Musings & Thoughts for Tuesday, September 1, 2020: Or, Hey, at Least I Got a New Book

Hi there, Dear Reader. Here it is late afternoon in my corner of Florida; warm daylight is streaming through the venetian blinds that shield my study from the hot summery sun that would otherwise flood it if all I had here were a window. It’s hot here; the temperature is in the low 90s, but judging from the ripples of heat in my otherwise cool room, the heat index must be in the low 100s. The temperature inside the house is 71˚F, but in rooms that get some of the afternoon sun, it sometimes feels warmer.

I have not done much today; when I woke up this morning I had every intention of writing a review, but somewhere along the line I lost any desire to do so. I didn’t even choose an item to review, which for me is always the hardest part of the process. I have so many items that I can review, at least in the categories that I most enjoy writing about (Movies & TV Shows, Star Wars Toys & Collectibles, Books, Music, and Computer/Video Games). And when my mind isn’t fogged by worry, stress, or regrets, I can whip up a decent writeup with a modicum of ease. After all, I’ve been writing reviews since I was a 17-year-old staffer for my high school’s student paper, and I enjoy it.

Today, though…. Even with a decent night’s rest, I couldn’t even pick a Star Wars figure and say, “Yep, I’ll write about this.”

So, instead of forcing myself to write a review or anything useful, I spent most of my Tuesday either paying some bills, tracking the progress of an Amazon order, doing some reading (The Looming Tower) and gaming.

Apropos of Amazon orders: Yes, my copy of Ian W. Toll’s Twilight of the Gods: War in the Western Pacific. 1944-1945 arrived a little while ago via UPS. It shipped from – of all places – Amazon’s Fulfillment Center in Kenosha, Wisconsin, the same town where a 17-year-old domestic terrorist killed two protesters several days ago.

As I mentioned in a recent post, Twilight of the Gods is the third book of Toll’s Pacific War Trilogy, the first multi-volume history of the war against Japan since Samuel Eliot Morison’s 15-volume history of naval operations in World War II (which was published between 1947 and 1962). I bought the first two books when I still lived in my old townhouse in Miami; I used to go to the “small pool” – the one that is closest to the house – with my copy of either Pacific Crucible or The Conquering Tide, lay down on a deck chair, and read a couple of chapters while getting a bit of fresh air and sunshine.

For me, the arrival of Twilight of the Gods is somewhat bittersweet; when I bought the first two volumes in late 2015, I had no idea that I’d be moving out of my townhouse. I hoped to get the house repaired, renovated, and redecorated to reflect my tastes and needs, so I thought that when Twilight of the Gods came out, I would be reading it there, too.

Alas, no. I won the legal battle in Miami-Dade County’s court system, but the house had too many issues to fix and I lacked the financial resources to fix them. So…I had to sell the townhouse – a decision that my mother would have not liked – and now I’m elsewhere….

So, yeah. It’s an odd bit of closure, but at least I got my copy of Twilight of the Gods, thus allowing me to complete the trilogy.

Oh, and when I was checking my bank account during my bill-payment activity – I sent the payment for my Star Wars The Black Series Snowspeeder with Dak Ralter – I noticed that I received a royalty payment from Amazon. It wasn’t anything spectacular: I earned seventy cents, probably from the sale of a Kindle edition of one of my two self-published books. But, hey, it’s something. Right?

Well, I don’t have anything else to add today. I woke up early in the morning – earlier than I’d have liked, but that’s the way things go here – and I don’t have much else in the way of news. So, until next time, Dear Reader, I’ll catch you on the sunny side of things.