How to create an audiobook in iTunes.

I had Pride and Prejudice on my ipod and it was driving me crazy how it would play random chapters while my music was on shuffle. Also, the boyfriend added an audio CD on how to speak Japanese on my laptop so I could add that on my ipod, too. Although throwing in random Japanese lessons would be like a random pop quiz and may help me learn it better, it would still be annoying if I only wanted to listen to my music.

I knew there had to be a way to separate audiobooks from music, and I found it here. It's a great photo tutorial that guided me through it, and it was so simple! 

1. In iTunes, select and highlight all the audiobook files. 

2. Right click, the select "Get Info." (iTunes will ask you if you want to edit multiple files at once and just say yes.)

3. Click on the "Options" tab.

4. Check the "Media Kind" box, then from the drop down menu beside it, select "Audiobook."

5. On the same screen, check the "Remember Position" box, then select "Yes" from it's drop down menu also.

6. Then click on "OK" and there! You should have a section for "books" or "audiobooks" listed on your itunes Library menu!

The rest of the tutorial will show you how to add a graphic if you choose to do so. 

Hope it helps someone else, too!

Favorite Quotes from Undead and Unwed by MaryJanice Davidson.

This book had me rolling with laughter. I definitely want to continue the series.

Here are some of my favorite quotes:

"Father," I said, "you have to help me."
"I'll be glad to help but I'm not a priest."
"I'm going to hell, and I didn't do a damned thing to deserve being damned. Except for that whole double homicide thing. But it was an accident! Plus, I should get points for saving Justine and her mom."
"I said I'm not a priest, miss. I'm the janitor. And this isn't a Catholic church--we're Presbyterians." -- pg 25

"I should shove my my fingers into his windpipe! Up his ass! Around his--" --pg 83

"I was fast, I was strong, I was...I was SpiderVamp!-- pg 84

"The thing that terrified me the most were zombie movies. After watching Resident Evil I had nightmares for a week. It was ironic, because now I was one of the unkillable monsters." -- pg 101. I mostly like that one for the R.E. reference :)

"I became gloriously transformed in 1972."
"That explains the nails and the bell bottoms."
"These are in again!" she nearly screamed, pointing to her Gap knockoffs. --pg 113

"If you ever- ever- accuse me of being prejudiced again, I will knock you on your fat ass. If you've got a problem with someone who treated wrong, go take it out on them." --pg 180

"I'd never talked to a former prostitute before. Oh, the questions I had! How was the money? Were the pimps as bad as they seemed in the movies? Was there a dental plan? .... Was pregnancy considered an on-the-job hazard by OSHA?" --pg 181

Fat Girl: A True Story by Judith Moore (Book Review)

I picked this book up at the Goodwill store last year as something to put on my shelf for a spur-of-the-moment read. The title caught my attention for obvious reasons.

Fat Girl is Judith Moore's experience of what it's like to be fat. In the preface she immediately lays down her point of view: she is fat but not a fat advocate, nor does she have an eating disorder or explain how she conquered fat with diets and what not. Instead she recounts several stories from her childhood and adult life; some humorous, some painful. Few were embarrassing to tell if they were my own, like how she broke in to the homes of people she knew to hang out and eat their food, or the encounter with the pedophile in the dark movie theater. However one story that sticks in my mind is when her chubby Dachshund, Lily, attacked some random skinny chick's KFC dinner. Still embarrassing, but it was an amusing story.

She also details the people that affected her "fat" life. Her beautiful, slim mother was hateful and disgusted with her daughter, told her she was ugly, and eventually wanted be called by her name and not by "Mama." Her absent father, who was also fat, had an obsession with food which eventually lead to the divorce of her parents when Moore was only 4. She always dreamed of being the pretty skinny child so that her parents would love her and have the perfect family relationship.

Moore never wants the reader to feel sorry for her, however I couldn't help but feel sad for most of her past experiences. Mostly because I can relate to them myself (and I can be a walking self-pity-party RAH RAH RAH!). Although, thankfully, I have never had to endure monthly weigh-ins at school where my poundage was embarrassingly announced in front of all my classmates. NIGHTMARE! And thankfully my mother never beat me just because I put on 10 extra pounds either. But the anxiety attacks, the negative/non-existent attention from peers, and how she grew a hatred for people yet yearned for their love and attention hit really close to home.

I started and finished reading it right before I left for Edmonton. Overall, I liked it and will keep it in my permanent library. And it gave me inspiration to keep moving on my elliptical while I was reading.

"The child might threaten the adult she had become." --Anita Brooker, quoted in Fat Girl: A True Story.

Edmonton, AB - Day 3: West Edmonton Mall

I think it's neat that it's almost 10 o'clock in the evening and the sun still hasn't set yet! It will go down soon tho, in about 30 minutes or so.

Today Ray took me to the Casino a short distance from his home and we had breakfast. It was actually my first time in a casino... aside from when I went into Harrah's in Shreveport, but I wasn't old enough to enter and stood outside by the million dollar wall while I waited for some friends. After we ate, he showed me around the place (very pretty wall water features!) and I got to play some slots! Didn't win anything tho. Poo.

Afterwards, we were on a journey to the University of Alberta (again) to find that darn S.U.B. and locate that bookcrossing zone. I wouldn't be so hard up for it if they hadn't mentioned they had manga there. We drove around a bit, but we finally found it. But lo, all the manga was gone. *cry*  But I did manage to grab one book to take back home with me, and I managed to drop 2 off at the zone 

After being stuck in a traffic jam for over 20 minutes, we made our way to West Edmonton Mall, which is the largest mall in the world. We spent a good 5 to 5.5 hours there. Finally got to try Tim Horton's coffee while I was there. What's a coffee lovers visit to Canada worth without trying Tim Horton's!? And lucky me, today they were giving away free small iced coffees  :D So I got one of those and an English Tofee Cappuccino. OMG they were so good! Ray got an Iced Cappa, but he didn't like it much, so I had his too! I was sugared up and caffinated! But I needed it for as much walking as we did. It's official, I'm hooked on Tim Horton's. I'm getting  more tomorrow.

I took lots of pics at West Edmonton Mall. Most are on my Facebook now, but I'll post them here too. But it's late and I'm going to watch Balls of Fury with Ray :P

Gigantic Picnic Basket!

No caption needed.

Sunken Ship

Edmonton, AB - Day 2: Whyte Avenue, University of Alberta, and Some Malls.

Ray took me up and down Whyte Avenue in the Old Strathcona district. We went to a lot of neat shops and a few bookstores. This is where that Warp 1 Comics shop is located. Ended up buying a few things from a bookstore called Chapters and I got some coffee at a chain called Second Cup. It wasn't very good.

Whyte Ave^

We went to the University of Alberta to hunt down a bookcrossing zone. Ray thought it might have been the Hub, but come to find out that the Hub is not the S.U.B (Student Union Building). We decided we'd try the next day on the way to West Edmonton Mall. BUT! I'm glad we went to the Hub anyway, because it was a dormatory/mall :O  

See the windows on the side? Those are dorm rooms. It's really just a lot of convenience store type shops and fast food. I ended up eating my lunch there, I got a Sukiyaki Beef bowl at a place called Edo Japan. There are several in Edmonton, and it was very tasty.

I visited two malls, Kingsway Garden Mall (where we went to the Oilers store and bought Josh a mini hockey stick!) and Bonnie Doon mall. Ray also took me on a scenic drive while going to Kingsway mall. I'll post pics in another post.

That's all we did around town. Then we mostly stayed back at his place and played some Wii bowling :P

The Latest with Peter S. Beagle

The February 22 edition of Peter S. Beagle's newsletter, The Raven, made several new announcements. The two that interested me are:

1.) Peter will be at the Scarborough Renaissance Festival on April 11-12 for a booksigning! It is part of what is called "The Peter S. Beagle Central Texas Tour."

2.) Peter has a new book called We Never Talk About My Brother. It has 9 new stories that he has been writting since 2006. Their goal is to try to sell more than 5,500 copies by the end of Match, so if you are interested, buy your copy here!

Peter S. Beagle is one of my favorite authors and I had the great honor of meeting him a couple years ago at A-kon 18. His most popular book (and one of my favorite stories since I was a child) is the The Last Unicorn. He also wrote the screenplay for the animated movie released in 1982, which featured the voice talents of Jeff Bridges, Christopher Lee, Mia Farrow, and Alan Arkin. Another screenplay by Beagle is the 1978 animated version of The Lord of the Rings, which was Peter Jackson's inspiration to read the Tolkien! 

Now onto the sad part, Peter S. Beagle has never seen a dime in royalties for either Lord of the Rings or The Last Unicorn. Hollywood cheated him out of his fair share of the money and others are reaping the rewards of his hard work. Connor Cochran (Peter's manager for over 4 years) and Conlan Press has been working diligently to get Peter the rewards he deserves. 

After much deliberation, Conlan Press and Lionsgate agreed to make the 25th Anniversary Edition of The Last Unicorn and it is now one of their best selling DVDs. But don't buy it from any store! Buy it directly from Peter's booth (if at a signing or convention) or the Conlan Press Website and he gets half the profit.

Right now Peter is fighting a lot of legal battles, and any support would be great! See what you can do at conlanpress.com/youcanhelp.