I have all the brainpower of a noodle today. I'm not sure where it came from - probably a TV show - but the thing at our house for a long time was to say 'But I'm a good noodle' when something wasn't going right. Usually the kids, but I've been known to say 'you're a good noodle' to them, too. It was a fun, cute saying, but right now I feel like that. Wet and floppy.
I've been trying to come up with a blog topic all day - well, ok, yesterday too if truth be told. There's a reason I don't often do photoblogs, and it's not just that I haven't had a lot of time to take pictures. I'm not a brilliant photographer and it's not what you all want to see. Then again, neither is me maundering on about the state of my brain-as-noodular. However, this is all I've got today.
Sure, there were topics that floated to the surface on social media and elsewhere that got me going. The conversation between Indie Authors about why they don't want to give their cover artists credit in their books: because they think that the artists will then get more work, charge more, and be less available to the author when they want another cover. Make a girl want to start slapping someone, that will. Frankly, I am very, very particular about who I work with nowadays when it comes to cover art, and that's just one of many reasons why. Also, I specify in my contract with an author that I will be credited (and how) in the frontmatter of the book. You violate that, and I could come after you with the full weight of the law at my back. So, dude, I don't care if you think artists are a dime a dozen, that's not how professionals treat their team. And your covers probably suck, not that I'm going to be arsed to look. Nor would I consider reading your stuff at this point, because my rage is going to seep into my enjoyment if you're a good writer - Ok. I'm steaming now.
Letting it go and walking away. I don't have the brainpower to put together a long, coherent argument about how cutting off the ox from the grain is cruel, and counter-productive. You know that one, right? Don't muzzle the ox who treads the grain? Because it seems like a lot of businesses (which is what the authors discussing this are, on a micro scale. Whether they want to acknowledge it or not) have absolutely no grasp of that. Want to keep good people? Pay them. Want to have a healthy, creative, engaged workforce? Don't cut them off from the small perks (like that mouthful of fresh grain) that make drudgery bearable. Some jobs are rewarding in their own selves - I have one like that, for which I am terribly grateful - but let's face it, many are not. So treat your workers with kindness, and they will work longer and better (not longer hours. Longer duration before turnover. Also, they are not slaves, so don't upbraid them when someone offers them something better and more interesting than plodding around in a circle on your grain).
Ahem. yeah. Limp noodle brain just lost the train of thought. messy derailment into the marinara of... um. I need a better metaphor.
I've been listening to podcasts at work - no surprise I'm sure to my readers - and today one queued up about health astrology and I listened to the hosts rant most entertainingly about the woo that is not medicine. It's scary, what gets proponents among celebs - I've written about that before, though. Seems like most of the topics that float to the top of my consciousness have been done before, though.
Want to suggest something? Cause I'm going to go back to what I was doing. noodling around.