Nearly Three Weeks Of Mostly Silence

The three weeks allotted for the trio of trusted friends to review The Real-Life Adventures of AgileMan (Lessons Learned in Going Agile) are nearly over, as this upcoming weekend marks the end of it. Over that period of time, I've gotten a few verbal comments from one of them, four graciously marked-up 'chapters' from another, and pretty much nothing from the third (except an unsubstantiated fear that she's not even started reading it yet).

Beginning on Saturday, I'll be putting the finishing touches on the next draft, before sending a copy off to my boss early next week in order to give him a brief window of opportunity during which to cry foul, if he sees fit. While that's going on, I need to write an Acknowledgments page, put together a copyright notice (I guess) to go at the front of the book, and figure out what the cover should look like.

If all of that goes according to plan, then I might actually be able to start the "prepare for printing" process the following weekend, although admittedly I'm pretty much guessing now in terms of how long any of this stuff will take. It was definitely easier to estimate when it was just a matter of writing the damn thing! (Recall that, in September, I predicted completion of the first draft by year's end, and it actually finished on Jan 14th, a mere fortnight beyond my estimate.) Part of that comes from knowing how long I wanted it to be and having some notion of my own productivity, versus dealing with tasks that I've never done before.

Having said all that, my notional target for getting to the actual publishing/printing stage is somewhere around my birthday (in the 2nd week of March) since that timing would provide me with a pretty awesome gift. It's a nice dream, anyway!