Only ten days till Christmas - are you prepared? I'm quite clearly not, having bought about two gifts so far (argh!). This has been playing on my mind all day today and putting me off writing, I've felt that I should be using the time to sort out Christmas shopping. "Here we go," I hear you say, "another excuse"- but no! Even with that distraction, I still managed to get 1581 words done towards Project NaNo. This is far better than I ever managed on a 'bad day' before NaNoWriMo, so it would seem that the experience has done me good. I'm better at getting into the 'NaNo Frame of Mind' and just typing whatever words come without editing every single sentence five times before moving on. That said, I did have to resort to bridging a couple of tricky gaps with AND THEN SOMETHING HAPPENS WHICH LEADS US TO... I'll go back and fix those at a later date. ;o)
This made me think about the whole concept of working from/at home. I couldn't even hazard a guess as to how many articles, books, blog posts and such must have been written about this topic - about how important it is to stay focused, avoid the TV/housework/bookshelf and to make sure family and friends know you are Working and not Available To Run Errands, Babysit etc. I know all that, yet it is still incredibly difficult to put it into practice! I'm lucky that I don't have children or pets to take up my time, I'm good at leaving the TV off and ignoring housework is practically written into my DNA, but my gosh the internet is my downfall. I think the only solution would be to work somewhere with no wi-fi, but then I wouldn't have my special mug, cosy fireplace or slippers...it is a dilemma indeed.
A quick side note in relation to technology - I've tweaked the blog a bit, adding 'About me' and 'Contact me' links at the top and amending the widgets down the side. I just wanted to say that if you have any comments or feedback, or ideas for things you'd like to see or questions to ask me - please just let me know!
Finally then, to wrap up, I watched the Galaxy Book Awards last night. It's such a rare treat for there to be a programme on about books! There were two reasons why I especially enjoyed it - firstly, one of my heroes, Terry Pratchett, received an Outstanding Achievement award. I've always admired Terry's amazing imagination since I first read his 'Nome' trilogy as a child, he is such an inspiration and it's so sad that he is suffering from Alzheimer's Disease. If you have the means available, I would urge you to donate to the Alzheimer's Society (UK) or Association (US) to aid their fight against this terrible condition.
The second reason I enjoyed the show was a little more self-absorbed. There's an award for 'New Writer of the Year' and I couldn't help but lean towards hubby and whisper that could be me. Self-indulgent, yes, overly-optimistic, almost certainly, but I allowed myself a little moment to imagine how I'd feel if it was me and my goodness - did it feel wonderful. I know that money, awards and fame are not the keys to happiness, but if that warm glowing feeling of appreciation isn't pure motivation then I don't know what is...
Every artist was first an amateur ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Showing posts with label blog. Show all posts
Showing posts with label blog. Show all posts
Wednesday, 15 December 2010
Wednesday, 1 December 2010
The results are in...
As the UK is in the grip of what seems to be The Worst Winter Ever And It's Only The First Of December, I write to you from within a huge jumper, thick trousers and fingerless gloves. No, I'm not outside, I'm in my living room (with the fire on!) but once my fingers get cold it takes an awful lot to bring them back to life. For every ten minutes I sit here writing, I feel like I need to spend five minutes huffing on them. But enough about my rubbish circulation...
Yesterday was the final day of NaNoWriMo and as you can see from my little blue box on the left, I did not make it to the 50,000 finish line. I'm very happy with just over 10k though as it's much more than I've ever been able to produce in such a relatively short space of time before now. The feeling that all you need to do is just sit and write whatever comes out of your head is really liberating and on the sessions I was able to sit and do it, I did get quite swept up in it. Now I have eleven months to think of an idea that I can use for next year's NaNo... ;o)
Today I've been catching up with some studying. I got the mark back from that last essay that I was stressing about - 72%! Hopefully for the next one I'll have a bit more confidence, given that my tutor obviously thinks I'm better at this than I do. We've moved on from Homer now to fifth century BCE Athens - the foundations of democracy and all that kind of thing. I've been reading about Athenian theatre and listened to a play called Persians by Aeschylus. It's not a cheery way to spend an hour, I can tell you - there's a lot of wailing and lamenting and 'aiaiai'-ing! I'm sure that once I get a bit further into the study block it will become more apparent how this links to Greek society and so forth.
Persians and the associated coursebook reading has taken up most of the day, but I've also been doing some tweaking to the blog, trying to make it more what I would want to see if I were a reader. I hope it doesn't feel too cluttered, I don't know how (or if it's even possible) to make the main section wider so that things would be more spread out. Hmm, maybe I need to add Blogger for Dummies to my collection...
Lastly I just want to share two links with you. I saw them while browsing some other blogs today and they just made me laugh, hopefully you will too!
Nine Circles (credit to Nathan Bransford as it's his blog)
Awesome Bookshelf System (credit to John Baker as it's his blog)
Best wishes - stay warm!
Yesterday was the final day of NaNoWriMo and as you can see from my little blue box on the left, I did not make it to the 50,000 finish line. I'm very happy with just over 10k though as it's much more than I've ever been able to produce in such a relatively short space of time before now. The feeling that all you need to do is just sit and write whatever comes out of your head is really liberating and on the sessions I was able to sit and do it, I did get quite swept up in it. Now I have eleven months to think of an idea that I can use for next year's NaNo... ;o)
Today I've been catching up with some studying. I got the mark back from that last essay that I was stressing about - 72%! Hopefully for the next one I'll have a bit more confidence, given that my tutor obviously thinks I'm better at this than I do. We've moved on from Homer now to fifth century BCE Athens - the foundations of democracy and all that kind of thing. I've been reading about Athenian theatre and listened to a play called Persians by Aeschylus. It's not a cheery way to spend an hour, I can tell you - there's a lot of wailing and lamenting and 'aiaiai'-ing! I'm sure that once I get a bit further into the study block it will become more apparent how this links to Greek society and so forth.
Persians and the associated coursebook reading has taken up most of the day, but I've also been doing some tweaking to the blog, trying to make it more what I would want to see if I were a reader. I hope it doesn't feel too cluttered, I don't know how (or if it's even possible) to make the main section wider so that things would be more spread out. Hmm, maybe I need to add Blogger for Dummies to my collection...
Lastly I just want to share two links with you. I saw them while browsing some other blogs today and they just made me laugh, hopefully you will too!
Nine Circles (credit to Nathan Bransford as it's his blog)
Awesome Bookshelf System (credit to John Baker as it's his blog)
Best wishes - stay warm!
Picture from here
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Sunday, 24 October 2010
Books, books, books - a new idea!
Hello! Yes, I know it's Sunday night and you're probably wondering why on earth I'm posting, but I was just reading another blogger's post ( The Taming of the Shelves ) and it struck me that the amount and variety of books which I read must surely impact on my writing. I thought that looking at this in more detail could be interesting, or at the very least might suggest books that you may not have tried but may like to.
I'm what you might call a butterfly reader - I flit from book to book depending on my mood, so at any time could have anything up to six or seven different ones on the go. This has increased since I got the Kindle (oops!), the way that it saves your place within each book is just so handy - and of course popping onto the site and downloading new stuff is so easy that it's hard to resist. People sometimes find it hard to understand how I can read multiple books without getting confused, but it's second nature to me. Surely it's no different to watching different TV series? I've watched Lost, Heroes and Sex And The City, but I never got confused when Carrie wasn't on the island or Sylar wasn't in Bloomingdales!
So my idea is to post here every Sunday about what I've read during the week, what I think of it, and anything else book-related that occurs to me. Of course if you have any recommendations please do post them - I'll try most things!
As it's quite late right now - and I have work in the morning - here's a quick starter for ten. This week I finished reading:
Company of Liars ~ Karen Maitland
Please Forgive Me ~ Melissa Hill
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow ~ Washington Irvine
Heart of Darkness ~ Joseph Conrad
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland ~ Lewis Carroll
I'm still reading:
The Book of Secrets ~ Tom Harper
The Children's Book ~ A S Byatt
The Redbreast - Jo Nesbo (this is for my book club)
I'll do some reviewing and scoring next week - but right now my bed's calling me! :oD
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I'm what you might call a butterfly reader - I flit from book to book depending on my mood, so at any time could have anything up to six or seven different ones on the go. This has increased since I got the Kindle (oops!), the way that it saves your place within each book is just so handy - and of course popping onto the site and downloading new stuff is so easy that it's hard to resist. People sometimes find it hard to understand how I can read multiple books without getting confused, but it's second nature to me. Surely it's no different to watching different TV series? I've watched Lost, Heroes and Sex And The City, but I never got confused when Carrie wasn't on the island or Sylar wasn't in Bloomingdales!
So my idea is to post here every Sunday about what I've read during the week, what I think of it, and anything else book-related that occurs to me. Of course if you have any recommendations please do post them - I'll try most things!
As it's quite late right now - and I have work in the morning - here's a quick starter for ten. This week I finished reading:
Company of Liars ~ Karen Maitland
Please Forgive Me ~ Melissa Hill
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow ~ Washington Irvine
Heart of Darkness ~ Joseph Conrad
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland ~ Lewis Carroll
I'm still reading:
The Book of Secrets ~ Tom Harper
The Children's Book ~ A S Byatt
The Redbreast - Jo Nesbo (this is for my book club)
I'll do some reviewing and scoring next week - but right now my bed's calling me! :oD
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Thursday, 19 August 2010
Beginnings
So I am well aware (and slightly guilt-stricken) that I started this blog in March, and that it is now August, but I am finally in a position to make proper, regular, use of it. At the beginning of August I changed the work pattern of my full-time day job, so I now work four longer days and have every Wednesday off. Wednesdays are now my Writing Days!
I've had three Writing Days - the first I spent feeling weird (like I was skiving off the day job) and organising my office and books etc, the second I spent catching up with the archaeology course that I was a bit behind on and the third (yesterday) I spent procrastinating while excitedly waiting for my new laptop to be delivered (it wasn't, as it happened - it came today). But now my shiny new tech-baby is all set up and I'm ready to go!
Of all the ideas bubbling around in my head, choosing which one to put my energy into first has proved tricky so far, but I think I've decided. It's a non-fiction work- a guide for British couples wanting to get married in the USA, and I'm really confident about it. When I was planning my own wedding (which was in New York) there were no books and very little information available if you weren't willing to scour the Internet. Fortunately I LOVE scouring the Internet and researching minute details for hours on end, but I know that I might be in the minority there, so I believe there would be a great market for my book. Of course there's a lot of research to be done before I get to the writing stage but I'm very excited nonetheless!
I plan to blog the progress of 'Hitched' separately as it develops, which you can find here: Hitched Guide blog If you follow it, it will be even more of an incentive for me to keep going!
Thanks for reading!
Toyah
"All of your dreams can come true if you have the courage to pursue them" ~ Walt Disney
I've had three Writing Days - the first I spent feeling weird (like I was skiving off the day job) and organising my office and books etc, the second I spent catching up with the archaeology course that I was a bit behind on and the third (yesterday) I spent procrastinating while excitedly waiting for my new laptop to be delivered (it wasn't, as it happened - it came today). But now my shiny new tech-baby is all set up and I'm ready to go!
Of all the ideas bubbling around in my head, choosing which one to put my energy into first has proved tricky so far, but I think I've decided. It's a non-fiction work- a guide for British couples wanting to get married in the USA, and I'm really confident about it. When I was planning my own wedding (which was in New York) there were no books and very little information available if you weren't willing to scour the Internet. Fortunately I LOVE scouring the Internet and researching minute details for hours on end, but I know that I might be in the minority there, so I believe there would be a great market for my book. Of course there's a lot of research to be done before I get to the writing stage but I'm very excited nonetheless!
I plan to blog the progress of 'Hitched' separately as it develops, which you can find here: Hitched Guide blog If you follow it, it will be even more of an incentive for me to keep going!
Thanks for reading!
Toyah
"All of your dreams can come true if you have the courage to pursue them" ~ Walt Disney
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