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Since it seems the big publishers in Utah like to have full paper copies of your manuscript for consideration, and since the last time I printed the whole thing I ran out of black ink and had to print about 100 pages in color (sorry Hillary!) for my thesis advisor, I decided to look into printing it at a shop. This would also save me from nursing the printer since I can only print like 20 pages at a time from my little baby.

Yeah. I called Kinko's. The guy said it would be $25 for my 252 pages. Eesh. I guess it makes sense. And even thinking about the competition of myself doing it, I realized that it wouldn't be that much less for the paper and the ink cartridges I'd go through. But eesh. Eager for a sale, he continued "if you print multiple copies, you might get a discount." "Okay, how about five?" "[numbers, numbers, numbers, calculation words, numberes] comes to about $99--that's 40% off!" Eesh. Do I really want five copies? Is simultaneous submission really worth $100?

When money's tight, I have a hard time justifying that. He concluded by telling me they price matched, so if I found it cheaper anywhere else, they'd match the price. Well, that's nice, I thought. Thanks. But eesh was still running through my brain. Maybe I'll try to publish on the national market where I'd only have to worry about the first three chapters.

So I know there's one Utah/unofficial LDS publisher that accepts emailed ms's, but their Author Questionnaire kind of indicated they wanted any sequels to be ready within a year. That's another eesh. (Though if you're reading this, sorry. I might still try you :). I have even gone ahead and started writing the sequel.)

That was a few days ago I called. But today, after this over two months of unemployment, well, let's just say I might still consider petitioning Congress on that bill. Seriously, we're in a recession. If I'd known that when I was contemplating quitting my last temp agency, maybe I would have proceeded differently. I'm still not sure though. I've run the feelings I was having at that time over and over in my mind, and I'll admit I probably made a mistake. But it might have just been time to quite anyway. Regardless, in this slump of job searching, I've of course thought that if my book sells, I might make some money, probably more than enough to cover that $25 dollars to print it. Finally today, I decided to go ahead and print it.

After making sure the latest copy was saved on my stick, ready to take to Kinko's, I had this other thought. Hm. They match prices. That must mean there are other companies. Duh, I knew that. At the job I had from February through June this year, I had to call several copy places to see if they would do a certain kind of print job and then again to see if they had a certain cartridge. Both times, I ended up walking quite a distance, once in a terrible downpour in my worst pair of shoes with a cruddy umbrella. Maybe that's why I blocked it.

But hey, it's not raining today. Thanks for unblocking me Kinko's! So, where are these, your competitors? I quickly did a Google search "copy centers near 22306," and a list pulled up. Staples. Well, that kind of makes sense. This other place on Belleview, near where I live. Interesting. I called them both--both had better deals than Kinko's. Staples had $.09 per page plus $2 handling fee. The Belleview place $.07 per page and $5 handling fee. Wow. Belleview was closer. That sounded pretty decent, even, too.

In the mean time, I had another errand to take care of in Old Town Alexandria, so I headed up there to take care of that, then was just going to stop by Belleview on the way back. But lo and behold, on my way to the building in Old Town, I see ABC printing on the corner--same building. Since I'm here, I might as well ask, I thought. Good thing I did too. $.07 per page and no handling fee. Wahoo. Now if that don't beat all.

So, of course I could get a quote from them and run it over to Kinko's. Riiight.