Traditional Publishing | Self-Publishing

I have no earthly clue what might be wrong here; posting this in lieu of cajoling OEBooks' celebrating 25,000 unique visitors this year. Guess when I started wondering how many  might be surprised to hear that the traditional model of publishing was self-publishing... I took the first green light of smooth easy writing and went with it.

For the longest I've been associating the word traditional with modern, current, and all things spanking brand new. Self-publishing I equated to 'home-made' ...home-spun, right from the backyard homegrown... the artifacts we find at garage sales selling with the relics... 

All that to say; this having been a week of reading traditional versus self-publishing blogs and comments, almost ad nauseam, and no one's fault other than my own for repeatedly reading, thinking I'd have something swifty to add to the dialogue, when this happens. I think I actually did find Swifty.

Fresh Squeezed Lemonade Anyone?

Its Best Feature is the Savings.

It's 100% Free... ...of gluttons and additives.

Sheds unwanted calories off almost magically!

All kidding aside, the funniest thought came to me this morning, just after asking, "now where would you prefer to buy your lemons?"

First image that strode into view was Fresh Grocer, or Trader Joes. I like them emotional health looking stores with all of that dull lighting, and vacuumed air, but unswept floors stowed in fabulously outfitted machine cut and treated damp wood. Its doctoral designers got the ambiance in there just right; right down to playing none of Mozart's greatest hits... In fact, there's never any music playing in there... whatsoever. Just the dull hum of vacuumed, unswept moody splotched space advertising old-fashioned glass cases, plenty of straw and abnormally large vegetation, to match big 'ole wooden barrels that have me leaving out of the store disbelieving I just spent $200 on two precious perishables. But the little friendly USA inspected sticky on it promises as much. That my perishables are cherishable. These two little fruits came straight off a farm. And in no way does it matter (to me) that the farm is located a Boeing jet plus a puddle-hopper and grass boat ride away from the store.

That's what got me to laughing. I remember a time when I wouldn't touch, much less look at anything Mom & Pop made. Are you kidding me!?! Not in the midst of Bloomies, and Nordies, and yes, good Lordy, tack on the Lord’s store too.

Once I finished laughing though, I got to doing what I usually do; ...thinking about snobbing elitists, narcissistically traversing missives. And please don't be offended. If you read between the lines, you'll see I can only be describing me.

I can buy lemons anywhere; the 10₵ aluminal lemonade stand, Mom & Pop’s home-spun woodshop, or from the Fresh Grocer's digitally raised and virtually inspected hand blown goblet of a store straight off the 23^rd century shelf. Actually, when I really thought about, I can plant, feed, and birth lemons myself. So long as a lemon does what a lemon is supposed to do; make my eyes water, my jaws pucker, and my hyphenated next supposens shudder, I'm satisfied that the vendor has at least raised a zesty piece of fruit.

All-righty, and okay. I clearly saw that one fly right over many heads. Sorry. There's a real good reason I write like this. On a plain note however, here's what I've got going; pieces of what I'm calling fruit, picked up off 'one-man stands', and out of Mom & Pop stores, and off  glitzy-ritzy shelves. (Hope that last line helps clear up any mis-comprehendings).

Just Finished

A Choice to Yield by Laurence Cook ~ Interesting...

An Unquiet Mind by Kay Redfield Jamison ~ Even more interesting...

About to Dig Into

Before I Forget by Leonard Pitts, Jr.

Church Folk by Michele Andrea Bowen

And Finally! Lifetimes Ago by Susie Schecter

Still Anxiously Waiting On...

Click: An Online Love Story by Lisa Becker