I have this idea that I want Skylights available in print in the next couple of weeks, so that theoretically people can order it for a Christmas present, right?  So I worked on that for a bit last night.  This involved 1) adding text to the cover image, 2) saving the cover image, 3) making a few minor error corrections in the interior text itself (dammit!) and then reformatting that for print.

The following has happened, all within about an hour and a half or so:

• The program I used to generate the ebook cover has “upgraded” to a new version, and the new version no longer allows you to change the font on text.  This is not a joke.  That’s actually true.  After spending far too much time trying to figure out what the hell I did to create the cover and giving up, I found a whole thread on the internet full of people saying variations of “Why the fuck would you even DO that?”  This means that I can’t reproduce the digital cover properly on the ebook cover, and also means that I need to learn a new program.  So I find a new program and figure it out.  I get the cover looking more or less like I want it to (the word “Skylights” on the cover is actually vertically stretched a little bit and no free program I can find will let me do that) and save it as a .jpeg and a .pdf.
• The saved version has, for no clear reason at all, my name on the cover at a weird angle and has completely reformatted the text that will go on the back cover, and it looks nothing like the document I saved.  I try to re-open it in the program I was working on it in and it’s been saved as a flat image, so I can’t fiddle with it anymore.
• So, okay, worry about that later.  I download the Word template that CreateSpace says I can use for my interior text.  It suggests simply copying and pasting.  I do so.  It does not surprise me one bit to discover that this does not work at all and not only changes margins and page sizes as I expected but also removes every carriage return and tab in the document, randomly right-justifies every subheading and chapter title, and does things I can’t even describe to my title page.
• Okay, fine, I’ll fiddle with the page size and such on my original document.  In the process of just fiddling with the margins, which is a simple matter of going to Format –> Document and changing a couple of numbers, the entire document reverses polarity so that the text is now going up-and-down on the page.  This sounds impossible, or like I’m a complete idiot with computers.  I am not a complete idiot with computers; Word just sucks that badly.

So, yeah.  Fuckit.  Found a new way for the weekend to suck!