stuff123

i would like to know how can i published my blog to more exciting topics, most of all in my blog content that shows guideline for travel people to various type of each country.

That is a question from a person speaking English, of course, but not using the words the way that most everyone accepts. Now the basic idea is there, but if this writer tries to gain an English speaking audience, he will find it a difficult task until his use of grammar and sentence structure improves. Bonus marks for trying but not too many people will come back to read a second article. It’s a lot like listening to someone singing off key. You can’t wait to leave the room or for them to stop.

So my suggestion would be to try writing a blog in your native tongue first, and then work on improving your English skills and come on back. The words up there are not unlike a Google Translate approach to converting from one language to the other. It is a great start and I look forward to it advancing and making it easier for the world to communicate with each other in a very understandable manner. Think how we sound when we try to use a foreign language in their country. I’m sure it would be the same.

The English language is very difficult for just about everybody. When you add an accent, you wonder if we are talking the same language. I was once in Barbados, where I met a very nice gal, who happened to have her personal papers stolen from her purse on a bus ride into Bridgetown. When the two policemen arrived, she asked me to join them in the lobby to help with her problem. I didn’t hesitate and we left the beach and made our way to the nice open air lobby (not many doors in Barbados, just gates that they lock up at night).

Turns out the two policeman were natives of Barbados and Trinidad and both spoke English with very strong accents so the look on Joanne’s face, when they started asking questions, only meant one thing. “What are they saying? I don’t understand”.

Try to follow this next story because I will try to describe the interview with the use of phonetics. I pride myself in understanding people that speak English with a strong accent because of my exposure to so many different ethnic groups in my youth.

The first policeman asks Joanne the following question. “Wadd dahh mann tall or wadd dahh mann chort?” And if the other policeman had asked the same question it might have sounded this way. ” Woody mon toll o’ woody mon short.”

Joanne just looked at me with that “I don’t know look” and I turned to her and said “Was the man tall or was the man short?” The two policeman looked at me as if to say “U bin on da beach and bin vizzaten dah can-dee mon” (The candy man is local slang for a drug dealer). Eventually, the interview was over and Joanne was able to go to the Canadian consulate and get temporary papers to be able to leave Barbados and return home to Ottawa.

The lesson here is that, even though we speak the same language, we are not communicating effectively until the other party fully understands the meaning of your question or dialogue. So if someone asks or tells you something that you don’t understand, don’t be embarrassed, just tell them that you don’t understand and could you please make that a little clearer so I can understand it better and give you a proper response.

Choose your words carefully and phrase them is such a way that the other individual acknowledges that they understand what you just said. And that is called good communication.

OK dats it. I just got back from de doctair. He be playin’ Pokemon wit me. Get me a room and coke, I be goin’ to da beach. I be soakin’ up dee sun, I be drinkin’ da room, I be warin’ me wool ‘at.

I just love the way they talk in Barbados . Some really wonderful people there. Go visit.

At this stage, I don’t even know what it means!

But that is one of the keywords in an assignment I have from my editor under the primary keyword of asbestos testing. So I will begin researching it.

What these articles will attempt to do is share my personal experiences in pursuing writing as a profession and not just as a really rewarding hobby. By sharing successes and tips, then maybe others out there will gain some insight into what will work for them and that is key. Everyone has there own style and shouldn’t look to changing it because someone says you shouldn’t do this and you shouldn’t do that.

But you have to keep the target in sight. Most of the jobs will involve writing stuff that you may or may not be interested in and you are a means to an end. That’s why you will receive compensation for your writing. It certainly helps that it your writing is interesting, informative and even potentially thought-provoking or humorous or both.

So some good starting points might include the following ideas.

Start a blog

You can use your blog to test and try out all kinds of different ideas in writing. You can even find ways to get feedback about what is interesting to others. It isn’t a bad idea to use Facebook as a method to get friends to help you with feedback. It is surprising how helpful and honest they are about your understanding of the subject.

This site, today.com, pays enough that it will cover your monthly expenses for your Internet connection so it is not a bad place to host your blog. The following link will take you directly to the site and start you on your way to blogging.

Get paid to BLOG at Today.com

Learn how to create links

This is an essential way to help your blog to become a useful source of information for others utilizing the Internet. Here’s a simple example. It is very handy to have two browser pages open for this exercise.

The project here is to create a link that you can use to get driving or walking directions between your house and anywhere else that you would like to go. The link will be to Google Maps.

1. Go to your a blank browser page and type in Google Maps in the search box.
2. Select the link that says maps.google.com/
3. Now highlight the address link in the box at the top of the screen. It will be shaded blue when you have done this successfully.
4. Now hold down both the Ctrl key and the C key. This will copy the link to your temporary clipboard.
5. Go to a place in your browser like Google docs, notebook or your blog editor and type something like “My Maps”.
6. Highlight My Maps , select the chain link symbol and now hold down both the Ctrl key and the V key.This will paste the URL link and use the term My Maps as the link. You can make it anything you like.

So we should have a link called My Maps here. Now you can go back into this link at anytime and use it for a point A to B route planner. Feel free to experiment with it.

You will use links in emails to prospective employers and editors to apply for assignments or jobs. The traditional resume is not that useful on the Internet and well written blog posts can use graphics, white space and even video and music. Keep it simple for applications. They are interested in your writing ability and not necessarily in your presentation skills.

Learn how to use graphics in your blog editor

There isn’t enough room here to cover this subject but it is important to understand the concept of a picture is worth a thousand words. The correct picture can help set the tone for your story. It also helps to learn how to manipulate graphics to customize your blog posts. I can’t draw a stick man to save my life but I have taught myself how to play around with graphics to develop art that is pleasing to my eye. I use Picnik for my graphic editing.

That’s probably enough as a starting point for now. I have to go and research that malignant alphabet thing now. Since I only know it has something to do with asbestos and probably relates to something to do with asbestos insulation installers, I will start with Wikipedia which is where I usually begin research. Use the language link that you are moist comfortable with.

It didn’t have anything so I went to WebMd which I figured would be more appropriate and it was, albeit far too clinical

I’m hoping that I might find something humorous to say about Malignant Pleural Mesothelioma. I’m not holding my breath.

And for those that have been suffering from this type of lung cancer, there is nothing too funny about it. I am reminded of a gentleman that played in one of our many golf tournaments at the club where I work in the summers. The group in this tournament raises money for insulation installers and this gentleman was playing with the assistance of an oxygen supply and guess what. He was having a lot of fun with this group and so were they.

There’s a bright side to everything if you look hard enough. Some of the copy here will be used in my assignment.

Rather than end up as just another request in either the forum or an email to today.com, I thought I would share my feelings about the one only approach to everybody’s blog—specifically the new single look and feel. I can understand that it makes it easier for the folks at today.com but it takes away a major method of expressing one’s individuality.

I will find ways to work around this problem, but there are lots of folks out there writing that don’t have the knowledge or skills to do so. It is, in my mind, a very poor way to treat the contributors.

Some of the design changes are very good. It is a well organized layout but is over dominated by ads. The today.com heading is far from neutral so I think a better way to separate it from everyone’s header is to reverse the blog name (in white) out of one of the darker greys used in the page selction icons. This would create a fairly solid bar between the today.com header and the blog header. It is then up to the contributor to decide what that header should be. Neutral is always good as transition between a dominating red and whatever the contributor chooses.

The type is just too small. Maybe they should read mice print. Not everyone has 20/20 vision. There is a workaround using the Ctrl keys in conjunction with the +, -, and 0 keys. (see altering , last few paragraphs. The change has also destroyed some of my formatting changes and positioning of the graphics. Since it is an older article today chooses to lock you out of any editing possibility so the information in the post is now incorrect)

The choice of colours is not so much a problem as the lack of contrast and thickness in the fonts to make links stand out better. The font choice is not what typographers consider a better choice for reading. It is a sans serif font, meaning it has no tails and hooks on the letters that make them easier to read. I chose Georgia in another blog for that reason. Don’t try to change your font. There are defaults within the editor that will override your choice in many cases and especially if you use anything but paragraph for style selection.

There also needs to be more of a definitive break between posts. A rule about 12-16 points in the grey that matches the page icons would work nicely.

I tried to create a more casual tone with the look and feel so that the overall image was not so formal. This layout is more suited to documentation than writing that is more free spirited.

I’m sure the forum and customer support will be swamped with a lot of angry contributors. I really don’t see any reason to contact them because I am finding them more and more a large waste of time. The people that staff them are trained to deflect the problem rather than solve it. But I’m sure there will be more and more contributors looking for the delete button for their account in the next month or so.

I only have one word for today.com’s approach to changing the creative environment within these blogs.

Disappointing.

That’s part of a Facebook conversation I had today with LS, another really friendly Aussie. We were talking about the weather and how we both suck at typing because we have “fat fingers”. She responded with the title and like the great “thief” that I am, I pounced on it. A lot of my story ideas come about this way.

And what is it with the Aussie ladies? That’s the third one this week that has shown me how “refreshingly easy” they all seem to be.

OK, get your mind out of the gutter. I already have dibs on it and it’s not big enough for all of us to fit anyway.

What I mean by “refreshingly easy” is the ease in which these three really nice people have accepted me in conversations that we are having on the Internet. As you may know I am Canadian and like most Canadians, well we are pretty harmless. We have an army of sorts but we are more like the welcoming committee in a new neighbourhood. Most of the weaponry belongs in some museum and that suits me just fine. War is really outdated anyway. It might be best done in computer simulations and the “winner” gets reward points from the loser. That’s another story for another time.

The “fat finger” syndrome is more about how all of us are with sharing our thoughts on the computer. We are in such a rush to spit out and share what’s on our minds that the keyboard just gets in the way. When you really look at, the computer keyboard and its predecessor, the typewriter makes no sense really. The QWERTY concept of a keyboard was something that others have tried to change with pretty much no success.

I guess I’ll have to write the “What will replace the computer keyboard” story some time soon but like the other what-will-replace stories I never have the answer, just more questions. I don’t think voice recognition software is the answer either.

It can’t get into your mind and heart and figure out what you are really saying. It has trouble with people who have speech impediments and with background noise so don’t be using that software for your next business presentation with the latest porno thing playing in the background.

If somebody is developing the next level of that software, pick me as part of your beta testing program. If it can figure me out, it’s got a good chance of figuring out a lot of other people, too.

The thing I am learning in my most recent Internet adventures is that people all around the world are full of surprises. Sometimes all it takes, is a passing comment about the weather at the coffee shop.

That’s how I see Facebook and the news feeds now. LS accepted me as friend as part of my “recruiting” game (another story for later) and now we are starting to get together over a cup of coffee.

I learned that the other day while taking an actual long walk and a lot of other things that I didn’t know about myself or maybe that I just need to be reminded of from time to time. Nothing like a good whack on the side of the head.

The Long Walk is about the cheapest thing you can do for maintaining good health—both physical and mental. I used to jog a lot but it was a lot harder than walking on some things like the knees and back and the pocket book. Good running shoes aren’t cheap and you have to wear good ones or you get shin splints and make it even harder on your knees and back.

So part of getting older is the getting wiser thing. You are reminded of the old doctor joke. You know the one. “Doc, it hurts when I go like this.” And the doctor replies with “So don’t go like that.” (For me, it’s always in the voice of Mel Brooks aka Melvin Kaminsky. He takes some really interesting routes on his walks)

And you have to try to remove the things that might confuse you in the Long Walk like I did with my multi-focal’s. They kept changing my focal point so much that I actually felt off balance. So next time, I will try the actual Long Walk with my glasses tucked inside my pocket.

And so I walk a lot more now. The actual long walk is something I need to do more often, but here are some of the other ways I take long walks.

Writing is a long walk. I try it in different “settings” so that it doesn’t get stale. Sometimes I write at night with only the light of the computer screen glaring back at me. Sometimes I have the television turned on but it is more like a radio because I haven’t moved it into a better viewing position. The television is talking to an empty couch a lot more these days.

And sometimes I have iTunes or Jango playing in the background because music will take you to places you haven’t been or have just forgotten. And sometimes, I slide the patio door open to hear the sounds of the world around me. And other times, I lay down on the couch with no radio or television playing and just plug in the recharger like I do so often with mouse batteries. (Use rechargeable batteries. “Mum” will thank you for it. see Listen…)

And I know I will discover more ways to take a Long Walk. Certainly the Internet is a really big one along with games that I play on the computer, especially the ones I make up for myself.

And other times the Long Walk is a short walk just outside my front door. I talk with my neighbours or a stranger that is at my door. They both probably think I’m maybe kinda’ little strange like I’m on something.

Yep, it’s called life. I’m understanding it better now. And like all long walks, it feels good.

Sometimes people think that there must be something wrong with you when you act that way. I think it has a lot to do with the fact that they haven’t experienced that sensation in life yet.

And I don’t get so discouraged when people don’t respond to my emails or Facebook messages or telephone calls. You see they are on their own Long Walks. Eventually, our paths will cross. When they’re ready, or maybe you could go on a walk and try to find them. Just a thought.

This just happened to be the perfect way to help explain what I’d like to do with BozosBrigade, which is a small team of people formed to firstly play games and secondly to help me write some fun stories.

The games’ part makes it easier to research the game tips side of Stuff123, a blog I write about stuff (go figure). Things that happen in life as I see them. It’s so much easier to find out how the games work when you have enough people in your team/crew/horde/tribe.

Some are even actually communicating with me which is what I’m really hoping will result out of all the games—a kind of Internet family, if you will, doing what families do best—share. Buying 6 casinos at a time isn’t the best part. It’s the people in the team that I find more fun.

And I’d like to write stuff about that sharing experience. So this one is about fishing which was triggered by one of the newest members I recruited (I’ll explain the recruiting thing in a couple of other stories, later). Specifically, the news feed that you get on your home page about friends status.

MF : Learn from the past, Live for today and Look to the future..
JC :Nice
AJD: It sounds OK, but what if the fish aren’t biting?
MF: Crack a cold one, lay back and relax and wait, they’ll come back on the bite.. Thats what fishing is all about
AJD:At last! Some one who understands fishing!
me: Some people use dynamite. It’s quicker. They don’t understand that the fish isn’t the real prize.
JC: Poor fish

I chopped out all the timestamps and pictures and changed everybody’s name to initials only, because I do believe in people’s right to privacy, but they are sharing this stuff with me because they accepted me as a friend.

At least MW did, after I attacked her in Warlords (lol). She was good natured about it and I was “Spot on” about my gut feel regarding her personality and how interesting she must be.

You can tell a lot from a picture. Just ask the police investigators. They use Facebook a lot for the bad folks, so you might be more careful with who and what you post in pictures in the future. Not that your bad (lol).

If I feel a picture is in order for the story, I will always ask permission. I have a story right now in draft form that I though was real nice—family values. Had a number of pictures of members of BozosBrigade and nice families. I asked their permission and since it went 0 for 6 in the reply column, the story gets shelved or rewritten with no pictures or some other pictorial way to handle it.

I think I understand. They want to protect their family. I learned something about these people. The pictures didn’t lie. Family is very important to them.

OK. So here’s the fishing connection.

When I was a little “Bruce” my dad would take us fishing. It was a pretty long drive to take three kids on but we weren’t there to have fun. We were there as part of the crew to bring home the catch. My dad saw fishing only as a method to increase the family food supply. And I know why.

He came to Canada when he was 13 from Poland. He didn’t know anybody. He worked in logging camps and with dam building construction crews in the deep woods of northern Quebec. They used to throw a stick of dynamite into the nearby lake near the outhouse drain pipe. The fish would congregate there because minnows would be attracted by the stuff that went into the water and the food chain would be completed with a stick of dynamite that was intended for a pile of rocks for the dam. They had no choice. The grocery store was a long ways away.

So my dad never learned the joy of fishing. Sitting on a dock or in a boat watching the little critters nibbling at your worm. The sense of excitement when the bobber plunges beneath the surface. The pleasant aromas in the air. The sound of water lapping up against the boat, the dock, the rocks. The feeling of the boat rocking while you fall asleep that night in your bed. It takes hours for that joy to disappear. And you sleep like a baby.

I don’t fish anymore. I like to look at the little critters more now. But I think I might go out fishing again.

I might just leave the hook bare.

Yah. It does feel kinda’ good.

You see lol a lot on Facebook.

That’s why I like to visit it.

I haven’t been writing on today.com for long so they’re still seeing how this is gonna’ workout. But I did get some acknowledgement that Stuff123 has got promise because they said I could apply for a second blog. I gave them all kinds of grief in a bunch of emails asking what is that I have to do so you can up the ante. I just wanted some targets to work toward and I could measure if I was achieving those targets and adjust my strategy accordingly.

Well, for now, its the second blog. It is their playground so I have to play by their rules or otherwise they’ll take the ball and go home. So I named it Stuff456 in the application and it will use the same look and feel as Stuff123. Got approval really quickly on a Saturday, too.

There will be some repeating in the categories but I plan to add some different ones like KidsStuff and StuffWeGet among many, many others. So maybe there will be a Stuff789.

But here’s where the problem lies. I write the first post and since this is a new blog, there are no categories. So I go into edit categories and select add new and type the new category name and hit enter and this comes up.

Warning: Attempt to assign property of non-object in /import/data/mains/t/today.com/wpmu/wp-admin/includes/template.php on line 52

Warning: Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /import/data/mains/t/today.com/wpmu/wp-admin/includes/template.php:52) in /import/data/mains/t/today.com/wpmu/wp-includes/classes.php on line 737

Who writes this stuff? Writing is about painting pictures with words. Use the wrong colours and all you do is create mud. This one is a landslide about to take over Peru.

It won’t go away because I don’t know how to make it go away. The software writers give you no understandable idea of what is going south. And they will argue sure it does, it’s write there in line 52 and line 737. Well guess what, I don’t have a line52 or a line 737 so I don’t know what the @#$% you are talking about. It will make you crazy.

The real lesson here is when you write anything make it so that even I can understand it. If you can write it in such a way that an 8 year old can understand it, then you have written something worthwhile. Otherwise, it’s just more stuff for the family pets to mess up.

So the email to customer support will be entitled “Help” and the content will be a link to this story.

I hate boxes. The corners make it so you can’t find a comfortable resting position and the the flaps are designed to keep you from going outside the space within.

I guess I’ll have to work on a workaround if it doesn’t get solved.

And the workaround is to copy the stories and paste them into the editor in Stuff123. It does result in the loss of the link to the original stories. They are in effect, brand new stories to the Internet. It is difficult for customer support to understand the problem because they are not sitting in front of your computer and seeing the problem. They see a different screen.

I think I caused the problem by deleting the initial story in the second blog and thus removed all categories. I will now advise them to delete Stuff456. I’m still scratching my head as to why it would be required with the approach I have taken to Stuff123.

So Stuff456 is dead after 4 days but lives on in Stuff123.

Forums on the Internet remind me of that bulletin board that all large grocery stores have in their entrance way that never seem to have anybody reading them. How do you find anything in that jungle? A friend of mine had the right idea—pure luck!

The Internet search engines (google, yahoo, msn, etc.) do a really good job of helping us sort through that mess so it isn’t impossible. But the forums are full of people making childish or rude remarks about nothing. Grow up children. Show some respect for people that are actually trying to learn something.

I really believe that the only way to communicate effectively is one-on-one. This post is one-on-one. You and I are having a conversation except you aren’t saying anything in return until you use the comments box.

And do your best to avoid short forms. It just confuses people.

It is true that you could be swamped by many, many requests for conversations. All that is telling you, is that people find you interesting and they would love to chat with you—the cup of coffee thing. They’re mostly not nosey, they’re curious.

You could make the bulletin board more interesting by putting little treasures in it but that trick won’t work for long because the truly smart people find the ones of value and go on about their business. Sounds familiar doesn’t it? The ads running down the side of your screen are a good example.

The only ad I’ve seen so far that seemed useful was the one from Domino’s Pizza. Order online now. Good idea. We all get hungry when we are on our various Internet quests. But up the ante if you really want it work, Domino’s. Give me an offer I can’t refuse—a nice discount, some extra free stuff of value. Don’t insult me with the “introductory offer” thing. Means I’ll only shop your store once and I might not come back because you played me for a fool, you insulted my intelligence.You tried to trick me. Build something of value so that I will always be loyal to your cause. Like a points program for frequent online orders that can be redeemed for useful stuff. It’s called Excellent Customer Service. I’m available if your marketing department goes duh too much. Use the comments box.

For the forum to truly work, it will have to evolve. It will need to have scam filters and be more organized in such a way that the users will readily find the information they are looking for and be given direction on some things that the forum offers that they did not previously consider—the top 10 lists.

Make it easy on the eyes. Fewer words. Good graphics designers understand the use of “white space”. It helps the story stand out.

All the Sports websites are a classic example of the Forum going wrong, in attempting to get your attention. They all use mice print and there are so many trees in the forest that they resort to recruiting the gals with Arthritis to try and grab your attention and stay a while.

So what do we do. We just visit the gals with arthritis. Usually, they are a lot more interesting than what you have to offer and they put their whole story right up front for even the vision-impaired folks out there. Careful, they might poke your eyes out.

And after a while we move on to something else.

That’s an actual question from someone I have never met face-to-face, and only on the Internet playing an online game that has a mail service within the game itself. It conjured up two pictures in my head immediately. ( I do believe the off-switch in my brain is footsed lately)

• Robin Williams (2? Why not)
  
• The Big Burn @ Snowmass Mountain in Colorado

No, I’m not comparing myself to the master. You bow to the master. On a scale of 1 to 10, he is a 14 and I am a 3. In Robin’s case, all the talk shows love it when he is to appear that night. They know they can pretty much take the night off and be prepared for a new and uncharted adventure. All the host has to do is start him off with something. Anything. It really doesn’t matter. Even Robin isn’t sure where he will go with it. Obviously, his upbringing in improv’ has served him well.

It’s about the approach. The free spirit. No barriers. Letting it flow. I don’t think you can teach that. You either have it or you are bottling it up with something keeping it from flowing freely. Perhaps some added fibre in your diet might be in order.

There’s more than one type of fibre. The stuff we take to make the visit to The Favourite Reading Room a pleasant voyage is one. Another one is the ability to let the mind flow freely without any artificial stimulants. Fibre has substance and body and so do Robin’s thoughts.

The Big Burn in Snowmass is a wonderful adventure and surprisingly, not that difficult. I am told that it got it’s name from a substantial forest fire in the 1890’s and that’s why there are very few trees on it. For me, the trees symbolize the everyday obstacles that we let clutter our mind and make free flowing thought that much more difficult.Think of your mind as The Big Burn and imagine your thoughts as a large beach ball rolling down the hill. It can go pretty much in any direction. Add a whole bunch of trees (bills, appointments, deadlines, traffic, world economics, war) and the ball gets stuck somewhere in the trees.

The Burn also has a happy ending (at least it did when I was last there) at the end of the run high atop the mountain was a moderately sized eating establishment surrounded by picnic tables with bronzed-face, smiling skiers enjoying all types of food. Outside were a few barbecues staffed by friendly people and big barrels filled with snow that you dug into to get your ice-cold Coors. There was a party going on.

So if you think happy thoughts and you just let them flow then all you have to do is try and keep up with the pace that they are flying out at your blank page or screen. I find that most of these short posts take about a ½ hour to pen and the stuff that takes the longest is the boring stuff like proofreading and graphics editing.

If you enjoy writing, it actually isn’t that hard like most things in life that you care deeply about. Painting a picture that the reader can easily envision is the real art.

If you are a skier and haven’t been to Snowmass, what’s stopping you—too many “trees”? Go there. You’re worth it.

Nannoo nanno
Shazz-bot

Proofreading

More than once

If you are going to gain any respect from your readers, you will make sure that what you publish is free from typographical and grammatical errors, as well as improper spelling and the equally annoying homonym. The only way I see of avoiding this is to read and reread and read again. Spell checkers can only go so far, as I’m sure you have found out. I’m Canadian and, in this country, we use UK English so I find it necessary to switch dictionaries in just about every software package I choose to use. Often, I learn to ignore the highlighted “incorrect” spelling of a word if the software does not support UK English.

Grammar, on the hand, is a horse of another colour (there’s that u again). I would like to thank my elementary school principal, Mr. Stiver for his efforts in getting us to use the language correctly. He would get up in front of the class, rub his hands together vigorously and say, “I just love grammar!” Of course, the entire class would groan in unison. Little did we know that he was preparing us properly for our life ahead.

He probably would be happy that I take the time to actually use the tools that he gave us.  A good teacher arms you with knowledge and sends you off in your life’s journey hoping that they did enough to make you successful. His efforts were not lost on this school’s graduates. It isn’t a coincidence that they all had higher scores in high school English than their classmates.

Here’s some examples of my common mistakes.

• form instead of from
• againg instead of again
• you instead of your (Today.com made the same mistake)

Please feel free to leave some examples of your personal mistakes in the comments box. It’s all about communicating clearly.