Was downloading my Amazon books worth the trouble?
So, I finally finished downloading hundreds of Amazon ebooks and comics after the announcement that Amazon is removing that capability.
Was it worth the trouble?
Ebooks that (I assume) authors and publishers have pulled from active sales are still in my library. Relatedly: on Audible, I subscribed to several of their programs before the days of podcasts, such as Robin Williams’ interview show. You can’t find that show on Audible anymore but those shows are still in my Audible library.
I’ve never had reason to download any Amazon ebooks or comics before. Why did I do it now? I remember a friend saying years ago how “they don’t want us to own things, they just want us to rent them.” Hence his ongoing purchase of CDs and DVDs and Blu-ray’s. Amazon’s announcement proves he’s still not wrong.
I may just zip up all these books and store them someplace in Backblaze and never look at them again. Just like I do now with all the physical books on my shelves and the ebooks on my Kindle Oasis.
Update, 2025-05-30: Duh. I have a Kindle Oasis. I downloaded all the books I really wanted to keep, hooked the Oasis up to my MacBook, and then copied them over. Much much less hassle.
Had to skip coffee yesterday so it would not interfere with this morning’s MRI. When we got home, that first sip of Amor Prohibido gifted me with instant well-being and delight.
On realizing when my vacation started
December has been an unusually stressful month this year, what with jury duty, a rather punishing work schedule, and the usual Christmas shenanigans.
How would you like to be remembered?
I would like to be forgotten. What’s so good about being remembered?
“A little out of date”
"Merry Christmas from the Kensingtons"
My friend, the novelist Lewis Shiner, has a new Christmas short story up on the Subterranean Press site. It's titled "Merry Christmas from the Kensingtons" and is Lew's own Christmas ghost story -- particularly the ghosts of Christmases past as lived out in a series of annual family photo postcards.
![[ C ] Joseph Cornell - Penny Arcade (1962)](http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5137/5498928968_bf62a28f39_m.jpg "[ C ] Joseph Cornell - Penny Arcade (1962)")
It's a haunting story, and in reading just the simple descriptions of the family members as they age and grow, I found myself writing each person's lifestory in my head.
Lew said he had bought such a stack of family photo postcards at a flea market and the images, showing each family member growing older and with their personalities inevitably peeking through, year after year, haunted him.
I share his fascination and deep imaginative involvement with found objects. I've always found art installations made from found objects more interesting than other types of sculptures, for example. I also enjoy such items as densely collaged artwork and Cornell boxes; contemplating the original objects and sorting out my reactions to them, and then to their new associations and relationships within the artwork, can keep me staring for hours.
The power of Lew's story -- and of those found images -- shook loose a memory from my own mental lumber room of when I cleaned out the attic of our rental house before moving to our current home.
Artists don’t talk about art. Artists talk about work. If I have anything to say to young writers, it’s stop thinking of writing as art. Think of it as work.
PADDY CHAYEFSKY
Shadows of things that Will be, or shadows of things that May be?