I’m down to slightly more than a dozen copies of the hardback copies of GameSpite Year One, Vol. 1 to sign and mail. (Plus about 10 that have been inscribed but need to be dropped by the post office. I’d just pop them into the nearest mailbox, but they weigh slightly more than the limit allowed for stamped packages and thus will be detonated by Homeland Security as potential bombs unless I give them to a clerk. Annoying!) Progress was hampered by the incubus that was GDC, and by the fact that the back half of the books are for people who didn’t make a request for their inscriptions. I have to come up with pithy little cartoons for each of them, and I’ve been out of the cartooning game for too long. My videogame funny bone has osteoporosis, I’m afraid. But, I think I can power through the rest of these over the next few days and have them in the mail by the end of next week. (It would be sooner, but I’ll be out of town for the first half of next week.)

I was thinking of doing more inscriptions for Year One Vol. 2, but the process of coming up with 30 interesting cartoons from thin air has been so taxing that I think I’ll just let you guys order bare-naked hardcovers direct from the publisher. If you want an inscription, I guess you can corner me at PAX or something. (Assuming they send me this year.)

Anyway, I’m looking at a July publish date for the second volume. Before that, I have a few other projects I’m working on that are really quite exciting — for one, the next bit of subscriber bonus content, which I’ve just begun working on, and which is already looking fantastic. And there are some other things brewing that you may or may not find interesting, but that are shaping up to be quite satisfying for me — and, I hope, everyone else who is contributing. And since this site is pretty much a giant Internet vanity plate, my smug sense of satisfaction is all that really matters here, you know? Right.

Anyway, you last few book buyers should have your copies by tax day.

Also: I’ve reactivated registrations on Talking Time after taking steps to kill spammer nuisances. You have to email me with your username once you’ve signed up in order to activate your account, though. I’ll be purging all non-activated accounts once a week or so, which means you should email me sooner than later.