Cleared My Plate For Tomorrow

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I had a scheduled day off on Sunday and had planned to get a couple of writing projects completed. Ended up being called in to work and given some much needed work hours. As a result virtually none of that writing even got looked at. Tomorrow I get another shot at it all.

Before getting to that though there were a couple bits of work that had to be done first. We have a storm on its way and our firewood pile was getting depleted. This storm is supposed to bring a mix of rain and snow, a terrible combination for bringing in firewood. Went crazy on it this afternoon though. I cut down three very dry dead trees and with the help of the boys hauled it all under cover. This will keep us warm well into March. That means tomorrow, I don't even have to think about it.

Tomorrow I'm going to punch my writing clock in the morning and get after that freelance writing bio. I need to get that done. After the bio, I have to put together a basic price list for my services and make the site public. I am hoping to begin making a small side income through that type of work.

Once I'm done with all that I have a project my wife and I have been working on for her website. On her America Fine Arts account it is possible to get her work on I-phone cases. For some reason the prices ended up all over the place. We've fixed most of them. Tomorrow we get to do the rest and then promote them. Some of her artwork looks exceptionally good on those products.

It is going to be a big day at the keyboard. Hopefully my writing endeavors with continue to develop and move forward.

Writing a Freelancer Bio

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This project is testing me severely. It isn't that I can't write a decent bio in a big hurry. The challenge is to create something that will potentially lead to paying clients. I went online to check out articles on the subject, which made things clear as mud. Then I looked at other freelancer sites for examples and that didn't seem to help much either. This has been bugging me intensely for days and not so intensely for a couple months. My subconscious hasn't failed me yet though and I have cobbled together what I think is a workable framework to hang everything on.

First thing a prospective client wants to know about me is what I am as a writer. That will be the first section of the bio. After that they likely want to know more about my background and education and finally my miscellaneous experiences outside of writing. Every section is important but needs to be in a resume order rather than what I would usually write for a bio. It also means headings and sub-headings, things that I don't normally associate with short biographies.

This is a good experience for me. Pushes me outside of my writing comfort zone. I don't doubt my abilities. I think I'll end up with something excellent when I'm finished. I expect to be putting it out there for my friends to critique within a week or so, depending on time and inspiration. I want to get this right.

Once that's done and I've put together a basic price list for my services, I will be going live with the site. Another step forward.

First Miss of the Year

Yesterday, I wrote nothing. First day I've missed so far this year. I still have more blog post, articles and other published pieces than I have days of the year. Incidentally I'm planning to catch this miss up before the day is out today. This is not a disaster. The problem isn't a problem until it happens all the time.

This is a miss I could have avoided by writing something when I had the time earlier in the day. Because I didn't, then plans changed on the fly and then finally I had a worry thrown on my plate. No one to blame. Everything was voluntary. Even the worry part. It isn't my problem. Just my heart hasn't turned completely to stone quite yet. That's my excuses at any rate.

Today's schedule got flipped around as well but I can make it work to my favour. Shake machine at work broke yesterday and has to be fixed this morning. The guy who fixes and cleans that machine wasn't supposed to be on early so we were asked to trade shifts. Works better for me. Especially since I can write this now and a background type post for my wife's artist's site when I get home. Spreads everything out.

So a couple cliché lessons for the day. If you suffer a set back, get right back up. If life serves you lemons, make lemonade. Works for me.

A Hoped For Step Forward

We have started February with a very encouraging success. My wife Francine opened her Fine Arts America account and site in 2012 and had not sold a single copy of any of her paintings and drawings during the ensuing years. Someone did buy a copy of a photograph once but that was it. I felt the issue had a lot more to do with our marketing than the quality of her work.

Several weeks ago we thought it would be a good idea to put together an artist's blog for her highlighting her work. The project is on going. We divided her work up into logical galleries and made links back to her original site for the purposes of sales. Fine Arts America does that part very well. Biweekly I'm am adding a background story blog entry for her existing paintings. I ghost write for her while she continues her artwork.

After the first week, Francine has sold two greeting card images. That is exactly the type of success we were hoping for. We aren't hoping to get rich from the site, in fact at this point if she earned enough to pay for all her art supplies we'll be delighted. Long term we are hoping she can gain a modest income from her work.

This isn't just a big success for Francine but also a win for me. In the background I've been slowly working at launching myself as a freelance writer on the world. I already have demonstrated that I am a pro at writing forum content and related work. This site is ample evidence that I can ghost write blog content as well. I am working at a dedicated site for this work. Once I've established appropriate pricing for my skills and the basics are ready there, I will be launching that as well. The process has been a slow one, but good progress is being made. I think it is only a matter of time before I'm making a side income writing, independent of content mills and other extremely low paying options.

My Brain is Misfiring

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Due to a scheduling quirk, I'm at work way early and have time to write before my shift begins. Only problem is the writing idea portion of my brain has shut down. It's a little frustrating because yesterday while I was working the grill, I had several really good ones bouncing around between my ears. Once I'm there again, I'm certain all those wonderful ideas will come flooding back. Problem is that I have the time now.

Now before someone drops the wonderful idea that I need to write down my ideas before they vanish, it's hard to do while I'm working. I've tried keeping a pen and paper on my person even at work but you would not believe how many pens I've lost doing that. I can't afford to keep buying them.

Nearest pen and paper is in my backpack on top of the employee lockers. If I can hang onto an idea until break or the end of my shift, I will capture it.  Sometimes I get distracted though and yesterday I got big time distracted. I finished my shift quite concerned about the incident. After work, my wife, one of my sons and myself followed up, did what we could but are still concerned. Won't write about that either because it's better left confidential. Life happens, everytthing will be just fine.

The ideas will come back and the beauty of writing practice is you can always write something even if your brain isn't quite all there.

Funny thing is that this'll wind up on my author's blog not my writing practice because this is all about writing. Going to be a great day. Maybe I'll write something else before the day is out. For daily writing I'm a plus two on the year and making it plus three would be nice.