switching from BBEdit to Textmate

The sketch above is based on a photo reference I took at a weekend house session. The session was focused on practising tune sets from the Tranzac and was different our regular session in that there was more opportunity to take apart tunes a phrase at a time. The setting was also more casual; I enjoyed getting to know some of the others beyond the instruments they play at sessions. :-)

I also started to learn TextMate on the weekend. I've been using BBEdit quite a while now for my plain text editing, but what started out as a nice simple editor (the company name is Bare Bones Software) has turned into something that feels somewhat overloaded and inelegant, like an overly spiced restaurant dish with clashing ingredients, or a pizza with too many different types of toppings.

Isn't it great how pretty much everything in life relates to food?

Jeff convinced me to try out TextMate and I've been impressed by the greater flexibility, especially when it comes to programming keyboard shortcuts. It'll take me a while before my brain has absorbed the new shortcuts, but I figure it will be well worth it. I wrote this Blathering in Textmate.

I've just begun to explore TextMate, but one of the other things I like about it is that you can group several documents into a Project. This is going to be incredibly handy since I often need to reference multiple docs when working on my columns, other written pieces and my Web sites. Ever since tendinitis became an issue, I've become so much more conscious of keystroke efficiency.

I'm also learning Markdown language, which is a text-to-HTML conversion tool for web writers. It's something I should have done a long while ago. Up to now, I've always tended to write HTML from scratch; I've never used an HTML editor, preferring instead to get my hands right in the code so I can see what's really going on. Fun, but inefficient.

I'm pretty confident that the current learning curve I'm going through will pay off in the end, but meanwhile I'm curious about the rest of you.

What's your favourite current plain text editor?

If you create HTML docs, what HTML editor do you use?

Do you use Markdown?

And meanwhile, I might as well confess one of my secret vices: user documentation. I do read the manual and Help files, and enjoy reading them. Unless they're horribly written or poorly designed, in which case I rant to Jeff about bad they are. I think I could have been a tech writer in another lifetime, thought I suppose I need at least few lifetimes to do all the things I've always wanted to do.

I love thick manuals with well-designed glossy pages, generous margins and good writing. These user manuals make me happy. I am not exaggerating. When I get a nice piece of juicy new software, I'll immediately grab the docs, find a cozy reading corner and happily dive right in from page one, plow through until the appendices.

Jeff, on the other hand, turns his nose up at user docs and would rather figure things out on his own. :-) To give Jeff credit, he is scary-fast at learning how to use new software intuitively. While I see the value in this method as well, my attitude is that I'd rather at least scan the entire manual first to get an overview before I invest too much time (and keystrokes) in tinkering around with the software.

So one more question: Do YOU read the manual?

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Music, art and writing: I love my life :-)

The drawing above is for Illustration Friday. This week's topic: "Insect." I created this in Corel Painter 8, used the Scratchboard Tool. My usual favourite drawing Painter Brush has been the Croquil, so I've been forcing myself to use other brushes for practice. I used the Gel Composite method for the colour layer, and the Salt variant of the Digital Watercolour Brush for the speckles, then the Subtle variant of the Palette Knife Brush to add more texture to the green area. You can see more of my drawings in my Flickr sketchbook.

I've been getting more inquiries about illustrations I've been posting to Flickr/Blatherings (like my book drawing yesterday)...I really have to get some kind of proper online portfolio online; I'm just way intimidated by all the amazing portfolios I've seen online already. Got the cheque for my first corporate illustration sale today, yay!

Plus I've been focussing on my writing. I'm working on THE LAST FEW CHAPTERS of my YA novel, woohoo! I started this novel (the edit of a Nanowrimo novel) just before the worst of my tendinitis hit and had to put it on hold for a while, focussing on shorter pieces and using ViaVoice while I recovered. Looks like it'll be about 60,000 words. Having this mss sent off to my agent is important to me for many different reasons, so I'm anxious to get this finished.

I've also been selling some shorter pieces: nonfiction and poetry. Yes, I'm writing poetry now. I've read and written it for years now, but for some reason it never crossed my mind that I could get it published. :-) I'm getting a lot rejections, of course, but I'm also starting to find markets for some of my non-rhyming and rhyming poetry. I've been working very hard at it, writing a bit of poetry every day, sending out at least one poem a week.

Looking forward to Urban Tapestry practice tonight at Jodi's place. We'll be working on material for our concert with Franklin: both our stuff as well as his stuff; we've all been exchanging MP3 files by e-mail in the past few weeks. It's going to be a fun concert, I gotta say. :-D

Have a great weekend, everyone!

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What kind of book person are YOU?

Today's poll: BOOK SPINE-BREAKING

Which type of book person are you...the type who will do anything to avoid breaking the spine of a book, or the type that doesn't care? I lean toward the former and secretly shudder whenever I see someone put a new book open and face-down on a table; I have to physically restrain myself from rescuing it. Ditto for when I see someone dog-earing pages on a book.

On the other hand, there are some books in my collection that I read so often that they reach the point where it doesn't really matter anymore, where their spines have been broken so many times out of sheer use. Those are usually my comfort books, the type I take into the tub with me and happily read while their pages wrinkle. So I suppose I'm both type of book people, depending on the book.

I think I could have been a bookbinder in another life; I've always been fascinated by the whole process, especially for older books. Which is one of the many reasons I enjoyed Cornelia Funke's Inkheart and Inkspell recently:




These books for young people are the first two in a series. One of the characters is a bookbinder while another is an avid collector of rare books, and there is an obvious reverence for books in the story. I liked the first book (Inkheart) so much that I went back to the store to buy it in hardcover. The hardcovers are especially nice because even under the dustjackets, the covers themselves have the same gorgeous coloured illustrations as the jacket. Didn't like the second quite as much as the first, but still looking forward to the next one.

Another recent read:



Kira-Kira by Cynthia Kadohata was another book for young people. The narrator's voice threw me off a bit in the beginning...I found it a bit too "I'm so cute and clever" at first, but then got caught up in the relationship between the two sisters as well as the story, which focuses on a Japanese-American family that moves from Iowa to Georgia in the 1950s. I made the mistake of reading a particularly moving part of the book while on the subway and had to stop reading because I didn't want other subway patrons asking me why I was crying. :-)

I've been slacking off on my language studies lately, so have started listening to my Living Language All-Audio Italian course again in preparation for our trip later this year. As I mentioned before, Jeff and I have been looking forward to this trip for several years, and we'll be visiting Paris, Florence, Italy and Rome; I've never been to any of these places before. Many thanks to my mom-in-law, who made this trip possible for us!

I'm also thinking of finding a short "Travel French" audio course, one that focuses on the bare essentials. Any suggestions? I took French in high school up to Grade 12 but haven't used it in many years. We'll only be spending a few days in Paris (I'M GETTING EXCITED JUST WRITING 'SPENDING A FEW DAYS IN PARIS'!), so I don't want to invest a ton of time in this.

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Chester Brown, Will Write For Chocolate

Last night I went to a talk by Chester Brown at the North York Central Library, where Chester is the writer-in-residence from April to June. The talk was excellent; Chester talked about the world of graphic novels and graphic novel publishing from the perspective of his own experiences...how he got interested in comics, his struggles to get noticed in the industry, his influences.

The venue was great: a small meeting room on the second floor, with a good sound system. Chester used an overhead projector to show us various comics by himself as well as comic artists who have been an influence. We also got to see roughs for his most recent project: the front and back covers of "Lady Chatterley's Lover," one of the new Penguin Classics which feature the work of comic artists. You can see covers by some of the other artists here.

My friend Rand told me about Chester's I Never Liked You, which I loved. That got me interested in autobiographical comics in general and eventually inspired me to start My Life In A Nutshell.

Thanks to Ruth for telling me about the talk!

Will Write For Chocolate has been updated with a new comic and a column. Column topic: Tax Tips For Freelancers.

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Walter at FilKONTario!

Walter, happily drilling a hole in our new house.

Yay, I just found out that my friend Walter is attending FilKONtario for sure! It's going to be his first filk convention ever, so I encourage those attending to please make him feel welcome.


Just before we went to see the One-Man LOTR show.

In case you missed previous Blatherings about him, Walter has been incredibly helpful to Jeff and me during the whole moving process, including providing engineering input during the house inspection, physical help during the move and renovations, and also pretending to be my husband during the occasional open house (thanks so much to Trish for the generous loan).


Walter and Jeff carry the washer/dryer unit
down four flights of stairs.

Walter was also the one to drive out to our new house in the middle of the night the first official day we owned the house to set up a practical joke that involved yellow caution tape and the following official-looking "Order To Comply" notice on our front door (click on the image to see a bigger version):



Walter will only be able to attend on the Saturday, but hopefully that will be enough to get him hooked. >;-)

Just over four weeks until FilKONtario, woohoo!

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