Saturday, March 21, 2020

Time to Read

Hello everyone,
If you’re like many people I know, you’re going to have a lot of time on your hands over the next few weeks, perhaps months.
As my inbox flooded with emails from CEOs across the country telling me what they were doing to help me through this time, I started to feel like a bit of a laggard. I mean, here are all these folks running multimillion/billion dollar companies (boring!) with all this great info about how they will continue to stock toilet paper for when we need it most, how drive-thrus will be operational, and how I will somehow still be insured after all this is behind us. Important stuff to be sure, but what was I doing? How was I going to fill the unimportant void in your life when you aren’t making use of the drive-thru or the 200 hundred rolls toilet paper? 
What could I possibly offer that isn’t covered by these two industries? In times like these, what could anyone possibly want besides food and toilet paper?
And then it hit me.
Now, if you’re thinking, “Holey Moley, Rey’s gonna give me some free art!” you can just hold your horses right there. The kind of art I do takes a lot of time, and I’m not about to just start handing away these tiny chunks of my soul for nothing. But on the other hand, what about writing? I mean, honestly, anyone can be an author these days. That’s why I became one! You can practically write in your sleep, while your driving to work, or while you’re travelling (if you didn’t catch the typo in that sentence, put the kibosh on you becoming a writer any time soon).
So, that big idea. What could I possibly have that might be interesting to you in times like these? Where we are stuck at home for weeks on end with enough toilet paper to last three pandemics? With thoughts of travelling to interesting places completely banished from our hopes and dreams?
Aha.
To that end, I’ve made my first book, Today I Ate Cow Stomach, available online for free for anyone who wishes to click the link below. DO NOT WORRY! This is not some link to a page that will ask you to pay for my other two books, whereupon you will get my first book free….although, that’s probably not a bad idea, and reason number one as to why I’m not the CEO of my own billion-dollar empire. 

Regardless, click the link below and you will be taken directly to the site hosting my book. You do not have to pass go or have a get-out-of-jail free card (not that that makes any sense) in order to access the book. It is free. Free as in “no money required.” You simply need to have an interest in travel, perhaps a desire to look at glorious, colour-filled pages of exotic destinations only marginally cramped by my mindless bouts of chatter. Actually no, that’s not true. It’s not mindless, but there is a lot of it, but that’s the charm of being me. An opinion on everything that isn’t about fast food or toilet paper.
If you have a friend or relative or neighbour who is interested in travel, feel free to pass this link on to them. I just know they will thank you for it because you are a good person.

For those of you who don’t know, Today I Ate Cow Stomach is about my family’s travels through Italy, Greece, Turkey, Syria, Jordan, and Egypt, the first 137 days of our 275-day trip around the world a number of years ago. Loads of stories, hundreds and hundreds of photos of beautiful places, and some artwork as well. So I guess in a way there is free art involved!

Please know that I am not in any way making light of the situation we now find ourselves in. This is serious business, and likely the only way we’ll get through this is if those of us who are deemed “not essential” hunker down at home for a long period of time. In order to make at least some of those weeks go by a little quicker (it’s a long book) and more enjoyably, I thought I’d offer up Today I Ate Cow Stomach.

Stay well in these interesting times, and enjoy the read.
Again, pass this on to anyone who may be interested.


Rey







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