> > Second novel, technically, but my excitement is none the less for it.
>
> Yes, but this one is PUBLISHED. :-p Somehow that makes it more real in my head...

Are you sure it's not that you've READ this one that makes it more real to you? :-)

I published the first one, too, but not done up by a professional company. I did it all myself, spending hours at night in front of the photocopier at my Dad's place of work. I made several copies of each page, then fed the copies back into the machine so the next page would be printed on the back. I had a couple of long tables lined up, where I did all the collating by hand, as the next page was copying. I can't even tell you how much toner I went through.

Then I borrowed my mother's ring-binding machine to punch holes in the paper and bind them. The covers were clear plastic cover sheets that somehow had this incredible static charge at first, such that they attracted every bit of lint in a 25 mile radius. The static wore off eventually, but it's pretty funny to think back on how hard it was to keep those covers clean.

One of the weirdest things about the experience was that, at the time, my Dad's office was in the town's historic (read: ancient) courthouse building that was then in dire need of renovation. There were holes in the bell tower, and bats crawled in at night and flew around the building. So on at least one late night of photocopying, I had a bat keeping me company. It spent I don't know how many hours flying circles around the place as I worked. Maybe it was waiting for a copy.

> I'm inexplicably proud of you.

Hehe. Thanks.