Feb 23
Freelance Writing Jobs, Saturday 2/23/08
Posted by kathrynv at 9:30 am in freelance jobs

Make sure to check out today’s post on why you would even want to apply for freelance writing jobs on the weekends!

Blog Jobs:

Ongoing writing jobs:

One-shot writing jobs:

Seeking submissions:

Editing jobs:

  • Editor, trade magazine, salary DOE w/ benefits

Misc:

[Tags] freelance, writing, jobs, gigs, resources, employment, links, freelance writing jobs [/Tags]

no comment
Feb 22
Tips for Greening your Writing
Posted by kathrynv at 9:52 am in green, writing

recycle 

I believe that we should all do what we can to be a little bit more eco-friendly in our lives. Recently I wrote a post about how writers can be greener in their working lives (8 Ways to Green Your Writing). The main way of doing that, of course, is to use your writing platforms to educate others about green issues and ideas.

Here are some tips for doing green writing:

  • Write about green issues. The biggest way that you can be green in your writing is to write specifically about green issues. Articles and blog posts that are related to pro-environment issues are a straightforward green writing topic. For example, I recently wrote a green guide to mobile phones.
  • Write for green companies. Every business needs a writer whether it’s for their web content, blog posts, newsletters, promotional materials or company speeches. Although this doesn’t directly inform readers about green issues, it does help to support the businesses that use green practices.
  • Encourage recycling and re-using. This doesn’t have to come across as a “be green” message. There are many great reasons that you can suggest re-use of something. For example, you might be writing an article about art and creativity and one of your tips could be to look in the trash for ”found art” supplies before they head to the dump.  Similarly, you could do a profile on a “junk artist” (my current favorite recycled art artist is Brian Dettmer). As far as non-art topics, whenever you mention the use of any materials at all, remind readers that they might be able to find used materials at a low cost.
  • Review green books and websites. Reviewing things is great for a lot of reasons. For one thing, you’re supporting the work of other people. This helps build relationships in the art/writing community and those relationships bring more readers to your work. Besides, it’s an easy way to share green info with others. (My favorite green site to point people to these days is Ideal Bite.)
  • Mention your green habits in passing. If you ever write in the first person, you can easily mention the things that you do that are green. For example, you’re putting up your blog post later than usual … in your intro, you can say that you spend a busy morning taking out the recycling or researching solar panels or whatever you were doing that was a little bit green.

You don’t have to be a green writer. However, if eco-friendly issues are important to you, it’s fairly easy to include green tips and articles in your writing. This helps spread the word and set the tone for a writing world that has eco-friendly habits as its foundation.

Question of the Day: What other ways should writers consider for writing greener?

[Tags] writing, green, eco-friendly, environment [/Tags]

1 comment
Feb 21
The Poetry of Altered Book Art
Posted by kathrynv at 9:25 am in art, creativity, poetry, writer's life

Writers need to explore visual creativity. Or maybe that’s not true of all writers but it’s certainly true for me. There are just times when the words get to be too much; times when I can’t think straight because there are just too many words and word choices and ideas expressed in language. When it gets to be that way, I turn to visual art. Sometimes I play around with it myself as a means of new expression. And sometimes I just observe it and enjoy it and try not to think about it in words.

Collage art has always been my favorite form of visual art in terms of how I like to creatively express myself. I like the cutting and pasting of different images to create something new. It seems to translate to what we do regularly as writers; we recraft the same themes in different ways so that they look new and make more sense and strike us differently. And collage art can also be meditative - taking apart, reassembling, shaping, changing …

In playing with collage art over the past few days, I rediscovered the art of the altered book. I had explored altered book art a few years ago because several friends left over from me penpalling days had started to get into making this kind of art. For those who don’t know, it’s the taking apart and changing of books. Sometimes the artists merely paints the pages of the book or collages over them. Other times, the book is cut or burned and reshaped into a new design. Many times, found objects become part of the collaged piece; it starts with a book as three dimensional canvas and becomes a work of art.

At the time, I didn’t get into doing this type of collage myself. For one thing, I had something of an inhibition about tearing up books. Sure, it was re-using them and re-purposing them and that’s fine. But I couldn’t quite bring myself to deface the books I owned. And I also was exploring photocollages at the time and felt that’s where my own artistic inclinations were best expressed. However, I’m seeking something new these days for creative expression and think that altered books might be a good step forward for me.

I have a bunch of books that I’m done with. They aren’t worth keeping around and they have no monetary value for resale. They aren’t in good enough condition to give them as gifts. And I don’t believe in just throwing books away. So perhaps trying my hand at some altered book art is a good choice right now. More importantly,  I’ve recently discovered a new type of altered book art that I hadn’t seen previously. It’s called “found poetry”.

The artist chooses words on the page of the book to create a poem. The other words on the page are scratched out or painted over or collaged on top of. The poetry words stand out amidst an artistic creation. I’ve always loved the pairing of poetry with images. I’ve always liked collages that incorporated text. And I enjoy the idea of using words already on a page to create something that reads entirely differently than the original author intended. It’s an interesting creative challenge and one that I think can be used to open up new channels of thinking, a means of allowing new creative ideas to flourish.

Question of the Day: What experiences with altered book art can you share?

Related links:  Altered Books by Judi Riesch, Karen’s Whimsy Altered Books, The Importance of Collage Art, Altered Book Artists

[Tags] altered book, art, creativity, writing, collage, books [/Tags]

4 comments
Feb 19
An update on freelance job listings
Posted by kathrynv at 11:40 am in Blog info, freelance jobs

As some of you already know, one of the things that I do on this site is to provide other writers with links to jobs that are currently available in the industry. There are many other sites out there that do this and I aim to be different in a few ways. One of those ways is by organizing the jobs into specific types of writing categories (blog jobs, one-shot jobs, ongoing jobs, editing jobs, submissions wanted, etc.). Another of those ways is that I provide links on weekends when not many other people are putting them up.

In fact, as an update to this site’s use as a job link resource, I’d like to say that you can be assured of finding job links here on Saturdays and Sundays. However, you might not find them here throughout the rest of the week. I’m discovering that the other job links sites out there are providing a great list of links on the weekdays and that what I add only moderately contributes to what’s out there, repeating a lot of the links that other sites find and publish. If I see something great during the week, I’ll let you know.

Otherwise, consider this to be your resource for weekend job links.

[Tags] writing, freelance jobs, gigs, employment, freelance, resources, links [/Tags]

1 comment
Feb 19
Tech Free Tuesdays
Posted by kathrynv at 8:31 am in author update, green

Today is Tuesday and that means that I must have pre-written this post because I’m not online at all on Tuesdays. That’s because Tuesdays and Wednesdays are my “weekend” and Tuesdays are my tech-free day. Although I don’t always stick to the rules completely, I try to avoid use of televisions, cell phones and computers during this day.

There are a multitude of reasons that I think it’s important for web writers to take a tech-free day each week. Some of those reasons include:

  • Boosts creativity. It’s easy to get distracted by the same old things when you’re always doing the same old things. By taking away the TV, phone and computer, you force yourself to “think outside the box” about activities. I find that this challenges me to do a variety of different types of things that I probably wouldn’t do if I had access to video games and web browsers.
  • It’s good to be green. I think it’s important that writers (and everyone else) engage in eco-friendly actions. Here are some other ways to green your writing.
  • True days off. Most freelancers don’t take real, true, scheduled days off. Ever since I started doing so, I’ve felt better about my work. I get more done during my work week than I did before and I also get more enjoyment out of my days off. It’s Tuesday and I don’t have to think about any work again until Thursday!

There are many benefits to tech-free Tuesdays. In fact, I find new ones each week so maybe I’ll have more to share with you on Thursday!

Question of the Day: What do you think of the idea of tech-free Tuesdays?

[Tags] green, tech-free, technology, writing, web, eco-friendly, environment, work, freelance, relax [/Tags]

3 comments
Feb 18
Reading Armistead Maupin
Posted by kathrynv at 5:00 pm in reading

I mentioned before that I had been thrilled to discover the author Armistead Maupin. It’s rare that I find an author who truly captures my interest and makes me want to read every single thing that he’s ever written. As I come towards the end of reading Maupin’s second book in the Tales of the City series, I find that he’s become one of my favorite fiction authors.

Here are some of the reasons that I like this series:

  • The characters are believable and lovable, flawed but in a totally perfect way. They are multi-dimensional and interesting and I can see having them as friends (and enemies!)
  • The chapters are short but poignant so it’s easy to enjoy reading just a few pages while on public transit and it’s just as easy to get lost in a hundred pages at a time.
  • Maupin has an uncanny ability to describe things in a way that makes you think twice. I have literally laughed out loud as I read the description of a character’s reaction.
  • Plot twists actually have caught me off guard. I find most books to be predictable because I’ve read so many but this one actually has managed to surprise me more than once.
  • There is an interconnectedness between the characters that extends through multiple books in the series.
  • It’s set in San Francisco mroe than twenty years ago so many of the city’s details are the same as what I’m used to now but some are different enough to make me feel like I’m learning something about the history of the city as I read.
  • It’s fun.

Anyone who likes general fiction, chick lit, and character-driven works will probably find this series to be enjoyable, especially if those people happen to live in San Francisco!

 [Tags] maupin, tales of the city, san francisco, book, writing, reading, recommendation [/Tags]

no comment
Feb 17
What a Writer is Reading on the Web, 2/17/08
Posted by kathrynv at 9:22 am in link love, reading, writing

(Writers, remember to check out the links to available jobs in the post below this one.) 

I generally spend some of Sunday morning trying to catch up on reading blog posts and news articles that I missed during the week. Most of these are related to writing, blogging, Web 2.0 technologies and general creativity. Here are some of the things I’ve found today that I think are worth checking out:

My favorite articles that I authored this week were:

2 comments
Feb 17
Freelance Writing Jobs, Sunday 2/17/2008
Posted by kathrynv at 9:07 am in freelance jobs

Here are some of the jobs that are available around the Internet for you to consider applying to today: 

Blog Jobs:

Ongoing writing jobs:

One-shot writing jobs:

Seeking submissions:

Editing jobs:

[Tags] freelance, writing, jobs, gigs, resources, employment, links, freelance writing jobs [/Tags]

no comment
Feb 16
Frequency of Freelance Applications
Posted by kathrynv at 8:08 am in author update, freelance, writer's life

I have more than enough freelance work. Despite this, I check out the ads for new freelance writing jobs nearly every day. I probably apply to new positions a few times per week. Is this a case of “the grass is always greener”? Not necessarily.

I believe that the key to being a successful freelancer is to challenge yourself to regularly rise higher in the business. This means finding jobs that you like more and which pay you more than the jobs which you currently have. While you may be content with the work that you’re doing, it may be the case that there are better jobs out there for you. I believe that it’s important to always work to find those jobs.

Unfortunately, what sometimes happens is that too many job applications get approved at once. That was the case for me this week when I discovered that I’d been hired for multiple new positions. Some of those I am excited about, others I’m waiting to see on and a couple of them I rejected off the bat. I’ve said before that I believe freelancing is a lot like dating; I’m in that stage of “first dates” with several new jobs and am trying to see which ones will become relationships and which ones will fizzle out.

It’s been a stressful week. However, it’s been a good week in that I was able to eliminate some work that I hadn’t been excited about because I got new work that’s more satisfying. Transitions are never easy but they’re what makes you move forward in the experiences that you’re undertaking. I have never been one who wanted to be stagnant and I continue to believe that aiming for the moon will land you amongst the stars.

Question of the Day: How often do you fill out new freelance job applications?

Make sure to check out this weekend’s list of freelance jobs here.

[Tags] freelance, applications, job, employment, writing, work [/Tags]

2 comments
Feb 16
Freelance Writing Jobs, Saturday 2/16/2008
Posted by kathrynv at 7:18 am in freelance jobs

This week was quiet on the job links front as I was out of the office and working on new projects. When there aren’t posts here, you can always check out Freelance Writing Jobs and the Craigslist ads to see what’s available. Following are some jobs that you might want to consider applying for this weekend. Make sure to join in on the discussion above on letting other people know how often you think it makes sense to apply for new freelance writing jobs. 

Blog Jobs:

Ongoing writing jobs:

One-shot writing jobs:

Misc:

[Tags] freelance, writing, jobs, gigs, resources, employment, links, freelance writing jobs [/Tags]

1 comment
« View Previous Post
View Next Post »

Real Words