Last Blooms of the Season

Aaah. Bring on the snow.

Just Thought I'd Share With You....

...the exceptionally crappy parking job I did last week.


Check it out! That's four, count 'em, four parking spots that I'm taking up with my tank. Moe was pretty sure we'd come back to find it keyed.

It Will Need Struggle Become Author

I love to write. I love to take crazy things that I see or that happen to me, put my humorous spin on them and then publish them on my blog for my friends to enjoy.

I also never want to have a real job again, you know, the kind where you have to get dressed and leave your house. But I would like to someday see my name on the 'Pay To The Order Of' line of a paycheck.

I've thought a lot lately about how I can make money while staying at home. My sewing does okay, but basically it's just a hobby that pays for itself. I rarely have any actual income from my sewing; what I charge just covers the costs of the materials. I doubt that most of my customers realize what a screaming deal they are getting.

I have thought that it would be great to have some of my writing published, but what do I want to write about? A how-to book or any sort of non-fiction is out; I don't know enough about anything to write about it. A novel just sounds tricky because I'm not so great at making up characters and plots and plot twists and drama. Don't get me wrong, I'm good at drama, just not making it up. What I am good at, however, is presenting my (I believe) unique and humorous view on life. It's not really fiction, but not always non-fiction, either.

I think a weekly humor column in a newspaper would be awesome. So tonight I Googled "publish newspaper column" and came up with a bunch of how-to articles. I skimmed through a few of them before I came to this gem.


Create Article to Newspaper

Newspaper is contains compilation of articles. There are various news articles and there are popular article too. Popular article is article to complete news or will more attractive of the newspaper to reader. Usually, popular article writes by expert author or deep investigation by reporter. Newspaper Article always short, deep, simple language and give fast solution for the hot problem today.

Almost, every newspaper and magazines has column for articles from other author. Many academician and researcher use newspaper and magazine to publish their article. The goal is to get extra money beside main salary and to get popularity of the expertise. Some research institution have rule to their researcher to publish their articles in newspaper or magazines. This is necessary as requirement to get research rank in their institution.

Same with research institution, academician in campus or university is necessary to publish their article to get academic rank. Newspaper article is popular article. This article is very fast moving of idea. One day relevant to an edition but will out of date for the next edition because not relevant with subject of the newspaper. Thus, newspaper article is one time article. After, reader read this article, they will ignore it and will attend to other subject without remember of that article.

Although that, it is very interesting to write newspaper article because it will need struggle become author of the newspaper article that publish on there. Many peoples need struggle to publish their article on newspaper. This is not easy. Often, newspaper will see who write these articles not what content of the article. More popular of author then they will more easy to publish their article. Popular author will influence to selling point to the newspaper or magazines.

Below some tips to become newspaper author or columnist:

[1] Improve your writing skill. You must train every time in writing.

[2] Keep update with information in society especially in newspaper or magazine.

[3] Know what character of the newspaper or magazines. Your article must suitable with that character.

[4] Newspaper article is short description and fast analysis of the cases. Article must content: title, problem description, analysis or solution and closing remark or conclusion.

[5] Long of article usually 4 pages with double space in formal language.

[6] Some newspaper needs academician style with high analysis and philosophies and other newspaper will receive middle style of writing.

[7] Do not send your article to other newspaper after your send to another one.

[8] Do not break author ethic especially for newspaper article. You will black list and never newspaper will publish your next article.

[9] For published article, you will receive money. It is happy as extra income for your life needs.

[10] For beginner, you should select lower class newspaper to publish your article. It is will easy to publish your article than with high-class newspaper or magazines.

[11] Better, you are not making specialize in one field except you are an expert in one field.

Short article as newspaper article is very good as writing practice before you start write a book with long articles. Often, some author creates a book as newspaper articles compilation. Usually, academician and researcher conduct that to compile many their articles from newspaper.

This was written by a guy from Indonesia. I do not feign to be able to write any sort of how-to for someone in Indonesia, but here's the kicker: I don't try!

I didn't read the whole thing, it gave me a headache and made me nauseous to boot. I did, however, completely love the irony of the horrible grammar, punctuation and capitalization in an article that covers the how-to's of writing.

So. Awesome.

Well, my search ended there because I had to come here and blog about it so now I have a new plan.

1. Continue to write witty blogs.
2. Friends will read blogs and pass the link along to their friends.
3. Friends of friends of friends will pass along ad nauseum
4. *Someone* in the literary field will read my work and say, "Gadzooks! I must have this young woman on my payroll!"
5. The person must use the word "gadzooks" or there is no deal.

Sounds doable, right?

Sounds like a lot less work for me than must train every time in writing and I would love money that is happy as extra income for your life needs.

What Happens When I Leave My Phone Unattended

When I see a book in a store that I want to buy, I take a picture of it on my phone so I can go home and find it on Amazon for a better price. The other day I was looking through the pictures on my phone for a picture of a book and found that I was not the only one who had been taking pictures.

Pretty fierce, no?


...and goofy.


... and, um, stoned?


This isn't a self-portrait, but I'm pretty sure that I know who the photographer is...


The monkey in the tree!


Classic Welly self-portraiture.


Apparently "Mom on a mower" is a fascinating subject.


Jake is pretty interesting, too.


Oh, cutie patootie Jack.


I love this picture! It's blurry, but he's shooting her. Priceless.


His attempt at being cute on purpose.


He looks a little like a demon in this one. Much more accurate.


Yeah. I can't leave my phone unattended around "adults", either.

Is Glad Cling Wrap Edible?

See, I need to know because I accidentally baked some into the bread that I just made.

I started my morning by telling Morgan that I was making chicken noodle soup with homemade noodles. He requested homemade bread too and I, being the wonderful, doting, sarcastic wife that I am, complied.

I read that a good way to proof dough in the oven is to turn the oven on for a couple of minutes, turn it off and then put your dough in the oven to rise. I spray a piece of cling wrap with non-stick cooking spray and then place it over my dough to make sure that it doesn't dry out.

So, I had two beautiful loaves, beautifully rising in the oven. Beautiful. My mom stopped by to drop off some of my things that she had and while we were visiting, I peeked into the oven to check on the bread. The oven felt too cool so I turned it back on, intending to stand there and turn it off after about a minute. But then my mom asked for a grocery sack and then I was loading up some tomatoes and eggs for my sister and I forgot all about turning the oven off.

I remembered when I heard the element in the oven click off because it had reached a toasty 350 degrees.

I opened the oven to find my beautiful bread covered with a beautifully browned sheen of....plastic. Yeah. I was able to peel a little bit of it off, but most of it baked right into the crust.

They really are nice looking loaves of bread. I may just "forget" to tell my family about the plastic at dinner and see if anyone notices.

It makes me wonder what sort of cooking mishaps my mother had that she served us without telling us about.

My Goats Have Identity Confusion

I don't know what kind of critters they think that they are, but it's not goats.



Weirdos.

Mas Pollos

Yup. We got more chickens.


Meet the girls. Eleven Leghorn pullets. (That's teenage chickens to the layman.)


This is Hank. He is not a purebred Leghorn; he may not even be a Leghorn at all. The transaction went like this:

Sweet Little Old Lady From Whom We Got the Chickens: Would you like a rooster, too?

Me: Sure. Is he a Leghorn?

SSLOLFWWGTC: No, he's a rooster.

Me: Oh. What breed?

SSLOLFWWGTC: Oh, he's a good old guy.

Me: How old is he?

SSLOLFWWGTC: Just a year.

I quit asking questions after that.

Does his breed look familiar to anyone? I suspect that he is a mutt.


I can't even begin to tell you how ridiculously proud of myself I am for building this nesting box/table this morning. The bottom part enclosed in white is where our new kittens will live when we get them in a week or so.


Check out the contents of the nesting boxes. Booyah!


I even installed this perch made from an old ladder.

I. Rock.

You may commence basking in my awesomeness.