BEWARE! Todoist Pro Scam

I mentioned in my weekly goals post on Monday that I had found a new system for managing my tasks and calendar.  I also canceled my Todoist Pro subscription on Monday after making sure all my tasks were switched over, so imagine my surprise when I was charged for another month tonight.

Making it difficult or impossible to cancel a subscription is a lowdown, dirty scam.  No honest company operates this way.

Avoid Todoist at all costs.  There are much better task management apps out there anyway.

I'm working on a more detailed review of my new system, which I will post soon.  But in the meantime, consider yourself warned about Todoist.

2025 Weekly Challenge, Week 7: Overcoming Difficulties

It's been a rough few weeks, but I finally feel like I'm starting to make progress.  I'm still feeling like I'm struggling with the political climate, but I'm clawing my way out of the hyper-fixation hole I had dug for myself.  I still need to figure out how to do balance attentiveness to the situation without letting it consume me, but I'm getting there.

Amusingly, I realized I was such a mess last week that I numbered the week wrong, calling it week 5 instead of week 6.  That has been corrected in the post now, although the URL is sadly stuck as a second week 5.

One thing I worked on a lot last week that won't count toward one of my goals, even though it contributes, is switching over my task and calendar system to a new app.  I wanted to move away from Google products after they ousted their DEI programs and jettisoned holidays such as Black History Month, Women's History Month, and Pride from their calendar.  I'll write more about that soon as I think others will find the new apps I've found very helpful as well.

Writing

I worked on my novel three days instead of one, wrote a couple of blog posts, and posted to my author IG a couple of times.  I still want to get to the point where I'm working on my writing nearly every day again, but this is still an improvement and I'm pleased.

I didn't count it as working on my novel, but I also worked on that writing, revising, and publication schedule I set up recently, refining it and getting it switched over to my new task tracking system.

Decluttering and Organization

I didn't get anything done in this category, unfortunately.

Dolls

Nothing accomplished here either.

Lessons Learned

I didn't improve across the board, but I'm pleased with the progress I did make.  I feel like even small progress should be celebrated here, and hopefully I will do better in this coming week.  I'm also looking forward to exploring some of these new, non-Google tools, which I will blog about soon!

Celebrating Small Successes

Yesterday I reported that I had started feeling a little better toward the end of last week, like my focus was returning.  I'm happy to report that yesterday actually was a fairly successful day.  Not only did I get done the blog post and author social media post I'd hoped for, but I also tuned in to a couple of webinars throughout the day (one career-related, on the book launch process, and the other politics-related, on bystander intervention).  And at the end of the day, I actually succeeded in writing for about an hour and a half, pumping out nearly 2,000 words — well over anything I've managed to write in about the last month.

The productivity yesterday did cost me a little, and I felt the effects of what I call a "productivity hangover" today — basically, feeling sluggish and unmotivated the day after a lot of productivity.  It happens almost every time for me.  Sometimes I can push past it and sometimes I can't.

This blog post is me trying to push past it today.  I have a few other things on my list for the day too, some of which are more important to me than others.  Yes, working on my novel again (can I get two days in a row and start a new streak?) is one of them.  Hopefully we'll also be able to make it to our weekly Tuesday evening write-in, as that will help with my plans to work on my novel again today.

Balancing my own life and goals against staying informed about political events is going to be tough to achieve in the coming weeks, months, and years, but I guess I'll be getting some good practice at it.

2025 Weekly Challenge, Week 6: Rock Bottom

Last week was dismal, even worse than the previous week.  By the time I finally worked on my novel yesterday, I had gone a whopping nine days in a row without writing.  But I'm not going to talk about that, or even do my usual breakdown.  Instead I'm just going to list what I did do:

• I worked on my novel one day, yesterday
• I wrote a couple of blog posts
• I posted not just once, but twice to my author IG
• I set up my new iPad, which I got for writing, as I am planning a staggered transition to Apple

Toward the end of the week I started feeling slightly more able to focus.  I'm not entirely ready to go back to normal, but perhaps I can at least start to focus on other things than watching for and consuming all the latest headlines.

Lessons Learned

I think the biggest takeaway last week is that I finally — I hope — hit rock bottom, and got the least possible amount done.  I think it's important that we don't overlook how utterly traumatic the last few weeks have been.  Watching this hostile takeover of our democracy and the erosion of our rights as citizens is having an impact.  I'm going to give myself some grace, acknowledge that there's no way I ever could have focused on anything else over the last few weeks, take a deep breath, and move on.

This week will be better.

Support Apple for Supporting DEI

In addition to boycotting companies like Amazon that are rolling back DEI, I'm supporting the ones who maintain their DEI policies.  One such company is Apple.  Apple was one of the early companies to stand by their DEI policies, and they're still standing strong.

I was already considering buying an Apple machine so that I could use Vellum to format my ebooks, but Apple's DEI stance helped fast track my decision, and I bought an iPad over the weekend with the goal of using it as a mobile writing machine.  My Surface Go has been a good mobile computer for writing, but it can also be pretty slow.  I think the iPad (running Scrivener's mobile app) will be a good alternative.

Eventually the goal will be to buy a MacBook Air as well so that I can run Vellum on it.  For now, though, I'll be fine with my regular computer — also a Surface, just a larger and faster one.  It's not that old yet, plus the staggered transition will give me time to get together the money for the larger purchase of a new computer.

I've always been an iPhone user, so it makes sense to make the switch to other Apple products as well.  I may also eventually switch to Apple's smart speakers, too, since I'll be transitioning away from Amazon as well.

That's another area the iPad will come in handy.  As I boycott Amazon products more, I need another place to read magazines and periodicals, as I'll lose those when I give up Amazon Unlimited.  The iPad will actually answer a lot of needs for me.  I'm looking forward to this new transition; and who doesn't love new gadgets?!

Boycott Amazon for Ditching DEI

This plan (and post) has been in the works for a few weeks, ever since I first heard that Amazon was rolling back its DEI programs, but I'm just finally putting together a post on the issue.

In case you hadn't heard, Amazon rolled back their DEI policies a couple weeks ago to kiss the current administration's ass.  They must be feeling the consequences of that decision since it's causing even more customers to pull back from using Amazon (they had enough of a fallout after The Washington Post refused to support Harris and again after Bezos started appearing all buddy-buddy with the current administration), as they are now claiming that they're still supporting DEI, just not officially.

In my opinion, that's total bullshit.  They're trying to play both sides and keep everyone happy.  But if you're not holding the line, what do you really stand for?  It's a coward's move, plain and simple.

My plan to withdraw my dependence on Amazon started a couple of weeks ago, after the initial announcements, and is now in full swing.  We are finding alterative sources for all of our major Amazon purchases.  Some are easy (switching to Chewy for pet food, for example, or buying tech from Costco or Microcenter instead of Amazon) and others will take some additional creativity.

One major issue for me is my reading habits.  I have two Kindles and I read a lot.  Much of it is through the libraries, which I don't think gives Amazon any money.  I do purchase ebooks sometimes, though, so I needed a way to convert my ebook buying habits to another source.

Enter Kobo.  I purchased a Kobo reader, the Libra Colour.  I will continue using my Kindle readers in ways that don't send any money Amazon's way, but for anything that costs money, Kobo is my new go-to.

As it turns out, there are advantages of having a Kobo reader:

• OverDrive syncs with my e-reader directly, which means I no longer have to jump back and forth between two different devices to check out ebooks and send them to my device.
• Kobo readers also sync directly with Pocket, which means I can save news articles to my e-readers by using the plug-in already on my browser.
• Kobo readers also sync with both Dropbox and Google Drive, providing a couple of different ways to side load ebooks wirelessly.  Project Gutenberg even has little buttons to save ebooks directly to these cloud services, making it super easy to get free ebooks on my Kobo reader.
• Kobo has its own reading subscription, Kobo Plus, and it appears the selection is much better than Kindle Unlimited.
• The Libra Colour allows me to annotate directly on the page of ebooks, which will be great for revising my novels.  (But if that doesn't work for me because of the small screen, I can continue to use the Kindle Scribe for that without sending Amazon any more money — although I'm also considering eventually getting the Kobo Elipsa 2E for its larger screen.)

There are also a few things that I will miss about the Kindle:

• No more automatic updating of Goodreads
• No more saving of highlights in Goodreads
• The option of annotating epubs in text boxes on the Scribe (why can't the Kobo offer both?)
• No more sharing ebooks with my husband

While I will miss these things, there are some workarounds.  For instance, I've signed up with both Storygraph and Fable as alternatives to Goodreads.  But more importantly, none of these things are worth sending money to a company that kowtows to the current administration by eliminating open support for DEI.

As an author, my decision may be a little different.  I will still likely make my books available on Kindle, but rather than starting out publishing exclusively with Kindle, as I'd planned, I'm going to look into publishing "wide" from the very beginning.  It's also worth noting that Kobo has its own authors program, and I will likely check that out as well.

One final switch worth mentioning is that I will be pulling back from the Amazon Affiliates program.  For now I'll leave existing ads up on my blog, but eventually those will come down as well.  I hope to find other affiliate programs to use instead.

There is, of course, always the hope that Amazon will realize they have impacted their bottom line more than they've saved face with the current administration.  The article about "supporting DEI without saying DEI" does read like they are walking back their initial decision, perhaps under pressure from disgruntled customers.  But unless they announce a full return to DEI and put the inclusion language back in their policies and on their website, I won't be returning to them as a customer.

There are admittedly some drawbacks making a major switch like this.  Our dependence on Amazon was pretty extreme, spanning everything from everyday purchases to reading to music to viewing.  Fortunately, the vast majority of the money we spend (or spent) with Amazon are based on convenience rather than necessity.  Here are a few of the things I have or will be switching to other sources:

• Ebooks and reading subscriptions
• Music streaming
• TV streaming
• Grocery and necessity purchases
• Pet food
• Business purchases

If nothing else, this may save me some money on impulse buys, or at least funnel my impulse buys toward small businesses on Etsy and eBay.  In other words, while the transition away from Amazon may be challenging, I suspect in the long run I will be glad for the opportunity to discover — and support — other options.

2025 Weekly Challenge, Week 5: Strugglebus

Last week was another dismal one.  I'm still very distracted by current events, although to be fair, there has been a lot happening.  I think last week might have been even worse than the week before, which was bad enough.

Without further discussion, I'm going to jump straight to last week's accomplishments (or lack thereof):

Writing

I only managed to work on my novel two days last week.  I did get a social media post up on my author Instagram account.

Decluttering and Organization

Nope.

Dolls

Nada.

Lessons Learned

I fear we're in a brave new world where I'm going to have to learn to balance my awareness of current events with the things I have to get done.  I'm going to start trying to build back a little bit this week, rehabbing my brain if you will, with a soft goal of writing 4 days and getting either a decluttering/organization project or a doll project done.