Badger Launching Apparatus No 3

what adventure games softlock you like that?

I had another client today get confused and upset at how I labeled their final file.

(If you don't know already, I'm a graphic designer)

The filename was something like "ProjectnameFNL-BLEED-DIE.pdf"

I also named the email "Projectname Final File - Bleed & Die"

Now, for the non-designers out there, a bleed is how you get the picture to the edge of the page in a document. You can't just print an 8.5x11 page in that situation, you have to print a larger page, and trim it to 8.5x11, and that overprint that you cut down is called the "bleed".

Die is short for dieline. If you are printing something in a different shape than a cutter can make (basically anything without straight lines) then you need a die. A die also helps trim things a lot faster, some can do a hundred sheets at a time, as opposed to manually doing it (which I'm not even sure how you'd even do that)

In this situation, I was making a box. They are notoriously tricky, but I've done a bunch before. And the person I was dealing with was new, and she had to send along the final approval to her boss.

She wasn't rude, but was clearly uncomfortable in our meeting today. I really had to explain it to her, and said that these were industry standard things and her printer needs this info. I also have worked with her boss before and absolutely knew that they'd understand the terms.

This is a kind of sample of what I mean. The dieline is the pink line. It is where things will be cut. You can see that it is a special shape that can't just be cut out regularly.

Everything blue outside the pink line is the bleed. you won't see any of that in the final folded box.

And the white lines you see are just the fold lines. They are usually part of the die line, but have a different process to use them.

It's sooo good

Seinfeld Screensaver & Planner / R. Crumb Screensaver & Companion / Cartoon Studio

So first of all: let me tell everybody how things went with the new glasses.

Briefly: they're brilliant. The new varifocals work way better than earlier versions of them have routinely done. (This is apparently secondary to the way my eyes continue to change shape as I get older. It continues to make me snicker that I'm getting Iess nearsighted as I age. "So," I said to my Eye Lady, "if I can manage to live to, like, a hundred and twenty-five, I'll be twenty-twenty?" She gave me sort of a cockeyed look. "Well... you'll still be astigmatic. As for the rest of it, let's see how things go...") The reading glasses are no good for the computer: they6're genuinely just for reading. ...But this is okay, because the varifocals work fine for computer work. So THAT whole business has turned out more than satisfactorily... and thanks once more, from the bottom of my heart, to all those who helped out. ❤️

And get this. I went out to lunch after picking the new glasses up, and in the middle of lunch found myself paper-outlining a paranormal police procedural trilogy. (headclutch) So that went well. ...And no, I can't tell anybody anything about the plotting on these: it's too soon. But this looks like something of a change of writing voice (and thematic material) for me: darker than usual, maybe a touch grittier. We'll see how this group of works sets itself up as work gets going. (Other works further along in progress are in front of these right now, but that's fine. Giving things time to mature is never a problem.)

Anyway: typically enough, some other unexpected health junk that had been behaving itself during the spring then started kicking up cranky in June and over the last couple of weeks. (eyeroll) I don't want to get into more detail than necessary about this, but it's an outgrowth of the internal problems that have made me give up long-distance travel. It's required a goodish outlay of cash, and has resulted in me falling behind on my rent.

My landlord is being really easygoing about this, but nonetheless I'd very much like to get caught up on this before it gets any worse. (As being behind this way, I'm finding, is increasingly interfering with my work... especially as that's now become so much easier to get to grips with due to the new glasses.)

So it seems to me that this is a good time to repeat the Summer Reading Sale over at Ebooks Direct!

I imagine lots of people here know the drill. Everything's cheap, and the ebook bundles are all being held at their lowest price points for the duration (meaning specifically the "All The Wizardry" bundle, the Middle Kingdoms series bundle, the LGBTQ Pride collection, and the Feline Wizardry bundle—Even our "Give Me Everything You've Got" collection, which is the whole ebook store in one package, has had a bit knocked off.

So could I get folks to reblog this post so that people who might not have caught one of these sales before can do so now if they want to? Please & thank you!

And additionally: for those who're already up to the gunwales in ebooks and don't need any more, but still want to help out with the rent situation—if you'd like instead to drop something into my Ko-Fi, it'd be very welcome. And if you feel like doing this, I thank you very much in advance! 🙂

...So that's the news from Lake Wobegon for the moment. ...Now to slip outside and give the potted plants a potful or so of water as an evening drink. They've been suffering from the (unusual-for-us) local heat wave, there's a wildfire watch on (leading to a ban on selling portable BBQs), and we're also having a ban on watering things with a hose at the moment. (sigh) One thing after another...

We like to party.

We like, we like to party.

Married the love of my life at 50.

Got my Class A CDL at 59.

You've got time.

It's such a fun show and also because the murders were never overly gory and it had such a whimsical and weird energy it never scared me which is good 'cause I get scared very easily