If I understand these new rules correctly then that creates a problem for me, too. The way I understand it is that once seeing a prompt on Monday and deciding I want to write a story (or poem or non-fiction articulation) and I spend three days writing it and submit it on Thursday via the new email procedure then I wait until I receive a private confirmation (I’m not sure how that happens) that my story is accepted and I’ve been temporarily re-added as a member/writer at which point I go back into my draft and re-submit the story via the old method — and this has to be done before midnight on Friday.

The problem with this is that I have a part-time job for which I work on Fridays beginning at 12 noon Central Time until around midnight. So if I don’t receive a confirmation that my story has been accepted and that I have been temporarily re-accepted as a member/writer until 1 pm, say, on Friday I won’t see that private message and be able to go into my draft to re-submit the story until Saturday when it is too late.

If I rush my story and get it submitted via email the first time by early Wednesday will that make a difference? Will I have a better chance of receiving a private confirmation in time for me to go into my draft and re-submit the story before 12 noon on Friday? It would suck to spend 3 days working on a story and then be at work (where I cannot access the internet) when I get notice that my story was accepted and therefore not be able to go into my draft and re-submit it in time to get published.

If this complicated beta system is the best the tech/geek/nerds of Medium can come up with then I’ve lost even more faith in Medium than I have already lost as of late. Maybe I have no reason to be upset that this new beta system was never offered to me and my lowly publication.

I guess the main question I have is that I really don’t know exactly how much time I have to write, edit, polish and submit and re-submit a story to TWK. It makes me just a little hesitant to embark on such an endeavor. I need a concrete deadline to which I can submit in time to get a concrete confirmation in time to be able to re-submit my story before 11:15 am Central Time on Friday (when I turn off my laptop and get ready to go to work). It’s the only thing that can work for me. Is this do-able in the new system? Do I need to submit my story (the first time) by Tuesday? Is there a cut-off time on Wednesday? Is Thursday too late?

Gosh, I wish I really did throw my calendars away on the First of January. It’s not that I’m adverse to deadlines. I’ve been joyously meeting them for well over a half a century. It’s not knowing exactly when they are that is mentally discombobulating for this old fart.

That aside, I am very happy for The Weekly Knob. Really I am. My non-mental intuition tells me there are great things in store for this wonderful project. I would be careful about expanding into new things too quickly, though. Every fisherman I know has told me that patience is a virtue when it comes to standing waist-deep in a river waiting for that trophy fish to come along.

I’ve only been fishing once in my entire life. It was the early Nineties and two dearly beloved lesbian friends of mine talked me into going with them up into the mountains of Northern New Mexico to go fly-fishing in an alpine mountain stream. They taught me everything I needed to know and how to cast and re-cast and such. We fished for 3 hours and each woman caught around a dozen fish and I didn’t catch a single solitary fishy.

At first the women laughed and snickered at me but then they came up to me and patted me on the shoulders, saying, “Don’t worry, you’ll catch a fish some day.”

Gosh, I hope they’re right. I have yet to catch a fish since that beautiful day up in the mountains. Of course, I haven’t been fishing since that day. Maybe that’s where the lesson is.

I’d love to catch a fish some day. Or maybe I’d like to be a fish that is caught some day. The only thing I know for certain is that when you’re standing waist-deep in a frigidly cold mountain river you can look all around you….

…. and there are no clocks.