Hickory Ridge Seeds just went online. I’m not into gardening (love the results, hate the work) but I am into writing and will be doing some writing for the company. They’re a small, family owned seed business located near Viola, Arkansas. I do get my head out of my writing long enough to occasionally watch real news and when it comes to food availability, the news isn’t good. Might be a good time to buy some seeds. Jack and Nancy are great to do business with. Check out the website.

Writing relationships are much like any other sort of relationships. They ebb in highs and lows. Sometimes they are wonderful, other times they are an uncomfortable must. Eventually they do one of two things: they grow or are terminated.

When I started writing regularly online, Demand Studios was one of the first sites I wrote for. It was an easy relationship. Claim assignments, complete them, get paid. Repeat the process.

Changes came . Sometimes I grumbled but I always complied and kept the relationship. Now they’ve thrown me a curve ball. It came wrapped in a simple email containing an ordinary request.

“Please login and update your bio.”  Okay. So they’ve made more changes. I make my way to the site, login and there it is. Right out of left field.

“Please correct your name.”  Excuse me? I exchange emails with admin and am informed that my first name must contain more letters. I politely point out that I’ve been writing for them for a few years now and my name has never been an issue before.

Admin replies with another command that I change my name.  I don’t want to be anyone else. What am I supposed to do? Randomly insert letters between the P and the J? Maybe multiply both so that I am now PPPPJJJJ?

Portia? Penny? Penelope? Princess? (That last one does roll nicely off the tongue, lol.) If money weren’t an issue and I had no fear of burning bridges, I know exactly how I’d reply to admin.

But burning bridges is rarely a good idea, and is actually quite a bad idea when one is a freelancer. So I will either 1) grab the baby name book and play the “open the book and take the first name” game or 2) assign myself an easy-to-spell and easy-to-remember new first name.

Last month, I did an article about dealing with emergencies and keeping article writing and blogs current. Hmmm. Wrote and published that article and then suddenly it’s been 3 weeks since I did any writing or blogging.

The first week involved a death in the family and, let’s face it, I just wasn’t interested in opening my laptop, much less in getting any actual work done.

The second week involved recovering from the first in addition to a minor but very painful illness in the family.  While I did open the laptop to check an occas email or play a game of Farm Frenzy, I wasn’t in the mood for creativity nor was I inclined to force the mood.

This, the third week, has been a jumble of obligations and interruptions. However, not only did I realize it was time to plant my backside in the chair and my fingers on the keyboard, I was feeling well enough to want to get back into circulation.

Wonderful morning, light rain falling as I sit by an open door and power up the laptop. No one else home to interrupt or annoy me. Click on the tab in the toolbar to open my blog and  surprise!  Firefox on Linux has refused to save passwords.

I am sooo tired of the password issue (gave roboform and xmarks half-hearted attempts before everything fell apart last month) but it must be resolved.  Time is too valuable to waste. Settled for a Firefox plugin called firefox sync. We shall see how it works.

Important files from old laptop are now on an external hard drive – accessible when needed, out of the way when not necessary. It appears that the only file I cannot locate is an entire series of articles I wrote in Notepad.

Since the articles are ‘evergreen’ meaning the information in them is unlikely to go out of date, I planned on using them to stock an emergency folder with blog entries and articles for the directories. Once emailed to a couple of other writers, I’ll have an emergency backup plan in place and ready to roll. Even if I can’t get online, my writing buddies can login and post for me.

Since I want to accomplish several things this am, I’m putting them aside and pushing on. The search can wait.

The more I write, the more I realize there are no perfect writing days. Not when you live among other people and you have a life outside of words. It isn’t so much that Murphy’s Law exists and makes itself known — it’s more that life happens and will continue to do so until death intervenes.

So how do you make the most of both worlds? By controlling, as much as possible, lol, how and where the two converge. While I have a wonderful home office upstairs, it’s upstairs. If I am upstairs, I must rely on my “mommy” instincts to let me know what the grandchildren are up to. I am also out-of-reach of everyone else.

Being out-of-reach is great when I can get by with it but I can’t do that unless a) everyone else is gone and I’m home alone or b) everyone else is in bed and I’m up alone.

(Shutting one’s self in an office to write, around here at least, is akin to being a mommy and shutting the bathroom door for a quick pee break. All of the people in the household who couldn’t care less where you were thirty seconds earlier, now demand your company- – -  immediately. They usually remain at the door, repeating their insistence for the entire thirty seconds you’re allowed to remain behind said door.)

I’ve now carved out writing space both in the family room and in the bedroom. I can work on projects that do not require serious concentration while at the table in the family room and do so without missing anything the GC are attempting. The small desk in the bedroom has proven to be the best place to get serious work done when I can’t totally remove myself from everything and everyone around me.

When first carving out my spaces, it was a pain to make sure I had everything I needed at each place. Get all settled in at the table in the family room, realize password book is upstairs. Settle in at desk in bedroom, realize wireless mouse is still on table in the family room.

When I sit down to write, be it blogging or articles, I want to write, not hassle with stuff. Aaaaggghhhh.

So somewhere in the mist that was last week, I took the time to make sure all of my files were in one place. I dragged out an old mouse with usb cable and left it in place permanently in the family room. I designated my old, aka dying, laptop for use in the family room. Should it fall prey to an accident of any type (rambunctious children, acts of nature, etc.) it’s no great loss.

My new laptop reigns at the small desk in the bedroom. It boasts the wireless mouse and now contains all necessary bookmarks, passwords and files I might need.  I’m no longer carrying an armful of computer stuff through the house every time I change locations.

Dealing with Murphy’s Law and all the other stuff that tries to leap between you and what you want to accomplish is best done with two weapons: Determination and Adaptability. Writing in the midst of everyday chaos is not my preferred setting, but it beats not writing. Writing on a laptop with a twitchy screen isn’t my blogging method of choice – but it beats not blogging.

Can’t say I’m crazy about the name – I prefer the simple tag “Linux” but whatever you call it, I’m learning to like it…

I recently replaced my old laptop. I’d been considering the switch to Linux for sometime, but hadn’t made the time to do so. Now, armed with a fresh computer and no chance of losing important information, it seemed like a good time to take Linux for a test drive. Especially since an IT guy offered to take care of the installation for me.

Unfortunately, I cannot say a permanent goodbye to Windows. (I’m REALLY close tho,lol).  So my laptop now boasts the latest version of Ubuntu with Windows 7 inside for those rare occasions when nothing else will do.

The learning curve hasn’t been as steep as I feared. I love the sleek speed and the ease of use. It’s easy to have multiple windows open and there are Linux-compatible programs for just about everything. Microsoft Office is one of the reasons I still have Windows available. Yes, I know Open Office is free. Free isn’t always good and I’ve been using Excel far too long to try to relearn Open Office’s secrets. Just to be fair, I did give it a try. That one document is hopefully the only spreadsheet I’ll ever create outside Excel.

I’m not saying Excel is perfect. I’m saying it’s perfect for me.

The more I use Linux, the more I believe it’s perfect for me too.

Firesuits Sb Required Monday Protection

There’s just something about Mondays – they’re an irritation whether you’re punching the 9-5 clock for someone else or working from home with an Internet business.

I’ve now been at my desk for four and one-half hours. During those hours, I should have been

• writing a set of articles that are due in two days
• posting on my blogs
• updating my websites
• implementing a marketing campaign

Instead, I’ve been

• cleaning up a master file (typo’s can really wreck havoc when you’re updating a password file)
• fighting a multi-laptop situation (gotta get the new laptop “loaded”, the old one “un-loaded” and the desktop synced to play nice with it)
• sorting all the notes and stuff from working while away from home
• yada, yada.

Next Best Thing to Cherry Dr P

Dealing with all these little fires would be simpler if I could just have a Cherry Dr. Pepper (with something choc, of course) but I’m trying to drink healthy and get back off the sweets. : (

While I have my doubts as to how healthful any purchased drink can be, Sobe Lifewater certainly goes down good.

Too bad it can’t make like Calgon and take me away. Away from blog pages that don’t load properly, misplaced passwords and contraband.

No, I haven’t become a smuggler. But teenage girls are notorious for hiding all sorts of things and the resident teenager is no exception. There was nothing real surprising or exciting in the stash I browsed (quite boring but nice to know she isn’t into anything serious) although I’m not sure I returned the stash holder to its original position.

No problem there. Just like the gremlins that tweak computer stuff, little brothers are well known for messing with everything.

It would probably set off more alarms if I did manage to put everything back perfectly.

I am now going to clear my desk of everything – laptops, notes, password books and all, and get down to the business of writing. I can at least control the outcome.

Game Plan Part Two – Assessing Internet Business Plans

When a level of Farm Frenzy: Pizza Party opens, you’re often greeted with a variable of two scenarios.

One, you have the factories but lack income and/or animals to generate product to be processed in those factories. Without any livestock or money, you’re forced to capture wild bears in order to have funds.

Two, you have a bit of money and an animal or two but must generate enough income to build the necessary factories in order to get product to market for a decent price. Egg factories may be cheap but the others are not.

The same factors often affect building an Internet business. Instead of animals/factories and money, it’s skills or knowledge and money.

When it comes to starting an online business, what one person lacks in finance they often make up for in skills or knowledge. In order to get where they wish to be online, they must learn to market the skills they do have in order to generate the finances they lack.

Not only is it necessary to take a close look at assets on hand (time, skills) it is also necessary to learn to leverage assets in way that makes it possible to achieve step one of the multi-step goal plan.

There’s a level of Farm Frenzy where the goal is a pat of butter. In order to make the butter, you need a cow ($10,000) but you start the game with a few chickens ($100 to buy, eggs sell for only $10.00 each).

It’s a long way from ten dollar eggs to a ten thousand dollar animal.

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I may be slow in jumping on the game bandwagon, but I’m not slow about learning what games can teach me about succeeding in business. A recent introduction to the Farm Frenzy series of games has me taking another look at my online business model.

Visual, Measurable Goal

Small Goals Lead to Large Game Success

The first step in winning at any game is knowing what you must achieve or accomplish in order to win.

In Farm Frenzy Pizza Party, one level requires that you produce or acquire all the ingredients necessary to make a pizza.

A graph provides visual notation of the game goal, including pictures of what is required and count-down as progress is made.

If I am to succeed at this game level, I must acquire all of the items shown and complete the pizza task.

Likewise, if I am to grow my online business to success, I must have a concrete and visual delineation of the action.

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Have you heard about the new WordPress Plugin that Ken Reno and Richard Wing have just released?

It’s called Commissions Automator, and it makes posts to your WordPress blog, and your Twitter account. The posts contain YOUR affiliate ID, so you earn instant commissions, directly to your PayPal account.

The sales hype states, “The shocker is that instead of $67, they are letting BETA users get access right now for less than $5! I know, right?”

I confess, I have to wonder why they are charging affiliates $4.97 for a plugin that promotes their products? If they’re so anxious to have affiliates promoting all over the ‘net, why not give those affiliates the plugin at no charge?

Hmm. Maybe because affiliates who pay for it will actually use it?

That said, I have purchased quality products from the parties involved in the Commissions Automator. So on the basis of Ken & Richard’s track records, I’ll risk the $5.00.

I will be keeping a close eye on the products that are promoted via the plugin. If sales letters and products are not up to par, I’ll just pull the plug on the plugin.

Read More: Commissions Automator

The first step in dealing with the aggravation of a totally unproductive day is to accept it. Accept the fact that stuff happens and it just happened to you. Nothing – nothing can bring back lost writing time. So accept the news.

Take a time out if necessary. Yes, you’ve already lost time but a time out to get your act together will save you in the long run. Rushed articles tend to be poorly written and are likely to contain mistakes you wouldn’t make otherwise.

Once you have calmed down, you can tackle the problem with a clear head and make progress with your article writing, hopefully salvaging lost time.

Many people are finding it necessary to earn additional income or to replace lost income thanks to rising unemployment.

When it comes to earning online, the Internet levels the playing field as far as location is concerned.

While it’s true that there are plenty of people earning lots of money online, there are also plenty of people who’ve lost more money online than they’ll ever earn.

So how does an Internet business newbie find a way to bring in money instead of watching it go out?

The same way any other skill is acquired – by learning. Pay attention and you can minimize financial risk while maximizing your earning potential.

Ken Reno and Scott & Sharlene Raven recently released a video series aimed at helping those new to the Internet succeed online.

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