Category: Non-Writing Projects


The Book Fairy’s Bigger, Badder Cousin!

Filed under: Non-Writing Projects, The Book Fairy — 4 Comments
January 18, 2013

Oh. My. God!

I knew it had to exist. I just knew, but I hadn’t managed to turn up anything during my (halfhearted) internet searches.

Last Saturday I took three books along with me to the Phoenix Writers, intending to get more Book Fairy offerings floating around through different channels. I explained, in brief, what I was trying to do by sending these books off into the wild and Maria asked ‘is that like the Book Crossing?’ Having never heard of it before I had to ask what that was about and, as it turns out, the Book Crossing really is a bigger, badder (and far more sophisticated) version of the Book Fairy.

I had a little skim of their website and though I haven’t joined it yet (and therefore can’t access many of the features) I can see that there is a massive amount of books floating around. And these books are travelling all over the world! They have labels and identification numbers so that they can be followed wherever they go.

Part of me is a little disappointed that someone ‘got there first,’ but the rest of me is thrilled that there is such a well organised initiative to share books. After all, books are made to be shared and the fact that a system exists to do so (other than a library, I mean), warms me. What I need to do now is decide whether I want to send my books through the world with the Book Crossing, or if I want to just keep going it alone. I’m yet to decide, but there’s no rush. I still have six stickers left so that’s at least six more books to get going. I left a couple on the train the other day, so I’m still really enjoying myself.

Do any of you guys use Book Crossing? Have you heard of it before? Have you come across any of their books on your travels? I would love to know; I feel like I missed a trick with this site, having not heard of it before.

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Erm… Ooops!

Filed under: News, Non-Writing Projects — 4 Comments
October 2, 2012

Having a mooch, as I do, through my emails in the middle of the night – head nodding as I try not to crush a feeding baby – I made my way over to JM’s blog. The mini series ‘Blogs – How Do You Follow Them‘ has been incredibly interesting to read and I wish I had more time to read through the comments. Head on over there if you’re interested on a quick study on how people follow blogs, do their reading and their criteria for choosing who to follow.

Anyway, it was after reading these posts that I got to thinking. There are lots of bloggers that I used to speak to quite regularly, picking their posts out of my email and following the links through to read what they had to say. But some of them haven’t popped up recently. I assumed that they were just busy and hadn’t posted. After all, life happens to all of us, doesn’t it? Some days there is just no way to get a post out on time, whatever you do – which is why most of mine are planned out in advance, sometimes by as much as two weeks.

I logged onto the WordPress dashboard, thinking this was a bit odd, and followed the links through to my Reader. Well imagine my surprise; there are LOADS of posts there! Most of which haven’t made it anywhere near my email. Grr!

angry green monster with teeth - from OpenClipArtCrap. So when I thought I was caught up, it turns out that there are a tonnes of posts that I just haven’t seen because I never though that they wouldn’t come to my email. As a matter of fact, there are 43 blogs that WordPress thought to set as ‘Never’ when asked if new posts should come to my email!

Wuh? I never told it to do that!

*huff huff* I’ve fixed it now, and I know in future to double check it. Its fascinating though, that’s 43 blogs I’d forgotten I follow because its been so long since I heard from them!

This post is as much to apologise for suddenly going quiet on all those blogs, as to let you guys know; WordPress does weird things with your settings! If you think you should be getting more emails, or if a blog you follow has gone strangely quiet, just check out your Reader. You may get a surprise.

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Writing For Money

Filed under: Non-Writing Projects, Real Life Chatter — 4 Comments
May 19, 2012

Tuesday’s post brings me neatly onto; how on earth does one write for money?!

Certainly unless you’re JK Rowling or Stephanie Meyer, you’re not going to produce £££s until coins fall out of your ears like golden rain. That takes skill and talent (Rowling) or wild, blind luck and a fanbase of nutters (Meyer).

So for someone like me, how do I make money from writing?

So far, I’ve come up with three real, workable methods (there may be more – I hope there’s more! – but I’m still working on that).
 

1) Writing For Other People
There are various ways to do this. One can write for individual magazines, local newspapers and websites. One can ghost write, or one can do what the lovely Kana has done, and freelance for a company who takes on a wide array of different writing assignments.

These, if you luck in with them, can provide a steady income. It might not be enough to buy your dream boat house with all the frilly trimmings, but if its enough to pay bills, buy food and keep my roof where I want it (above my head) then that leaves more time to embrace option two.
 

2) Writing For My Self
Not just for this blog, but I mean novels. I’m talking about novellas and self published anthologies that I can put on the market and sell.

Again, while I would love to make buckets of money from this sort of enterprise, luck, timing and the will of the powers that watch us, have a lot to do with whether that will happen. Its not a given and its silly to depend on. But surely there’s nothing to stop me from trying? And if I make a few quid each month then that is ready pocket money that I’ve made from doing something I love. What on earth is wrong with that?
 

3) Helping Others To Write
Dave keeps talking about this one and I love him so much for it. He asks how I feel about giving talks and seminars and sharing my experiences and knowledge with other people. I shy away from it because I have no qualification to say I can do so, but, to be frank, do I really need one? When I can show what I’m able to do, can I not share my experiences and knowledge with people who might learn from them?

I’m learning all the time; picking up hints and tips and knowledge about social media, advertising, networking, editing, formatting for various formats of ebook. Why can’t I use that knowledge, not only to help myself grow, but others too? I’m talking about young people here; folk who, in the current climate, may be so overwhelmed by doom and gloom stories that they’ve no idea that their creative urges can still be fulfilled, so long as they’re willing to work for it. The next Charles Dickens could be hiding in a school somewhere, and we might never find them because the whole world insists that they need to be [insert generic money-making job title here] to get by in the world.

What about things like editing and proof reading? I’ve been through university; academic and technical writing are both things I have skills in. Why can I not offer out those for a fee? Obviously I would need to gather some real, tangible experience and testimonials for that sort of thing but I’ve done it in the past and helped people lift lift grades from fails into solid passes.
 

In short, there are lots of ways that I can do my part to support my growing family with something I love so very, very much. If you can think of more, hey, let me in on it and I’ll add it to my list of ‘things I’m considering.’

I’m so absolutely determined now that I’m going to make this work. I have to, not just for me and my kids, but for the memory of young, sceptical me who looked out at the world and was afraid of it. The young me who almost gave up on doing what she wanted with her life. I need to show her that it was okay to dream and prove that with the right amount of work, dedication and stubborn bullheadedness, we can get what we want. I want my kids to know that too.

What do you think folks? Can you think of any other avenues I can try?

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My Acting Début

Filed under: FUN!, Non-Writing Projects — Leave a comment
October 11, 2011

So not that I’ve never done any acting work before, but this was something special. I spent Sunday morning (and some of the afternoon) being the Diva of Joy. ^_^

You may recall my talking about Carol Leeming before. Leicester Diva, poet and all round performer of awesome. Well her project The Loneliness of the Long Distance Diva has begun filming and I’ve been involved in a club scene set in the bright, colourful and totally beautiful 70s. The scene features a dance floor full of revellers, roller girls (because skates are cool!) and a drag queen (of course). On stage is the performer (Chester) and his two glitzy backup singers, the Divas of Joy.

One gold, one silver, these girls help to rile the crowd, work them up and play off against Chester as he performs for the masses.

There is more to the scene that that, of course, but the bits I’m not involved with, I’ve made an effort not to learn too much about, since I really want to enjoy the film as a whole when its completed.

I played the gold Diva. A role that kinda fell into my lap when I ran into Carol outside the test centre when I did my driving theory test. She almost jumped on me, pointed a bit and exclaimed that I would be perfect for it. If I wanted to be involved.

My very last acting experience prior to this had been with LUT in my second year of uni, a Czech play called The Memorandum. I played a slight crazy, utterly bemused secretary type who would pinch your bum in the office, but not really mean anything by it. Brilliant play; very funny and pointing out some of the more ridiculous drawbacks to insisting that everything is by all the rules, with the appropriate paperwork and red tape dodging. Office politics gone awry, but very much fun.

Prior to that, it had been operettas at school and one big play at my drama school in which I actually managed to snap up a leading role. Oh and some BBC extra work on Hope & Glory.

Nothing since leaving uni though. So I really did hop on the chance to do some more acting; particularly with Carol who I really do admire and respect for all the things she’s done.

Cut to Sunday morning, after all my worry that I might not be able to make it for various reasons I ride down to the location ready to be glammed up and made glitzy.

I wish I had a photo.

I ducked Dave so many times that he didn’t manage to take any (d’oh!) and by the time I’d cooled down enough to stop sweating off the makeup, it was time to go.

Oh, but it was an amazing time! Afro wigs, flared-leg jump suits, bright colours, massive jewellery and sequins! My golden wrap type thing was fabulous! So shiny (and custom made, by the way!) and caught it the light in a truly funky way. I got a matching headdress of gold (you know; those nets with the long dangly bits in the back) and a glittery microphone so I could sing my heart away.

And I did. I remain surprised by how many of those songs I actually knew. But then, after going through uni and then doing the radio show I shouldn’t be surprised that many of the songs played were well known to me. When Le Freak came on it was a bit hard to control myself.

Hehee.

I believe the piece is out in June/July 2012, but don’t worry! I won’t forget to tell you guys all about it when it does; so you can see. I think somebody said it will be playing at Curve, but that’s just speculation until I know more. And there are still photoshoots to do, so I’ll have more to talk about later on. Have no fear of that!

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Radio Is Back Up

Filed under: Non-Writing Projects, Radio — Leave a comment
April 10, 2011

On airIt took a while, a lot of testing and, frankly put, its not as smooth as it once was, but I can now broadcast again. Using Spreaker allows me to keep going and play music for the world as I used to, though, since many of my listeners were based through AL I’ll have to do some quick work to establish my listener base again.

*sigh*

Ho hum. It could be a deal worse. In fact, I’m pleased that I can do this at all, since, for a long while it was looking like I wouldn’t be able to. Do you remember the frustration and irritation earlier on in the year when it all fell to bits? So… this is a nice way to keep going at least in a small way until I have a better alternative.

I’m actually broadcasting now, so this is just going to be quick. But its fully possible for me to fill in the gaps – while songs are playing of course – with osme writing here. I call it ‘an efficient use of dead time.’ Even though it isn’t really dead time.

Hmm, okay, I’m rambling now. I’ll stop, but mainly, I just wanted to say that its back. It does require a little bit more clickage than it did before, but the talk, music and insane babbly goodness is just as good as ever it was! :D

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