Mini-Update -- August 27, 2012

[Kevin]

Mini-Update, August 27, 2012

Good morning.

Halloween in August. We’ve all been dragging a bit since Gen Con, so I took Saturday off to catch my breath and spend the day with my sweetheart, Kathy Simmons. We ran some errands, but spent most of the day working on zombies for Kathy’s Queen of Ghouls ebay store. We created a female zombie that is scary as hell in dim lighting or illuminated in a spotlight at night; the photos don't do the piece justice. Kathy also sold one of her other “ghouls” over the weekend and has seen interest in several of the life-sized Halloween props in her store. They are all very cool and I enjoy helping her make them. I’m primarily responsible for tattering the clothing of zombies, adding blood splatters and painting in extra details like wounds, blood, and such. Another zombie is half finished and I have several articles of clothing and masks prepped and ready to go.

Kathy and I LOVE Halloween. It’s her favorite holiday and my second favorite (Christmas edges it out for me, but just barely), so we are already planning our 2012 Halloween display. Kathy goes all out and we have something like 80-90 life-sized props in her large front-yard with several different spooky scenes, including a horde of zombies. The display has become so popular we get hundreds of people a day showing up throughout October, and they come from within a 100 mile radius. How wild is that? The neighbors love it too, thank goodness. The display is usually up by the second weekend of October and takes 2-3 weeks to get it all set-up.

Sunday, I slept in till at 8:30 AM and didn’t get to the office til about 10:30 AM. I came in to take care of more business and worked till 6:30 PM. I cleared off the surface of my desk, filed papers, paid some bills, wrote my final Gen Con Murmur, and answered some emails. I’ve also been reorganizing much of the office and our work space so we can all function more efficiently.

Meanwhile, back at Palladium Books . . .

Alex has been busy scanning stacks of Robotech® Macross model sheets and references as we prepare for the needs of sculptors and designers to create Robotech® game pieces of mecha and spaceships. He’s got more to do over the next few days, but I’m very happy with our progress on this front.

Julius had the weekend off, but came to work to find a stack of orders for Rifts® Black Market™ and other books to ship.

Wayne is on vacation. He’s not back till after Labor Day. Lucky dog. It’s a much deserved break and with any luck, he’ll find piles of text waiting for him to edit.

I got an early start this morning and was on the road a little before 7:00 AM. I ran several errands before arriving at the office and getting to work.

I’ve been buried in business matters, booking convention space, taxes, coordinating various projects and keeping them moving forward, amongst other things. Writing this Murmur is likely to be the most fun part of the day. I'm almost done with the business matters and I should be able to dive into the creative end of work in a couple of days. I can’t wait to get back to writing Rifts® Vampires Sourcebook and editing Robotech® Genesis Pits, and getting them to printer.

Online sales. I’m happy to report that online sales continued to be very good over the weekend, with many people ordering Rifts® Black Market, The Rifter® #59, Rifts® Lemuria, Endless Dead™, and various other products. Folks seem to be purchasing a little bit of everything, with is nice to see. Please keep the orders coming. We are also shipping out the Rifts® Black Market PR copies today.

Everyone is highly motivated and moving full-steam ahead to keep everything progressing forward. I have a busy day ahead of me, so I need to run. I’ll have more to report tomorrow.

Sincerely,
Kevin Siembieda
Publisher, Writer, and Game Designer

© Copyright August 27, 2012 Palladium Books Inc. All rights reserved.

Rifts®, The Rifter®, RECON®, Splicers®, Palladium Books®, Phase World®, The Palladium Fantasy Role-Playing Game®, Megaverse®, Nightbane®, The Mechanoids®, The Mechanoid Invasion®, Coalition Wars® and After the Bomb® are Registered Trademarks of Palladium Books Inc. Heroes Unlimited™, Beyond the Supernatural, Dead Reign, Warpath, Shemarrian Nation, and other published book titles, names, slogans and likenesses are trademarks of Palladium Books Inc., and Kevin Siembieda.

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