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I’ve been writing quite a bit lately about our upcoming trip around the country. Nevertheless, there are a few other things on my mind, too.

Take excess, for example. A thought struck like lightning through my mind yesterday morning and I’ve not been able to shake it.

Why do Americans feel the need to acquire excess amounts of everything? Do they believe that the world will run out of everything they’ve ever seen or wanted tomorrow? You see now why I said “like lightning.”

I was in the shower at the time. (I know, but that’s where the most profound thinking takes place, isn’t it?) I was facing the shower caddy, looking at all the shampoos, conditioners, body washes, etc. that wait each day for our consumption. A bit of everything resides on those small hanging shelves. I suddenly realized how much of everything necessary for bathing kept company in and around the bathtub. Packing for this long trip has me considering life in different aspects now.

It’s not like I’d never seen it all before, but I hadn’t really took note of it before. Big difference.

Lack of free space in our car restricts the amount of everything we take along for the ride. I was reminded of a friend of mine from years ago. This wee gal was an absolute hoot, and I loved her dearly, but she had one trait that I could never understand. She adored vintage clothing. It didn’t matter what era of clothing she found; it came home with her.

At the time we lived in an area that had lots of second-hand clothing and household shops. Once a month two of them held $2 bag sales. For those who’ve never been to one, you’ve missed a wonderful opportunity to go decadent without breaking the bank. The premise is that whatever you can get into a standard paper grocery bag is yours to take home for $2.

I can testify to her enjoyment of such sales. She lived in a large two-bedroom apartment at the time. The huge second bedroom was her clothes closet. Rack upon rack of clothes filled the room to overflowing. The gal wore about a size 4/6 at most. The room, which measured a good 15 x 15 ft. was so full of racks that she could barely squeeze into it far enough to find something to wear.

I asked her once why she just kept buying more clothes. She said that they were all so pretty, she just couldn’t pass them up.

The truth is, I still can’t understand it. She never wore the same outfit more than once. She didn’t need to. Yet, she never got rid of anything either.

It’s been years since I’ve seen her. We lost touch when she found amore. I think of her, though, and wonder if she’ll soon be featured on “Buried Alive,” the show on hoarding.

Does anyone else think we’ve gone a bit overboard in our acquisition mode mentalities? When an entire room meant for living in is used to store one’s clothing, doesn’t that strike anyone else as a bit overboard?

When I have a moment, I watch TV shows like “House Hunters International” and other home finding shows, whether for rent or to buy. It’s curious that a room’s size is such an issue for people. How much space does a person or family really need to live? Why must a house have walk-in closets? And on and on…

It seems like we’ve gone a bit crazy in the acquisition department, whether due to  personal feelings of inadequacy or social status. It makes me wonder if we will ever come to realize as a nation, that what a person does with his/her life and how that life is lived means far more to the world at large and to themselves than what one can buy, wear, own, show-off, or what have you.

Why must we continue to build over all the land with homes that fewer and fewer people can afford and then turn around and complain that we’ve destroyed the ecology, the beauty of the land, etc? Does this make sense to anyone else?

Tell me your take on this part of the American lifestyle. Let me know what you think the rationale really is for our compulsion

One of the most rewarding things about studying youth is the firsthand opportunity to witness societal change. The act of listening to, interpreting and commenting on youth is rewarding in and of itself. While it is perfectly acceptable to limit... Read the rest of this post

Do you ever wonder if you’re a REAL writer? If you have doubts, it might be because you have a bad case of the “shoulds.”

Symptoms of the “shoulds” include:

• You should write first thing in the morning.
• You should write daily.
• You should keep a journal.
• You should write down your dreams every morning.
• You should have a room of your own and be organized!
• You should write for publication.

What if some of the “shoulds” just go against your grain? Are you not a real writer then? What if you write best after 10 p.m. instead of first thing in the morning? What if you start journals repeatedly and never last more than three days? What if you can’t remember your dreams? What if an organized office makes you freeze and you secretly prefer writing in chaos?

Are you a REAL writer then? YES!

What Am I Exactly?

If you struggle with your identity as a writer–if you don’t seem to fit the mold no matter how you’ve tried–you would love the book I found over the weekend. It’s called The Write Type: Discover Your True Writer’s Identity and Create a Customized Writing Plan by Karen E. Peterson, who wrote the best book on writer’s block I ever read.

This book takes you through exercises to find the real writer who lives inside you. You’ll explore the ten components that make up a writer’s “type.” They include such things as tolerance for solitude, best time of day to write, amount of time, need for variety, level of energy, and level of commitment. Finding your own personal combination of traits helps you build a writer’s life where you can be your most productive and creative.

Free to Be Me

To be honest, the exercises with switching hands (right brain/left brain) didn’t help me as much as the discussions about each trait. I could usually identify my inner preferences quite easily through the discussion. It gave me freedom to be myself as a writer. It also helped me pinpoint a few areas where I believed some “shoulds” that didn’t work for me, where I was trying to force this square peg writer into a round hole and could stop!

We’re all different–no surprise!–but we published writers are sometimes too quick to pass along our own personal experience in the form of “shoulds.” You should write first thing in the morning should actually be stated, It works well for ME to write first thing in the morning, so you might try that.

What About You?

Have you come up against traits of “real writers” that just don’t seem to fit you? Do you like to flit from one unfinished project to another instead of sticking to one story until it’s finished and submitted? Do you need noise around you and get the heebie jeebies when it’s too quiet?

If you have time, leave a comment concerning one or two areas where you have struggled in the pas

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Like an attention deficient child in the back seat, the mainstream media is fixated on the fledgling recovery, nervously scanning for any indication as to whether we're headed in the right direction and how long it will take to get there. We've... Read the rest of this post

Retail brands, especially those aimed at teens, are finally realizing the value of social media. MediaPost, reg. required, recently reported that many of the top brands finding success on Twitter, Facebook, and Myspace (assuming people do still use... Read the rest of this post

A few weeks ago in “Find a Need and Fill It” I asked for your input concerning the topics you find most helpful in this blog.

Thank you all for the responses! It’s been very helpful. The requests fell into three main categories. Since I blog on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, that made it easy for me. From now on, this will be my general blogging schedule so that I can cover each topic area regularly.

What You Can Expect

Monday = Inner Motivation (includes:)

• fears–all kinds!
• discipline
• focus
• goals
• rejection
• lack of motivation
• encouragement
• a writer’s dream life
• procrastination
• working with our “inner editor”
• enjoying writing more
• perseverance
• creative inspiration
• writer’s block

Wednesday = Outer Challenges (includes:)

• setting boundaries
• time management
• distractions
• discipline
• writing schedules
• goal setting
• balancing writing with chaos in life
• balancing day jobs with writing
• our writing needs (vs. “their” needs)
• self-defeating behaviors

Friday = Tips ‘n’ Tricks of the Trade (includes:)

• specific genre help
• writing books I’ve found helpful
• blogs I find useful
• classes I’ve taken
• voice (writer’s and character’s)
• critique groups
• conferences
• working with publishers
• marketing–all kinds
• considering the audience when writing
• dealing with publishers who don’t respond
• finding good markets
• developing depth in writing
• selling “unique” pieces instead of jumping on the bandwagon

Thanks for Your Input

All your feedback has been immensely helpful in organizing future blog posts and making sure I cover topics you want to hear about and find useful. If I missed anything on these lists, feel free to let me know!

In yesterday's Essentials I referred to the rise in young bowlers as a comeback for a retro pastime. Upon closer examination and a flashback to a post from Anastasia on this same trend back in the early days of Ypulse circa 2005, I'd like to revisit... Read the rest of this post

Getting into the writing habit is difficult, especially in the early years of writing. Our lives are full to overflowing already, so where can we possibly fit in some writing? How can we form a consistent writing habit when our schedules change from day to day, depending on our obligations?

Believe it or not, you have more time to write than you think. Keep a time log, tracking how you spend your time for a few days or a week. If you do, you’ll spot “down” time that you use for other things which could be snagged for your writing.

Redirect Your Time

When my kids were very young, I desperately wanted to write. I realized that instead of catching up on laundry and chores during their afternoon naps, I could write. Instead of making beds and doing dishes during the morning half hour of “Mr. Rogers,” I could write. Instead of thumbing through ragged magazines for twenty minutes every Friday afternoon while my daughter got her allergy shots, I could write.

Bed making and dishes and laundry could be done while little ones milled around. I chose to write instead when they didn’t need me. That “nap-Mr. Rogers-allergy shot” schedule became my writing routine until my youngest went to kindergarten. By that time, Atheneum had published my first five middle grade novels.

Hidden Time

“But I really don’t have any free time!” you might truly think. I challenge you to study your schedule very closely. Everyone has pockets of “down” time during the day. It may vary from day to day, but usually it is consistent weekly. (For example, you may sit in the pick-up line at your daughter’s elementary school every afternoon for fifteen minutes. Instead of listening to the radio, write.)

You might free up some time by doubling up on your mindless activities. Most of us multi-tasked before the word became popular, but if you’re not, try it. While supper is cooking, don’t watch the news; pay those bills or wrap those birthday gifts, and free up a half hour in the evening to write. If you want to write YA novels, listen to those young adult books on tape while you walk your dog. You’ll be doing your “market research” for an hour, freeing up an hour later to write.

Get It in Writing

Write down whatever pockets of time that you discover can be used for your writing. Even if it’s only fifteen-minute chunks, note them. You can write an amazing amount in ten or fifteen minutes at a time-and it adds up. You may find these chunks in the “between times.” You might have a bit of time between when the kids get on the school bus and you have to leave for work. Or between your day job and supper, you may have half an hour that you wait on a child at ball practice. (I wrote a lot sitting in bleachers waiting for children at practice.)

Write all these pockets of time down on a weekly schedule and write it on your daily calendar. Make it a habit. Perhaps on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, you write half an hour before work, plus daily you write fifteen minutes before cooking supper, and Saturday morning you write an hour while the kids watch cartoons. That’s four hours of writing in a week, just in the free bits and pieces. Since many of us started writing while caring for small children and/or holding down a day job, this kind of weekly schedule may be the best you can do for a while.

And that’s fine!

Time-Honored Tradition

The highest percentage of today’s famous, best-selling authors admit that their writing schedules were exactly like this in the early years. But they had that “burning desire to write” too. And that desire is what motivates us to find those pockets of time, give the

Well, you can fess up any day about it but what’s the worry?! Everyone has done it! The top chunks of a hamburger fall off while you’re trying not to trip over, or a biscuit slips through your hands. We say that after three seconds on the ground food will really start to spoil. But is it really the case?

Most of us has heard of and aboded by this “three second rule”, but is it true that when you pick food up from the floor before three seconds no harmful bacteria can get a grip on your food yet? Well, “What’s Good For You” on Channel Nine has put this to the test…

Three cookies and three banana slices are put on three plates, one of each on each plate. This is to determine whether the texture of a food helps the bacteria stick on. Another cookie and banana is left alone because it is the control.

One plate of food is dropped on the ground, and is left there for three minutes. Two and a half minutes later the second plate is dropped, and with three seconds left the last plate is dropped.

The specimens were then wrapped up and sent to a lab. Over there the bacterial were smeared on agar plates and left to grow for a prolonged period of time.

The results:

Three minutes:

The cookie had 10 to 100 colonies of bacteria. So did the banana.

Thirty seconds:

They both had the same as the three minute sample.

Three seconds:

Cookie: 5-10

Banana: 5-10

**************************************************************************

The experiment proves that there is no such thing as the three second rule. Take in mind that bacteria are infinitesimally small and one colony contains over 1 million bacteria which is enough to make you terribly sick! This also demonstrated that bacteria even found a foothold on these dry biscuits! So next time if your food drops on the floor, don’t take chances with your health. Bin it.

By Kirsty OUP-UK

While Rebecca has been quizzing the publishing world of New York, I have been hounding people a little closer to home: the staff of OUP here in Oxford. Here is what we’ve been reading on this side of the Pond in 2007…

Kate Farquhar-Thomson, Head of Publicity
Wildwood: A Journey Through Trees by Richard Deakin. As an outdoors girl this journey through the woods and forests of both this country and abroad evokes a sense of being at one with nature in all its grandeur. I loved the book and could read it over and over each time discovering something new. (more…)

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This is not exactly a pencil sketch, in that it was not done with pencils and it isn't a sketch. But hell, I haven't posted in a while. (I did try to make it look like a pencil drawing.) It's supposed to be Evangeline Lilly (Kate from Lost), but I'm only sort of satisfied with the likeness. Done in Corel Painter X, with some Photoshop to fix a few bits.

Actually, I think I have a layered version of the file at home, so I'll post the sketch for it later on.