We had an excavation hoo-hah here.

Yo, shalom,  howdy and how’s the family from the best address in the Lone Star State. It’s Friday morning, 7:36 a.m., and I apologize for taking a few days off this week (i.e., I haven’t posted here since Monday). There’s nothing wrong, really … I was just concentrating on developing and designing additional products — holiday cards, iPhone cases, luggage tags, etc. — for The Howdygram Store on Zazzle. I also spent a great deal of time on Wednesday opening three additional stores, although at this point I’m not really sure I’ll ever use them. (Details follow in case you give a shit about this.)

Here’s a little local news. On Wednesday morning the City of Mesquite’s water department tore up a portion of the street in front our house … including the lower half of our driveway! Apparently there was an active underground leak from a neighbor’s house pushing water up into the street in front of ours. The excavation hoo-hah wasn’t nearly as noisy or obnoxious as I expected, and our only real inconvenience (so far) involved Sam parking his car on the street for four hours. (He pulled back into the garage after the city laid down some gravel.) They’ll be back soon to re-pave our little section of Bonnywood Drive and pour new concrete for our driveway. At that time I expect Sam to take a few pictures for the Howdygram, as thus far I am not especially impressed by his skills as a roving reporter. He didn’t take a single picture on Wednesday! NOT EVEN ONE!

---

For your possible interest, here are the “details” that I promised back in the first paragraph. There are three points I’d like to make about all this.

WHAT I WANTED TO DO. I always knew it would be beneficial (i.e., lucrative) to sell the same line of products in more than one location on Zazzle’s website … I’d have better search coverage, better ranking, more visibility and so on. Therefore, a few days ago I finally opened three new additional marketplace stores: Cases by Marcy (iPhone cases); Greetings by Marcy (greeting cards); and Mugs and More by Marcy (mugs and custom drinkware). I assumed there would be a way to copy existing products from The Howdygram Store.

WHAT I FOUND OUT. After trying a couple of procedures on my own (with no success), a couple of days ago I contacted Zazzle’s “help” line via live chat to ask how to copy products into my new stores. Unfortunately, the technician told me there’s no way to do that! I would have to create each product from scratch all over again in the new location, which involves retyping a page full of information — product title, detailed product description, category listings, search keywords, royalty request, and so on — FOR EVERY INDIVIDUAL PRODUCT, and that’s a colossal volume of labor for a bedridden person like yours truly, especially when you consider how many hundreds of products I’ve got.

PERSEVERANCE PAYS OFF. Believe it or not, there’s actually a happy ending to all this! About half an hour ago I had a brainstorm and decided to try one last time to copy a product from The Howdygram Store to Cases by Marcy. And I did it! I’ll have to copy them one at a time, but the procedure I discovered only takes a few seconds for each product and involves no retyping whatsoever. So therefore, as of today, it’s my goal to open all three new stores by the first of the year. Stay tuned, okay? Woo-hoo!

---

I’ve got a fabulous, varied collection of FREE FONTS for you today … everything from terrific scripts (“Summertime,” “Monochrome”) to unusual display faces (“Kookie, “Logbond”). HOLIDAY HINT: Wrap a few for stocking stuffers! Convenient download links will appear after the graphic, okay?

Encore • Baristafi • Beaujolais • Summertime • SunSurf • Starla Bold • Kookie • Escucha

Rauda • Lambretta & Kongo • Kingdom • Logbond • Monochrome • Kobold Family

---

I think it’s time to wake Sam because I just ran out of iced tea and have to keep drinking and drinking and drinking. I’m still battling that goddamn urinary tract infection!

Thank you for reading this. I’m not kidding, either.