Here’s a note from HCI, publishers of the Chicken Soup series and the Ultimate series:
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This is just a quick reminder of deadlines coming up for submissions from writers and photographers for the Ultimate series from HCI Books.
We’re looking for “slice-of-life” stories and photos that are inspirational, motivational, humorous or thought-provoking. Here’s what’s looming, please don’t procrastinate - we’re already evaluating stories (thank you if you’ve already sent one!):
submission deadline June 30, 2008(*) The Ultimate Christmas (pub date Nov 2008)
submission deadline July 31, 2008 The Ultimate Teacher (pub date Feb 2009)
submission deadline August 31, 2008 The Ultimate Mom (pub date March 2009)
submission deadline September 30, 2008 The Ultimate Dad (pub date April 2009)
All the details you’ll need (e.g. what we pay, our guidelines, book synopses, and a full list of titles in development) can be found at www.ultimatehcibooks.com.
Links on the main menu will provide access to pages of details.
(*) contracts on The Ultimate Christmas stories and photos chosen for publication will go out to writers and photographers on or before July 15, 2008.
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I wish I were one of those freelancers with a perfectly organized office. I long for a clear desk and floor space that doesn’t require fancy footwork to get around. I spend hours looking at organized offices on flickr — and dreaming.
Recently I noticed how much the clutter was getting to me. I have plenty of file drawers, and it cracked me up to discover that well over half of them are empty, while every horizontal surface is covered with papers and books. I first went through all my books and sold a bunch of them on amazon.com. I ended up selling enough to cover the cost of a Nikon D40 digital SLR for an upcoming trip! What I couldn’t sell, I gave away to my public library for their annual book sale. Then every day, I picked a square foot of horizontal surface and got rid of everything on it. If it was something I wanted to keep, it went into a file folder. Some stuff I gave away on freecycle or Craigslist. Seventy-five percent of the stuff was paper, though, and it ended up in recycling. I had a dozen or so cables, adapters, and chargers sitting around, so I figured out what they belonged to, then labeled them with my trusty Brother P-touch labeler and put them in a (labeled) drawer. Then I attacked my e-mail and set up folders and filters to help me process communications efficiently.
My office still needs quite a bit of work, but here’s something amazing: yet again, whenever I go on a major clutter purge, I end up getting a ton of assignments. I’ve gotten $5K in work over the last week alone! (That’s NOT a normal week for me, let me assure you.) It’s almost as if you’ve got to make room for the work you want on your desk. I don’t think there’s anything magical or woo-woo going on here — what happened in my case is that I was able to jump on a few opportunities faster because I could actually SEE them. When I bought the camera, I was able to tell one editor I could include high-res photos with a story, which made it an easier sell.
So if things are a little slow and your office is kind of messy or your systems are falling apart, do a little purging and streamlining. Clean off your desk, make room on your hard-drive, get rid of books or equipment you don’t use that much and see if the work starts to flow in. I’m not nearly done with my office, so I’m eager to see if I can get a couple more $5K (or $10K) weeks before I’m done. [db]
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Congrats on seeing a reward for all your hard cleaning work!
My office is clean…so where’s my $5k? ;->
How great to see a financial reward after clearing out the clutter!
FYI, thanks to ya’ll, I read David Allen’s book and now I try to have that ‘what’s the next action?’ mentality — his system is working to keep my office space clutter free. And, a friend of mine (non-writer) is now listening to the book on audio tape as well. That post (http://therenegadewriter.com/?p=264) started to pay “stress free productivity” forward.
Good job! I love a clean, organized space. It does help clear the mind, too, doesn’t it? Congrats on your new work.
Lisa
Yay! I’m a GTD fan all the way. It really DOES work!
Personally, I live and die by a 3-ring notebook full of looseleaf, with lots of tabbed dividers. I write down EVERYTHING, and each day I turn to a new dated page to see what I have for that day.
I number out the pages at the start of every month, so that I have a month ahead of me at any given moment. That way I can write down reminders to myself - “Check with X if no word back by now,” “Project Y due in a week,” etc.
I do the same thing as Erika with a daily planner. I have a laptop and, along with a pen for writing in the agenda, that’s it for my office. I get really distracted by visual clutter, and find that paring down what’s in front of me makes it a whole lot easier to tackle each day’s tasks. It also makes it easier to be mobile, so if I want to sit in another chair, lay on the ground or go the library or a cafe to work, my office easy comes with me.
Visual clutter to me means more procrastination material, “I’ll get started on my work as soon as I think of some way to declutterize.” Not that the clutter disappears, of course. But the elaborate plans that I have made for 86ing clutter are astounding.