Writing

One thing about working for myself — no worries about April Fool’s pranks. But I do have kids and one in particular likes to pull stuff. Full alert! Here are some great April Fool’s office pranks [Link: Marc Harty] — fun ‘n safe. #37 cracked me up. What’s your favorite April Fool’s prank?

Legoland Discovery Center rocked. It blew away this adult who has seen many incredible creations. See a taste of MINILAND in the below Dallas skyline picture. That’s only part of it. It also had famous buildings from Fort Worth, my hometown.

A lot of GREAT stuff this week… so go explore.

Brain food…

• On writing: authors reveal the secrets of their craft:  Love Ian Rankin’s response to writer routines. “I have days when I do*bleep* all. I sit down at a computer, nothing’s coming, I’m having to tear each word out, it’s like digging for coal, and I’ll go: ‘No, this isn’t working,’ and I’ll just walk away.”  [Link: Kristin Bair O'Keeffe]
• The last freelance resource article that you will EVER have to read: Nice round up of apps and programs ranging from invoicing and legal to client management and project management.
• Champing at the bit: That’s not a typo. It’s champing, not chomping. [Link: Amber Naslund]
• Work Life Balance in the Home Office: I wear the same thing daily, so the clue to my kids that I’m at work is sitting in my office. It works so well that on a Saturday, my son asked, “Why are you working?” [Link: Alan K'necht]
• Freelance writing jobs: Top 10 places to find quality work: So many awful sites out there — good list to have as starting point.
• The secret to freelance work/life balance isn’t so secret: I’ve created a schedule and that makes a big difference to sticking with things. Need to grow “cheer team” to include writers.

And for fun because we’re allowed…

• The Last Supper: 17 of the Best Parody Illustrations: Love the iPod / iPhone picture.
• 10 Real Cars Inspired by Cartoons: Donald Duck car = thinking of my dad. (He talked Donald Duckish to kids and his family spoiled him with a ton of Donald Duck stuff.)
• Cover Tune Grab Bag – “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da”: This Beatles song is one of the few I can follow. This simple yet powerful video made me smile all over. [Link: Mark Hurst]
• Noma Bar’s Negative Space Illustrations: You’ve probably seen the young woman / vase picture. Here’s more. Neat, but my eyes have readjusting to do. [Link: Fred Schlegel]
• 3eanuts, Cinema Nutrition and WikiBomb: Three of the websites featured in 7 Sites You Should Be Wasting Time on Right Now. Who knew Peanuts could fall deeper into despair? Just cut the last panel in 3eanuts and it does. You’ll never look at movies the same way again after studying up on your cinema nutrition. Wikibomb captures Wikipedia pages before they’re taken down. In other words, Wikipedia vandalism vandalism.
• The Writing Process: Graph depicting the process of writing a feature. Just needs a ::headbang:: in there somewhere. What? You haven’t noticed a lot of writers walk around with dents on their foreheads? At least, I do [Link: Mridu Khullar]

Copyright secured by Digiprove © 2011 Meryl Evans

You know March roars in like lion and goes out like a lamb? Not this time. It feels like the month whizzed by unless you’re in Japan. I’m sure it’s been a long couple of weeks. I’m thinking of the folks there every day.

The second Legoland Discovery Center in the US comes to Dallas. My family heads there tomorrow as part of a special preview for Boy Scouts and Cub Scouts. I can’t believe Lego built the second one here. Here’s hoping it’s a memorable experience for the boys. I’m sure they’ll be asking for this ‘n that as Lego wouldn’t have this place and no Lego for sale.

The youngest got his braces on this week. He got tired of everyone asking, “Why do you need braces?” Severe overbite in his case. That will be three braces for all three kids.

I hope the younger two won’t need them again in the future. The older brother’s permanent teeth haven’t all come in yet and the latest round tried to mess with his teeth. Poor guy had to have three teeth pulled to prevent damage. Orthodontia has changed since I’ve sported railroad tracks. They put braces on kids sooner because they’re waiting until they’re older and baby teeth fall out can do more harm than good.

Brain food…

• 6 Strategic Approaches for Using Twitter: What I like about this infographic is that it covers customer relations, crisis management, corporate reputation management, event coverage, product promotion and sales and issue advocacy. Applicable to almost everyone. Key: Don’t wait until you need it to use Twitter. Start now.
• America’s 100 Best Small Companies: If you’d like to learn about how small companies succeed, these are a good place to start. Some known and some not known.
• 7 Different Types of Writing Gigs for Freelance Copywriters: When I spoke to second graders, first thing I asked was what kind of writers do they know about? Answers: book authors, newspaper writers, magazines. The usual. You know we can do much more and here are some ideas.
• Is a public post a quotable source? Due diligence in sharing information: Depends on the quote selected and where content posted. Newspaper, blog, testimonial, company website, Twitter etc. [Link: Arik Hanson]

And for fun because we’re allowed…

• 20 creative guerrilla marketing campaigns: I must live in a dull place or don’t get out much. Never see creative campaigns like these around town.
• 14 Funny Warning Signs: Thank you for noticing this notice. Your noticing this notice is noted.
• Angry Birds Papercraft: Made my own! No, I didn’t suddenly find myself with free time on my hands. Need to make ‘em so I could throw ‘em around when I get angry at the game instead of breaking my iPod.
• Magazine grammar fail: Eat, Ray, Love — that works, but they forgot the rest of the commas.
• Star Ways John Williams Tribute: Even Wookie captions! (Thank you, Corey, for captioning the video.) [Link: Lori Widmer]

My family doesn’t have ancestors from Ireland, yet Dad and I always wore green on March 17. Dad went to the extreme and wore a striped green suit to work. He also had a button that said, “Kiss me, I’m Irish” and a couple of others. (He wouldn’t get away with that kiss me button today with sexual harassment policies.)

My ancestry is tricky to trace as many of them came over from Europe and Russia in the late 1800s and early 1900s. However, Facebook connected me with some relatives on my mother’s father’s side. In ONE day, my family tree tripled. The top of this image shows the family tree before I found my cousins on Facebook and the bottom is what I added based on our conversations in Facebook.

Amazing, eh? Despite all of its flaws, Facebook is an incredible resource as so many friends and family members who aren’t social networkers actually use Facebook.

Brain food…

• Be Authentic: Why the World Needs You to Be You: I wish I could remember where I read a conversation between two people and one person convinced the other to stop ignoring a difficult part of her life. Face it head on. It made a difference in her writing.
• The Bare Bones Guide to Twitter: Get what you need to know and not a drop more. [Link: Lydia Ondrusek]
• Browser Evolution – The History of Web Browsers [Infographic]: Wow! I started using the Internet around 1993 with Internet in a Box and Mosaic. This chart begins in 1994.
• Prithee, Inform Me: The Rules of Writing: Kurt Vonnegut’s eight rules for fiction writing. A keeper.
• 100 Exquisite Adjectives: Need to study these. Not familiar with some, but I like ‘em! Can’t use words like these in writing because they’re not well known.

And for fun because we’re allowed…

• Another 12 Modern Bookcases: I love the US map bookcase. Don’t think I could handle such a bookcase as I like my books in a neat row. Here’s the original 15 coolest bookshelves.
• 12 Most Creative Objects Inspired by the Rubik’s Cube: That puzzling puzzle from the ’80s has a new lease on life… as a bunch of other things.
• Celebrate Pi at piZone: If you enter your email address, you’ll add another digit to Pi. I did this and my position is my birthday (month and day) with the #7.
• Stop-motion chess game: Builds up… give it time… [Link: Guy Kawasaki]

Where are you from?

Two ways you can easily help others and make a big impact: Donate blood and join the bone marrow registry. Donating blood takes little time and helps many. You have a few options for donating blood and some depends on your physical attributes. My tall husband can donate double red, I can’t.

Another great option is donating platelets, which you can do every three days. With platelets, you have very little — if any — physical reaction. Some people say that donating whole blood makes them lightheaded or too tired. Platelets don’t do that since the machine returns some of the blood properties back to you. I used to donate platelets, but I had a lot of problems with it. Because I couldn’t always hear the the beeping sound that lets you know when it’s downloading or uploading blood, the alarm kept going off due to low pressure. I tried watching the monitor, but it didn’t work either.

So I donate whole blood. I do it quickly and with no side effects. The blood center is grateful for anything you can do. Whole blood requires waiting 56 days between donations. Double red requires 112 days between donations. If you can do double red, it’s an amazing way to contribute and it’s only a few times a year.

Brain food…

• 7 Don’t-Miss Sites for Online Marketing: Focuses on authors.
• Finding Case Studies for Your Articles: Facebook is also great.
• 50 Rhetorical Devices for Rational Writing: I just learned the word “tricolon” before reading this. Oh, I’ve used tricolon. I just didn’t know it had a name. “A series of three parallel words, phrases, clauses, or statements: “I came, I saw, I conquered.” “Veni, Vidi, Vici.”  [Link: Elizabeth S Craig]
• Why Selling Similar Work to Multiple Clients is Risky Business: And don’t do it when you do a guest post. At least, be honest about it and post a second version months later.

And for fun because we’re allowed…

• Demotivational Posters for Freelancers: Demotivational posters aren’t new, but this is a great collection.
• Paper vs. Rock: Yeah, paper magically wraps itself around rock. If it could do that, it’d attack us when we write all over it.
• Scrabble a la Typography: Love this! [Link: Esther Schindler]
• Admiral Grammar letter to Colonel Burn: I salute you, Admiral!

We used to call it a chart. Now it’s “information visualization.” 1 syllable to 10. George Carlin would have a field day. – @markhurst (Yikes! I’d never thought I’d be guilty of such a thing!)

“Mom, I had fun,” said my youngest. That alone made last week’s family night out to the Texas Tornado hockey game worth it. Oh, they lost to Topeka Roadrunners, but being there provided a memorable experience for my husband and our two sons. Our teen daughter had no interest in going.

And all that in spite of my older son refusing to eat the BBQ buffet meal and my husband standing in line for an entire period. One of my clients invited us to the hockey game as part of its partner appreciation. We didn’t sit in the normal seats in the crowd. We went to a reserved area on the ground level behind one of the goals. It had tables and chairs and a buffet along the back wall. Popcorn, baseball hats, signed hockey sticks, pennants and programs decorated the black and gold tables.

I had an it’s a small world encounter when I entered the area. It was one of the tennis coaches who taught several of my classes a few years ago. Her husband also works with the client.

NHL vs. NAHL Experience

I’ve attended a Dallas Stars hockey game. The NHL Stars have nothing on the NAHL Tornadoes. If you’ve been to a major league and minor league baseball game, you can tell the difference. It’s the same way with the NAHL hockey game. Smaller arena, more entertainment, closer to the action. Although I grew up a big sports gal, hockey didn’t make my top list of sports. The Dallas Stars didn’t come to Texas until I was a teen and hockey wasn’t popular in Texas.

Watching the game on the ground level is a whole different experience than watching it way high up in the stands like I did with at the Stars game. At one point, I jerked in response to the loud crashing of players into the window near me.

Intermission

During the intermission, the boys got into a Porsche and rode in it around the ice. That may not sound exciting to you, but my boys — especially the older one — LOVES sports cars. It was the first time he rode in a Porsche. The girl on the other side of the cheerleader in the photo is the client’s daughter.

After that, the fans threw hockey pucks to try to get them in a small bucket in the middle of the ice. It was wild watching hundreds of flying pucks and only two landing in the bucket.

And another small world thing happened during intermission when kids from an elementary school choir sang. That elementary school was my kids’! What are the chances of that? First, the arena is in Frisco. The school is in Plano. Second, the Tornadoes played 34 games at that point. About half of that would be home games. So out of roughly 17 games, they sang at the one we attended.

I also met Ike, the team’s mascot. I’ve got a thing (no, not a fetish) for Mascots since seeing the San Diego Chicken when I was a kid. The chicken came to a Texas Rangers game and I had a blast watching his antics.

Freelancer Feels Like a Part of the Team

As a freelancer, I don’t have opportunities to attend corporate events like I did when I worked in the corporate world. One event took place at the old Texas Stadium in Irving (pre-Super Bowl 45 stadium) and one at Las Colinas Studios where TV shows film. Imagine how it makes a freelancer feel when she’s invited to a client’s event. One thing’s for sure — it makes you want to work harder (I already do, but it gives you renewed energy) for the client knowing they appreciate you.

It’s a Teeny, Tiny World

Though a local company (my only local client — Hint: Look on the window of the Porsche), I met Frank online. He created Fib or Not and hired me to do the copy for the game. Later, we discovered we lived within a mile of each other. When we first met, the little guy and girl in the Porsche were babies. Fast forward a few years, they are one year apart in grade at the same elementary school and we run into each other at school events.

Brain food…

• Phlixie: It’s tedious to find captioned instant download movies on Netflix. Phlixie is doing what Netflix should’ve done. They hope to expand it to other services. Yeah!
• Reading Judiciously: When I read — especially nonfiction — I try to look at the author’s writing and learn from it. Tough to do because you want to absorb the material, too. Kind of like multi-tasking brain. [Link: Elizabeth S Craig]
• The Query Letter That Won Me an Agent and a Four Book Deal (And Why It Was So Successful): That says it all.
• HTML5 Cheat Sheet: I still rely on my old yet in great shape VisiBone HTML card. It has high quality lamination.
• Claim Your Oscar: Worried about giving away too many trade secrets? Need not to worry.

And for fun because we’re allowed…

• Parents Shouldn’t Text: That should be “SOME parents shouldn’t text.” I think I’m a decent texter. Training my son on texting etiquette. [Link: Bitrebels]
• Light Show: Sensational!
• 13 things worth knowing about Super Mario: I had the mini Donkey Kong arcade toy. Memories…
• A cartogram done in real 3D: The material used? Legos. My mom has an beautiful book of map art. This will need to be in the next edition.

In the spirit of Valentine’s Day last Monday (we won’t debate the merits of whether it’s a valid holiday or not), I want to thank you for reading and commenting. Because of you, I keep on trekking and sharing what I learn along the way.

Artwork by Marko Schmitt

Brain food…

• How Kindle’s new Public Notes could change the way we read ebooks: This will be an interesting feature. I hate writing in books because I like them clean, bright and wrinkle-free. So far, I haven’t made notes in the three books I’ve read on the Kindle — but all were fiction.
• Confessions of an Ex-mill Writer: Tempted to join a content mill to get writing experience and build up your portfolio? Stop. Do not pass go. Read this first. If you still want to do it, more power to you.
• How to Avoid the Most Common and Dangerous Passwords: I hope you’re not using the same password at all the sites. What if one site is hacked?
• 110 Ideas to Get More Freelance Work and Generate New Client Leads: Nice list organized in several categories.

For fun because we’re allowed…

• Think Snow: Sick of winter, ice storms school cancellations? Me, too… and so are the subjects in these hilarious photos.
• 7 Sites You Should be Wasting Time on Right Now: Nintendo does Great Gatsby. Ha!
• 13 Funny School Names: There’s always more to the story… based on my experience in seeing “General Hooker entrance” in Boston. General Hooker was riding on a horse at that entrance.

Copyright secured by Digiprove © 2011 Meryl Evans

I use a pen instead of computer when I write in my journal, sign stuff, write thank you and personal notes, capture reminders on a sticky and make a list. It doesn’t take much for my hand to cramp when entering longer journal entries. The left hand tires easily when writing and I type fast. So why would I rely on a pen or pencil for coming up with ideas for articles and blog posts?

Photo by sxc.hu user mzacha

Brainstorming with a keyboard just doesn’t work as well as with pen and paper. Not even when using brainstorming and mind mapping apps. It takes a different type of effort to enter information and draw shapes. This  interferes with the brainstorming process making it feel forced and tedious.

By accident, I discovered a better way. A bunch of ideas hit me while I worked on my laptop in bed. Rather than let risk losing those thoughts, I pulled out the pad stored in the drawer next to my bedside for easy access. I also grabbed a specific right pen instead of the first one available. I had a specific pen that I love to use for special writing with its soft point that glides without teeny bumps as my left hand made circles, dots, crosses, curves, lines.

The brain and hand ran wild bringing more ideas than I had initially. Bullets, circles, notes. No criticizing allowed. Within 15 to 20 minutes, I had enough notes for 25 articles and posts.

I’ve had a pen and pad next to my bed for years. Why did it take this long to realize the benefits of hand mind mapping? Whenever I jotted anything down, it was only an idea or two and then I went back to sleep or resuming whatever I was doing. This time I had a mountain of ideas that grew from there as I continued writing.

So why does opening a document and typing everything that comes to mind not work as well as pen and paper? Even mind mapping and graphing software fails me. Using software merely produces a few notes between a lot of long pauses.

Daphne Gray-Grant gives me the answer in her excellent Power Writing newsletter. She says it’s a left and right brain thing. The right side is the creative side. Using a pen and paper gets the right side’s motor running allowing thoughts to pour out easily and quickly. The act of typing and using the mouse slow creativity.

This doesn’t mean that mind mapping software has no place in the brainstorming process. They work for many people.

I’m a lefty, so the right hemisphere of the brain dominates. You’d think this advantage would make up for using the keyboard. It doesn’t. I love using technology and gadgets, but sometimes the brain needs extra help and that means switching to pen and paper.

If you’ve struggled with mind mapping or brainstorming or find you can’t get much out of a typed outline, go the pen and paper route and see what happens.

How do you come up with story ideas?

Photo from sxc.hu user yirsh

My first course outside of the classroom happened through old-fashioned mail. The first was a high school history correspondence course and the second in a college-level marketing course that I took after college to learn more about marketing. These worked well for me with no lectures to follow and missed out conversations.

Over the years, I took several online graduate level courses and completed a certificate program in Internet Technologies from New York University (NYU). I loved taking all the courses through a web-based course environment and from NYU. I love where I live, but I valued the opportunity to take classes at a respectable university out of state without moving or traveling. Besides, I felt connected to New York because my dad hailed from Brooklyn and I still had family there.

I started an MBA program at Dallas’ SMU, which added a small campus within a few miles from my house. This campus held all the required courses while you had to go to the main campus for other classes. I attended for one semester and burned out. It took too much time away from family on the weekends and I worked full-time in a corporate job.

It worked out because I’d rather get an master of fine arts (MFA), master in liberal studies (MLS) or something focusing on communications, literature or journalism. Over the years, I’ve watched for distance learning programs in these areas so I have the information available when I’m ready to go back to school.

Note some are low residency programs. These give you the opportunity to go to the campus several times a year for a week or two. Also, colleges appearing in this list do not imply any kind of quality. The list lets you know what’s available to help you find the school that best fits your needs.

List updated when more colleges pop up. If you’ve attended a program or know of one, please in comments.

Low-Residency Programs

Goddard College MFA in Creative Writing. “The low-residency Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing Program is a 48-credit, rigorous, student-centered program for writers who choose to live their lives and hone their writing skills at the same time. Each semester in the low-residency MFA in Creative Writing Program begins with an eight-day residency at the Goddard College campus.”

Naropa University MFA in Creative Writing: “The online Creative Writing degree requires 49 total credit hours, a combination of online workshops, online literature seminars, online elective studies, contemplative practice, summer residence at the Summer Writing Program and at-home manuscript.”

Pacific University MFA in Writing: Located in Oregon, the program helps experienced writers grow in building a portfolio of fiction, nonfiction or poetry and celebrates writing as an art that has the potential to make a difference in the world. The program consists of two annual residency sessions.

Southern New Hampshire University MFA in Fiction and Nonfiction: Low-residency program lets you write at home and meet peers and faculty online. The residencies occur in the summer and winter.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing: Two sessions per year residency program with the opportunity of attending a residency in Slovenia instead of Vermont. Available tracks include poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction and a concentration in translation. Dual-genre study options available including study in Writing for Children & Young Adults.

Online Programs

Drexel University MS in Communications. Focuses on technical communication with studies in writing, editing, message design, software documentation and ethics. Graduates can go on to pursue careers as technical writers, computer documentation specialists, or training specialists. Students develop a professional exit portfolio based on course work and professional assignments.

Ellis College MA Communication Arts. Ellis College offers two MAs. One in advertising and public relationships. The other in journalism.  ”The Master of Arts program in Communication Arts is an interdisciplinary program that incorporates sound theoretical principles of research, reporting, writing, and cultural studies to achieve effective professional results.”

Full Sail University MFA: “In the Creative Writing Master of Fine Arts Online Degree Program, storytelling is not merely taught as it relates to the typical output mediums of print and publishing.” Offers several areas of focus.

The New School MA in Media Studies. “As a student in the program, you explore traditional disciplines, develop a strong commitment to research and critical analysis, and create and develop media, perhaps transcending traditional formats. It is through the unity of practical and theoretical work that scholars can contribute to the notion of media literacy and our understanding of the modern world. The New School’s 39-credit master’s degree program integrates the studyof media theory and management with production practices.”

Texas Tech Master of Arts in Technical Communications. “This master’s degree combines study of the history, theory, research, and genres of technical communication with practice in applying this knowledge. The thesis option requires students to complete 24 hours of graduate courses in technical communication and electives or a minor, 6 hours of research methods, and a thesis. The nonthesis option requires students to complete 36 hours of graduate courses in technical communication, electives, and a minor. Students who elect the nonthesis option must pass a comprehensive portfolio examination in the semester of graduation.

“The master’s degree in technical communication is also available online. Application and admission processes and degree requirements are similar to those for the nonthesis option for the degree. All distance students must complete 36 hours of graduate coursework in technical communication, language- and communication-related electives, or a minor. One of the courses requires a substantial independent research project that could result in an article for publication. Prospective students are advised to consult www.english.ttu.edu/tcr for details of degree requirements and the course schedule.”

Texas Tech Doctor of Philosophy in Technical Communication & Rhetoric: “Designed for students with an interest in rhetoric, writing, technical communication, and composition. The degree in TCR requires 45 hours of graduate work in rhetoric and technical communication beyond the bachelor’s degree. An additional 15 hours may be used for a minor in a related field. Credits earned on a master’s degree count toward these totals. This degree prepares students for positions in a wide range of college and university writing programs. This degree program requires courses in qualitative and quantitative research methods. The program emphasizes five broad areas of scholarship in its scholarship, coursework, and initiatives: a) Rhetoric, Composition, and Technology, b) Technical Communication, c) Rhetorics of Science and Healthcare, d) Technology, Culture, and Rhetoric, and e) Visual Rhetoric, New Media, and User-Centered Design.”

Utah State University Master of Science in English, Technical Writing Specialization. “There are more than sixty professional directions in professional and technical communication, and our program instructs broadly enough to allow you to choose from most of the most interesting professional directions. In our program, in addition to learning to write professionally, you may design webpages, create technical animations and videos, program special effects for computer applications, study websites for usability, publish book length manuscripts, and create games in two- and three-dimensions.”

University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) Creative Writing and the Americas: Offers a bilingual online Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing program. The goal of this unique bilingual program is to prepare writers for the publishing marketplace and for teaching and editing careers, both in the United States and Latin America.

Resources

Working Mother magazine had a valuable article about online learning and provided some of these resources.

• elearners.com: Search for programs, degrees, courses, colleges and more. It also lets you know about accredited schools.
• projectworkingmom.com: Information and resources for working parents interested in pursuing a college degree.
• studentaid.ed.gov: US Department of Education resource for funding education.

Football fans, welcome to Dallas-Fort Worth and places around and in between! First, sorry about the cold weather. It happens when you have Green Bay and Pittsburgh headlining the game. So what can we do? Here are the answers to all your “North Texas” questions and myth crushers from The Dallas Morning News.

Photo by flickr user John Pozadzides

Technically, Cowboy stadium is in Arlington, not Dallas. Oh, not the one with the cemetery. That’s in Virginia. It’s Arlington, Texas where the 2010 MLB American League champions Texas Rangers play. Dang proud of ‘em even if they didn’t win the World Series.

You’ll also find a couple of amusement parks where I spent many summers there including Six Flags and the water park that has changed names many times.

Although Arlington is an entertaining city sandwiched between Dallas and Fort Worth, naming the teams “Arlington” just doesn’t work. Sorry, Arlington.

On top of the identity confusion, did you know that official Super Bowl merchandise say, “North Texas”? Bland, isn’t it?

“Where are you from?”

“North Texas.”

“Where’s the Super Bowl?”

“North Texas.”

Good news is that weather reports predict temps in the 50s on Super Bowl Sunday. I’d say that’s cool. Maybe not South Florida warm, but it’ll do.

I haven’t seen Texas Stadium except while driving on I-20 to my hometown of Fort Worth. My seven-year-old has (camp field trip), my cousin from New York has (Cowboys – Giants game). I just don’t pass that way often and when I do, I’m on my way to hang out with my family in Fort Worth. I did catch a Cowboy game at the old stadium. Neat experience. TV works just fine for me especially with the high priced tickets and parking.

A memorable Super Bowl: I was 11 days from my due date with my oldest child when the Cowboys won the Super Bowl in 1994. Boy, it took a lot of energy not to jump up and down. Folks were surprised I didn’t go in labor during the game.

Brain food…

• 10 Ways to Make Editors Fall in Love with Your Work: Michelle Rafter shares advice from Society of American Business Editors and Writers (SABEW) editors.
• Four reasons why the sales growth of e-books will be slower than industry executives think: Michael Hyatt is one of the most reliable resources on the publishing industry.
• The Problem with Memoirs: Harsh, but lots of truths. [Link: Rachelle Gardner]
• Yes Virginia, You Can Over-promote: Sometimes I’m perplexed. I’ve seen folks like the person described in Lori Widmer’s article. Yet, they’re getting results. I aim to help others, get to know ‘em and occasionally point to my work. I think results could be better, but I’d never promote myself like this. And I’ve unsubscribed to newsletters from people who send too much stuff.

And for fun because we’re allowed…

• Typography Art: Darth Vader and Typographic Maps. [Links: Bitrebels]
• Browser History Timeline: Eric Meyer updated the timeline. I remember my first browser: Mosaic from Internet in a Box.
• United States of Awesome and United States of Shame: Texas rocks wind power, but fails high school.
• Intel’s Thrilling Chase Movie: How long did it take to create this extremely creative film?
• 7 Videogame Characters Made out of Bottle Caps: Starring Blinky and Mario.
• Gamer Wedding Cakes: Glad we stuck with a traditional one even if we liked playing games. These are cute, though, especially “Game Over.”

19 high. 8 low. Whoa. Texas gets below freezing temps, but rarely single digit temps. Cold, yes. Affect work, just a little because the kids didn’t have school. It turns out to be a booming YES.

Image from flickr user innpictime

This week has not gone the way I expected. I knew extremely cold temps were heading toward the Dallas-Fort Worth area, but I never thought my kids would be out of school for two or three days and that we’d have rolling blackouts. Four of them came my way in six hours … so far. (Another place just one mile down the road had zero by the time I had three. Hmm …)

I’m grateful for rolling blackouts with their lasting 15 to 20 minutes max. The alternative is to go without power for hours, freeze in my house and worry about refrigerated food. A friend of my daughter’s went without power for over five hours. Yikes. Yay, rolling blackouts.

My computer connects to an uninterruptible power supply (UPS) so that sudden outages don’t hurt the computer. But I need to shut it down as soon as I can to preserve the UPS.

Since I use a wireless network, the network goes down as soon as the blackout hits. This means I can’t save any work done over the Internet. Easy workaround. The content stays on the screen after the wireless shuts down. So I just copy the content and paste it into a document that I save on my computer. Then, I safely turn it off.

The constant shutting down, booting up breaks the work flow. After the fourth blackout, I clock out the computer knowing a laptop stands by I need anything.

I started writing just before the second blackout occurred. When the power returned, I moved on to admin work doing first of the month stuff. It needs to be done and this is a good time to do it as disruptions don’t get in the way of the process.

Constant interruptions during writing produces a scattered draft that’s worse than an expected bad first draft. And when you try to get back in swing of things, the power goes out again. Nasty cycle that. Just not a good use of time.

Cell phones. Amen for them! I email my clients to let them know I’d be out of the loop. Thank you, wonderful and understanding clients.

Snow is A-OK in my book. Ice… not so much. Few of us own ice skates and sleds around these parts. Although, I did have a sled in my childhood home and my parents had a perfect small sloped driveway for sledding. AND my neighbors had an unusual driveway that went below the street (only house to do that), so I’d sled down our drive way gaining enough momentum to make it down the neighbor’s driveway.

My current driveway has a slope, but it’s not safe because it’s in the back facing an alley with fences blocking the view both ways. You can’t see who’s coming unlike the driveway in front of my parent’s house. Besides, there’s very little street space (just enough for a car and one person walking next to it), so the chances of smashing into the neighbor’s fence are very good.

What unexpected work disruptions have encountered and how did you deal with them?

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