Life in progress

Tag Archives: writing


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If Only, part deux

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I find myself saying ‘If I could only just…’ a lot.

If I could only just find more time to write…

If I could only just have more money…

If I could only just find true love…

It goes on, ad infinitum. But all these things denote that I’m not content, when for the most part, I am. I have my children here with me, we have a roof over our heads, the air inside is warmer than outside, and there is food in the fridge. And I’m keeping up with my writing quite well, although sometimes it’s a struggle to do anything else.

So what is it which makes me wish for more?  Is it simply the human condition to keep striving? It’s hard, for me at least, to keep my mind from going, from wandering, and from wondering what it would be like if I had just a little more.

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Now if only I could consume nothing but coffee and chocolate and wine and cheese …. then I’d be happy.

What would make you happy?


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Word Press Views and What I’ve Discovered

It’s been a week since I posted Getting Views is Like Pulling Teeth in which I complained that since the reader went all to hell my view count has gone down, so I thought I’d post a follow-up on the conclusions I’ve come to.

As Chris McMullen (http://chrismcmullen.wordpress.com/) pointed out, the new pop-up window in the reader does seem to provide us with what counts as a view. I know this because I’m now getting as many views as I am ‘likes.’ This is something they’ve fixed recently, obviously, because last week when I posted, I wasn’t. I’d be happy to know if anyone else is finding the same result.

But at the same time I’m finding my views per visitor as dropped substantially and I think this is really where the problem lies. While it’s great to have lots of views for the post we just published, the pop-up window still discourages people from visiting our sites, from following, and from seeing what else we have to offer. It’s especially damaging for those of us who are selling something on our websites, particularly if we’ve paid for the site in order to do just that.

I encourage everyone who has a problem with this to complain.  Here is the link to the forum which discusses it: http://en.forums.wordpress.com/topic/reader-changed?replies=284

They have already addressed the issue of my initial complaint, (not to me personally) which was to please put the word count back in the reader for each post. If you click on the word count, now that it’s back, you bypass the pop-up window and go straight to the original site. If you click on the title of the post, you get the pop-up window. However, if the post is short and doesn’t have any more words than fit in the reader preview, it’s obviously not an option – you just get the pop-up.

I did change my reader view to “Read full post…” and I believe that has helped my view count at least. You can do this by going here, and I quote: “In your dashboard go to Settings/Reading and then scroll down to “For each article in a feed, show”. Select either Full Text or Summary.” Thanks to mewhoami (http://mewhoami.wordpress.com/) for this tip.

Anyone who is still following this thread and is still interested in this topic, I’d love to know if you’ve made or seen any changes in the past week and have come to the same conclusions, or if you plan to write and mention your dissatisfaction with this awful ‘improvement’, in the forums. I think the more we talk about this issue with Word Press, the more we’re likely to have something done about it.

Thanks very much for being on board with me on this. 🙂


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Women’s Work

I read in the paper the other day about a man in Northern Quebec who is whining about the fact that people don’t want to bring their kids to his daycare. He advertised locally, with simply the name of his business, his address and his phone number. Parents showed up to check the place out, seemed happy, but then declined his services once they found out he would be running it and actually be the one looking after their kids.

Now, while this may, on the surface, seem like gender discrimination, the fact is that people want their young children cared for by women. It’s not a matter of ability, necessarily, but more a matter of instinct. YES, men have most of the instincts required to look after children, but many parents don’t see it that way. Then there are the stories in the news of men (what is it, 1% or less?) who have been known to abuse children in their care, in some way or another. I wish it wasn’t true, but every major city has had these stories.

The article about the daycare brought up in my memory another occupation which I found out doesn’t welcome men. At the dry cleaning business on my paper route there is a wash and fold service. They will not hire a man to do this job. It makes sense – many women wouldn’t bring their clothes, particularly their underwear, in to be washed and handled by a man. Does it make sense? No. Panties are inanimate objects. Even if the guy behind the counter is sniffing them, they don’t care. But women, like parents, are sensitive to some things.

Would you take your kids to be looked after all day by a strange man? I wouldn’t. Ladies, would you take your underwear to be washed by a strange man? …depends how strange he is.

Is it fair that men are discriminated against in these cases? Maybe not. But it makes sense.

What do you think?


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Slapstick

Warning: The following my cause you to spit coffee out of your nose. Please read with caution.

Do you ever have so many things go wrong at once that you wonder if you’re on a sitcom and nobody told you? I had one of those moments at 6:30 this morning – far too early to start wondering who started the cameras rolling.

So there I was, standing at the counter in my kitchen, painstakingly crushing my son’s chewable vitamin with the blunt end of a knife as I do every morning. He won’t chew it – I have to stir it into his yogurt.

Anyway, there I was with this fine fine powder on the counter when my cellphone alarm went off in my pocket. I reached for the phone and pulled the crushed pill off the counter – all over the floor.

So I go to the broom closet, take out the broom and drop the dustpan. Bend down to pick up the dustpan, the mop falls and hits me on the head. Stuff the mop back in the broom closet, go back to the kitchen. Sweep up the mess, almost knock an opened bottle of wine on the floor with the broom handle.

Yes, there was a stopper in the bottle; no, I don’t drink wine at 6:30am, though I’m not sure why not.

All this happened in the space of about ninety seconds. One of those mornings when I just wanted to go back to bed and start again, you know?


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Writerly Procrastinations

In all honesty, I have to say I don’t believe Candy Crush Saga is a procrastination tool. It’s a way for me to escape my story for a few minutes and do something mindless that allows my imagination to wander.

When I’m not hungry but I get up to get myself something to eat anyway, that’s procrastination. Candy Crush Saga keeps me in my chair.

When I check my WordPress stats or my email, that’s procrastination. Candy Crush Saga takes far less time than that, especially if I have comments on my blog.

When I post a new blog to ask other people what they do to procrastinate, that’s procrastination.

So, how do you procrastinate?

Oh look, I have a new life on Candy Crush Saga! Gotta go.

 


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Shhh! Don’t Tell!

I’m an excellent person for keeping secrets. Unfortunately, I’m a horrible liar. Unless it comes to my mother, in which case I’ve been practicing since I was four and had it down to an art by the time I was a teenager, I blush, I look the other way, I avoid eye contact… I do everything in the book that will show anyone with an ounce of observational skills that I’m not telling the truth.

Is it a good idea to entrust a bad liar with a secret? If the person you’re confiding in knows your deepest darkests, and they also know, say, your spouse, do you hope that somehow they will suddenly find the ability to not blush, or simply avoid your loved ones lest they give you away?

I’m finding myself confronted with these issues, not in real life, but because of my writing. My plot is so thick with secrets at the moment, that not only am I having a hard time keeping track of who knows what, but I’m finding it difficult to not give things away to my reader.

I actually studied the body language of people who are lying, just so that I could write a more believable liar. In this, I’ve found the perfect way to tell when my kids aren’t telling the truth, and how I, myself, can become a better liar.

But back to telling secrets. Everyone has them, whether they’re big like infidelity or small like you think someone looks horrible in their favourite suit. Fibbing is a necessity when it comes to secrets. Secrets in fiction can be the backbone of a story.

Can a person who is a bad liar even have secrets? I sometimes feel as though I’m an open book, for all to see. Maybe that’s why secrets are prevalent in my fiction – practice for real life. I’m puzzling it out on paper.

Do you suffer with this dilemma, either in fiction or in real life with yourself or someone you confide in?

Tell me. Tell me your secrets. I won’t tell anyone, promise. 😉


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It’s Official

As of today, two of my children are adults. My middle son turned 18 today.

It’s really strange for me. I know I’ve said it before, but I’m in a unique position. I can watch him shave his face, reach up to hug him because he’s so much taller than I am, and yet I bought him Lego to unwrap today – the contradiction being because he is severely autistic.

I feel sad that he isn’t like his older brother – thinking about moving in with his girlfriend. I don’t know that he’ll ever have one.  But at the same time I am, very very slightly, content that for a while longer I will be able to watch over him.

A very happy birthday to you, Chris.

Chris

I love you very much.


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Getting views is like pulling teeth

Has anyone else noticed that their view count has gone down? I’m blaming it on the new pop-up window in the reader that allows people to read a post without going to the site.

While this new feature is sometimes handy, it discourages other WordPress users from clicking on the actual post. When they don’t look at the post, they don’t see our site, and when they don’t go to our site, they don’t see what else is on our site.

Just think about it this way:  One of the people you follow may have found the cure for the clap yesterday, but if you only read about how his or her cat looked cute rifling through the cantankerous neighbours trash bin today, you’ll never know! That’s valuable information there you’ve missed out on!

So tell me, is it just me? Or has your view count gone down too?


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NaNo Nono

Do you ever have one of those days when you want to write – you really do – but everything that comes out of you is sheer crap? I’m having one of those today.

On a happier note, I handed in what I consider another eight pages of utter drivel for my short story course today. Well, okay, maybe it’s not that bad. I hope it’s not. But I wasn’t allowed to polish it since it had to be a rough draft, so I certainly wasn’t happy with it.

It’ll at least be interesting to see if my professor sees the same things wrong with it as I do.

So unless I get a reprieve from this creative brain fart I’m having today, my NaNo wordcount is going to pot. I am so due for a weekend off – it’s been five weeks.

Maybe after 48 hours of solid sleep this weekend I’ll be back into the swing of things. Back in the saddle.

Back to being creative enough not to keep falling back on proverbs.

Or maybe I’ll feel better after a good night’s rest tonight. After all, tomorrow is another day.


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Eavesdropping Fun

So yesterday I was sitting in an unnamed coffee shop

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with my friend John, and we were chatting over lunch. A couple of twentysomethings sat at the table next to us and proceeded to scratch their lottery tickets.

When John and I got up to leave, he commented that he needed his jacket cleaned soon – he works in the automotive-type industry and it is covered in grease. The man at the next table said, simply, “Baby shampoo.” We both looked at him and he explained: “You can get grease off clothes with baby shampoo. Oh and it costs $300 to ship a car from Vancouver to Toronto by train.” The latter was something John and I had been discussing earlier on in the conversation. We both thanked him for the information, like the polite Canadians we are, and left.

Since then I have thought about all the things we could have been talking about, and one conversation I had years ago with my ex sticks out in my memory.

Being a writer, sometimes I talk about my characters as though they’re real people. Just imagine what the eavesdropping couple would have made of this:

Me: So it turns out Helen is fooling around on Frank.

John: That bitch!

Me: I know, right? But I don’t want him to find out.

John: Because…

Me: Well, you know. He’s in jail. There’s just so much a guy can take.

John: True.

Me: So I’ve decided to kill her.

John: Huh. How?

Me: I can’t decide. I was hoping you’d help.

John: I’ll do what I can.

Me: I mean, I’ve thought about drowning her in the bathtub.

John: That’s a good one.

Me: Or I could just drop the hairdryer in with her.

John: And fry her…

Me: I don’t know though. It seems too convenient.

John: How about killing her in a car accident?

Me: She doesn’t drive, so that would mean killing someone else as well.

John: How about Martha!

Me: YES! Great idea.

You’ve got to wonder if the couple at the next table would have been quite as ready to make suggestions…