The Kindle store had promised that my book would be published within 12 hours, but almost a day after upload it was still not available to buy and according to the webpage is "in review". Who is reviewing it? I feel sorry for them. I thought I had probably messed something up, but it turned out I hadn't quite. I finally got a presumably automated message which asked me to clarify why the name on my account was different than the name on the book. I was surprised that this was the case. Surely I hadn't started an account under a different name. But I went to have a look and discovered that I had signed in as "R K Herring" (presumably because that's the name on my bank account details, not Richard Herring. So the name was different, but it didn't take an Einstein to work out why. Or that I was the same person. I changed the name on the account and emailed them back, so we'll have to wait another day or so I think. Bloody Hell - three days to publish a book. What a world we live in!
Incidentally I am also looking into doing a print run of Talking Cock and getting that up as an ebook too. It seems likely that I might revive the show this year, so hopefully there will be some call for the book (it didn't sell very well in its first print run, but mainly because book shops seemed to hide it away in shame). This time, if we do it, we will sell it via gofasterstripe and at gigs and just hope there's call for it. I will be pleased if we pull it all together. I was very proud of that book and a bit sad that after the work and stress of putting it together (which you can read about in Bye Bye Balham) it sort of disappeared into the ether. A cock ending up in ether is a terrible fate.
I love this brave new world where the internet allows a niche product to reach the audience who want it. Again I find myself fortunate to be in the position where I can release stupid things on the internet and more considered work via publishers, distributors and in theatres. I just like getting my stuff out there. As you may have noticed. Might as well make a lot of noise now, because we'll be a long time dead and won't be able to think of a thing to say and even if we could would only have Psychic Sally to relay it to anyone else and she JUST WON"T LISTEN PROPERLY.
Talking of putting any old rubbish out there, the oddly hypnotic Me 1 vs Me 2 snooker podcast finally went up to day as electricity returned to Hampshire and Orange Mark (his orange juice had got slightly warm in his useless fridge - this is why you should have a gas fridge and gas internet and steam powered podcasts). You can get it in the usual places. My favourite one star review on iTunes (and I have to say, I anticipated and hoped for more - having people enjoy my avant garde experiment I know how Stewart Lee must feel when he wins British Comedy Awards: "I thought this stuff was too left field for anyone to ENJOY") comes from a man called Johnskiii (with 3 i's - not since Leee John have I seen such audacity) said (and I hope this is genuine rather than someone joining in with the "joke") "An old man recording himself playing snooker on not even a real size snooker table against himself? Really?"
It just sums it up so beautifully. And he's right it's not even a real size snooker table. He's sort of wrong, because of course the snooker table is a real size. But not the real size that one would hope for in an audio snooker podcast commentated by an old man playing against himself. If there is ever a poster, that's going on the poster. That's the exasperation I am aiming for. So stop enjoying it so much everyone else.
In other news I've been playing a lot of Monopoly on my iPhone (against computer opponents, but once again, this could be an excellent and long tour me 1 vs Me 2 (vs Me 3) podcast. The app was free a couple of weeks ago - might be still. It's a good time pit. I think in this time that I have worked out the best Monopoly strategy, which is to make sure you get all the transport squares (the railways in traditional game) as this gives you a good and constant income which will weaken your opponents and provide income to buy houses AND try and get all three Orange properties as soon as possible and build on them. I'd always thought the dark blue (Mayfair/Park Lane) combo was the best, but people don't land on them all that often (though if they do when you've got a hotel it's basically game over), it is hard to accrue the money necessary to build on them, but also that fourth street on Monopoly is the least visited. People get sent to prison or spirited through to Go. The Orange properties are affordable, as are the houses/hotels, but also every time anyone gets sent to jail they risk throwing 6,8 or 9 (very popular possibilities, especially given two of them are double numbers). I'd definitely swap a green for an orange, even though the green costs more, cos people land on the green squares much less and the houses and hotels cost too much. I have cracked this game and I am only 44 years old (it takes chess grandmasters a life time to get to the top of their game and even then they don't know it all).
It's all down to how good a trader you are. Though interestingly when I was a kid we never played the rule where you could trade properties. You had to work with what you got. I was actually quite angry when I played with friends who traded (it does mean that an unwise opponent can wreck a game for you by giving away a good property too lightly). But now I wonder how on earth we managed to play Monopoly in our house at all without going mad. The games were, even for Monopoly, impossibly long. My family are jerks. I did, of course, play a fair few games against myself. Which would (and will, oh podcast fans) make trading very interesting.
A cursory google of Monopoly strategy shows that I am not the first person to come to this realisation.
this website provides the statistical proof, though I like the comment underneath made by Dave McCallister who says "The best way to win Monopoly is not to play." The idiot. He sounds like the kind of man who thinks it would be "sad" to listen to an old man playing himself at snooker on a not even real-size snooker table and commentating on it.
Do you think if I try to climb out of this hole I am creating for myself now, that I will be able to escape? Or will the sides just collapse and keep me trapped? Is my best bet to keep digging in the hope that if I go far enough I will come out on the other side of the world and be free? It seems unlikely, but there's only one way to find out if that can happen.
