Name It

I was stewing over Rock Stew when it finally occurred to me why I was so bothered by it: Stone Soup is the title of a children's mag! I guess Rock Stew is the grown-up version? Heh.

Methinks a good brainstorming session is in order.

I've invited a couple of friends to have a look at our blog-about-it blog here; one has had a peek and thinks we should definitely go for it. Thanks, Liz! Your opinion means a lot to me! I don't know if the second invitee has been here or not, nor -- if she has been -- whether or not she's rolled her eyes at our flight of fancy. (A decided flight of fancy considering my reduced circumstances!)

I put in some time with MSPublisher over the weekend to see just how workable it is. I'm happy to report that the program includes CMYK and Pantone functionality. I'm investigating the difference between "Black" and "Process Black" in the Pantone system, because of problems I am aware of on the printing end: one of these is probably what is known as "rich black" that uses all 4 printing colors (cyan, magenta, yellow, black -- the CMYK of CMYK, with black being K) to create black, while the other should be 100% K. My thinking is that "Process Black" is the one we want (100% K) but I won't know until I run a test .pdf and use the full Acrobat to see the color separations. That is, however, an easy step.

I will have to learn where all the buttons are for everything, but after an initial foray into it, I'd say that Publisher will be just fine for our purposes.

Resources

What makes this enterprise possible at all is the existence of MagCloud. John used this resource to publish his Amy & Pyx comic at super duper teeny tiny cost. He had an invitation to open a publisher's account on the site that he sent to me and that I am reserving for when we decide on a name for the Zine. MagCloud has its pros and its cons, but for now at least the big pro is that it is cheap -- almost-free cheap -- a consideration that overrides all else at the moment.

And, yes, it is a Zine, in the proud tradition of amateur-production limited run 'Zines produced by obsessed fanatics everywhere. (Or at least that was once the case. Is it now? I don't think I've seen an actual 'Zine in years and years!)

Other resources:

Internet access, which I have (for now) at home and (when I'm there) at work. There is also, I understand, net access available at the public library, should it come to that. And it might.

I have Microsoft's Publisher program on my home computer. Assuming that after January I still have a home in which to keep the computer, that means I can produce the Zine entirely myself. I would prefer to use Quark as well as Adobe's full suite with InDesign, Photoshop, and so on, but those programs are priced so far out of my reach it's plain laughable. Publisher is usable. I'll use it! (And, hopefully, should it come to that [so sorry for repeating that but reality is reality], perhaps we can find a kind soul who also has Publisher and will allow me to use same to get at least one issue out!)

Google. As in: gmail, documents, chat, Blogger, calendar, and so on. So many google resources! Free! Thank you, Google, I adore you!

Something at least sort of ready to go: A story I entered in a 1-day writing contest (it didn't win, not even so much as a door prize, po' po' me) can be spiffed up for inclusion in the Zine. Even if I can't polish it to my satisfaction, it can still be published in the Zine as an Object Lesson and/or Ongoing Writing Experiment.

And, of course, our own selves. So far, John and I. With any luck, more to come.