores I do with any regularity should certainly be out of the way by then.  Let’s get back on track.

Speaking of improvements, I recently unearthed the mini-sketchbook I bought from Dollar Tree back in 2018 when I decided I was going to try my hand at Inktober, and oh my God, is that sketchbook a revelation, let me tell you.  Again, I know I have a long way to go, but it’s amazing how, even with sporadic practice (it’s really only since December/January that I’ve made art/drawing a regular part of my routine) my art has grown in leaps and bounds.

I have three new drawings to upload anyway, so I think I’ll try to find something relatively analogous (in subject matter or composition) for each of those in my Inktober sketchbook to do a side-by-side comparison.  That ought to be good for a laugh.

I spent some time today working from a resource my husband uncovered on Twitter¹ called Croquis Cafe.  They have both a Vimeo and a photo reference gallery of nude models for gesture drawing, anatomy drawing, etc. and it’s really great.  I did a few sketches of their model Tamara and was happy with the results.  (Also, please notice the emphasis — the subject matter is entirely non-sexual, but it is still full nudity, so NSFW, if that’s relevant to you).

Stay busy, safe, and sane everyone.  My husband is picking up reusable face masks for us tomorrow, courtesy of a friend who made them for us for free (two each for Bear and I, five for Andy since he’s an essential worker).  I’m hoping this makes me feel secure and safe enough to leave the house to go for walks and get a little fresh air, since I am actually starting to get a little stir-crazy.

¹ I deleted and recreated my Twitter yet again, because I still don’t know exactly what I want to use it for.  I start doing Twitter writing challenges and amass a following of folks who are very much Twitter Writers, and then I lose interest and start posting about, like, DnD Real Play podcasts, and I just know they’re all going “WTF?” and meanwhile my reading list is just haiku and self-promos (which is an absolutely valid use of Twitter, but I’m definitely not the target audience).  If you use Twitter for a smattering of personal.creative things, hit me up: @milkandkerosene.  I have zero followers and like, two tweets at the moment.

Creative Break and Family Time

I’m itching to crack open my new sketchbook.  Why??  I have several pages — like, more than several, really, though I’m definitely running low — in my old sketchbook, but I’m aching to open and start in on the shiny new one.  Do a lot of artists have multiple sketchbooks going at once??  Are they frequently thematic, or sort of an “anything goes” situation?  I plan on using the pages in the old one; I stopped doing really thoughtfully planned pieces with a lot of reworking and started doing more illustration- and comic-book-style drawings, because they were good ways to practice perspective and anatomy without having too much of an emotional connection to the work (which always leads me to second-guessing, obsessive reworking, self-editing, etc).  I’ve also been doing loose, experimental perspective sketches, so I’m definitely still using the old book.  I don’t know.  I feel like not giving myself permission to open the book is akin to my old habits of hoarding art materials until “the right time,” but I feel like starting it now feeds into my habit of starting multiple projects and than slowly abandoning them, one-by-one.  Advice?

I haven’t done any real art in several days (though I might post a sketch I did of a “Disney-style” witch illustration I did, which I kind of like despite some fair anatomy issues, and a mermaid (for Mermay) that I feel similarly about, despite similar issues).  I’m waiting on my watercolor pad to arrive, because my son made an art request that actually I really liked — “I want a Queen surrounded by birds” — that I sort of instinctively conceived of as a watercolor, so I want that to be my next significant project.

Plus, you know.  I’ve had other things to do.

I’ve been feeling incredibly lethargic lately, so a couple of weeks ago, I ordered a fitness journal in an attempt to start tracking things again — not so much calories, per se, though I will note them if it’s easy enough (calorie counting drove me bonkers, it plays into my worst obsessive tendencies) — but just general accountability.  It tracks glasses of water consumed, what you ate for each meal, what you did for physical activity, how long and how well you slept, how you feel that days, and how you think you could do better tomorrow.  Around the same time I ordered it, I got an email from some coworkers saying they set up a Wellness Challenge, to run from May 4th (around when my Fitness Planner was set to arrive) to June 2nd.  It seemed like perfect timing.

When my Fitness Planner arrive Saturday, days before the Challenge was set to start, I decided it was a great time to get other things in order as well.  So, I flew through and got the house clean, reset all my alarms so I’d get back on an actual schedule (5:30 seems excessive, though, so I set them to 7 am), broke out an old binder to use as an organizational “command center,” and re-committed to actually having checklists, to-do lists, and daily purpose.

It’s four days in, and it’s working for me so far.  I’m doing a little housework each day, writing out simple lists of priorities each morning, and doing — at the very least, in terms of physical activity — the ab circuit and daily challenge for my fitness challenge each day.  Also, re: water — hey, did you know drinking eight to ten glasses of water a day makes you feel significantly less tired?  It’s true.  Weird how that works, right?

Having things in order also means I have time (and energy!) for other stuff.  A couple of weeks ago, my mom told me my brother (who lives with her) got a Hunt a Killer subscription, so when the box arrived two days ago, he forwarded me and my sister photos of all the documents in the box, and I got online and Video Called him, my mom, and my sister, and we worked on that first box for two hours.  It was a lot of fun, even though we finished the objective of the box pretty quickly (like within twenty minutes).  There was still so much to go through and decipher, and it’s been fun messaging back and forth with them about theories and things we’ve read on the forums, etc.  I wish I could work with them in person, but this is still a lot of fun.  And honestly, my sister almost definitely wouldn’t be able to join us in person anyway, so this isn’t so different to how we would have to arrange it regardless of the circumstances, if we wanted to do it as a team.

On today’s roster is trying to get a little exercise in (the goal is 25 min, plus the ab circuit), clean out the fridge, take care of the upstairs bathroom, watch some Gravity Falls, find a good book to read, and meet up with my family after Bear goes to bed for happy-murder-fun-times.

Hope you’re all taking care of yourselves and each other.  Find something to do each day that makes you feel good.  And water!   Drink water!  Apparently that’s important.

Daily Life and Daily Sketch Dump

Since giving up on my April Challenges (good on those who followed through!), I’ve gotten back to doing regular ink work, sometimes in conjunction with watching some tutorials, sometimes just one my own and off the top of my head.  These are not photographed for the gallery (I’ll take better care doing that some other time), but here are the as-of-now finished versions of my three latest sketches.

I completed the foreground the first sketch (the fairy) simply in order to test a few pointers I got from a YouTube video¹.  I opted to fill out the image today while on a conference call, since I still felt in looked a little sparse.  I could have been more conscientious about the shading on the flowers, but over all it was always intended as a “quick sketch,” so I’m not going to agonize over it.

Second drawing I did just as a quick study of hands, since they (and feet, and to a lesser extent, noses) are still the body parts that give me the most trouble.  I added the plant yesterday, and the roots, extra leaves, and quote today.  Again, for something that was sort of spur-of-the-moment, I’m satisfied (looking forward to breaking out those new microns, though; look at the weight behind some of those hatch lines).

Third one I’m just really, really happy with.  Figure and birds were drawn partially from three different references, flowers were free-handed.  Completed it yesterday in its entirety while listening to podcasts.

Bear has been having a difficult time, lately.  He’s up every night and in our room, something that had become a rare occurrence before COVID-19 and quarantine became his day-to-day reality.  He says he’s happy about being at home because he can be with me and play whenever he wants, but I can tell it’s hard for him.

We’ve been letting him out on the porch in the nicer weather; I hesitate to let him downstairs because it’s already difficult keeping him and his friend next door apart.  They started out yesterday chatting from the porch and her window, and then moved to her being in her yard and them both drawing with chalk together-apart (she on her retaining wall, he on the porch), when we noticed the volume of his speech getting quieter.  He and she had pulled their jackets up around their mouths like face masks and were trying to sneak into the yard together.  Something similar happened today, as well, but this time he had an intense crying jag after.  I don’t want to keep him inside, because I think that’s counter productive, but I don’t know what to do.  I try to be as direct as possible with him about the severity of COVID and the seriousness of the quarantine without scaring the absolute shit out of him, but he’s five.  Even though he’ll tell people he can’t play with them or that they can’t see each other because of quarantine (something he’s repeated to his cousin multiple times over video chat when Ben inevitably asks him when they’ll see each other), he just doesn’t fully “get” it.  Which is a blessing, in some ways, but a curse in so many others.

His teacher messaged me to set up a Zoom conference tomorrow at five with a few of his classmates, which I think will do him a world of good.  I asked him today what the first thing he’d want to do after quarantine ended was.  He said, “Go to school.”  I think he needs the face time with his teacher, if no one else.  He went from seeing her every day and giving her a hug before we left to suddenly not seeing her for, we told him, two weeks… three weeks… six weeks… not again until at least September, at which point she’ll no longer be his teacher.  I honestly mourn his ability to say a real goodbye to his teacher and classmates.  It’s the same way I feel about my Seniors.

I myself had a Zoom conference with my department today, and scrolling through the three pages of attendees faces literally made me tear up.  I’m not an especially social person, but I’ve always taken for granted how much of a social thing work is for me, and how far that went towards fulfilling my social needs.  With that gone, I’m sort of lost.

I’m hoping to get more art done today, but barring that, maybe some binge watching or some work down in the basement.

Hope you are all holding up and being kind to yourselves.

¹ I’m considering putting up an old-school “links” page, for things like my favorite YouTubers (ArtTube, BookTube, general entertainment), forums I frequent, podcasts I enjoy, etc.  We’ll see if I can get that done by the weekend.  That’s the goal.

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Moon Rock Site_Pilliga NSW 2020 (Andrew Belletty)

Support Material for tRAKa-tRAKn, a new Video / Animation / Sound / Installation work

Arial image – Pilliga

tRAKa-tRAKn takes as it’s starting point a traditional Gamilaraay survival story – Burra Bee Dee (flying mice): this cultural story teaches Gamilaraay youth about the importance of healing on country.

Gamilaraay Community Letter of Support

Letters of Support from Galleries

Creative Team

r e a – lead artist/creative concept/director

r e a is a Gamilaraay / Wailwan / Biripi (NSW) artist / curator / activist / academic / cultural educator / creative thinker.

r e a’s ongoing practice takes its development from new and critical discourses exploring intersectionality and positionality, through the cultural convergence of Aboriginality; within the creative arts and technology, history and colonialism, the body and identity, gender and queer politics.

Miss Mel Pesa

Composer /Musician / Sound Designer, works across sound & film to make experimental audio-visual works, which explore voice, piano & machines. Missi’s work is influenced by altered states of attention, which is achieved through meditation – these imagined texts are used to reconfigure original piano compositions. Missi has exhibited work at: Scienceworks (Victoria), Tribadelic Festival (Victoria), Tap Gallery (NSW), Arts House, North Melbourne (Victoria) Adelaide National Art Gallery (SA), Slovenia, the Netherlands and Croatia. Missi’s film soundtracks have been played on: NITV, Channel 7 & in festivals such as the Short Black Indigenous Cinema. Missi has been working in Indigenous communities with Indigenous artists as a collaborative artist & digital media producer since 2016. She has travelled around Australia with Sharing Stories Foundation, collaborating with artists and community on art exhibitions, ABC radio documentaries and digital storytelling ibooks. Currently, Missi is part of the Cultural Resilience Hub, based at Jumbunna Research Institute of Technology UTS, where she collaborates on art installations, podcasts and film.

Andrew Belletty

Sound Design/ Technical Director / Recording Engineer, is an Indian-born Australian sound artist and researcher, working with the vibro-tactile materiality of sound, across visual, media  & performance arts. His work creates intimate, tactile listening experiences by redesigning images & sounds of country as flexible experiential forms through gallery & site-specific installations. These multilayered, experimental & site responsive works draw on Indigenous knowledges systems. A founding member of acclaimed band Yothu Yindi, Belletty has an extensive track record working with Indigenous communities on country, he also works internationally as a cinematic sound designer with hundreds of screen credits to his name. Recent Exhibitions: 2019: vibrotactile sound design & install, collaboration, Maria Fernanda Cardoso: The Origins of Art. 3-Channel Audio, Single Channel Video, Vibrational Floor, MCA, 2018: Woer Wayepa – Interactive Performance, Cairns Indigenous Art Festival, collaboration with Torres Strait Artists Margaret Harvey & Awa Jeffrey Aniba-Waia, We Here You, We See You, Interactive 360 audio-video. 16-Channel Audio, UTS Data Arena, Jumbunna Institute for Indigenous Education & Research, UTS, NAIDOC.

Neil Mansfield

Cinematographer / Videographer / Camera Operator, with 25 years experience. Neil began his career at Film Australia, 1988. Currently he works as a Lighting Cinematographer, Camera Operator & Videographer. He also writes & directs  ‘new wave’ features & installation films, which have screened at international festivals: Best Film Jury Prize at Anchorage International Film Festival; The Owl in the Snow (short, 2010) which premiered at the Edinburgh International Film Festival; and, Fresh Air (feature, 1999) which premiered at the renowned Rotterdam International Film Festival. Neil is professionally trained and experienced in all aspects of video production. Over the past 25 years, he has shot music videos; drama & documentary films for Screen Australia, Film Australia, SBS, Channel 4, Greenpeace and Sydney Opera House. Neil makes the most of resources—people, time, equipment, locations & money to achieve the highest production values possible.  He has vast experience making art videos, with fixed budgets and strict deadlines, for a diverse range of artists. Recent art projects include- Propel, dance-film project, co-produced with dancer Kristina Chan, Catapult Dance, 2015/16; and, IN BOCCA AL LUPO, music-art film, by Missi Mel Pesa.

Joey Carriage

Performer, is a young Indigenous man from the Gamilaraay/Wailwan/Biripi nations’, which are located in the central western region of New South Wales. Joey is currently developing his performance and creative skills and tRAKa-tRAKn is his first professional project.

Karen Kriss

Motion Capture Animator, is an artist, researcher and lecturer at UNSW Art and Design with over 10 years of experience in the animation and VFX industry. Her past roles include Head of Production Management, VFX Producer, Digital Producer at Mr.X Toronto, Canada and Senior Production Coordinator at Animal Logic, Sydney. Karen has worked on short form animation and feature films including Oscar winning Happy Feet and Ang Lee’s award-winning Lust Caution. Karen’s current research and passion lies in improving access and inclusion in animation and media arts for people living with disability. She has collaborated with artists from The Junction Works, a disability provider in South Western Sydney on several projects including two live interactive motion captured media arts projects Power of the Dream (2017), SPARK Festival Finale (2017), & animations: Pirate of Floating Island animation (2018) and Destiny title sequence (2019). Recently Karen worked with 5 artists with disability on 2019 Vivid project, Dream States which included large scale animation projections on the ICC building Sydney, “Birdsmouth” Screen ICC building and nineteen screens along Tumbalong boulevard.

Brett Leavy

3D Landscape Animator, is a First Nations, Digital Aboriginal and descendant from the Kooma people whose traditional country is bordered by St George in the east, Cunnamulla in the west, north by the town of Mitchell and south to the QLD/NSW border. Brett’s dedicated his working life to recording cultural knowledge. His digital work seeks to represent the arts, cultural stories, heritage, traditional knowledge and histories of First Nation people using new, immersive and interactive technologies. He has developed numerous websites, represented First Nations Internet interests at United Nations Forum on Internet Communication Technologies in Tunisia, held Board positions for not-for-profit community organisations in health, housing, media, communication and the arts and presently sits on the Digital Strategy Forum for the National Museum of Australia.

Biz (Gerard Scifo)

 Illustrator / Original Bat Drawings, was a young graffiti artist from the Eastern suburbs of Sydney. By the mid-90’s he had started practicing as an exhibiting artist and freelance illustrator. His work consisted mostly of pastels on paper and acrylics on canvas – these works were significantly influenced by his aerosol art practice. Much of his work was political, portraying what it was like to be a young indigenous man living in an urban environment. He continued his art practice whilst working as a traditional animator.  During this period he realised that he had a passion to make original comics so he gave up animation to focus on creating and publishing his own underground comic. He did this throughout the 90’s whilst still exhibiting his paintings and drawings. From 2001 to now he has continued to diversify his artistic practice by engaging with projects that involve drawing, customising motorcycles & bicycles and creating dioramas.

Gail Kelly

Project Coordinator / Administrator, has directed & devised contemporary performance projects for youth theatre, multicultural theatre, community theatre, contemporary performance, circus & physical theatre. Gail has devised hybrid, cross-art form & interdisciplinary contemporary Australian performance projects and directed solo physical performance projects in Australia & UK. From 2007 – 2015 she was the director of ACAPTA (the Australian Circus and Physical Theatre Association).

Recently Gail was the creative producer and project manager for The Fair Ground Project an integrated circus arts project: she has worked as project coordinator, administrator and dramaturg on all of r e a’s new media /visual arts projects and installations for over twenty years.

Arial image – Pilliga Scrub

r e a & Missi – Drop Tests (Andrew Belletty) 2020
Drop Tests (Andrew Belletty) 2020
Moon Rock – Water/Sand Site (Andrew Belletty) 2020


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Best closing lines – What are your favorites?

As a teacher, I am always looking for ways to keep my students motivated.  I recently had my students find their favorite closing lines from books they read.  They actually loved this activity and it got some of my reluctant readers to read and participate.  While they compiled their lines, I did too.

Here are some of my favorite closing lines from books. I have decided to mix it up since that is exactly what my library looks like, a little bit of this and a little bit of that. I love all genres.  **Note, if you haven’t read some of the books listed, these closing lines may be spoilers.

I used to dream of medals and championships, and now I dream of a blue-eyed fighter who one day changed my life when he put his lips on mine.

Mine, Katy Evans

Max stepped into his private boat and waved goodbye and sailed back over a year and in and out of weeks and through a day and into the night of his very own room where he found his supper waiting for him—and it was still hot.

Where the Wild Things Are, Maurice Sendak

a beautiful wedding

I looked into his eyes, as full of love and hope as they were the year before, “One down, forever to go,” I whispered back.

A Beautiful Wedding, Jamie McGuire

In the meantime, she would just live.

P.S. I Love You, Cecelia Ahern

bound by wish and mistletoe

You are loved.

Bound by Wish and Mistletoe, Kat Bastion

For a moment, neither of them spoke, and he found himself holding his breath just so he could hear hers.  “I love you, too, ” she whispered.  “Babe,” he said softly. “Yeah.”

Unbeautifully, Madeline Sheehan

So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.

The Great Gatsby, F.Scott Fitzgerald

Oh, my girls, however long you may live, I never can wish you a greater happiness than this.

Little Women, Louisa May Alcott

esperanza rising
It is no wonder that in Spanish, esperanza means “hope.”

Esperanza Rising, Pam Munoz Ryan

Lauren Marie Day, you have come into my life like a whirlwind, you have flipped my world, my thoughts and my heart upside down, you have woken something in me that I thought was long dead, you have brought me back to life, I love you more with every beat of my heart and I cannot and do not want to imagine my life without you in it.  I want to be with you forever, please would you do me the honour of becoming my wife?

Saviour, Lesley Jones

The offing was barred by a black bank of clouds, and the tranquil waterway leading to the utmost ends of the earth flowed sombre under an overcast sky — seemed to lead into the heart of an immense darkness.

Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad

What are some of your favorite closing lines?  Leave a comment.  I’d love to know.

5 thoughts on “Best closing lines – What are your favorites?

  1. One of my favorites just because I loved how snarky Darby Quinn was about love, is the one below… Beware of spoilers.
    “That’s when it hit me. I had to go through a lot of bad relationships first, but I’d finally found him. My very own Prince Charming. Turns out they do exist.
    Touché, Cinderella, Touche.”
    Cinderella Screwed Me Over by Cindi Madsen

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Book Review — 53 Letters for My Lover by Leylah Attar

Book Review — 53 Letters for My Lover by Leylah Attar
Book Review — 53 Letters for My Lover by Leylah Attar53 Letters for My Lover by Leylah Attar
Published by Self-Published
Publication date: June 17, 2014
Genres: Adult Contemporary Romance, Women's Fiction
351 pages
Format: eARC
Source: ARC via author

This is not your typical love story.
It’s not so black and white. Lines are crossed.
Walls are smashed. Good becomes bad.
Bad becomes very, very good.

Shayda Hijazi—the perfect wife, the perfect mother, the perfect daughter. For thirty-three years, she has played by the rules, swallowing secrets, burying dreams and doing whatever it takes to anchor her family. Shayda Hijazi is about to come face to face with the one thing that can rip it all apart, the one thing her heart has always been denied: Love.

Troy Heathgate—untamed, exhilarating, dangerous—a man who does exactly as he pleases. Life bends to his will. Until he comes across the one thing he would give it all up for, but can never have.

Born on the same day in opposite corners of the world, their lives collide. And nothing is ever the same again.

Spanning three decades, 53 Letters for My Lover is a fiercely sensual, emotional ride to the heart of an epic, forbidden love that defies it all—an intimate exploration of love, loyalty, passion, betrayal, and the human journey for hope, happiness and redemption.

"Sexy, intense fiction isn't afraid to step out of the box."

Contemporary women's fiction: Ages 18+

Affiliate Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links. In plain English, this means that I may receive a small commission (at no cost to you) if you purchase something through the links provided. This small income goes back into my blog, so I can continue to create fun content for you. I appreciate my readers and make it my goal to be upfront and honest. Thank you for supporting my blog!

Book Review:

53 Letters For My Lover is a poignant, emotional and love story, showing both the painful and beautiful sides of love.  The combination of Leylah Attar’s beautiful writing and the intensity of the romance is why you need to read it.  Troy and Shayda’s love story spans nearly twenty years and Leylah Attar had me hanging on to Shayda’s every word as she told us her story.

Somewhere in the fabric of all these years, our lives got tangled, like unruly threads pulling and snagging into impossible knots. How could we have known that one night would stay with us so long? I remember it like it was yesterday.

Shayda moved to Toronto from Tehran, Iran in the midst of the country’s revolution. Now in Toronto she has very little except an arranged marriage with her future planned out for her and the promise of a new start.  Bound by the ties of her culture, she marries someone she doesn’t love.

“Are you happy, Shayda?” A second. That’s all it takes. A single beat of hesitation on my part.

Shayda’s husband, Hafez, is a good man.  Before I started the book, I thought that maybe he was going to one of those overworked and cold men who made no time for his wife or children.  But that wasn’t the case; he cared about his family and he wanted to do right by his wife.  He was just a little too late.  Due to his own pain, he was never able to physically and intimately show Shayda the kind of love that she needed, that she wanted.  Hafez’s goodness was part of what exacerbated Shayda’s internal turmoil and guilt and complicated her decision to either stay with her husband and her two children or leave it all for the man she loved.

Troy came into Shayda’s life very quietly, but his presence made a lasting impact on Shayda.  Small moments between the two of them turned into waves, drowning out all rational thought and evoked pure passion between the two of them.

“It’s always there, the fire between us, like glowing embers waiting to be stoked. One look, one kiss, one caress, and I come alive for him.”

The way Attar revealed the love story was beautiful.  Intricately weaving the beginnings of their relationship with the love affair in years later, I was emotionally invested in their love story.  I wanted them to not only be together but for their families to be okay through it all.

This story had the feel of The Opportunist by Tarryn Fisher.  Like Caleb and Olivia, Shayda and Troy were inundated with obstacles and road blocks and had countless missed opportunities.  I wanted to make time stand still for Troy and Shayda, but despite my wishes the clock kept rapidly ticking.  The relationship development in this book was beautiful! I’m really picky without the author develops relationship. Through the author’s words and descriptions, I like to feel the characters fall in love. In this book, I felt it.

Yes. Yes yes yes. This is what a kiss should feel like. Like nothing else exists. All yearing and dizzy and falling and flying. Great big galaxies of want and wonder spiral inside of mere.

Part of what makes the characters so memorable was the way Attar told their story and shaped their characters. There were so many funny and special moments between the two of them like the “bundt cake” moment.  They both had nicknames for one another that were ingrained in their history and held special meaning to both of them.

What I loved about this novel was Attar’s beautiful writing.  Her vivid descriptions of the character’s emotions drew me in and held my full attention.  I loved this line:

I looked like a powerful opera had picked me up, dragged me through every aria between elation and agitation and dropped me, exhausted but oddly sated.

The use of symbolism was prevalent in this story and only enhanced my reading experience.  Attar used the Monarch butterfly to represent transformation, change, strength and resilience.  Every year millions of Monarchs travel south, but it often takes generations of monarchs to make the whole trip.  Shayda’s metamorphosis from the woman she is when she marries her husband to the Shayda we meet at the end was amazing.

I liked the ending of the book but I didn’t love it.  I don’t mind some things being left to my imagination and don’t require everything to be so tightly wrapped up.  The family issues and “other things” worked out a little too conveniently at the end and could have done without some of the events that lead up to the characters’ decisions.  Nonetheless, I fell in love with Troy and Shayda.  It’s a testament to an author’s writing when she makes you care deeply about the characters and Attar accomplished that and then some.  I hope Shayda’s book makes the New York Times.

4 stars

*I received a copy from the author in exchange for an honest review.

53 Letters For My Lover by Leylah Attar

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Apple’s Pixel Revolution

John Gruber pens an excellent post on pixel resolution, and surmises how the new Apple MacBook Pro with retina display is the best computer Apple’s ever made:

Today’s pre-retina Mac displays are excellent, especially when judged by historical standards. Brighter, more vibrant colors, and — again, by historical standards — smaller, sharper pixels. A regular 15-inch MacBook Pro ships with a 1440 × 900 pixel display at about 110 pixels per inch, and can be configured with a 1680 × 1050 display at about 130 pixels per inch. Both the 11- and 13-inch MacBooks Air sport resolutions of roughly 130 pixels per inch. Far beneath the retina threshold, but much nicer than our sub-100-PPI displays of the 90s, to say nothing of the mere 72 PPI display on the original 1984 Macintosh.

But we went from 72 PPI in 1984 to 132 PPI in 2012 gradually — a few more pixels per inch every few years. Along the way there was never a moment of celebration, no single great leap forward pixel-density-wise. Even the shift from bulky CRTs to slim flatscreen LCDs didn’t bring about a significant upgrade in terms of pixel size.

But now this. The 15-inch MacBook Pro With Retina Display. This is a boom. A revolution in resolution. The display I’ve been craving ever since I first saw high-resolution laser printer output.

In the footnotes, John Gruber notes that the 15-inch MacBook Pro puts him in a dilemma: it’s too big a laptop to lug around as a travel companion. I’m in the same position. I played around with the retina MacBook Pro when it came out, but I much prefer my 13-inch non-retina MacBook Air for its weight and portability. But when Apple releases the 13-inch retina MacBook Air, I am going to have a hard time holding out upgrading…


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2020 Carol Award Finalists Q&A (and a Giveaway!): Sara Ella & Coral

Posted September 17, 2020 by meezcarrie in 2020 Carol Awards, Christian, Sara Ella, YA / 21 Comments

Happy Thursday once again! Through this Saturday (culminating with a list of winners), I have the privilege of sharing mini interviews with nearly all of the 2020 ACFW Carol Award Finalists! Today I’m continuing with Sara Ella and her Carol Award finalist book Coral! You can check out a list of all the finalists HERE.

FYI – There will be 2-3 posts per day, and a series-long giveaway, so make sure you catch them all!

Once upon a time, Sara Ella dreamed she would marry a Disney prince and live in a castle. Now she spends her days homeschooling her three Jedi in training, braving the Arizona summers, and reminding her superhero husband that it’s almost Christmas (even if it’s only January). When she’s not writing, Sara might be found behind her camera lens or planning her next adventure to California. A lover of fairy tales, she believes “Happily Ever After is Never Far Away.”

Sara’s UNBLEMISHED trilogy has received high praise and multiple awards, but none as rewarding as the love and support she receives from her readers every day. Her latest novel CORAL, a reimagining of THE LITTLE MERMAID that focuses on mental health, is available now. Look out for her upcoming ALICE IN WONDERLAND duology, with book 1 set to release from Enclave Publishing in the spring of 2022. Visit her at saraella.com

GENRE: Young Adult Fantasy/Retelling
PUBLISHER: Thomas Nelson
RELEASE DATE: November 12, 2019
PAGES: 384

There is more than one way to drown.

Coral has always been different, standing out from her mermaid sisters in a society where blending in is key. Worse yet, she fears she has been afflicted with the dreaded Disease, said to be carried by humans—emotions. Can she face the darkness long enough to surface in the light?

Above the sea, Brooke has nothing left to give. Depression and anxiety have left her feeling isolated. Forgotten. The only thing she can rely on is the numbness she finds within the cool and comforting ocean waves. If only she weren’t stuck at Fathoms—a new group therapy home that promises a second chance at life. But what’s the point of living if her soul is destined to bleed?

Merrick may be San Francisco’s golden boy, but he wants nothing more than to escape his controlling father. When his younger sister’s suicide attempt sends Merrick to his breaking point, escape becomes the only option. If he can find their mom, everything will be made right again—right?

When their worlds collide, all three will do whatever it takes to survive, and Coral might even catch a prince in the process. But what—and who—must they leave behind for life to finally begin?

Taking a new twist on Hans Christian Andersen’s beloved—yet tragic—fairy tale, Coral explores mental health from multiple perspectives, questioning what it means to be human in a world where humanity often seems lost.

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Hi Sara! Welcome back to the blog!

Q: How has Christian fiction impacted you personally?

Sara: My first encounter with Christian fiction came by way of C.S. Lewis. It was his allegorical storytelling that first inspired me to spin my own tales that pointed back to the King.

Then I picked up Shannon Dittemore’s Angel Eyes in my twenties, and I discovered a whole new world of Christian fiction for young adults. Shannon was a mom and a writer. She did both! Her personal story inspired and encouraged me to chase my novel-writing dream between diaper changes and midnight feedings.

Carrie: this reader is thankful to them both for inspiring you ♥

Q: When you’re not writing your next award-nominated book 😉 who are your fave authors to read & why?

Sara: The list is a mile long, but I always return to Kasie West and Kiera Cass for my “comfort food” reads. I am a huge fairy-tale nerd, so C.J. Redwine and Marissa Meyer have been two other authors I’ve found who speak to my Disney-loving heart.

Carrie: I’m a huge Kasie West fan and the other three are on my must-read-SOON list!

Q: Do you have any strange writing habits/quirks?

Sara: Strange? If lighting a bookish scented candle and pouring a fresh cup of coffee or tea is strange, then sure! I also turn on my twinkle lights and miniature Christmas tree when I write. I guess having a Christmas tree up all year ‘round is a bit out of the ordinary, but I am a firm believer that Christmas is something we all need more of (especially this year).

Carrie: I don’t think that’s strange, I think it’s delightful! We are kindred twinkle lights/Christmas tree spirits 🙂

Q: Which of your characters has really stretched you as a writer?

Sara: The entire process of writing Coral stretched me to my breaking point. It was writing Brooke, in particular, that pushed me to a different level of raw honesty in my writing.

Carrie: i can only imagine how tough that process was! but you did it so beautifully.

Q: What’s the weirdest thing you’ve googled lately while researching a book?

Sara: I was literally just closing out tabs on my laptop relating to this very subject before starting this interview. I recently Googled “how many sounds can a cat make?” And, yes, what I discovered was quite helpful in venturing away from the traditional “purr” and “meow,” thank you.

Carrie: LOL

Q: What is something God taught you while you wrote Coral?

Sara: God taught me grace upon grace upon grace. Grace for myself. His grace for me. And that telling the story he wants me to tell is not a comfortable process, but it is far more rewarding than taking the easier route.

Carrie: amen & amen ♥

Q: What is one of your favorite quotes from Coral & why do you love it?

Sara: “You are not nothing. ” It’s one that my readers quote often, and one God reminds me of every day. I love it because it’s true. And even when we feel worthless and helpless and alone, the truth is that God made us and we are something to Him. We are everything to Him. And that’s the best truth of all.

Carrie: i love that so much!

I am offering one reader any TWO books (print copies) that finaled in the 2020 Carol Awards! (open internationally as long as Book Depository ships to your address) This giveaway is subject to Reading Is My SuperPower’s giveaway policies which can be found here. Enter via the Rafflecopter form below.

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What about you? What makes you want to read the Young Adult Carol Award finalist Coral by Sara Ella & what did you enjoy about Sara’s answers?

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21 responses to “2020 Carol Award Finalists Q&A (and a Giveaway!): Sara Ella & Coral

  1. Elizabeth Litton

    I love reading modern-day spins of fairy tales and I think it’s so cool that she talks about mental health issues in it as well!

  2. Donna Irvin

    I love that she writes with twinkling lights on, keeps a Christmas tree up all year! And the quote ” You are not nothing!”

  3. Perrianne Askew

    It sounds very interesting. I loke that this book pished her to “raw honesty.” It sounds like it was a real challange!

  4. Suzanne Sellner

    I love how special each person is to God! You’re a new author to me, and it was a pleasure to learn more about your writing.

  5. Becky D

    I love Christmas all year round, too, with white string lights setting the ambiance. And, always love new twists on fairytales. Thanks for sharing the interview!! 🥰📚

  6. Mallori N.

    I can’t wait to read this book! I love Kiera Cass’ books as well, though I haven’t read any books by the other mentioned authors. I purchased Sara’s “Unblemished” and “Unraveling” a while ago and am disappointed I haven’t had time to read them yet. (While my digital TBR pile is infinite, my physical pile is at a count of around 80 books.)

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Lisa Rinna Suggests Bravo Encourages RHOBH Cast to Fight and Looks Over Fun Moments, Wants Them to Bring “Joy” and “Glamour” Back to Show

Lisa Rinna Suggests Bravo Encourages RHOBH Cast to Fight and Looks Over Fun Moments, Tells Fans to Demand They Bring "Joy" and "Glamour" Back to Show

Credit: MEGA, John Tsiavis/Bravo

Lisa Rinna claims the ongoing fighting on The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills is no fault of the cast.

In a post shared to her Instagram Stories over the weekend, Lisa, who has been starring on the reality series since its fifth season in 2014, suggested that Bravo is behind the many show disputes before encouraging her fans and followers to contact them and demand change.

“Tell Bravo you want to see the fun again, you are tired of the fighting and you want to see our lives, you want belly laughs, you want fun, and you want the glamour,” Lisa wrote in her Instagram Story, which was shared by Queens of Bravo on Twitter on September 20.

According to Lisa, she and her castmates would love to spotlight the happier times in their lives but because the network has chosen to focus on their drama, they have been unable to do so.

“We want that too, but they think you want to see us fighting all the time. Please write to [Bravo] tell them you want fun and joy and laughter and the glamour brought back! Please!!” she continued.

RHOBH Lisa Rinna Suggests Bravo Makes the RHOBH Cast Fight

As RHOBH fans may have noticed, Lisa has been facing backlash online in recent weeks due to her treatment of her former friend of 20 years, Denise Richards.

RELATED:  Kyle Richards' Husband Mauricio Closes Palm Springs Location of The Agency as the RHOBH Husband is Forced to "Lay Off and Furlough" Employees at His Luxury Real Estate Firm Amid Pandemic

During the show, Lisa continued to question Denise about her alleged affair with Brandi Glanville before showing up to the reunion special with text messages sent between the two of them in an apparent effort to prove Denise was lying about the nature of their relationship. However, when confronted about her behavior by a fan on Instagram, Lisa suggested her “mean girl” demeanor was part of her job.

“Don’t you find it strange that your job is to attack other women for the profit of mostly men? What happened to your acting career? You could definitely still gets [sic] parts somewhere,” the fan wrote.

“It’s a TV show. Do you do a TV show with your friends?” Lisa replied.

Lisa also issued a warning to co-star Garcelle Beauvais in regard to a potentially upcoming attack on season 11.

“At the reunion, actually, Rinna said, ‘Your first season is always nice and pleasant and the second one, they come for you.’ And I said, ‘Is that a warning?’ She goes, ‘Yes!’” Garcelle revealed on SiriusXM’s Entertainment Weekly Live in August. “So, I’m a little scared. I’m a little scared.”

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Cities consider subsidized housing to appease teachers

Teachers across the U.S. are increasingly relying on strike action as they fight against low salaries that make it difficult for them to pay the rent or buy a home. Now, cities are attempting to respond with subsidized housing for educators, with projects under way in places like Chicago, Los Angeles and Santa Clara, and more being considered in Miami and San Francisco.

“Providing subsidies and housing is a smart incentive,” Sandi Jacobs, a principal at EducationCounsel, an education consulting group, told “There are certain metro areas where home prices … are so high compared to the average teacher’s salary. So it means teachers may have to live a significant distance from the school they’re teaching in, or they live with five roommates to afford their rent.”

Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that the average elementary school teacher’s salary is $57,100 per year, while high school teachers rake in an average of $59,170 annually. However, in areas that have seen teacher strikes these salaries are often much lower – for example, in Oklahoma, elementary school teachers make an average of just $40.053 per year, while those in Arizona fare little better with just $44,200 per year.

That compares with a median home price of $279,900 nationally, according to National Association of Realtors’ data. In addition, the average cost of a two-bedroom rental apartment comes in at $1,170 per month, Apartment List data shows.

California was one of the first states to offer its teachers subsidized housing. In Santa Clara, 70 one-and-two bedroom apartments have been reserved for teachers since 2002, priced at around 60 percent of the going market rate. San Francisco meanwhile, has set aside $44 million to build 130 to 150 new subsidized apartments for between 60 and 90 teachers, and for other school staff, on a single site. It’s sorely needed as the median price for a home in San Francisco is a cool $1.3 million. The project will take three years to complete, however.

Meanwhile in Miami, officials are considering building a middle school with an entire floor reserved for teachers’ apartments. Should that project prove to be successful, officials may also construct a complex of 300 apartments on the grounds of another school in downtown Miami.

About Mike Wheatley

Mike Wheatley is the senior editor at Realty Biz News. Got a real estate related news article you wish to share, contact Mike at


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RIF6 Cube review: A pico projector worth buying?

The Good

  • Excellent build quality
  • Easy to use
  • Portable

The Bad

  • Resolution could be better
  • Pricey

In our RIF6 Cube review, Ben Griffin investigates the merits of having a 2-inch mobile ‘pico projector’ capable of up to a 120-inch image, including a look at picture quality, battery life, resolution and value for money.

RIF6 Cube review: What does it do?

The RIF6 Cube is a mobile DLP projector that projects an 854×480-pixel image onto a wall at up to 120 inches in size and has an internal battery so it can do the job without being plugged in.

Measuring 2x2x1.9 inches, the RIF6 Cube is faithful to its name and can be easily carried about, although some of its rivals are flatter and therefore more pocketable. But when you consider the tripod, you will probably always need a bag to carry it around.

Battery life is up to 90 minutes and a wall charger/USB cable combo is included to top it back up, while content can be played from a mobile phone, tablet, games console or SD card.

You can connect the RIF6 Cube to a smartphone, but it will only work with MHL-enabled devices (a list of supported devices can be found here). Assuming it is, you can plug into the HDMI or mini HDMI port and it will project what you can see on screen.

It comes with a tripod that has bendable legs, making it competent at keeping the RIF6 Cube steady no matter where you are. Think of it as a bit like those Goby flexible tripods you can buy for cameras.

Because it uses LEDs to light the image, the RIF6 Cube is said to be good for 20,000 hours – roughly 833 days solid of viewing time, to be all precise about it.

RIF6 Cube: Build quality?

It is hard to miss the fact you get a lovely slice of aluminium that has been folded around the device, providing a quality feel and stability. Looks great, too. Black plastic adorns the other two sides where you can plug devices in and this looks slightly less appealing.

There is a low quality plastic wheel for adjusting the focus, which is fiddly to use, but the lack of sharpness is more the fault of the sub-HD resolution (more on that later), but otherwise the RIF6 Cube comes across as a premium bit of kit.

We particularly like the attention to detail such as the soft padding in the tripod mechanism that keeps the RIF6 Cube firmly in place without causing damage. It really is, by and large, an over-engineered bit of kit.

RIF6 Cube: Any good for video?

If there was ever a case to be made for increasingly short movies, it is the fact the RIF6 Cube runs out of juice after around 90 minutes, meaning you will need to plug it in to finish Titanic. No problem if near a plug or you prefer to watch typically shorter television shows, mind you.

The 50-lumen brightness is below what some would deem acceptable, but we found it worked in a room with a relatively dim bedside lamp on at around 20 inches from the target surface and around 30 inches away in a dark room.

The 854×480-pixel resolution means the RIF6 Cube will make films look much blurrier than you are used to. Being below full HD and even HD ready televisions is easily noticeable in a time of high-resolution tablets, smartphones and laptops.

With that said, projecting the latest House of Cards episode onto the ceiling while lying in bed is pleasing and it is bizarre how quickly your brain stops complaining about clarity and instead concentrates on what you are actually viewing.

Plus if used in, say, a tent on a rainy day we doubt anyone will complain too much. And let’s refrain from ignoring the fact it offers a large image you can play from your phone. That is pretty neat.

A headphone jack lets you listen to whatever you are watching without disturbing others and it is worth using it as the in-built 1-watt speaker is poor at best. Tinny and shrill without much in the way of volume. You could also hook up some speakers if there are multiple viewers.

RIF6 Cube: What about gaming?

If you simply want a large image to look at, the RIF6 Cube will do the job but it is more suited to retro games, mobile games and other lower resolution sources. 1080p games are going to lose the clarity when downsized to its resolution and make it harder to play them, particularly if accuracy is important.

With that said, a low-resolution display is better than none at all and transporting the RIF6 Cube to a friend’s house for some multiplayer local area network (LAN) gaming fun is going to be much easier with a small metal cube and a few cables than a whole television or three.

RIF6: What about the competition?

There are a few around this price range. One of the most capable is the 0.5×2.5×5.9-inch Celluon PicoPro, which has a longer battery life and a laser image that never needs to be focussed, but lacks the same pleasing aesthetic and has a lower claimed lumen brightness.

RIF6 Cube: Any negatives?

There is a quiet but constant hum generated by the RIF6 Cube’s fan, which is great because it signifies it won’t burst into flames anytime soon but a bit of a pain when the movie or game you are playing goes quiet. Obviously this is a non-issue if using headphones.

Then there is the lack of wireless connectivity, meaning you always need to bring cables along unless using the SD card slot. An odd ommission at this price, we must admit. A tad longer battery life would be a plus, too, although the trade-off would almost certainly be portability.

Unlike some of its competitors, such as the Celluon Pico Pro, there is also no wireless functionality so you will need to plug devices in physically. If you want to hook up an iPad or iPhone, expect to fork out £49 for a Lightning Digital AV adapter or buy the same one from Amazon UK for a tenner less.

RIF6 Cube: Should I buy it, then?

The RIF6 Cube is well worth a look if build quality and portability are chief concerns because its closest rivals are somewhat nastier in terms of design and finish and televisions are difficult to lug around. For a higher resolution, you will need to go for a larger, less pocket-friendly device.

As such, we could see the RIF6 Cube going down a treat for those who like to stick to hand luggage and need to do the odd presentation, or perhaps someone who travels a lot and wants to keep up to date with the latest show, but fancies a bigger display than a phone or tablet offers.

Even though the RIF6 Cube has its share of faults and is pricey, we rather enjoyed watching the odd movie in a room devoid of a television (by choice) and its well-thought out tripod makes that easy. Plus there is something nostalgic about picture quality from yesteryear – even if it is jarring at first.


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UK’s average broadband speed is 12Mbps. Double figure download speeds for the masses?

The UK’s average broadband speed is 12Mbps according to Ofcom. A report released today shows that for the first time, the UK’s average download speed is above double figures.

This shows both how far we’ve come since the likes of BT and Virgin Media started rolling out speed boosts across their networks and since the last report, which pinned the UK average download speed at around 9Mbps. A quick look at the figures also shows that despite these gains, we’re still way off seeing the average UK subscriber actually enjoying double-figure downloads.

Ofcom’s report combines data collected in November 2012 and breaks down the speeds achieved by those on slower, mainly ADSL-based lines as well as those on ‘superfast’ FTTC (Fibre to the Cabinet) and Virgin Media cable.

UK’s average broadband speed is 12Mbps, double figures hit for the first time

The average speed of those on lines providing speeds of 2Mbps-10Mbps got an average download speed of 4.4Mbps and those on connections promising top speeds between 10Mbps-30Mbps were getting on average 8.1Mbps.

Those on the premium superfast lines promising 30Mbps or higher were racking up average download speeds of 44.6Mbps. This shows that while the overall UK average download speed is 12Mbps, most people will be getting speeds that are either a little under or head and shoulders above this mark.

Ofcom figures suggest that the majority of people in the UK (77 per cent) are signed up to mid-level 10Mbps-30Mbps services, suggesting that most people will actually be getting around 8Mbps.

UK’s average broadband speed is 12Mbps, double figures hit for the first time

Average upload speeds are up as well, with the UK average climbing to 1.4Mbps. As with download speeds, it’s clear that the expensive superfast packages are responsible for driving the averages up.

Those on entry-level packages are getting uploads of 0.5Mbps on average. Mid-tier packages don’t fare much better, weighing with average upload speeds of 0.8Mbps. Those on the premier-class packages are lording it with average upload speeds of 5.7Mbps.

This means that most people will be getting just under 1Mbps uploads on their packages, which is actually  fairly close to the overall UK average, especially when compared with download speeds.

Ofcom’s sampling methods mean that smaller ISPs like Hyperoptic, Gigaclear and Gigler, all of whom offer 1Gbps downloads, won’t be included in speed test results. So while these surveys are useful for giving us an idea of what to expect when we sign up for household name broadband, they don’t give us a totally accurate picture of the state of Broadband Britain.

As we did with the last set of results from Ofcom, we’ll be breaking down the figures for ADSL2+ and superfast broadband, taking a look at Ofcom’s findings in closer detail.