I don’t like to brag but I’m not usually perplexed by technology or the computer-ese jargon of elite IT secret societies. What does perplex me, however, is the HTML language in the context of the painfully useless and inaptly named Blogger Help.
Help desk? Is that what Satan calls his podium at the gates of hell? Satan, with his little concierge nameplate pinned to his heartless chest that says, “Ask me where to go”?
I thought that, while waiting for the anticipated rejection from the latest agent, I could post some sample chapters here, then research other agents in preparation for the next batch of queries as soon as that polite “no thanks, but other agents will no doubt feel differently” is received.
But I’m stuck. I can’t figure out how to post the sample chapters as midget widgets to the right of your screen, accessible as separate windows rather than as a full-blown artery blogging-clogging post below.
The so-called “help” tells me how to hide posts, to copy and paste a string of text in the HTML template. Great. But where? The template is two pages long. Do I paste at the beginning or at the end of my rope? I then find another reference that says a similar string of text needs to be pasted after the first {body} but before the first {header}—but neither the specified body nor header is in my expanded template. Apparently, I am without arms and legs (I already knew I've irrevocably lost my head).
So here I am. Trudging through the blogging bog, unable to post sample chapters as mere handy dandy links rather than as additional semblances of “War & Peace”, and convinced another rejection is forthcoming—that is, in precisely two weeks when I send a reminder email.
For some reason, Mark Twain appears in the room, standing next to me. He is atypically—but not surprisingly—speechless. But he’s wearing wooden clogs and is about to throw one at the monitor…or is he aiming at my head?
“Ha!” I laugh, as I duck under my desk. “You forget—I am headless. And I have no body, funny man. Oh, and by the way, this is a non-smoking house, if you please…”
But I digress—because I don’t know what else to do. Except to walk away, slowly, from the computer, then run away in a zigzag manner.
