I Just Published An eBook On ‘Comet ISON’, C/2012 S1 (ISON), ‘The Great Comet of 2013’. Paperback In A Few Months.
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by Anura Guruge
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I had to get this book out before the Comet, covering millions of miles a day, got ahead of me.
I started working on it on December 29, 2012, when Deanna forwarded an e-mail from one of her cousins about the comet. That e-mail just had a link. And, as soon as I read the newspaper article about it (per that link), in the British ‘The Independent’, I knew I had to write about this comet. I felt it was destined in my stars — as they would say in Sri Lanka. I had been working for over a year on a book on asteroids. So the transition was pretty easy. I was working on that book when I got the e-mail. I just saved that book. Opened a new copy of it, and used it as the template for the new book. Yes, I started writing that day itself. I don’t mess around.
I finished the text of the book on March 29, 2013. So exactly 3 months to write 50,000(+) words — and I had the 5 weeks of craziness with the papal transition, during which I did publish 3 other Kindle eBooks.
So, yes, this is my 4th book in 2013. I did three books in 2011 and was getting worried that I would never equal that again.
Lot more yet to be done.
Yes, a companion blog, ‘Comet ISON‘, went live just now! What can I say. I was in sales and marketing for better part of my life. But, today was stressful.
D.C. Sequestration Hits Close To Home: West Point Band Cancels Dartmouth Performance Due To Budget Constraints. Blue Angels Also Cancel Shows!
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..by Anura Guruge
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Extract from a Press Release from Dartmouth Hopkins Center announcing withdrawal of Band. Click here to access the Hopkins Website with the Press Release. ‘Marsit’, referred to at the start is the Director of the ‘DCWE’ — Dartmouth College Wind Ensemble.
I actually talked to the Hopkins Center’s extremely motivated and energetic Publicity Coordinator/Writer, Rebecca Bailey, about this yesterday. Appears that you can’t even get the band to perform further than 100 miles from West Point even if you offered to pay ‘all’ the costs — since the Pentagon insists that there are still ‘hidden’ costs that are being incurred.
This is a shame.
This, ‘stick to the public, to make them squeal’ stuff with the sequestration, does not sit well with me. This is D.C. playing games with us. Yes, I am totally in favor of them cutting expenditure and increasing revenues. But, this petty sequestration stuff is pathetic and is just trying to get a raise out of the public — when the only thing they should trying to raise is taxes.
The Band can’t make it to Dartmouth but how much foreign aid are they giving to Israel and Egypt this year? Yes, MY PRESIDENT should stop using the gas guzzling ‘Air Force 1’ as if it was a golf cart. Scale back on his trips or use a more cost effective plane. If you look at some of the cuts, in addition to the White House tours, Military Bands and the Blue Angels, they are all to do with the elderly, the poor and kids. This is crazy. There are 30,000 troops in the DMZ in Korea. In my estimation it would take about 20 minutes to achieve a successful and permanent regime change in North Korea. Rather than spending all this money they should just eliminate the North Korean ‘problem’ and just have a united Korea. That would save billions.
Yes, this stuff makes me livid. I hold MY PRESIDENT responsible for some of this. He loves to play his little games too. I guess we now have to wait for Hillary.
The good news is that the Dartmouth College Wind Ensemble is proceedings with their concert despite the let down. It should, as with everything Hopkins’ related, be another great concert. We won’t be able to make it, but I am sure it will be a blast.