Cell Phone or Email?

I can't help but marvel at all the people who walk down the street or drive with a cell phone stuck to the ear. Whatever do they have to talk about for so long?

It's particularly mystifying to me, since I rarily use my  iPhone as a phone. I take photos with it, check my email, and do all sorts of other things instead. The DH and I communicate back and forth on my cell while I'm at work, I'll call other members of the family about plans, or I'll use the phone for long distance calling, but that's about it. I always have a huge amount of units rolled over to the next month.

On the other hand, I'm constantly on the computer using the email feature to communicate with friends, promote my books, arrange book signings, learn all sorts of things, swap jokes, and various other reasons. Somehow email seems more civilized. I'm not demanding someone instantly talk to me. I'm allowing that person to respond when it's convenient, with the understanding that I'm receiving the same courtesy.

Some people say that email has taken away from the personalization of communicating. Maybe, but I tend to believe that even though I don't hear that other person's voice, I'm actually sharing a lot more. I don't know about you, but I tend to reveal more about myself when I write than when I speak.

It's your turn. Tell us, do you prefer cell phone communication over email?  Or, maybe you use them equally?

Facebook's New Design - Do You Like It?

I opened up Facebook this morning and got confused. Overnight apparently a remodeling job was going on. The Daily Herald Business Section this morning said the new design is meant to streamline navigation and also let the games and apps stand out more.

I'm still trying to figure out whether or not I like it. What about you?  What's your take on Facebook's new design?

How Silly Can They Be

Twice in the same day I saw women walking Downtown wearing shoulder bags facing their backs. I also saw women wearing boots with high pointy heels. It's winter in Illinois, snowy, icy and slippery. How silly can they be?

Guys are not excempt from doing silly things. What about putting house or car keys in the coat pocket and leaving the coat in another room at a party? keys have a habit of falling out. Coats have been known to go off with the wrong owners.

When you write, do you let your characters do silly things? Do they do them as a matter of habit or as a mistake? Depending on the answer and the skill of the author, the reader can look on your character as ridiculous or endearing. It's fun to create a quirky character, but the challenge is in not making the person seem too dumb.

What about you? As a reader, do you enjoy it when a character does silly things? What would seem too silly?

As a writer, do you let one of your characters do silly things? On a regular basis? Maybe only once, but it turns out to be once too many?

Please Visit - It's There Somewhere

I'd appreciate your visiting my guest post at Kaye Barley's blog. The topic is It's There Somewhere. Some of you may relate to this one -
http://meanderingsandmuses.blogspot.com/2010/01/its-there-somewhere-by-morgan-mandel.html

If you missed it, you can still come over to comment about whether or not to include politics on blogs at
http://acmeauthorslink.blogspot.com/2010/02/political-views-by-morgan-mandel.html

Thanks,
Morgan Mandel

Never Too Old To Learn New Tricks

I bought Adobe Elements 7 over a year ago, but only learned a few basics. Then, I discovered I needed Adobe Photoshop CS4 to really get things done.

Well, I get 30 days of free videos to learn all this Adobe stuff. Over the weekend, I spent many hours listening to the videos and taking notes. Now, the trick is to apply what I learned so far, before I forget.

Tonight I worked on removing blemishes and whitening teeth. The teeth one is hard, because I don't have a steady hand. Even with the minus tool for erasing, I'm still not very good at it. The remove blemish one I had more luck with.

Also, I had fun doing the panorama one. I did one of Rascal in the snow I may use for a book cover or illustration some day.

What about you? Have you played with Adobe? Or, maybe you've been learning something else lately. What is it?

Arianna Huffington - The Huffington Post

Friday night I caught a great interview of Arianna Huffington by Elizabeth Brackett on The Friday Night Show, at WTTW, on Channel 11 in our neck of the woods.

As I listened, I admired her positive attitude, which she attributes to her mother who told her not to be afraid of failure. As a young girl from a poor family in Greece, Arianna dreamed of going to Cambridge and got there by means of a scholarship.

I was not only drawn to Arianna's engaging manner, but also to the fact that she authored 12 books, and was once a candidate for Governor of California. Her latest venture is The Huffington Post, The Internet Newspaper:News Blogs Video Community, which boasts an astronomical number of followers, something like 22 million visitors a month. She's a great believer in the power of the Internet, not only as entertainment, but also for information.

I'm not sure how long it'll be up at the WTTW site, but here's a link to her interview:
http://www.wttw.com/  It's highly motivating and worth a listen. If you check it out, let me know how you like it.

Morgan Mandel

I Didn't Want to Do It

I didn't want to do it. Others have, but I thought maybe I could get away without it. Well, I can't keep coming over here all day and night to check the comment section, to delete a certain spammer that keeps showing up.

So, unfortunately, for now I'm doing the word verification thing. I hate to have people type in those extra letters. It's such an annoyance. I'm hoping that after a while the spammer will turn his or her attentions elsewhere and I can go back to letting my comment people not have to jump through hoops.

Anyway, please don't let it scare you away. I do appreciate your comments here.

Morgan Mandel

Should Rascal Get Her Own Blog?

I'm not sure if Rascal should get her own blog or stay here. Or maybe, later after her book is ready, I'll send her off on her own.

I'm also not sure if I should keep my same name for my book about Rascal or figure out a new one. It's hard to decide these things.

In the meantime, I'm trying to figure out how to work the Adobe Photoshop software. I found some apps for the Iphone I'm checking out, plus a Children's Book for Dummies and Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Dummies.

Lots of learning and deciding.

Ipad or Kindle? That is the Question - One of Many

Well, the great unveiling happened. The latest gizmo has emerged on the scene. With the revelation of the Ipad, questions buzzed in my head. Is it worth the extra money? How much bigger is it than a Kindle? It seems like it could be wider that the average Kindle, and I don't need the International one. I do know it's more expensive than a Kindle. I also know I'm not into playing games, so I wouldn't use it for that. Would I use if for music? Well, my Iphone does a great job on that already. Why carry around something larger if that's the purpose.

Would I use it for reading books? Now that is a good question. How would it compare comfortwise to a Kindle? I tried out a Kindle from our local library and my eyes were very happy - no strain.

Now, with the Ipad and it's color screen, I suppose I can see a nice cover on the screen. I like that idea. But what about glare? Will that be a factor? What about fonts? I guess they can be manipulated. Another big question - What about the price of Ibooks? Will they be more because of the fancier trappings? Amazon does have some great prices for kindle books right now. Will Apple want to compete or will it go for the higher market?

And what about publishing on the Ipad? Are self-publishers allowed?

I'm such an impatient person, but I guess I'll need to wait a little longer for the answers to all these questions. I'm kind of thinking I can't afford buying and maintaining this fun gizmo, especially since for me it would just be a glorified ereader, and not serve too many more purposes - still it is cute.

What about you? Are you tempted?

Going to the Dogs Over at Acme Authors Link

Going to the Dogs - See What I'm talking about at http://acmeauthorslink.blogspot.com/.

Thanks,
Morgan

Describe Your Work In Progress

Right now I've got two works in progress. One's a children's lesson book about my deaf dog, Rascal. The other is a thriller on aging targeted for the Boomer generation.

What about you? Tell us briefly about your work or works in progress in the comment section.

Thanks,

Morgan

Beware - Don't Look If You're Easily Grossed Out

B.S. Photo - Rascal before the snow.

Whether or not you're a dog owner, you'll know what I'm talking about here.

The past few months, we've had tons of snow in our part of Illinois, but thanks to the recent warmer weather and rain, most of the white stuff has disappeared.

Hidden underneath the pretty white stuff was - to put it indelicately - a lot of crap. I spent a good part of Saturday and  this morning scooping it up with a shovel and depositing it into plastic garbage bags.

You may wonder how I can think of relating this nasty little chore to writing. Here goes -

After you've finished your manuscript, it may look beautiful and wonderful to you, but beware. Hidden under that false beauty can be all sorts of nasty piles of stuff that need to be removed. If you're savvy enough, you can tackle the cleanup job yourself. Otherwise, you may need the help of a critique group or editor to do the chore for you. Here are a few nasties to clean up:

Backstory dumps - Do readers really need to know right away every little thing that already happened?

Overly long descriptions - Sure, they look pretty, but do they move the story forward?

Adjectives and adverbs - They're the lazy way of writing and slow down a story. Make sure you have the best words for what you want to say, like action verbs and exact nouns.

Orphan letters - Did you start a word in your writing excitement, then begin another one without completing the first?

I told you I could do it. Never underestimate my ability to relate anything to writing. Anyway, today I'll be working on my Rascal manuscript and looking for spots to remove some of that, to put it indelicately, crap.

If you know of other hidden nasties to look for, please share with us. Or, maybe you have a dog and can relate to my chore today. (g)

Writers Reading

Just want to mention my contribution to the Writers Reading series at Un:Bound is up now. Yes, authors do read, believe it or not. At least this one does.

Please come on over  to see my books. Learn when, where and what I read at http://hagelrat.blogspot.com/2010/01/writers-reading-morgan-mandel.html

Tell us what you read and where, while you're at it.

Thanks,
Morgan Mandel

EDITORS - AGENTS - Julia Quinn - Cherry Adair - SPRING FLING CONFERENCE This April

STILL TIME TO SIGN UP -

Spring Fling 2010 Writers’ Conference
Sponsor: Chicago North chapter RWA
Location: Hyatt/Deerfield, IL
Fee: $159
Date: April 23-24, 2010

Speakers: Keynote Speaker is Cherry Adair; Headline speaker is Julia Quinn; also attending: Paige Wheeler (agent), Amanda Bergeron (Avon/HarperCollins), and Sarah Wendell from Smart Bitches Trashy Books. Publishing Houses: Avon/HarperCollins, Sourcebooks, Inc., Samhain and The Wild Rose Press. Agencies: Larsen Pomada Agency, Fox Literary, Folio Literary Mgmt, and Nancy Coffey Literary and Media Represenatives. Conference Features: Editor and agent pitch sessions; craft, career, and special interest workshops; Fire & Ice award ceremony, book signing, silent auction to benefit literacy charity, bookseller/librarian event and more.

FMI, http://www.chicagospringfling.com/ or email conference@chicagonorthrwa.org .

After Diane commented asking if I would be going, I thought I better add a note - YES, I'll be there for sure. I wouldn't miss it for the world. It's my local chapter. I'll be offering more news on other chapter members in attendance once I have the list, but let's just say lots of them are published authors.

Do you like conferences? What's your favorite? Maybe you'd like to try this one.

A Feel Good Story

The DH and I were very upset to read in the Daily Herald earlier that a man's pit bulls had been stolen. We know what unscrupulous people will do with that breed. Before Rascal, we didn't care for Amstaffs ourselves. That all changed when we adopted her.

Anyway, here's the new story we saw today, which makes us feel really good. It would make Rascal feel good, too, if she knew -
http://www.dailyherald.com/story/?id=352525

Rituals - What Are Yours? at Acme Today

It's Wednesday, so I'm posting at my group blog today. Come on over to tell us your rituals at
Rituals - What Are Yours?  http://acmeauthorslink.blogspot.com/

Thanks,
Morgan

As Time Goes By - Find it at Blood-Red Pencil

In deference to my wonderful guest, Penny Warner yesterday at Make Mine Mystery,  I didn't mention my post at Blood-Red Pencil called As Time Goes By - There's still time to check it out to and see if any of it applies to you -


http://bloodredpencil.blogspot.com/2010/01/as-time-goes-by-morgan-mandel.html

Thanks,
Morgan Mandel

Penny Warner is my Guest Today at Make Mine Mystery

Come on over to http://makeminemystery.blogspot.com/ to welcome my guest, Penny Warner, author of 50 books, with a new release, How to Host a Killer Party. She tells us in her post How to Survive a Book Event When Nobody's Heard of You.  -- Thanks, Morgan Mandel

Google Is So Smart!

Last night the DH had trouble starting the hand-me-down laptop I gave him when I switched to a lighter one for the train. He'd push the Start button, the lights would go on, then turn off. We changed the adaptor, but that didn't help.

In desperation, I went to Google on my desktop computer and typed, "Dell Latitude D600 starter." It wasn't long before I found a link where other people had experienced the same problem as the DH. The solution was strange, but worth a try - Press the Start button, while firmly holding down F9 and F10.

We tried it. It worked!!

Google Is So Smart!!!

Have you had a similar experience when Google solved one of your problems?

Scary moment on way to today's book signing

Trust me, you don't want to be on the train enroute to your book signing, happen to check your email on your iPhone and see one from the bookseller saying Important!

Turns out someone took my glossy 8x10 poster, that's all, thank goodness.

I've got 4 more with various promo with me.

All is well so far for my book signing today at Barnes and Noble DePaul Center 1 East Jackson Chicago
12-2
Morgan

Sent from my iPhone