CornerScribe

Archive for January, 2007

I believe I’ve heard each of these at one time or another, and I have to say I’ve believed a few of them.

As for number 2 (the direction water drains), I’m not sure even still. I’ve known people who SWORE that it did spin the opposite direction south of the equator. That, of course, begs the question… how does the water spin if you’re exactly on the equator?

Regardless, these may be some myths to use (or avoid using, as the case may be) in your writing. If nothing else, they are interesting.

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As you can see, I’ve done two postings from the offers on Blogitive, and both were accepted. At only $5 per posting, you’re certainly not going to get rich.

As of this evening, Blogitive hasn’t transferred anything to my paypal account, but I understand that they do that once per week. I’ll keep you updated on that as well.

The big question is… Do you want to put ads on your blog for only $5/per ad? Since I’m using adsense, it also interferes with the ads that Google delivers, since the keywords are different than what I usually write.

I haven’t decided, but I’m leaning to not using them, or perhaps using them just enough to pay the hosting fees. We’ll see how things pan out.

If you’re interested in fashion, or how someone makes it in the fashion industry, check out Belisi Fashions. If you’re at work, you may want to turn down the volume before clicking the link — the site has music.

Peter Belisi’s story is interesting. He started off as a bartender in Palm Beach and got noticed by collecting and wearing unique and trendsetting ties. He began designing for celebrities, and here’s the interesting part, also contributes to socially conscious causes with every purchase.

Some of the handbags are pretty attractive; they’re not the bizarre fare that you sometimes see from big-time designers.

I could see how this site might be a good research tool if you’re looking to outfit a character who’s chic or fashionable. I know I’d need some research help in that department.

If you’re like me, you probably jot some notes down when you overhear something funny, interesting or striking. A lot ends up in my writing notebook for (possible) future use.

Today, I had a funny conversation. We’ve been getting little snow “teasers” but nothing serious. I love snow, so it’s driving me nuts. We got to talking about how in the South things more or less shut down when there’s snow since most people aren’t accustomed to driving in it.

Which brought up this…

Pete was telling us about his service in the Marines in South Carolina. In 2000 (or 2001) they got some snow and ice, which is unusual for the area, so the base called a snow day.

Yep, the MARINE CORPS called a snow day.

Maybe I have an odd sense of humor, but I think it’s hilarious.

As I’ve mentioned before, I do some writing for Constant Content. The site had been down for upgrade for a few days, but it’s back up now.

You’re not going to get rich writing for them, and they do take a pretty hefty percentage (about a third), but it is a way to earn a little extra cash. Even writing a few articles a month will likely pay your hosting fees and buy you some coffee at the cafe.

Does anyone have recommendations for other sites that are good for some freelancing or making a little extra from blogging? Please post any ideas here.

Geico (the folks who sell automobile insurance and have the fun commercials) have added a “Teens and Trucks” section to their online safe driving materials. They give tips about how to drive safely around large trucks.

My first job was working for a trucking company as a teenager, and I can relate to some of the things that they recommend. One that comes to mind is the advice to never treat a truck as if it can stop as quickly as a car can. It was described to me this way “A truck has several tons pushing it down the highway, and there’s no way you’re going to stop that fast.” As a teen, I’d have never realized that had I not worked where I did.
Geico’s materials on teens and safe driving is located at http://www.geico.com/auto/safety. If you have a teen driving, or nearing driving age, this is something you may want to look at together. It’s been a long time, but I know my driver’s education classes didn’t include this!

I’ve talked about other ways to make money from writing online here in the blog, and here’s another I ran across the other day. Blogitive pays you to write a blog entry on a topic from their database.

The first step is to fill out the registration information and give the blog address. Then, blogitive will check your blog to verify that it’s suitable. According to their guidelines, they won’t pay for entries on sites that include pornography or hate speech.

After your blog is approved, you can log in and view offers and decide if you want to do a blog entry on them.

That’s as far as I’ve proceeded in the process. I’m hesitant to place advertisements on this blog unless it’s for something that I think you all might be interested in. However, I’m also curious as to how well the blogitive process works.

I’ll be writing a few articles and placing them on the blog under a new category, “Paid Ads.” If you’re interested, by all means read them. If you’d rather not, then stay tuned for a later update on Blogitive and how well it works.

Now that I’ve put together my writing goals for the year, I’m beginning to think about my marketing goals as well.

Obviously, I’m trying to earn a little to help pay the hosting costs for this site. I’m sure you’ve noticed the ads that appear on the blog pages, and I hope that they’re not too intrusive.

I also hope to be able to use the blog to market the novel when the time comes, but I’ll also need to think about other marketing tools. What types of marketing work do you do or plan to do this year? I’d be curious to hear other’s feedback as I’m thinking about my own plans.

As promised, I’ve thought about and put together my writing goals for this year. I’ll continue to post here as to how well (or not so well) I’m meeting them.

1. Publish a novel. This is obviously the biggie. In order to meet this goal, I’ve also set some writing and editing goals for the novel as well.
2. Spend four evenings a week either writing or editing the novel, at least half an hour each time.
3. Write four blog entries per week.
4. Write two non-fiction articles per week.

I decided to focus more on what I can control (writing) and less on what’s out of my control (publishing). As for the novel, I’m leaning strongly to print on demand publishing, so that’s within my control as well.

If you’ve put together some writing goals, post them here.

This is an interesting article, particularly if you’re interested in creating alien races. People in the Netherlands are growing taller (six feet one is the average for men). The article points out that it’s probably because they lead healthier lives and have better nutrition.

When I read about alien races, I like to understand why they’re different from humans. Evolution selects the fittest, so if someone is taller, shorter, has four arms or knees that bend backwards, there has to be an evolutionary explanation. In short, their design must fit their environment or be explained by their environment. Otherwise, it’s just a neat anomaly that’s likely to bug the reader. I Know it bugs the heck out of me.

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