February 11, 2007

Site wide 3 day sale

20% off all books in stock.

For the next 3 days every order gets an extra 20% off. Offer ends at midnight EST Feb. 14, 2007.

Posted by derstaffo at 11:29 AM | Comments (0)

January 22, 2007

Is google book search fair use?

Is google book search fair use? Thats the name this pod-cast that was posted on Jan. 9, 2007. And it brings up some really good points. Some of which that can have far reaching effects, even outside of the publishing industry. And possibly even put some businesses out of business. Because it would require redefining what fair use is. And what it can be used for.

After you watch this let me know what your thoughts are.

Posted by derstaffo at 04:05 PM | Comments (0)

January 01, 2007

Winners, Winners, Winners ALL.....

But only 3 get the top place....

As you may, or not as the case may be, know I help sponsor and judge the Brighid's Fire Books Annual Fiction Contest. This year was a challenge to get through, and well, having good reading material helped to keep me from being washed away with the flood waters. for that I have to thank all of you that entered. You kept my summer from being just clean-up work.

As our custom as early as possible on the 1st. we announce the winners. So forward on to the winners.

Grand Prize — Reclamation by Robert Mestrovic (Action/Adventure)
2nd. Place — Born To Lead by Todd Howard (Thriller)
3rd. Place — Elysia by Rachael Haring (Fantasy)

Congratulations!

Dawn will be getting in contact with the winners soon.

Official contest announcement and rules are hear.

Posted by derstaffo at 12:31 AM | Comments (0)

December 25, 2006

Merry X-Mass

As I wait for the rest of the house hold to wake for Christmas morning, A green Christmas at that here in New York, I thought I'd shout out to all who stop in — Have a Marry Christmas!

And if you don't happen to return before 2007, Have a safe New Year.

Posted by derstaffo at 10:44 AM | Comments (0)

November 14, 2006

Updated Shipping Prices

I have not gotten much in the way of stock up onto the site for sale as of yet, so I'm not sure that I'll be running much in the way of sales this Christmas. Although I'm sure I'll be doing something between Thanksgiving and Christmas. So watch for it.

In the meantime I have lowered the additional shipping prices for domestic mailing. The additional shipping exists because it is too hard to figure out the weight of an order because the weight of every book differs.

For each additional hard cover, was $1.00 — Now $0.75

and for each additional paperback, was $0.25 — Now $0.15

Don't forget that basic shipping charges are waved on orders over $25.00.

Posted by derstaffo at 02:21 PM | Comments (0)

November 09, 2006

Latest word in the flood recovery

The latest is that I have been denyed the state grant money from the NYS Department of Labor's Individual and Family Flood Grant. Now I get the pleasure of going through their appeals system. More paperwork and longer to wait to see what I can do to rebuild.

They said that the books were not covered by the grant. So much for business inventory being covered. I wonder if thats the reason behind 5 or 6 businesses on the main street closeing? Because they were declined this help and as a result had little or no inventory left to sell, sitting in a ruined store....

Of course this also means that I'm automatically declined for the Small Business Grant as well, even though I was preapproved for that one. There goes 20,000 dollars right out the window.

Posted by derstaffo at 08:27 AM | Comments (0)

November 03, 2006

Well Halloween is over

And the trick was played on us.

The furnace came in, I even helped get it into the basement and set in place. Thought we were in for a nice treat, namely heat.... The trick was that somewhere between the manufacturer and us is the flange for the duct work and a water heating coil.

So its the ultimate tease, a furnace that we can't use yet.

We're still waiting for windows and insulation too. So, I'm cold. And my fingers still don't want to work write.... I keep them wrapped around the coffee cup till they're warm then I type a sentence or two, then back to the cup for more warmth.

In other news, I'm still supplying documentation to NYS for the grant funds, so that is still up in the air. But its a source of nice thought for the cold nights. Even if I do hate all the paperwork involved.

And last Monday I had the pleasure of driving Congressional House Candidate Kirsten Gillibrand around Sidney. Something I should have written about when it happened. But I've been busy and cold, well busy being cold. But I was able to get a receiving ear on what my issues are. Unlike others that I've talked to she actually came across as real and genuine.

Lastly I have a number of books that I have sorted out and ready to go into stock. Its only the cold that has me stopped. Well not totaly, yesterday was working the new Shop Harlequin site adding stock.

Enough of my bitching about the cold. I'm going to go and get this documentation to NYS.

Posted by derstaffo at 11:17 AM | Comments (0)

October 31, 2006

Halloween

Trick or Treat....

I'll know in an hour or two...

Workmen are scheduled to be here today, to install the new furnace that is also to be delivered today. So this will be the ultimate treat and I'll be warm or the worst trick and I'll have to hunt down the workmen and haunt them after I die of the cold!

Also I'm still waiting to see if my grant applications have been approved or denied. I'm hopeing to find out more information soon. It would be a nice treat if my applications were approved.

Posted by derstaffo at 07:30 AM | Comments (0)

October 26, 2006

Scratch that last post...

I got a call yesterday from the Empire Small Business Flood Grant telling me that the deadline for documentation was extended. Pushed out to March 31st. And asking me if I wanted to reconsider withdrawing my application.

Up to 5 months instead of 2 to rebuild the inventory with the grant money. Ok, this sounds more doable to me. So I'm going ahead with the application. The other strings that are tied to this grant (and I don't even think I know them all) I can work with.

Now I just need to wait to see if I'm approved for the smaller grant from NYS. From where I sit, everything seems to now hang on the approval of the smaller one. Looks like an all or nothing deal...

Posted by derstaffo at 07:58 AM | Comments (0)

October 24, 2006

Its official I turned down free money

Well its official, I turned down $20,000 in free grant money from the government.

Sounds strange don't it? I'm sure that the lady who was working my claim thought I was just a little crazy. And I'm sure that she was a bit disapointed that I gave up on the money. I think she also felt bad for me that I lost so much, then to turn down the grant.

But I din't think I could handle the strings attached. One major string was a time limit on spending the money. It would be ok if I was stocking new books and could just call up an account rep to order more, but because of the kinds of books I have listed and what I want to continue to stock, I need to research my purchase decisions and that takes time. I just can't spend that kind of money in the time limit they gave.

I made the mistake of buying everything I could get my hands early on. And because of that there were books that even after dropping the price by over 2/3 and giving sales ontop, they still sat in inventory 6 years later.

This was one of the toughest decisions I've had to make sense I started selling on-line in late 1998.

Posted by derstaffo at 11:17 PM | Comments (0)

Its hard to think when your cold

Its getting cold, and colder, each day here. And its hard to think about anything when your cold. Or at least I find it hard to think about anything that isn't about how cold I am.

There is still no furnace in my little hobbit hole, our local heating oil supplyer refuses to make a delivery until the construction crew in charge of putting in the fuel tanks finish with the second tank (which is still being waited on), and last night what fuel we had ran out so there is no hot water ether.

I haven't even been able to curl up with a good book to help wait it out because all I do is shiver. That is when I'm not helping others winterize there homes. Not that it helps me any.

And the fun dosn't stop there. The past three months I've been filling out paperwork and doing what I have to to quilify for the NYS grants for flood victoms. And I can't say that it was fun doing so.

The other day I found out that who ever was in charge of my claim at the NYSDoL never inputted my information, so the process was stalled and I basicaly had to reaply.

And it looks like I'm going to have to turn down the larger small business grant because of some restrictions on money use that I don't think I can meet. So I'm going to be back to square one again in building up.

Posted by derstaffo at 09:15 AM | Comments (0)

October 16, 2006

almost nothing to do with books but I wanted to let you all know that I'm still here

I haven't written anything of great importance in quite awhile, nor have I held a sale or worked on any marketing of my wares. Sense the flood that happened at the end of June, I've been filling out paperwork, sorting and counting books — one to be listed, one to be tossed — and finish up some of the odd programming tasks that I was in the middle of when this whole adventure started.

It's been my luck though that it is taking much longer to sort through the books. And because of that I've ended up taking on a part-time job with a local contractor to help make ends meet while I rebuild. Which is having the lovely effect of making the rebuild process take even longer.

Final woe is that I've gotten sick. Nothing major but a good enough head cold that I haven't wanted to a blessed thing in days. Well I guess that's what happens when cold weather is setting in and you don't have a furnace to keep the house warm. There seems to be some sort of a fight going on between my land lord and the mortgage company in releasing the insurance money to get the jobs paid for.

Well I know that this has almost nothing to do with books but I wanted to let you all know that I'm still here, that I'm still trying my darn best to find those obscure titles, and strange research pieces.

Ok, we have workmen coming in about twenty minuets, and I'm not sure what their going to do. So I'll leave it here for now, just in case they cut the power for some strange reason.

Posted by derstaffo at 07:15 AM | Comments (0)

October 02, 2006

Brighid's Fire Books/LughnassadhBooks.com Fiction Manuscript Contest Finalists

I got together with Dawn from Brighid's Fire Books yesterday, to come up with this years finalists in the Fiction Manuscript Contest. This morning Dawn made the official announcement. Below is a copy of that announcement.

-----

Greeetings!

Wow! Usually, our summer reading stint makes for lovely summer leisure but this year has been a real challenge.

Back in late June, the Susquehanna and Delaware Rivers seriously flooded dozens of communities in upstate New York — perhaps you saw the reports on the national news. It so happens that both Brighid's Fire Books and LughnassadhBooks.com have our headquarters in a building that is right across the street from the Susquehanna.

We wound up going through the entire evacuation shelter ordeal, followed by an enchanting summer of flood cleanup and repair. (If you want to see Derek's photo essay, click here and scroll down the page.)

For awhile, we considered cancelling the contest again this year, figuring it was going to be tough to get through all the entries while dealing with the whole federally declared disaster area cha-cha. But we decided not to. This contest was still the high point of the summer.

In any event, and without any further ado, here are this year's ten finalists (in no particular order):

   1. Secrets by Kim Dahl (Mystery)
   2. Elysia by Rachael Haring (Fantasy)
   3. Reclamation by Robert Mestrovic (Action/Adventure)
   4. Keeping Secrets by Cathi Stoler (Mystery/Suspense)
   5. Born To Lead by Todd Howard (Thriller)
   6. The Heartstone by Lisa Finnegan (Fantasy)
   7. Risen by Michael LaMarche (Fantasy)
   8. Foxes in the Vineyard by Michael Cooper (Thriller)
   9. Blood Relations by S. H. Armstrong (Horror)
  10. Dominique by Thea Childs (Mystery)

Finalists should forward a submission-ready manuscript — clear and legible, double spaced, one inch margins all around the page, numbered pages, and with headers that include a short name of the novel and the author's surname — to Brighid's Fire Books, c/o Wahmpreneur Publishing, Inc., P.O. Box 41, Sidney, NY 13838.

Overseas finalists (those not living within the 48 contiguous Untied States) may forward an electronic copy of their manuscript to info@brighidsfirebooks.com (we know about international postage fees). Please scan before you send.

We will announce our first, second and third place winners on New Year's Day, January 1, 2007. Congratulations to our ten finalists, and our thanks to all who entered.

Cheers!

Dawn Rivers Baker
Brighid's Fire Books

Derek Stafford
LughnassadhBooks.com

Posted by derstaffo at 09:54 AM | Comments (0)

September 24, 2006

update 3 months after the flood

Small update on how things are going with the clean-up/rebuild. As you know from reading the posts here, the flood waters did some major damage at the end of June. I've been steadily weeding out the secondarily damaged books sense the initial push to clean out the soaked and mildewing books. The secondary damaged books have been a little harder to find. And I have to go box by box, book by book and check every one of them.

In the mean time I have also been working on the back end of the site. Fixing the bug that took down the search feature, doing a redesign of the site, sorting out the stock list, adding new shops to the mix, and doing the final push to read the last of the contest entries for the Brighid's Fire Books Fiction Manuscript Contest.

Last Thursday I finally heard from the State of NY about my small business flood grant application. And had an inspector come out to see that I and the books were real. So I have hope.

But its taking some time. So adding to the mix of things I'm doing, I've also started working in the neighborhood doing odd jobs to earn enough to keep these shops going until things turn around and the shops start paying for them selves again.

After things start to calm down a little my next major project is to rewrite my short book on books. And I think add a wish list to the new Shop Harlequin site.

Posted by derstaffo at 08:44 AM | Comments (0)

September 08, 2006

The search feature is back on-line

I was able to get the basics fixed. Although, if your used to say Google then this little search may drive you a little batty. It is really very basic and simple. Keywords are the best bet for simplifying the results at this time. Full titles and phrases are a touch and go thing until I get all the bugs worked out. But I didn't want too much more time to pass without some sort of a search feature, even if it is basic. I'll keep working on it, so that future versions will have better search results.

Posted by derstaffo at 12:39 PM | Comments (0)

August 26, 2006

New Shops

In the midst of re-organizing I've broken up LughnassadhBooks into different shops and yet combined them all into one. Consider them departments if you like, Each with its own catalog of books, each with its own q&a, but all contained at LughnassadhBooks.

Think Macy's:
First floor - Mens wear
Second floor - Childrens wear and toys
Third floor - Lady's lingerie

Or more to the point

First floor - LughnassadhBooks.com Non-fiction books
Second floor - LughnassadhBooks.com Shop Harlequin
Basement - DLS-Antiques Collectable Odds & Ends

Posted by derstaffo at 02:52 PM | Comments (0)

August 18, 2006

I don't think it will ever end

Dealing with the house has come to a stand still while everyone waits for the insurance company. And paperwork for the state grant programs is in processing, again not much I can do until the next phase. So I've been trying to push forward in sorting and cleaning books and working on the database.

Being a one person operation has its points but when you get to a situation of "I'm trying to do everything" it can burn you out, fast. Thats what happend to me. I got overwheled.

It was depressing enough to have to throw away the first 30,000 but even now the stacks are growing smaller. I've thrown out more than 5,000 books due to secondary damages. Seaped dampness, dirt and mud, water stains, mold, and ripped covers from when the stacks of boxes and books shifted and fell.

I've gotten to the point of it might be saved but it's not worth enough to bother with. So books like the one in the below picture are getting throwen out.

It may be hard to tell in the picture but the book is speckled with river mud on the cover. The mud came from another box when I was doing the initial cleaning, at least thats what I speculate happened. Things were in a state of chaos.

It goes against my frugal nature to do this, but I'm overwhelmed and depressed over the whole thing.

Posted by derstaffo at 08:32 AM | Comments (0)

August 06, 2006

Photo Essay Epilogue

Its now been a month since the flood waters had receded. Life is starting to show signs of being normal. But it has gotten unusually quiet. I'm not talking about sounds of construction and clean up. But instead the sounds of people. A lot of the renters home and business alike have moved or are moving. Leaving neighborhoods with only scattered families living there. Its eerie to go through a section of lower Sidney and only see people every so often — when it used to be that every house and apartment had someone living in it.

On the home front, I'm just getting to a point that I can dedicate full time back to the business of books. As you may have noticed the stock lists are starting to get some listings back into them.

But its been slow going. I've been working along side the contractors to help the work go quicker. Instead of working full time on the catalog of books. Well, I get tired of the electric cutting out because of bad wiring, I never want to take another cold shower in my life, and it was just yesterday that the rest of the old equipment from the basement was finally removed getting rid of most of the rest of a fuel oil smell in the basement.

So now the rebuilding can start.

Working from a home office has its advantages. But in cases like this, it also means that your disturbed a lot. And you get to a point where you just want it to be done and over with.

I finally got around to applying to FEMA for their grant money, only to get turned down and sent to the SBA. As I knew I would be. It was a joke, but they require that you have a paper-trail.

The SBA wanted to give me a loan. Another joke. As if I could pay for a loan having lost more than 70% of my stock to flood waters. And little to no sales as I try to rebuild here — the site, the office, the home....

It may take another month before things really settle, but at least normality is creeping back. A little more each day.

Posted by derstaffo at 09:39 AM | Comments (0)

July 24, 2006

Changing face

As I'm going through all the books that are left, I'm realizing just how broad I had gotten. And how far from my original mission of bringing knowledge to those that are looking for it, I had strayed.

My tag line "Planting the seeds of yesterday for the dreams of tomorrow" was ment to convey just that. A place where one could come to find books of knowledge and research materials.

But I had let myself be destracted by the fiction. And while its fun to deal in fiction, its not practical for what my main mission of this site was. So I'm returning to the basics of my mission, the Nonfiction.

Later after I get resituated I may open up a sub-store for fiction but that's down the road, for now.

Posted by derstaffo at 09:38 AM | Comments (0)

July 21, 2006

Back in business

Well, I'm no where near ready to hold a "Grand Opening" yet, but I do finally have some books in stock.

Posted by derstaffo at 02:31 PM | Comments (0)

July 19, 2006

Flood Picture Essay Part 5

Thursday 7-6-2006

The National Guard was set up at the bridge and I still couldn't get to my warehouseing. So we spent the main portion of the time working on cleaning up the grounds.

Where we did get hit was major. Even though we were one of the lucky ones. Our neighbors lost everything on the first floor.

This log was moved from my side yard. It went around a telephone pole, the house, and went up against the fence and missed the car in front of it. Doing no damage to anything.

Monday 7-10-2006 The bridge's are opened, YAY!

Finally I can get out to see the damage that happened to the boxes of books.

My warehouse is little more than a 14x22 foot storage unit but its precious space. We took out some of the boxes of books in the front just so that I could get a clear picture.

You can see the jumble of boxes and books here from where they were tossed and spilled. You wouldn't know to look at it but I did have a sort of orginization to the boxes of books.

As you can see in the picture, the boxes that were closest to the ground were hit the worst. The water got up to the bottom of the fourth box, completly destroying the books that were contained in them. The books in the fourth boxes in the stacks were destroyed just because it took so long to be able to get there, they had soaked up water from the boxes below.

Then there were the ones on top that should have been fine but they fell over.

The closer to the bottom of the stacks we got in the cleaning the more saturated and slimy the books were. River water is probably one of the worst things for books. (Under statment of the year, I know.)

I and 3 volunteers worked for 3 days cleaning and sorting books. Near the end of the third day another person who was cleaning out their rental unit showed up with a backhoe. I solicited his machine, and him to drive it, to help with the clean up. He did in 20 minuets the equilivant of what I did in one day.

In three days we moved about 30,000 books into a dumpster and sorted most of the 20,000 that was left removing damaged ones.

Monday 7-17-2006 Going through and starting the inventory of what is left.

The warehouse looks a bit empty.

But as one of my subscribers mentioned, look at the room that I now have to work with. Not the way I want to do a cleaning, I perfer to be a bit more selective, but it was effective.

Of course this doesn't cover what was contained in the second unit. I had appropiated space from my father's rental unit to contain even more. But he had already gotten rid of many of the books that were there. And I can only guess what they were or how much they were worth.

So to conclude this little essay, its not over....

The water has receded and the clean up is, well, mostly done for many of the inhabitants. But the work has just begun. Now everyone is in holding patterns waiting for contractors, insurance companies, inspecters, and the government to get to them.

The insanity has not gone away, but a type of normaility has begun to creap back into our lives. As we see the ice cream truck starting to make its rounds again, and the streets slowly become clean again.

Posted by derstaffo at 02:31 PM | Comments (2)

Flood Picture Essay Part 4

Monday 7-3-2006

The flood waters had finally receded enough so that we were aloud back into lower Sidney. With Police, Firemen, Emergency Squads, Forest Rangers, E.P.A., D.O.C.-NYC and the National Guard clamoring over every street. We, the inhabitants stood at the RR Crossing waiting for the Mayor to give us a speech and announce that we could return to our homes.

After the speech, long lines formed and everyone signed liability wavers against accidents. Sign in - Sign Out.

The town smelled of fuel oil and raw sewage. There was mud and muck 3 inches deep every where.

So home I went. The first thing I saw was a brown line on the house wall.

About 3 feet or a little more.

Here is me standing in front of the water mark to give some perspective.

When I went in I was shocked.

These stains were all the damage there was to the first floor. They were caused from the underside where the water was sloshing around in the basement.

There wasn't even any secondary damage to the boxes of books I had sitting in the corner. Of course I had picked up what of the loose ones before the flood and put them on top of the desk.

So, I grabbed some changes of clothes for everyone, after checking the inside and headed back to the shelter to get every one else.

Tuesday 7-4-2006 - Happy Independence Day!

That it was, with the coming of the Red Cross and the Gestapo authority they wielded, we had taken our leave of the evacuation center. Now the only rule we had to worry about was the 6PM curfew.

No electric, no phone, and a lot of work ahead of us. But we were home....

We all did a collective sigh of relief, for the first time in six days I slept more than 3 hours.

The only thing that we did that day was to get some pictures.

Here you can see the inside of the landing and how close it came to the first floor. The black line is the water mark.

Who ever designed and built this house expected there to be flooding. The foundation is almost two feet higher than that of almost every other house on the block and it sits also on a mound about a foot higher than all the other yards.

Here again is the stairs to the basement. There is about 3-4 feet of water.

For perspective, The washer in the back ground sits on a 12 inch concreate pedistal.

During this time I'm freating about the books that I have stored across the river. We are still an island, cut off from every one until the engineers finish their inspection of all the bridges. And that can't happen until the water receds even more.

Wendsday 7-5-2006 Clean up

This picture was taken Wendsday 7-5-2006. The water was still a raging torrent, but at least it was back into its standard flood plains and out of most of the village.

The village looks like a war zone!

The park's restroom with sink holes. Looks like a bomb hit near by.

Service Road next to the restroom.

Behind the camera is a water dug trench 8 feet wide, 3 feet deep, and about 350 feet long that used to be the rest of the road. It ends at the river for a rescue boat launch.

Piles of water damaged stuff littered the streets. Adding to the ambiance of a war that took place.

With our own war against the raveges of nature, we here could care less that Isrial was conducting the start of a real war or that we still had troops in Iraq fighting. Our wold began and ended with the river banks.

Flood Picture Essay Part 5: Aftermath and life goes on.

Posted by derstaffo at 08:53 AM | Comments (0)

Flood Picture Essay Part 3

Okay, the clean up job of yesterday is now complete. I just watched the town pick up and haul off the fruites of my labors. And the rest of the day was spent doing inventory. So now on with the story.

Saturday 7-1-2006 The flood waters crest on the Susquehanna River.

When I left off the East Sidney Lake had finally crested and the water was running over the spillway for the first time in its history sence it was built in 1936.

This caused the third spike in water levels. Adding another 2 feet to the river. It also caused another wave of evacuations in the town. Adding about another 75 - 100 people to the center. Of course others had people who they could go stay with, so there were a lot more evacuees than who we saw.

On top of the problem of water was two others, causing some to be evacuated even though the water didn't get closer than 100 feet from their homes. One was that the sewage treatment plant in Oneanta failed and dumped close to 35,000 tons of raw sewage. The other was that in the middle of the village of Sidney is a manufacture that uses some very toxic materials. And it was under 3 feet of water on the inside.

Sidney Amphenol Corp.

Here the water has dropped a foot or more from crest. Notesible as the dark spot on the telephone poll.

The only good thing was that the waters carried much of what leaked away from the village proper. I feel for those down stream though.

Heres some pictures that give a good view of what the town looked like.

To give you a idaea of the water level, the ramps in the foreground are in a parking lot about 2 feet up from the banks parking lot and they stand another 3 feet. That puts the water on the doors at about 4 and a half feet, down from the crest in this picture of about 5 feet.

Here is an overview of the town or about half of the lower portion of it. The brown waters of the mighty Suquhanna can be seen running around the buildings.

Of course villigers wern't the only ones that were affected. Animals that couldn't make it to higher ground sought refuge where they could.

These buildings were deemed unsafe after the waters receded, displacing businesses and people who rented the upstairs apartments.

This is Division St. about half way up our Main St. The water here was running at about 20 MPH. No drinking at this bar today!

Flood Picture Essay Part 4: Monday 7-4-2006 Clean up starts.
Flood Picture Essay Part 5: Aftermath and life goes on.

Posted by derstaffo at 07:36 AM | Comments (0)

July 18, 2006

I have to take a short break

I have to take a short break from everything I've been doing here. We found more damage that has to be taken care of. Areas that one would never think about.

If I'm not too tired I'll try to get Part 3 posted later today.

Posted by derstaffo at 09:08 AM | Comments (0)

July 17, 2006

Flood Picture Essay Part 2

The town pulls togethor. With no out side help, the Village of Sidney pulled togethor to help those in trouble. The local small businesses effected or not by the flooding pooled togethor to provide. People who were not effected and many that were donated to the shelter what they could. The school opened up their food reserves and local stores donated food, water, soda, etc. Local resturants provided us with hot meals. Drug stores donated medicen for those that left it home during the evacuation. There was a steady stream. With up to 250 of us there it was a blessing.

It wasn't until Monday the 3rd that anyone from the Red Cross showed up in town. And FEMA didn't show up until Saturday the 8th. On the 13th along with United Way and the Salvation Army, the social workers started to make the rounds.

On the Saturday before, the National Guard took over the center but they were cool and worked with us, especialy after I and Dawn had a long talk with the Captain in charge and the School's Super. This was a very good thing because it was just ealyer that day that some lady from the NYS Board of Health had stopped by and effectivly told everyone off, with one very nasty chip on her sholder about how the volunteers were running the shelter.

She tried to put prison rules in place, and when a few of the evacuees and volunteers stood up to her about it, she had them arrested and removed. She put in place rules like the Firemen get hot meals, even if its the ones donated by the local businesses for us and we get sandwitches. No leaving the center, doors are locked at 6PM, we're to be locked into the gym at 9PM with only the bathroom accrssable. No outside food was to be brought in by evacuees. And other stuped rules.

Thank goodness she never returned, and when one Fireman asked about the duel line for dinner, the next day it was disbanded. Monday when the Red Cross took over the center it became a prison camp. And things that hadn't been happening like theft and fights started to occure. Wednesday they moved everyone to Bainbridge, then that night to Walton. I don't know how many went, we left Monday morning to go home.

No power, bad water, and a 6PM curfew. But at least we were out of the now prison camp that used to be an evacuation center.

I've lost what little respect I had left for these orginazations.

I'll admit we were in a bit of a pickle, being an island of sorts. With views like this downtown and bridges out.

Car Dealer Parking Lot

Main St.

Every road around us looked like this if you could get across the bridges to see it.

The reason for the town curfew was to stop theft. Of course you want to stop people from stealing ruined junk, right?

This was the view of the town. Junk every where. People lost their whole first floors. And it all ended up out by the street.

The other reason for the curfew was to know who was and was not supposed to be in the village proper.

Hoses in the streets were a common site for weeks.

But I'm getting a head of myself here. I need to take a step back and finish the story.

More to come:
Flood Picture Essay Part 3: Saturday 7-1-2006 The flood waters crest on the Susquhana River.
Flood Picture Essay Part 4: Monday 7-4-2006 Clean up starts.
Flood Picture Essay Part 5: Aftermath and life goes on.

Posted by derstaffo at 01:39 PM | Comments (1)

Flood Picture Essay Part 1

I did say that I would get some pictures posted of the flood and the aftermath. So here it goes, part one of a photo essay of my experience of the flood. Sorry I don't have much from the evacuation center, I ran out of pictures on my digital cameria.

Some of these pictures are from submitions to The Daily Star photo gallery
To see the full size pictures right click and choose view image.

Tuesday 6-27-2006 Main St. Sidney Bridge

Everything seemed fine, high water but nothing we hadn't delt with before. Life is normal and good. Latter that night the fire/rescue siren went off, calling out the firefighters and rescuers, to start the evacuation of the lowest lieng areas. Us in town think nothing of it, As I said we've seen high water before.

Our first warning about the impending flood was this I88 accedent.

Although for us it was a knock on the door and the nighbor telling us that we were to evacuate ASAP. Couldn't argue, there was water running right up the street.

This is the River St. right behind the house. In front of the house (other side of Weir St.) is the Susquhana River.

Wednesday 6-28-2006 Main St. Sidney Bridge

I snapped this shot as I crossed the bridge after checking on the small warehouse area I rent. We were one of the last people allowed to cross that was not an emergency vehicle.

Wednesday 6-28-2006 Self-store units (my small but valuable warehouse)

From there I was sent to the evacuation center at the Sidney Central School.

In the fore ground is Dawn Rivers Baker owner of Wahmpreneur Publishing Inc., home of The MicroEnterprise Journal and Brighid's Fire Books. Sitting next to her is Aubrey Baker AKA Sir0tter owner of Sir0tter's Traiding Den. Behind them is their daughter Regina and her friend Erin.

Thursday Morning 6-29-2006

At the evacuation center we were kept in the dark about how bad the flooding was getting. But here you can see the waters lapping at the Main St. Bridge.

And roomers were running wild. One man was arrested for running up and down Unidilla's main street shouting that the dam was breaking. This caused all kinds of panic.

It certenly did have enough water behind it. This was before the crest of the water. So even though the Susquehanna river had already crested, we weren't done.

Before this dam started to spill over another above us towards Cooperstown did. causing a second rise in the water level on Thursday night.

All signs pointed to a controlled release of water from East Sidney Dam but as the water there continued to rise it was put off until the water could start going over the spillway.

Friday 6-30-2006 we were given word at the evacuation center that the water had started coming over the spill way at the dam.

This gave us a third spike in the water level. I heard one old-timer say that this was the first time he could remember the spill way was used at the dam. I'd like to get that confirmed.

And here is what I88 looked like at that time.

About this time Fire Fighters and the National Guard started to arrive in town to get ready and help start the clean up.

The National Guard set up to help patrol and keep us civilians out of the flood areas. The fire Fighters were doing search and rescue till they could start the clean up. They came from all over the east coast. I saw one truck that had Alabama on it and one that was from Canada. They happened to be the ones from the farthest away that I spotted.

Flood Picture Essay Part 2: Thanks to the volunteers.
Flood Picture Essay Part 3: Saturday 7-1-2006 The flood waters crest on the Susquehanna River.
Flood Picture Essay Part 4: Monday 7-4-2006 Clean up starts.
Flood Picture Essay Part 5: Aftermath and life goes on.

Posted by derstaffo at 08:19 AM | Comments (0)

July 15, 2006

The LughnasssadhBooks Inventory list Has Been Zeroed Out

I have zeroed out the inventory list of books. This is because of what I had posted earlier about the flood and the flood damaged books.

Starting Monday, I'll be doing a full inventory and reading those that were saved into the database.

Things are starting to get back to some sort of normality here. Clean up is still an on-going process. Power has temporarily been restored, and with it the internet. But there are extension cords running throughout the place. And service can go down at any time.

So I'm going to try to do what I can while I have temporary acess. But my thinking isn't too clear right now. I'm over tired, stressed, I've been living on cold sandwiches for the past two and a half weeks and worst of all there's no hot water! COLD SHOWERS! BRRRR!

Those of you that have asked questions, I hope to be getting back to you soon with an answer. Please bear with me on this.

Posted by derstaffo at 01:29 PM | Comments (0)

July 12, 2006

With thanks to the local library

My thanks to the local library for use of their computers in the midst of this crises.

With no power I can't do much and the days, even though the daylight is longer, are short because inside you can't see what your doing after the sun moves past the zenith.

But with the computers at the library I can at least read your emails, even if I can't get reply's out, and fill orders for those books that were not destroyed.

Currently though, I am holding all orders for 5 days to make sure that the books ordered were not destroyed in the flood. Including any possible secondary destruction through mold, mildew or just having a bad smell.

Because I still can't get into the database to remove the damaged inventory, I am refunding all the orders that come in for those books that have been damaged or destroyed.

I have gotten the pictures back from the photo lab so I be able to post them when I have power at the office.

Posted by derstaffo at 09:27 AM | Comments (0)

July 10, 2006

Floods - Wall to wall water...

Got Insurance?

Thats the name of todays news... Why I haven't been keeping this page updated and why I have not responded to any orders, queries, questions, and other email.

On June 27th at about 7AM there came a rap on my front door. Wrapped in a blanket I answered, bleary eyed and in a foul mood for being awakened.

There stood the next-door neighbor "We're being evacuated!" she said.

I looked out on to the street to see 6 inches of water running down the street. "Oh, Okay..." She ran off and I turned to my landlord, she was aleady going to wake everyone. I took us an hour to round up everyone and get out.

We were sent to the school. No one took this seriously and we all thought we'd be home for dinner.

At 2:30 PM I got down to see that there was 2 feet of water running down the street as swift as the river its self, and it was back flowing into the rest of the town.

Needless to say we were not aloud to leave the evacuation center until the water receded. That was on Monday the 3rd.

I want to take a moment here to thank the volunteers that ran the evacuation center at the Sidney centeral school. With out them and the help of the small businesses of the town we would all have gone nuts. The Red Cross didn't show up until we were sending people home to start the clean up process. Our evacuation center which was holding 200 plus evacuees and 50 volunteer firemen from around the east coast was wholely held together by the people of the village.

To them THANK YOU!!
To the Red Cross... Learn something form their success! Or get out of the help business!

Now comes the hurt...

The road to the small warehouse I rent to hold all the books was out. Closed because there was water over the road in one place and the engineers were worried about the bridge on the other side. So I was cut off for another 3 days.

I finally got in to start clean up on the 7th. It took 3 days of hauling to clear out the soaked books. They were too far gone by the time I got to them to try to save them. Anything that was closer to the ground than three and a half feet was ruined.

That said, once I have power back - yes we are still waiting for power to return to our block. I'm currently using the computer at the local library, and do not have access to the data base and can not reply to emails (I can still read them). - I'm going to be taking the data base off line. I need to do a complete inventory to see what is left.

Right now I believe that I have lost 75% of the stock. Or a loss of about $250,000.00

Harlequin Romance, Mystery, and Sci-Fi/Fantasy I know were hit the hardest with losses of close to 90%.

My time on this computer is coming to an end.

I'll have more for you in the near future. As well as some pictures. Probably more rants about the Red Cross and FEMA too.

More info about the flood can be found at The Daily Star Flood of 2006

Posted by derstaffo at 01:15 PM | Comments (0)

June 25, 2006

20% off everything in inventory till the 9th. of July

The move is done... mostly. The sister site DLS-Antiques is still down and I'm still trying to salvage the archive of posts and articles. But, Three weeks of grueling work is coming to an end. Now I can get back to work on listing more books.

To celebrate, LughnassadhBooks is holding a re Grand Opening sale. 20% off everything in inventory till the 9th. of July!

And don't forget any order that totals $25.00 or more gets Free Basic Shipping!
See Payment, Shipping & Returns for more information.

Posted by derstaffo at 07:46 AM | Comments (0)

June 22, 2006

New Servers

We have moved to new servers. As you may have guessed the front page here and the archives are messed up with technical dificulties. And we have possably lost all the arcives. Sigh....

Back to work.

Posted by derstaffo at 03:01 PM | Comments (0)