Manic Mondays: Moving Forward!

Hello, My Happy People!

It's Dianne taking over the blog again. I have a feeling, moving forward, Stephen will just be doing Friday Funnies with Dad Jokes. I may even just change the blog to Author or Book Blog instead of Stephen's Blog.

In preparation for branching out as Dianne Burckhardt and exploring a few more genres in my writing, I'm trying to go a bit more generic on things connected to my webpage and books. Today, I updated my podcast and changed it from Whatever Wednesdays to Book Banter with Dianne Burckhardt.

I have already updated the podcast logo with an up to date photo of myself which I think better represents who I really am. I have always been a bit eclectic and I think it is time to bring everything in line with that as I start to release books actually associated with me. I am done hiding behind "Stephen".

I am also excited to tell you that yesterday I wrenched some money out of my savings account (That is so hard for me to do) and purchased the interface I need to hook up the new microphone to my computer programs. I cannot wait until it gets here.

This interface has some amazing features I am dying to try out. For example, I had a hard time getting good sound quality for the two guests I interviewed on my podcast. I was using Messenger to do the interview and their voices were just coming over my computer and was picked up in my microphone. After the interviews, I adjusted the sound in my audio editing program. It was a LOT of editing.

Now, with the new interface, I can connect my cell phone to the interface and call my guest or use an app like Messenger on my phone and the sound goes directly into the interface. I could actually even take callers on my podcast now. It also has some amazing special effects controls that will help me when I am doing the different voices for my audiobooks. I'm really looking forward to trying this all out soon! I can even add more tech later if I want, like a sound mixing board if I want to do more with music and sound effects.

Tomorrow will be devoted to recording my podcast for the week and then I'm joining my writers group in the evening to work on getting back into the right mindset to finish this last book in my Into the West Saga Serial Collection, Into the West: Family Ties. I have allowed myself to procrastinate more than long enough and it's time to put on my big girl pants on and get it DONE! I have identified my issues that have been keeping me from working on it and I'm facing them head on now. Part of that was not wanting to leave the comfort of hiding behind Stephen Burckhardt, but it's time to get over that and take some risks so I can finish building this career.

I do need your help with a new name for those of you who have been following me. Up until now I have been referring to you all as my "posse," but since I will be branching out into more genres, I wanted to find something a bit more generic and not so "western centric".

My family and I have joked about a few different ones. My husband and I have always said we are weird and we revel in that so we have come up with: 1. My Weirdos 2. Bibliomaniacs 3. BookFiends 4. Rav-ers (Ravenous Readers) 5. or just stick with My Happy People which I have started using recently. None of them are great, so if you have suggestions I'm more than happy to hear them. I will be getting the poll up on Dianne Burckhardt - Author on Facebook this week so you can vote on the name. In the meantime, I will try to come up with some better ones, promise.

So that is it for today, Rav-ers? My Weirdos? My Happy People? (We'll figure this out)

Have a great Monday!

Dianne