My new editor

     When I started this whole thing my lack of continued education after High School was a big concern in terms of the quality of my book.  My grammar sucks dishwater and there was no way in hell I would even attempt to submit any work of mine to an agent that wasn't the best effort I could put forth.
     So I perused the internet looking into professional editing services.  My asshole tightened like a snare drum at what I was going to have to pay.  I think the cheapest I found was $400-500.  As someone who lives paycheck to paycheck, that's a lot if money.
     Mentioning this to my buddy Tim he generously offered to assist me.  And when I say generously, I mean it.  Dude has a wife, three kids, and more medical issues than Sam Jackson's character in 'Unbreakable'.  He rarely gets any time to himself and he was offering to use that time cleaning up my mess.  And while he is by no means an English teacher, his education on the subject far surpasses mine.  Not to mention the asshole's a million times smarter than I am.
     Sadly due to his medical issues he has had to step down.  Something about his brain not working right and not being able to read without intense pain and dizziness and blah, blah, blah.  He's such a wuss.
     Anyway that left me back at square one and being nearly halfway through DM I stressed a bit over it.  So I decided to work writing and editing into my regular routine.  This was a huge mistake that nearly brought my progress to a halt.
     Fortunately it turned out that I had a great resource right under my nose and her name is Brandi.  Originally I brought her into the project because I only had one female beta reader and wanted more feminine input.  Also when I had my minor panic attack about whether I could successfully write believable female characters she offered to educate my dumb-ass in the ways of women.
     Now I know all your secrets ladies!  Mua hahahahaha!  (Actually she's just filling me in on banal points that I should probably already know, but, hey, I'm an idiot.)
     Anyway, a couple of weeks back we were doing the feedback thing via Xbox Live, and I was lamenting my editorial deficit, when she informed me that she used to do copy editing and offered to do so for me.  Needless to say I jumped on the offer.
     It's been a great experience working with her so far.  She is skilled, knowledgeable and highly intelligent.  I had no clue about things like format preference for publishers or that things like the font even mattered.  Before now the only time I even used the font options was to type curse words in wingdings.
     Creatively it has been cool as well.  She has a good sense of where things should be added or moved, not to mention making suggestions that I wish I had thought of in the first place.
     Working with Brandi I feel like a real writer.  It also gives me experience for the future when I'll (Hopefully.) be working with an agent and publisher.
    I'm lucky to have her on my team, working with her has been fun and interesting and she's got be the coolest chick I've ever met.  If her husband didn't make me laugh so much I'd be plotting his imminent assassination.
     Looking forward to what she'll bring to the table.  My book will be better for it.
     And though he's no longer working on the project, any and all editorial mistakes should still be attributed to Tim.  I don't want him to feel left out.