after talking about
murder
corruption
disaster and
hemoroid research
the radio announcer
wets his lips
I can hear it
an intimate sound
sexual even
and I wonder what
he looks like.
Wednesday, April 3, 2013
Tuesday, April 2, 2013
The Shield
Young man
Oblivious
Marches through the parking lot
Eyes glued to his
smart phone
Held before his face as a
Shield
Protector of his disconnection
With the
real world
Monday, April 1, 2013
Thursday, March 28, 2013
Time Flies
My oh my! Time sure does fly. I can't believe how long it's been since I've added a new post here. I suppose it's a good thing that work has kept me busy, but not good that I've been too busy to post and write my "non-client" work. I've been working hard to get back in the habit of writing just to exercise my creative muscles and will soon be back to posting items here on a regular basis.
'Till then, make every minute count!
'Till then, make every minute count!
Playing with Plays
Last year a client asked if I'd be interested in working with them on a new type of heath education event. Would I be interested in writing a series of short plays or skits that would give the audience important information about breast cancer screening and treatment? Oh, and could I make them funny? Well, I love a good challenge, so of course I said yes.
I got some background information from them, came up with a list of concepts (which they liked), and proceeded to panic. I write scripts for video projects on a regular basis, but it had been a long time since I'd written a play. I did what any self respecting student of words would do - I found a class.
I had planned to attend the Rhinelander School of the Arts, a summer program run through UW Madison, and they just happened to be offering a one week class on writing 10 minute plays. Halleluiah and pass the paper. I was saved!
The class turned out to be not only informative but fun. We read well written plays and shared our own work in the class. I got some great feedback on the first of my six plays, and I was off.
I had a blast concocting scenarios and characters, working in tandem, which conveyed important information about breast cancer screening, symptoms, and treatment. Other people who read the plays even laughed at the parts I had intended to be funny - no small relief.
The plays will be staged locally in about a month. (They came up with a cool logo for the event. Check it out! ) If the first show goes well, we'll take it on the road for one night performances at regional clinics. If that goes well, we may be looking at an annual event dealing with different women's health issues. How cool is that?
OK. Now. How do I make ovaries funny? THAT will be a challenge.
I got some background information from them, came up with a list of concepts (which they liked), and proceeded to panic. I write scripts for video projects on a regular basis, but it had been a long time since I'd written a play. I did what any self respecting student of words would do - I found a class.
I had planned to attend the Rhinelander School of the Arts, a summer program run through UW Madison, and they just happened to be offering a one week class on writing 10 minute plays. Halleluiah and pass the paper. I was saved!
The class turned out to be not only informative but fun. We read well written plays and shared our own work in the class. I got some great feedback on the first of my six plays, and I was off.
I had a blast concocting scenarios and characters, working in tandem, which conveyed important information about breast cancer screening, symptoms, and treatment. Other people who read the plays even laughed at the parts I had intended to be funny - no small relief.
The plays will be staged locally in about a month. (They came up with a cool logo for the event. Check it out! ) If the first show goes well, we'll take it on the road for one night performances at regional clinics. If that goes well, we may be looking at an annual event dealing with different women's health issues. How cool is that?
OK. Now. How do I make ovaries funny? THAT will be a challenge.
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
Making the Most of Down Time
We are just barely into September and I’m sitting on my deck as I write this. Summer goes by way too fast in Wisconsin, and I refuse to squander even one day of warm weather and sunshine by sitting in my cave chained to my desk.
I also refuse to squander my down time. When work is a little scarce (as it is with many of us in the current economy) I need to get creative with how I spend my time. I’m one of those people who work best under deadlines – the more I have to do the more I get done. But when I have less to do it seems that my pace slows and I don’t accomplish as much. So, I make up or find additional things to do. Like take a class. Read about industry trends. Experiment with my little prosumer HD camcorder. Write more short stories and poetry. Etc.
Right now I’m reading a book by Wisconsinite Stephen Woessner called “Search Engine Optimization: Increase Your Google Rankings, Double Your Site Traffic.” My business partner and I went to one of his workshops at UW La Crosse on search engine optimization and learned a lot. The book is a great recap of the presentation and I’m sure I’ll refer to it often as we plan the re-design of our website. And I am happy to tell you that Stephen will be presenting for our chapter of the Media Communications Association - International this spring on SEO and marketing.
At the end of last year I bought a nice little Canon Vixio HD camcorder. I’ve done a little shooting with it, but haven’t had a chance to try edting any of it. So, within the next month I plan to write, shoot and edit a short story. My main stumbling block is finding the right method for digitizing the footage. (Yes, I went with tape for a variety of reasons.) Even though I have no aspirations to shoot and edit for my clients (I'll stick to writing, directing and producing), it would be fun to learn how to do it for myself or my family, and may help me as I write shot descriptions in scripts.
Some writer-friends and I started a writing group a few months ago. We are having a blast exploring screenplay, short story, poetry, and creative nonfiction formats. I believe that working in other genres reenergizes my scriptwriting, making for fresher concepts and crisper narration. Who knows, maybe I’ll even try my hand at writing a book some day. Whether it would be a work of fiction or industry related I can’t say, but the general idea is intriguing.
Of course, marketing is also a very good thing to do when you have time between projects. My business partner and I are developing a marketing plan that includes our main target markets, what message to tailor to each market, and how to reach the most people with investing the least amount of cash. We’d rather go heavy on the time investment and save the cash for the highest return ventures only.
So, what are you doing when work gets a little slow? How do you make the most of down time? Send me your response and I’ll post a compilation of answers.
Thanks for reading!
I also refuse to squander my down time. When work is a little scarce (as it is with many of us in the current economy) I need to get creative with how I spend my time. I’m one of those people who work best under deadlines – the more I have to do the more I get done. But when I have less to do it seems that my pace slows and I don’t accomplish as much. So, I make up or find additional things to do. Like take a class. Read about industry trends. Experiment with my little prosumer HD camcorder. Write more short stories and poetry. Etc.
Right now I’m reading a book by Wisconsinite Stephen Woessner called “Search Engine Optimization: Increase Your Google Rankings, Double Your Site Traffic.” My business partner and I went to one of his workshops at UW La Crosse on search engine optimization and learned a lot. The book is a great recap of the presentation and I’m sure I’ll refer to it often as we plan the re-design of our website. And I am happy to tell you that Stephen will be presenting for our chapter of the Media Communications Association - International this spring on SEO and marketing.
At the end of last year I bought a nice little Canon Vixio HD camcorder. I’ve done a little shooting with it, but haven’t had a chance to try edting any of it. So, within the next month I plan to write, shoot and edit a short story. My main stumbling block is finding the right method for digitizing the footage. (Yes, I went with tape for a variety of reasons.) Even though I have no aspirations to shoot and edit for my clients (I'll stick to writing, directing and producing), it would be fun to learn how to do it for myself or my family, and may help me as I write shot descriptions in scripts.
Some writer-friends and I started a writing group a few months ago. We are having a blast exploring screenplay, short story, poetry, and creative nonfiction formats. I believe that working in other genres reenergizes my scriptwriting, making for fresher concepts and crisper narration. Who knows, maybe I’ll even try my hand at writing a book some day. Whether it would be a work of fiction or industry related I can’t say, but the general idea is intriguing.
Of course, marketing is also a very good thing to do when you have time between projects. My business partner and I are developing a marketing plan that includes our main target markets, what message to tailor to each market, and how to reach the most people with investing the least amount of cash. We’d rather go heavy on the time investment and save the cash for the highest return ventures only.
So, what are you doing when work gets a little slow? How do you make the most of down time? Send me your response and I’ll post a compilation of answers.
Thanks for reading!
Thursday, April 30, 2009
Keeping Up
There are strange terms permeating everyday conversation. I recently joined Twitter and have been making a conscious effort to be more active on Facebook and LinkedIn. But I swear, some of the other folks on these social networking sites speak a completely foreign language.
One posting on a LinkedIn group which focuses on content creation was asking for connections to people who own or create video content. Well, I know a few people who do that, so I replied and said so. The woman who posted invited me to check out her website and send my contact info so we could talk off line.
I went to her website, which indicated that they provide “mashup” software to clients via the web. I had to Google mashup and learned that it’s just a fancy word for repurposing video, text, audio, etc to create derivative materials. OK, but how do the owners of the original materials get paid? Still not sure on that.
The first few times I heard people reference SEO I thought they really meant to say CEO and were just misspeaking. I’m glad I kept my mouth shut for once and did not politely correct them. It finally sunk in that they were talking about Search Engine Optimization.
Last week my business partner and I went to an SEO workshop where we learned that we have to pick key words for each page of a website and then use those same key words in the copy of each page a bunch of times in hopes that search engines will be impressed with our redundancy, index our pages, and give us a high ranking. It poses an interesting problem for people who make their living by providing clean writing to a variety of customers. We decided to simply find a balance.
I guess the bottom line is that our world is constantly changing and there are always tons of new things to learn. We can’t tackle them all, but if we can at least take a closer look at a few here and there, we not only learn a little bit, but we might also have some fun. Think of it as making life mashable.
See you on Twitter!
One posting on a LinkedIn group which focuses on content creation was asking for connections to people who own or create video content. Well, I know a few people who do that, so I replied and said so. The woman who posted invited me to check out her website and send my contact info so we could talk off line.
I went to her website, which indicated that they provide “mashup” software to clients via the web. I had to Google mashup and learned that it’s just a fancy word for repurposing video, text, audio, etc to create derivative materials. OK, but how do the owners of the original materials get paid? Still not sure on that.
The first few times I heard people reference SEO I thought they really meant to say CEO and were just misspeaking. I’m glad I kept my mouth shut for once and did not politely correct them. It finally sunk in that they were talking about Search Engine Optimization.
Last week my business partner and I went to an SEO workshop where we learned that we have to pick key words for each page of a website and then use those same key words in the copy of each page a bunch of times in hopes that search engines will be impressed with our redundancy, index our pages, and give us a high ranking. It poses an interesting problem for people who make their living by providing clean writing to a variety of customers. We decided to simply find a balance.
I guess the bottom line is that our world is constantly changing and there are always tons of new things to learn. We can’t tackle them all, but if we can at least take a closer look at a few here and there, we not only learn a little bit, but we might also have some fun. Think of it as making life mashable.
See you on Twitter!
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