Adding Related Posts Widget to Blogger Blogs

While doing some SEO research I found that having related posts at the end of your blog posts is a good thing to do. It helps keep readers at your site longer. It gives readers additional posts to peruse on your subject matter. Among other SEO things, It also looks kind of cool.

My blog buddy Peter from St Vincent's Hospital Darlinghurst - Male Nurses asked me about my related posts widget in a comment recently. I thought it might be prudent to post how I went about adding the widget to my blog.

First, the SEO blog I found commenting about related posts explained how to get it done at Wordpress. Apparently that platform has the widget as an add-on. Blogger does not. Well, luckily, I'm pretty good searching keywords. I plugged "related posts blogger" into my Google search bar and came up with plenty of resources.

The first few did not work for me. Either I did not get the code in right or the instructions left me in a daze. I found this post: Related Posts Widget For Blogger to get the job done for me. Use the second set of instructions. The first did not work.

You will also need to host the little plus image on your own image hosting site. I use Photobucket and it's proven to be very reliable.

Once you get your related posts up you will not be able to view your work in the preview mode, it must be saved and you have to click a post to see it. Ensure you download a copy of your template before you start chopping away at it. Just in case you make any mistakes.

If you are still afraid of messing with your template html, you can always make a dummy template account and play with the html at your will. I did this and I'm loving messing with my templates regularly. It's especially beneficial for making those little changes you need to make but are not quite sure about.

1. Create a dummy blog by clicking "Create a Blog" on your dashboard.
   
2. Name your tester blog anything you wish. I call mine Template Tester.
   
3. Once your test blog is live, go to your main blog and copy the entire template html from the Layout tab: edit html section.
4. Once you have copied your entire template html, take it back to your test blog and paste it into the same html section on the test blog.
   
5. Click preview and if everything worked out correctly you should see your main blog's template before you.
   

At this point you can make any alterations or additions to the template html without worry.

For the related posts widget, remember your test blog does not have any posts. You will need to make up a few posts and tag or label them so you can view your related posts widget in action.

If you like everything you've done to your blog's template in the test blog, copy the entire html code and paste it over your main blog's html. Preview the template to ensure it's there then save it.

Double check your widget is there by clicking a post.

Important note: Related post widgets will not work unless you have your posts labeled.

Check Out FairShare to Combat Plagiarism

I've been reading about plagiarism and checking many of my articles for copies on the Internet. Since I've been working on Shared Reviews, I've found many "writers" don't have any scruples when it comes to copying. I came across an article on Associated Content about an alert tool that may help combat plagiarizers:

Using FairShare to Detect Plagiarism of Your Web Content
If you're a Web content writer, you know how upsetting it is to find that your articles have been plagiarized. It's expensive to use commercial plagiarism checkers and time consuming to set up individual Google Alerts. Want a better way?
http://www.associatedcontent.comarticle/1657084/using_fairshare_to_detect_plagiarism.html

FairShare limits you to 5 feeds. I can't get it to work on my yahoo home page, but it works beautifully on my Google reader. If your putting your stuff online and are afraid of plagiarizers, FairShare is easy to use, automatic, and free.

I will continue to use CopyScape and Google Alerts, but you can never be too aware when it comes to plagiarism.

You May have Noticed...A New Background?

Noticed? Noticed what? Okay, I've changed the blog once again. I mentioned in the last post I could not stand the spread. I did not even want to visit my own blog. So, I changed things up a bit. I put up this background by following the directions from Blogger Templates and Blog help in the post: How to add a background picture in blogger.

I was thinking about using a pyzam template, as I had in the past, but I could not find one I really liked. Additionally, the pyzam templates are full screen images with a tiny, I think 660px wide, blog area. Knowing this, and hating messing with width adjustments, the background idea came up.

I was working on the fish blog template. Like Inspired, it had some real formatting issues. I understand all computer monitors are different so I want to have my blogs look right per the monitor viewing it. I remembered the new blog I built for SR fit just right in the old monitor and it seemingly adjusts for the new monitor perfectly. However, I found only a few of the static Blogger templates do this.

I grabbed my texture from GRSites and hosted it on Photobucket, then I followed the background image instructions linked above.

This new computer has really got me wanting to do a whole bunch of different things...I wonder if I have time for it all?

Follow Directions: the Answer is Boots

In junior high I had a teacher I loved. We played Pente during our free time and learned critical thinking, problem solving, and how to be better students effortlessly under his direction. This teacher really knew his stuff and how to get kids to learn and follow directions.

One thing that has always stuck with me was something he did, or should I say, said. He was teaching us how to follow directions. We all know how to do that, right? He went to each student and whispered in their ear. Then the student would say something back. He would either tell the student to stand or remain seated.

I watched as student after student was passed and most remained seated. I could not wait for him to come to me as I knew I would have the correct response. Finally he came to my desk. He leaned into my ear and said: "Say just what I say. Say boots...without shoes."

You know what I said? I said, "boots!"

Teachers like this are hard to forget. They really make learning fun and interesting.

I've been examining a few things about my blogs and doing some problem solving, critical thinking, and following directions; just as my teacher taught me many years ago. One thing I found very, very interesting was my page rank on Inspired plummeted to a big fat ZERO. Okay, so I know this blog will probably never be on top, but it was hovering between 2 and 3, which I considered fairly respectable for what it is.

During my examinations I found Inspired was not verified and did not have a sitemap. (These were things I was sure I did when I started this blog almost two years back.) Given these two factors, this blog has not been on the crawled for who knows how long. Well I've done verified and mapped it, again.

If you have a Blogspot blog, I would check if you're verified and have a sitemap submitted in the Webmaster tools of your google account dashboard. It's easy to do, just follow the directions.

To be doubly sure it gets crawled I added Meta tags. Do I know what Meta tags are? No. But I have them as supposedly they give spiders pertinent information about your blog.

I would have never known about the fall in page rank had I not been messing around with the newer blogs I've been building. Revisiting all you learn in the beginning certainly helps keep you on track in the end. Really, all I had to do all along was follow directions.

Building a Niche Blog

I've been working on building a niche blog. Like I don't have enough things going on already. I decided to buckle down and work my affiliate marketing endeavors to maximize my online earning potential.

My first decision, after deciding to build this niche blog, was which platform to go with. Everyone in affiliate marketing seems to promote Wordpress as the best platform. I decided to stick with Blogger.

I'll tell you why.

• I already have an account with Blogger.
  
• I already know how Blogger works and how to set it up.
• I figured this would be the easiest and fastest way to get the blog started.

I did do a little research prior to making my decision. The research showed Wordpress would work better for a SEO blog, which is what the new blog will be wrapped around; however, Blogger indexes slightly faster. Another major factor is Blogger is part of Google: Google is a search engine, Google has taken over FeedBurner, Google has AdWords, plus my above mentioned reasons.

Second I had to decide the niche. Previously I talked about niches in my post on Inspired about branding. At that point in my blogging and web writing, I did not have a niche blog. Well, I built Squidoo to Do for Me and You, which you can consider a niche blog. Now I'll be diving in a bit further with my new blog: My Fish Tank Adventures.

I chose fish-tank-aquarium-care as my URL (not my first choice but doable). Fish tanks and aquariums are well searched topics, about 200,000 and 3,000,000 respectively according to Google AdWords, which is good for me.

I just happen to know a thing or two about fish tanks, aquariums, and fish in general-content won't be hard for me to put up. I'm also an affiliate for AquariumsDirect.com. Finally, I found a couple of good clickbank items I can post on the site in hopes of generating an income from Clickbank in addition to Pepperjam Network..

Lastly, building My Fish Tank Adventures will be a family affair. My oldest has aspirations to become a Marine Biologist or Oceanographer some day. The little one just loves fish. My husband and I combined have 30 +++ years experience with aquariums. This said, I probably won't have to come up with all the content on my own.

This should be a fun niche blog to keep up. Since I plan to continue my online endeavors, I had to build it for the experience of creating a targeted, niche, branded blog.

Alpha Inventions: Blog Traffic Generator Update

I really meant to post this last Wednesday to follow up my post about Alpha Inventions. I get wrapped up in things sometimes. I can't help myself. I also tend to put the cart before the horse and wonder why I'm not getting anywhere.

Anyway, about Alpha Inventions, my blog traffic showed a significant increase according to my report from statcounter. I'm talking triple my normal hits. I did not get comments, except from myself and my normal commentators. My blog stats are back to norm since I did not resubmit my blog or post anything new. I think, as I mentioned in the post, this is key.

I believe Alpha Inventions is well worth looking into if you're looking to increase your blog traffic.

In light of this information, and my minimal testing, my SR friend had another blog traffic generator suggestion: Condron.us. Condron is hauntingly familiar to Alpha Inventions. You submit your blog URL and you are exposed to a multitude of various blogs. I played around there and found a couple of interesting reads, just as I did at Alpha Inventions.

I think both sites are good for blog exposure, traffic, and a swift kick to keep your blog updated. I think they're both pretty good for sparking a post topic idea or two also--for when my mind goes blank.

Increase Your Blog Traffic and Connect with Alpha Inventions

I came across something posted by a friend of mine in the SR forums. It's a blog traffic generator thing called Alpha Inventions. You know how I am, liking to check things out sometimes (okay a lot), so I submitted this blog. You can submit your blog at alphainventions.com.

My first impression is Alpha Inventions is it's really nifty. The creator, Cheru Jackson, developed it as a way for blog readers and owners to connect faster, get blogs more traffic and exposure.

I sat on the site for quite a time just reading blogs as they flashed before me. I will have to work on my speed reading skills because you only have a few moments to browse the blog unless you click it.

Alpha Inventions is a blog traffic generator. They also encourage you comment on blogs you read when you're there. Personally I had all I could do to just stop a blog I became interested in, let alone comment. As I become more accustomed to it I'll get comments going.

The submission process is swift. You just enter your blog URL and click Notify readers about my blog. Alpha Inventions is free but you can donate if you wish (you get a bonus if you do).

I'll have to check my stats next go round so I can see if I gained any traffic from Alpha Inventions. Since I've been slow posting lately, I don't know how well it would help me. I think it would be really good for the blogs I follow though. Check it out: alphainventions.com.

Affiliate Marketing: Getting My Toes Wet

I've been busy, too busy. I had to put the blog on the back burner for a bit. I hope to get back to my 3/week posts by the end of summer. I am still visiting blogs. I just haven't had too much time for posts.

I signed up to be an affiliate marketer. You can see some of the ads on the top of the blog. Adsense just isn't cutting it for me. I signed up for their "image" ads and still only got text. So I took the plunge to be an affiliate. Guess what, it's free. You should check them out because Pepperjam Network is Now Offering a $10 Affiliate Sign On Bonus. Join Today.

Here's how I'm using the Pepperjam affiliate ads on Squidoo:

• Swimsuit Model Selections for Real People
• Food Recipes: Variety is the Spice of Life
• Debt Free! Real World Credit Management Solutions
• Dereon Makes Perfect Back to School Clothing
• Bartending or Bar Tending? That is the Question...
• Old Vintage Jewelry is Beautiful and Stylish
• The Pepperjam Affiliate Marketing Program is for You!

Here's another affiliate program: ClickBank. Their ads are in text link ads to digital products. I just signed onto this one. I created Bass Fishing Guide for Fishing Largemouth like a Pro. I don't know how many clickbank lenses I'll do, but that lens was a fun one to throw together.

You probably won't have to hear me ramble on too much about affiliate marketing until I get to know the ropes a little better. So far I'm doing alright with it. Every day another advertiser accepts me as an affiliate at pepperjam. As long as they do, I'll keep building the lenses.

If you are looking to run ads on your blogs or make more money on Squidoo, I think you should give Pepperjam a go.

My Horoscope: Time to take Action, Muse!

How often do you read your horoscope? I read mine just about everyday I'm on the computer. I have it as a part of my homepage. Here's what it says for today:

This is a wonderful day to get stuff started! If you've been delaying making travel plans, calling up that cutie, or getting you car fixed, it's time to stop stalling and do what you need to do. You've been thinking and pondering long enough. Now it's time to act. You can be confident that whatever is begun today will end in a huge success. As for your concerns that you're not quite ready: Well, you're never going to be completely prepared. But you can make things up as you go along!

Funny, I really want to go on vacation, my hubby has a sexy phone voice and is a cutie, and my car is broke down. Call me paranoid, but is somebody watching me?

All that aside, the first sentence: This is a wonderful day to get stuff started! Indeed it is! You know me, everyday is a wonderful day for me to start something. As a matter of fact, I started two new Squidoo lenses in the last two weeks:

• SharedReviews: Paid to Review


• SproutBuilder Widgets Help You Market and Promote Your Content!

I put a lot more effort in these two. I learned a few more tricks about Squidoo also. I'll make a separate post to talk about the tricks.

Back to my horoscope, it says I should quit thinking and start doing. I guess I've had the irons in the coals long enough? Whatever I start today is going to be a huge success. I don't know whether I should build a lens, write an article, or start that book I've been thinking about.

The last part really made me laugh because it's so true about me: ...make things up as you go along! I do that all the time.

I suppose no matter what I do, it'll be grand!

Squidoo Talk Time

I've been updating. I like to go through pages, check links, and decide if I'm ready to change up the format, style, or direction. I play with the blog constantly, so if you're looking for changes here you probably won't see much.

The biggest changes I've made were on the Squidoo lenses. I decided to work on those a bit since they are getting a little traffic. I was reading through some tips Squidoo has to make desirable lenses and get them to produce. So I've started applying some of the tricks and adding relevent fun applications and widgets.

I read that some lensmasters are earning quite an income from their lenses. I can see how that's possible. I can also see those top earners have bucket loads of lenses--many are similar in nature. I guess I need to make more lenses so I can cash in.

I need to gather ideas. The last few posts here have covered some topic discovery tricks I use for my articles. The lenses are different though. They're not really articles. They're more of a lead to some of my other stuff.

Right now I have two I'm working up but haven't published yet. One may not get published at all because I'm waiting for an okay to use an image. Without the image the lens would be rather lame. If I can't use it I'll just delete it.

I want to build some hobby lenses, a few more local attraction lenses, and of course a few more promotional lenses. Then comes content, which takes time. Given I'm always short of time, I've decided to start the lenses and add to them as I can to freshen them up.

On the lenses I've got up, some of my content is short. Some of the content only directs to other articles. Some of the content is pictures and links--something different I was trying.

Since Squidoo only requires 5 modules to publish a lens, you can have a table of contents, a text/write, an Amazon and eBay selling module, and a guest book--there's 5. Lens started and published tout suite.

The trick is updating the lens and adding to it over time. So much to do...

I was hoping to build 30 more lenses before June 30. If I could accomplish that I would become a Giant Squid. I don't think it will come to fruition at least not this go around. With summer, the kids, and family stuff, I can barely keep up posting to the blog twice a week--I was doing 3 but I cut back for summer break.

Maybe I could still get the lenses done... Three a day... No, I'm not even going to try. I have bigger fish to fry.

Have you built your first lens yet?

The UC4C and Generating Article Topics

And the winner for the Ultimate Call for Content is Rodney Southern! Congratulations!

The top ten finalists and the winning article can be viewed from the AC News Team: "Ultimate Call for Content Winner and Runners-Up."

As for me, I'll just keep trying. I actually came up with several article topics from my submission, "Collaborative Media Editing is "What's Next?" for the Internet." (Now I just have to get to writing them). I believe AC was trying to push producers into thinking outside of the box with this contest, giving us free reign on article topic choice. Hopefully the trend will continue.

Generating article topics can be rough. Swubird, of Swubird's Nest, mentioned in his last comment that reading helps him come up with article topics. I use reading myself. Sometimes I read something and think, "I need to write about that."

Ideas don't just come to me from Internet reading. Junk mail, magazines, books, and sometimes even billboards give me leads. Occasionally one word will get me off on a writing spree.

I've been working on developing a wider perspective on things. For instance my article, "Go Green Eternally: Green Burials, Sky Burials, Cremation, or Promessa," developed from a conversation I had with my Father-in-law about his funeral preparations. Talking to people can generate many good article topics. Heck, even eavesdropping can give you an idea or two...

I keep a notepad handy to jot down things down when I get hit with an idea for an article. Most of my topics sit in contemplation before I actually get to writing about them. Some topics are scratched off or narrowed because they are too involved or overly done.

I'm finally figuring out the ropes at AC. They want articles readers want to read. They want articles that have good ad alignment--something I've read over and over on the forum. They want the articles to be well written with good SEO. I'm finally getting the SEO thing. With those things in place page views rise, the site makes money, and the producers get paid.

I believe I'm doing pretty well. Considering I've got a few articles that are dead, a couple of poems, seasonal, and local interest only pieces. My page view average for 51 articles is about 488 and continues to rise. Take away the poetry and the dead entries and I'd be well over a 550 average.

I need to keep up the momentum. My anniversary with AC is the end of August. I'd love to raise my average to at least the 550 to 600 range by then. Now I'm off to work on it...

Topic to Theme: Brainstorming, Freewriting, or Clustering

My article submission for the contest (I mentioned in Friday's post) went in at about 6 pm yesterday. I did as I said; I let it sit and edited it to the bone on Monday. Yesterday morning I spent some time working on my links and finding an appropriate picture to accompany it.

I mentioned my brainstorming in Friday's post also. Since the submissions are all in, I'll tell some of what I did.

The theme was "What's Next?" Content producers had carte blanche on topic choice. I went through a myriad of ideas. I went to Yahoo and Google top searches and discovered "Stand up to cancer" was in the top ten. I mused about it for a while and decided there would be too much involved in writing about and narrowing a topic like that. However, I may do something on it in the future.

Other than cancer, the lists were like a "who's who" of the stars. I knew the UC4C might get some submissions about the stars but I don't write about people like that. My thinking was on the mark as the actual UC4C clearly stated submissions should not be about who will get pregnant next?

On that note, I did think about writing on teen pregnancy. The Spears teen pregnancy, being a mother of a teenager, and the movie Juno kind of made me sway towards it. I opted against it. Again, the topic was too large to do in 400-500 words.

I thought about work at home, blog marketing, and citizen journalism. All pretty big topics...

What I ended up doing was taking the last three thematic topics, combining them, and narrowing to something I could manage. My topic is something I have a lot of interest in and relates to photography, videography, writing, editing, and publishing.

I did my best with it. I employed all the keyword and SEO tricks I've been learning and writing about here. We'll see how it goes. The finalists are supposed to be picked today and judged through the 10th. I'll let know when my article goes live for a looksy.

ETA: the contest submission: Collaborative Media Editing is "What's Next?" for the Internet

Since it's Wednesday, let me throw this in for Workshop Wednesday. I know I'm cutting away from my fiction practice again, but it's all in good writing fun.

There are so many wonderful ways to come up with a topic. Brainstorming is a good one. It can be done alone or in a group. Group brainstorming is more fun because you gather more input and variation. To brainstorm you take a theme and develop topics from it. Write your topics out on a piece of paper, one after the other, as quickly as you can.

Another great way to get to a topic is freewriting. In freewriting, you just start writing. Take 10 or 15 minutes and write non-stop, without constraint from grammar or sense. Start with a keyword or phrase and go from there. Write everything you know and let it ride.

A combination of freewriting and brainstorming is clustering. Clustering takes your theme and gives you a pictorial reference of it. I never could cluster very well. One would think clustering would be my favorite since I'm more visual than anything else. Oh well, that's how the cookie crumbles.

There you have it, my textbook post on topic to theme development.

Writing Prompts: Digging through People Watching and Picture Prompts ©

I've been reading about writing prompts. My head is full of stories but laying those stories out is hard for me. Especially now, not exercising the creative muscles and just writing for search engines.

When I was younger, I loved to people watch. My friend and I would sit on this rock wall in the mall and watch people go by. Some people were very interesting, appealing, and stories about what they were doing, talking about, or there for would just roll off my tongue. I could come up with some real humdingers back then. Sometimes I'd get my friend laughing so hard she'd fall off the wall. I should have written some of those stories down...

I miss those days.

Have you ever gone to a museum? My mother and I loved museum hopping. One I remember fondly. It was actually an old castle in Europe turned museum. We walked through admiring the displays, the portraits, the architecture. Of course you knew the history, but you didn't really know the people. I would look at those portraits and wonder, "What were they really like?"

Keeping that in mind, what kind of story could you develop from a picture? Picture prompts are used to spark a story in you. What kind of a story could you develop from these picture prompts?

My story starts something like this: When Sallie Mae married George Danker it was the perfect match. They bought a stretch of land far from the city and settled in to have 6 kids...In memory of their parents, the kids erected a roadside display. The windshield reads: "Not For Sale!"

...

These trucks sit prominently on the road to our neighborhood. The display fascinates me. I'm sure the property owners erected it to sway people from purchasing lots in a new development next door.

I'm a visual person. I love to see things and create something from it. I'm going work with picture prompts more to see where it takes my creative writing.

Adapt, Innovate, Create, and Invent: My Writing Pledge

I was watching the news last night. I try not to watch it, but there was a special report about saving on gas I wanted to see. The report was interesting and discussed using water to increase fuel mileage.

Basically, by adding this little piece of equipment to your vehicle that turns water into hydrogen gas, you can get up to 80 miles per gallon. Interesting. The technique is not perfected yet. Some adjustments must be made for the process to work and the car's computer must be tweaked.

I do not know all the specifics, and I'm not all that mechanically inclined, but it sounds really interesting. Here's the link for the report.

If you watch it, the mechanic talks about how Americans adapt, innovate, create, and invent. I've been working on my writing. I absorb everything so I can improve myself.

Writing articles for the Internet is rather tricky. All that keyword density, SEO, and promotion is daunting. So, I have to adapt my writing to marketing demand.

Then I read the article out loud...

How many times can you say "Peter Piper Picked a Peck of Pickled Peppers," without tying your tongue in knots? I swear some articles are soooooooo repetitive it drives me crazy. But the search engines want it that way. Frankly, I did not learn how to write that way.

Recently, I wrote an article on green burials. It should be coming up soon. As interesting as it was to do the research about it, learn about it, and think about it, I do not feel as if it came across how I wanted it to be.

My keyword phrase "green burial" spots the article as if it has chicken pox. It was intentional. I admit it.

Am I compromising my writing by doing this? I wonder. I guess it's something I have to do, if I want to write for the web.

I have to adapt my style to create Internet friendly work. I must do this in an innovative way. This will lead me to invent strategies to incorporate web friendliness into my style of writing.

So there you have it, my new pledge.

Dream Journals, Night Terrors, and Me

I cannot sleep. Either I have these weird dreams, the little one wakes up, or the dog starts barking. The little one and dog are really no big deal. It's those dreams.

The other night I woke up startled. I sat up in the bed and felt as if I had been shocked. My husband grabbed my arm and asked me what was wrong, I was calling for help. I have no idea what was wrong. I cannot remember the dream.

I think I was abducted by aliens. Really, I do. Sometimes I have dreams that involve being whipped through the air, unbearable noises, blinding lights, and crazy distorted figures. I always wake with a jerk afterwards, like I had fallen into bed.

For a time I kept a dream journal. I was trying to pinpoint where these night terrors came from. It was useless. I could never remember enough of the bad dreams to write them down. Good or erotic dreams were no problem to remember; I have plenty of those written on paper.

Dream journals are supposed to give you insight. That's what I heard. I do not know how much insight I got from keeping one, but I did get a lot of practice writing. I kept a notebook and jotted down what I could remember about the dream(s). Later I transcribed those dreams and filled in the blanks.

Do you keep a dream journal? Have you ever kept one? If not for anything else it's useful for writing practice. I suppose I could work up a raunchy novel from some of my dreams--I do not want to go there though. Or do I?

I should pull out the old dream journal and work on it. Maybe I can get these dreams figured out this go round.

Fishing Through My Muse ©

Today I want to write just to write. No exercise, no guidelines, just free-write.


My husband and I have been prepping our off-shore boat for the upcoming season and the "all-guy" fishing trip. I always help him wherever I can with these projects. Doing all of this work has brought us to talk about fishing.


As a couple, we do most of our fishing in our Jon boat. This is a story of how a day of fishing goes for me.


...


It was a cool September morning. The sun had not yet broke the morning darkness when Carl and I pulled the boat out of the driveway. "I think we're gonna catch 'em today!" I looked at Carl and winked. He raised his nose in the air, "Yep, I smell fish!"

Pulling onto boat ramp road, we saw trucks already lining the parkway. "Ramp's gonna be wet." Carl said as he spun the boat into position to launch. I jumped out of the truck. "You want me to lock the hubs?" Carl nodded.

The sky was just starting to wake up when Carl caught the first Bass. I put the net under it and pulled it in the boat. "Wow! He's a keeper." Carl strung and tied the squirming fish to the boat. "Now it's your turn."

I cast my lure into the water and we trolled up river. Zzzzzzzzzzz! Carl's line went off again. "Feels like a big one!" Carl tightened the drag and cranked the reel. "Wow! He's a fighter!" Carl's rod bent and wriggled as the fish fought its way to the boat. I slipped the net under him. "This one's bigger than the first!"

We started trolling. There was enough light in the sky to see steam rising off the water. I started to sing, "Smoke on the wa-ter." Carl tapped my shoulder, "You're gonna scare the fish." I smirked at him and took a sip of my Irish coffee.

"Okay, it's your turn!" I placed my rod in the holder and pulled out my camera. "I think the only thing I'll be catching today is..." Zzzzzzzzzzzz! "...A buzz!" Carl tightened his drag and cranked the reel.

"Carl, I want to trade rods." I passed him my rod. We started trolling up river. I cast my lure off the stern and placed the rod in the holder.

The sun crept up in the sky. Shadowy images of trees lit on the surface of the water. Who cares about catching stinky old fish? I thought as I captured the moment on film.

Zzzzzzzzzzz! "Again?" Carl cranked his reel. "You realize that's my rod, so technically, it's my fish!" Carl laughed, "It may be your rod, but the fish is mine! It's another big one--Come on, you sucker!"

We continued up river the rest of the morning. When we hit the gravel bar it was almost lunch time. Other boaters were parked on the banks. They waved and flashed fingers to indicate their catch and the sizes of them.


We found a quiet spot up the bar and banked near a tree. I pulled boat up on the rocks and tied it so the current would not carry it off. Taking a long deep breath, I bent and stretched. "This is a pretty place."

Carl put his lure in the water. "Gonna fish?" I looked around and nodded, "In a minute, I gotta go first." Carl smiled, "Women!"

We sat on the bank for an hour and did not catch one fish. I thought we should start trolling back down river. But I did not say anything about it. I popped open a beer. After all, I had to catch something even if it was just a buzz.

Writing Prompt Sites to Nudge Your Muse ©

This Workshop Wednesday is going to look at writing prompts. I've found a few here and there so I thought I should put them up on the blog.

Writing prompts are suggestions to get you started writing. They are great for times that you just do not have a thing to put down. A writing prompt may help to jar your creativity or lead you to your next great work.

Writing prompt sites:

Creative Writing Prompts
Writer's Digest - Writing Prompts
Daily Writing Prompts
Imagination Prompt Generator

In the last link I was playing around with the next prompt feature. One prompt said, You have to give up one of your senses. Which one will it be?

I thought how cruel it would be to have to give up one of my senses. How can one choose? Each sense evokes its own bit of pleasure. All together they enhance the rich world we live in.

Without my taste buds, I could not relish the mixture of flavors in my favorite Italian sausage lasagna. I would never be able to delight in the sweet nectar from a honey suckle bud. I would be lost when I gulped my favorite mixed drink



Without the ability to feel, I would not be able to enjoy the soft texture of my baby's chubby cheeks. I could no longer enjoy the warmth of my cat's long fur as I pat him. I would not be able to feel my husband's gentle caress and the tingles that it brings.

Without my hearing, I could not listen to the sounds of the ocean. I would not be able to hear the squirrels barking at my cat as he climbs up their tree. I would miss the buzzing from a humming bird as it zips by my head.

Without my ability to smell, I could not enjoy the aroma of my sweet Wisteria when it blooms. I would not know when I brushed my tart Rosemary whilst walking in the garden.

Without my sight, I could not see the beauty in the world. The flowers as they emerge from the earth. The dew glistening on a blade of grass. The sun as it sets on the horizon.

How cruel could someone be to take a sense from me? They are all a part of me. They make me whole.

I do not know that I could choose. I would have to ask for more time. I would stall. I would stammer. I would run the other way.

Which would you choose?

Dabbling the Muse in Poetry...©

In my last post I talked about the movie Amadeus. Mozart was an extremely talented musician composing 600 pieces throughout his short lifetime. His first composition was at about the young age of 6--incredible. He started playing at 4.

I love music. I wondered if I could write a song. Many times songs are formed from a piece of poetry.

A couple of weeks ago I started working on a poem. It's rough and it came from a dream I had about my deceased husband. He came to me in my dream and it was as if he had never passed.

The pain of his passing left me numb for a time. Had it not been for our friends, my family, and my daughter, I probably would have become some sort of a recluse. So deeply depressed that nothingness would have absorbed me.

My husband now was a touch stone for me. He was my deceased husband's best friend. He carried me through the roughest of emotional times then. Our friendship turned to love. Sometimes I feel as if we were somehow put together by a force from beyond.

The dreams I have about my past love are vivid, always. I feel as if he comes to me because I asked him to. When we found that he was terminal we discussed the afterward and what would be.

We were not morbid about it. We knew the facts. In the backs of our heads, we knew what was happening. We tried every thing that medicine, and alternative medicine, had to offer to belay the inevitable. At times I lived in denial just to get through it; I was young. Those times were the hardest I had ever had.

However hard it was, we still had our love to pull us through.

I could go on, but I want to get to my exercise for this week: Poetry. (I felt it necessary to give a little history so my poetry rambling could be understood.)

What got me started with this was my daughter's English class. They have been working on poetry during this 9 week section. If you are interested, you can see a little poem we put together for an assignment in Spring into Summer Mood-A Pattern Poem Assignment.

Lately, it seems that poetry has taken a front seat. I've been reading a lot of poetry in blogs, articles, and print.

This poem is a work in progress. It is only the beginning, I think. In my head I hear it with music.




Last night...
You joined me in my dream
Last night...
You really made me scream
Last night...
It was like we never parted
Last night...
My heart was restarted


Last night...
You were stronger than ever
Our hearts were never severed

This can't be a dream
Not all is as it seems
When I awaken
I find I was mistaken

What was all so real
Left me nothing to feel



...



I wonder, given my musical background, if I could...Forget that, I'm no Mozart. I can read music but I doubt I could write it.

Challenging My Muse with a Flash ©

Last Wednesday I posted a 55 word flash fiction challenge for myself. I worked on it briefly and came up with this:


I entered the moonlit room. My heart skipped a beat when I heard her voice. I am guilty. I tried to explain, but it fell on deaf ears.

How different my life has become since. I am single now. I need not hide my obsessions or faults. I am free to live, as I will.

...

It rings familiar to the short story I have been working. Perhaps too familiar--call me a cheater, I had a busy weekend.

So it has a beginning, a middle, and an end. After that it seems a little sparse. I guess that's the point.

I read a little more about flash fiction and the point is to get to the point. The author is the framer and the reader is the filler. All at once, the story should be concise yet complete.

Within the flash fiction you should find a setting, character, conflict, and resolution. So did I meet the requirements?*

• Setting: moonlit room


• Character: speaker and partner


• Conflict: guilty of unknown


• Resolution: living single and free

Working on this was fun. Talk about exercising your edit/delete button. I want to branch out more on stuff like this for my Workshop Wednesday posts.

*From "Flashes of Brilliance" by S. Joan Popek

Flash the Muse with Flash Fiction...©

Playing around with this Workshop Wednesday thing, I've decide to make a hard left turn this week. I've been exploring different blogs, migrating out of my comfortable zone. A part of my broadening/promotion quest, I guess.

I came across a post by elizadashwood, "Craft of fiction: Example of 55 word fiction," that got my wheels turning. Now that challenge is tricky at best--to hone out a story in 55 words--that I'm going to try for next week.

Now for my left turn, I was reading though the comments and saw (S)wine's comment about Hemingway's famous bid of flash fiction: "For sale: baby shoes, never worn." This I remembered from studying Hemingway--you know he frequented one of my favorite vacation destinations? (Off topic, I'll talk about that some other time...)

I just had to dive deeper to find more, since I've been working on this clarity, condense, and edit thing. I found the Short Stories Site and Siobhain M Cullen's post "Flash Fiction" that has several different 6 word flash fiction submissions by several authors, which is very entertaining you should check it out.

Here's my little attempt at the exercise:

Open lips, embracing, they fell asleep.

I also reversed "Open lips" to say:

Lips open, embracing, they fell asleep.

I don't know if that's how it's supposed to go. It's just my feeble attempt at dusting off my creative side. At any rate it's a fun little thing to do. Now to tackle the 55 word challenge for next week is really going to take a little effort on my part.