gypsygirl

Note from Hugh:
Dear LibriVox supporters, friends, volunteers:

Two weeks ago we sent out a request for donations towards a $20,000 fundraising campaign. We outlined why on this post (with a number of questions answered in the comments thread). You responded with generosity, and we can now close down our campaign.

So:

Thank you!

We got to our target so quickly it warms our hearts. Not only did people donate, but this campaign also allowed many many people to express their appreciation for all the hard and wonderful work done by LibriVox volunteers.

We won’t have to talk about money again for a few years. Instead, we’ll get back to working hard to fulfill our mission, which is:

To make all books in the public domain available, for free, in audio format on the internet.

So: Thank you again.

For those curious:

Campaign Details:

We raised $23,000 from 433 donors, in 13 days, averaging $1,769 in donations from 33 people every day. We had a couple of big donors, who gave a few thousand dollars each, and many more smaller donations which all add up to: everything we asked for. Thank you again.

LibriVox Details:

This money will help support our efforts, which so far have resulted in the following:
* 3773: Total number of projects
* 3227: Number of completed projects
* 470: Number of completed non-English projects
* 31: Total number of languages
* 28: Number of languages with a completed work
* 1498: Number of completed solo projects
* 3549: Number of readers
* 3347: ...who have completed something

Total recorded time: 66472509 seconds, or 2 years, 38 days, 20 hours, 57 minutes, and 37 seconds. Total of 66978 sections.

Have I said thank you? Well: thank you again! Oh, and a very special thank-you to our friends and supporters at the Internet Archive, especially Jacques and Brewster, who managed the donations for us so that we didn't have to worry about setting up paypal accounts and all the rest.

And now, back to making free, public domain audiobooks.

All the best,

Hugh McGuire.

So thanks so much to everyone who contributed!

Not quite 8:30am and I've already filled my laugh quota for the day.

Was chatting with one of my coworkers, and the subject drifted into Hebrew words and phrases we were familiar with. He was trying to remember the "writing on the wall" from the book of Daniel, "Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin" (KJV); what came out was "many, many tickle a parson".

We had a pretty good snowstorm last Tuesday, two to three inches. The weathermen thought the temperatures were going to drop below freezing overnight and make for difficult driving (around here, everything shuts down when there's ice on the roads... our cars just aren't set up to drive on ice, and our people just get stupid when trying to drive on ice, so it's just safer to keep as many people home as possible), so the university shut down a bit early and sent us home. On our way out, while cleaning the ice off the cars we played around in it a little. A couple of girls built a snow bear in the bed of one's pick up (sic 'em bears!), we had a minor snowball fight, and I made a tiny snowman from the snow on E's hood.

When we got home we discovered that the weight of the snow had bent the poles of the canopy we'd put over my scooter.

I'm going to have to see if I can find something with stronger poles.

For the first time in its 4.5 year history, LibriVox is asking its supporters for money.

Chances are, if you're reading this message on my blog, you've heard and possibly enjoyed some of my LibriVox recordings, Pride and Prejudice, or Anne of Green Gables, or perhaps the Scarlet Pimpernel.

I'd ask that you consider supporting LibriVox in this donation drive to allow us readers to continue providing you with audiobooks. Every little bit helps!

Here's Hugh's message:

Dearest LibriVox listeners, volunteers, & supporters:

For four-and-a-half years, LibriVox volunteers have been making audiobooks for the world to enjoy, and giving them away for free. We've made thousands of free audiobooks that have been downloaded by millions of people; our site gets 400,000 visitors every month. To date, all our costs have been borne by a few individuals, with some generous donations from partners. However, these costs have become too big.

See below to FIND OUT HOW TO DONATE (Or, keep reading!).

LibriVox needs your help.

We're asking for donations for the following:

• to cover hosting costs for our website, including: the site you are reading now; the forum; the wiki; the catalog; but NOT including the audio files which are hosted by Archive.org
• to redesign the site and improve its accessibility
• to make the LibriVox catalog easier for listeners to use
• to make the management software easier for admins to use

Your donation will support the work of our volunteers.

Our fundraising goal is $20,000. After we reach it, we'll shut down our fundraising campaign. And we hope we can make it another 4.5 years without having to bother you again!

HOW TO DONATE:

1. Visit the Internet Archive donation page (the Internet Archive, a registered US charity and friend of LibriVox, is managing our fundraising campaign)
2. Select a donation method (Justgive.org, Paypal, or Check)
3. Be sure to write: "Donation for LibriVox" along with your donation (otherwise we won't get the donation!)
4. Don't forget to write: "Donation for LibriVox" along with your donation!

About a year ago, I bought Lucy a new bed. It lasted intact for about three months, I think, then she started ripping out the bottom and strewing the fluff everywhere. It got a little more ripped one time when she was staying with E's dog, Huxley. I think they decided it was a tug toy.

Poor bed.

I'd had it on top of my bedside mat so she wouldn't be sleeping on the wood floor, but it just wasn't pretty. I kept intending to make a sort of quilted bottom for it, to replace the torn one, but I never got around to it. Last weekend I happened to be in Tractor Supply Company and saw a pretty nice sheepskin-ish bed for not too much, so she finally has a bed with a bottom again.

Yay!

Today was a beautiful day! After weeks of cold, rain, sleet, snow (yes, sleet and snow in C. Texas!! Not constant, but still), we had a warm, sunny day; warm enough for t-shirt and shorts, during the warmest part! A perfect day for a little yard work.

About eight years ago, our next door neighbours planted a few bamboo shoots along their back fence. Needless to say, there's bamboo everywhere now. Last spring I was going out every two or three days to cut down the new sprouts that were coming up all over the yard.

I'd been meaning to thin out the thickets along the back fence for ages; there's a rosemary bush back there that's completely hidden in the thicket, and a pretty little tree that's all but surrounded, but it was hard work with a hand saw, so I never did too much.

Until today.

Another thing I bought while I was at TSC last weekend was a reciprocating saw (cashier had the nerve to ask me if it was a Valentine's present. Hmpf! Yeah, sure, Valentine's present to myself, maybe!). We now have a mountain of bamboo in the yard.

E and I are planning on using some to make gardening stakes (for tomatoes and such). Not sure what we'll do with the rest. If you're in Central Texas and could use some bamboo, drop me a line!! Free to a good home!

The back fence looks much better now. You can get to the back gate without resorting to a machete, you can actually see that there's a tree back there, and there's still enough bamboo to provide shade and privacy.

Gosh, look, there's a door back there! And a tree!

The brown patch in the middle of the bamboo is the poor rosemary bush, which is half dead, but we're hoping, if we trim it back and stake it down a bit, it'll re-root and grow back this spring and summer.

E also suddenly remembered that she had a picnic canopy that was sitting around gathering dust, so she offered me the use of it so I could have semi-covered parking for my scooter. Great fun putting that up, because by that point, the temperature had started dropping again and a fairly brisk wind had picked up. Always the best time to put up tents, when it's blowing a gale!

Finished recording the latest Ignatius book today. Just need to proof-listen the last section and upload it. Those long sections were a challenge, though, even divided up into three recording sessions each.

So New Year's Eve I was getting ready to head out to Beth and Marcel's 4th yearly karaoke bash when I found that my car wouldn't start. My poor car is fourteen years old, and it's been going downhill for the past year or so, dying at intersections, juddering, etc. Now, it's dead. It might be resurrectable, but at fourteen, I really don't want to put more money into it. On the other hand, I'm not quite ready to buy a new car right now. I'm trying to pay off my school loans, and getting further into debt isn't part of my plan. So, instead of a car, I got me one of these:

Granted, mid-winter is probably not the best time to start riding a scooter, but I'm still having fun.

I recently finished my recording of Dayspring by Harry Sylvester for Ignatius Press. It's already up on their website, and I've started a new recording for them, The Eternal Woman by Gertrud Von le Fort. It's considerably shorter than either of the other two books I've done for them, and I'm nearly halfway through already. The only difficulty with it is the length of the sections; only four of them but two are about 20 pages and the other two are upwards of 40. That's over an hour of recording for those last two sections. I've had to divide them into three so that I don't blow out my vocal chords.

I'm also currently recording The Sky is Falling by Lester Del Rey for LV, another scifi, since I had such fun with the Mack Reynolds one I did for the SFFAudio Challenge.

I forgot to take photos of my Christmas knitting projects before giving them away! Well... they were for my housemates, so I may yet get a chance. I made two pairs of fingerless gloves (Fetching pattern from Knitty that I made for myself a couple of years ago), one in black, one in variegated pink. The third housemate got a cap and scarf. Now I can get back to work on the jacket I've been making for myself (another Knitty pattern - cover image from last fall). It's been a while in the making. I started it last winter but kept getting sidetracked by gift knitting and only got about halfway up the back by the time it was too hot to continue (I don't knit in Texas summer). By the time I picked it up again a couple of months ago, I was totally lost, so I ripped it all back and started over. So far I've finished the back and am halfway up the right front (might get that finished today or tomorrow).

The library book sale was last week. I went on opening day this time ($5 entry) because last year I couldn't find any knitting books and I was hoping to get a better choice this time. There still wasn't a whole lot, but better than last year. In addition I got a few books of poetry, some mysteries and some scifi. I also picked up a few baby books for a friend.

I've started a new LV project, Ultima Thule by Mack Reynolds. I'm doing it for the 4th Annual SFFaudio Challenge. It's a short novel, so I hope to have it finished within a couple of weeks.

Left the window cracked in my car a couple of weekends ago and got rained on, and though it's nice and dry now, it still smells. I may go through an entire bottle of Febreeze to get the smell out. The car has been living on the roof of the parking garage in the sunshine with the windows cracked while I'm at work, hopefully that'll help too.

Finished stage managing Woman in Black this weekend. Dressed as a dead cowgirl for this year's Masquerade Ball (which for once actually fell on Hallowe'en!). I'm hoping to get some more photos from the others who were there, but for now there are a few on my Masquerade Ball page.

Have been able to get more work done on my recording projects since the end of the show. I've been putting a bit more effort into Dayspring (had been concentrating mostly on Clara Vaughan before); the chapters on that one are much longer than any others to date - I have to make sure I have a glass of water handy or I won't make it through.

Finally finished The Secret Garden for LibriVox.

Also finished two paid gigs within the last month. Megan for I Publish Press, though I don't think it's up for sale yet; and The Death of a Pope for Ignatius Press.

ETA: Megan is now up on their website