Friday Check In

Well, I said I would check-in regularly and this week was pretty disappointing ... but now that I have to own it publicly hopefully that will make next week a little more productive.  I only wrote Tuesday night and only 357 words.  That's not awesome.

But onto next week!

Building a Habit ... The Redux

Hopping back on the bandwagon ... but will
resist asking Amanda Bynes for any
driving tips.

Okay, so about a month ago I said I was building a new habit.  And then managed it for about 7 days and then stopped reporting on it altogether.

What happened?

I could blame it on the new television schedule but since I've got my new, shiny DVR taping all my soon-to-be favourite shows, this would be an all-out lie (side note - have decided Elementary will be my favourite new show - Jonny Lee Miller as Sherlock Holmes??  Drooling as I type this ...)

The truth?  I stopped spending time on the habit ... and even worse ... started to hide away when I realized I wasn't keeping on track.    If I don't report on my failures then they can't be failures, right???

As someone who's a Project Manager in real life, I can tell you that the absolute worst thing you can do when stuff is falling off the track is stop reporting on it.  Once you stop keeping track of how you're doing, it's very easy to ignore the problem indefinitely.   Even if you have to report fail after fail after fail, it's better than not showing up at all ... and as I've seen on most of my projects, once the failures start adding up it often spurs you into action!

So, I 'm jumping back into it and will vow to report on my progress ... no matter how terrible.  No one said this writing stuff would be easy ....

Building a New Habit: Day 7 .... Kind of

RIP Phyllis Diller. 
No one rocked the rainbow feather dress better!
[Photo by Allan warren]

I bet you thought I forgot all about this little habit-building journey I was on, didn't you?  Well, I didn't -- I just ended up taking a little break.

My day-job sent me across the country last week, and even though I had all good intentions to write while I was away, the job kept me going from early morning until late at night.  I did manage to haul my butt off to a Denny's at 5:30am the first day I was there and wrote for 45 minutes (yay!) ... but after that I tanked.  No writing at all!  And taking the red-eye back home didn't help me over the weekend.

But I'm back to it ... and this morning I got up early to write.  Got derailed by laundry and then drove to the day-job telling myself I would make sure I wrote before I started the day-job.

And I did!  I worked on my query letter for forty-five minutes today (much, much harder than it looks when you read other people's letters, isn't it??).

So writing successful at least for today.  Now off to Day 8 ....

Building a New Habit: Day 6

Schmidt and CeCe from New Girl
celebrating my successful week!
Holla!

Woohoo!! I hit 965 words in the last session.  I'm very, very happy with that and I got through the hard part - the kiss!  Now I just need to tie this scene up, clean up the rough edges, and send it onto my crit partners.  Yay!!

My new habit is designed for weekdays only.  I alwasys feel a lot of pressure to write every day, but I also know I need some breaks, so I've decided to give myself weekends off.  And since I was pretty good at writing this week - not great, but good - I'm going to count this week as a success!!

Thanks for all the 'pump-me-up' messages.  Looking forward to enjoying my wine tonight!  See you Monday!

Building a New Habit: Day 5

The classic 'kiss with a leg lift' ... I give them a 15.8 for
execution.
[Photo by Ohcaroliiina]

I wrote last night!   432 words.  Not the 750 I wanted, but I'm happy with 432.   I'm working on a scene where my characters kiss, and admittedly I'm lousy at these scenes.  They aren't my strong suit and I find them excruciating to write.  Thinking about them in my head?  All good.  But writing them down is painful.

One of my critique partners, Anne MacFarlane, is really, really good at love scenes.  They look effortless when she does them, but when I write them I seem to focus too much on the mechanical parts and it feels so clunky.  I *should* practice them on a regular basis and then they probably wouldn't feel so foreign to me, but I think I'll tackle that once I've got this habit down.

Have also been thinking about the time of day I'm writing.  Building a habit is about making it so routine that you don't even think about it anymore.  I'm moving my writing times around a lot, so I think I need to find a time where it's consistent.  Might move it to the morning next week to test it out.

Building a New Habit: Day 4

My well-flossed teeth. 

Okay, Day 4 did not go very well.

I didn't write.  Anything.   I had to stay late at work for meetings (didn't get home until 10:00pm) and then I was too zonked too write.  Admittedly, I watched TV instead of getting home and going right up to my office, but this habit-building stuff isn't going to be easy, right?

Normally, if I miss a goal I pile all the work up onto the next day and then feel so overwhelmed by it I find excuses not to do it.  But I'm not going to do that to myself.

If I miss a day of writing, I miss it.  I don't need to make it up the next day, I just need to make sure the next day I sit my butt in the chair and write. 

It's like flossing my teeth.  I have a good habit in place where I floss my teeth every weekday while I'm brushing in the morning.  Sometimes I'm rushed and I skip the flossing, but I don't floss my teeth twice the next day to make up for it.   And I have a great set of teeth (mostly thanks to my orthodontist - 4 years of braces - that's a lot of braces!).  I must be doing some things right!

So tonight, back to it!!

6 Things You Can Do to Help Support Authors

How do you stand out among this crowd??
[Photo by Raysonho@Open Grid Scheduler]

I love my writing friends and want to support them, but I'll be honest, I haven't always known the best way to help them out when they've released their babies into the world ...

Author  Shawna Romkey posted the following blog post about a month ago and it sums up all the things you can do to support your fave authors.  Hope you find it as useful as I did!!  (As a side note, Kobo is the name of an e-reader we use in Canada ... so it might be a new word for you) :)

Do you have an author you love, like, are a fan of or just want to plain old support? These are the six things you can do to help them out.

1. Like their book. Find their book on Amazon, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, and Goodreads and “like” it. The more “likes” a book has, the more “like”ly it is to sell. If no one has liked it, a potential buyer may not want to try it.

2. Tag the book. On Amazon.com you have the ability to add “tags” to the book. If you scroll down past the reviews, you’ll find “tags.” What tags do is show keywords that the book is about, so someone looking for a book on dogs might type in the word “dogs.” If your friend has written a book on dogs, add the keyword “dogs” to their tags. That makes their book more likely to come up in a search of that word. If your friend has written a romance, add the tag “romance.” If it is about “vampires” you can add that, as well as whatever else comes to mind: “horror,” “paranormal,” “gothic” etc… Add the author’s name. Add any other titles the author has written. Add whatever you can think that’s relevant. The more tags, the more searchable the book will be.

3. Review the book. Reviews sell books, plain and simple. Give the book a read, go to the big 4 sites I mentioned above (Amazon, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, and Goodreads) and review it or rate it. The review doesn’t have to be perfect. You aren’t writing it for your high school English teacher. It can just be a few lines about why you liked it. Try to avoid giving spoilers in a review.

4. Share the book on Facebook. Share your review after you’ve written it. I know on Amazon that option pops up for you to post your review on FB. If you can, Share it. If your author friend posts it on FB, share it to your list.

5. Tweet it. Just like sharing above, except for Twitter. You are given the option to tweet your review after you do so. Do it. Tweet it. Retweet your friend’s posting of it.

6. Pin it. The new social media giant on the block is Pinterest. It’s number three, right behind Facebook and Twitter. If you haven’t checked it out yet and are bored and have nothing to do, take a look. If you are a busy person, don’t because you’ll become addicted and never get anything done. Go to one of the big sites mentioned above and Pin your friend’s book. Their book will end up in the massive Pinterest feed for hundreds of thousands of people to see, and those people will be able to Re-pin it.

Those are the 6 things you can do to help out your author friends. Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo and Goodreads are the big 4 sites you can go to for their books and to post ratings and reviews. Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest are the big 3 social media outlets out there to help spread the word.