My last post was weeks ago.  I could tell you about abandoning my car on the Pennsylvania turnpike because the head gaskets leaked coolant into the engine.  I could tell you about how the sucky economy has ramped up my workload at my day job (financial planning).  I could tell you that kids and house need attention.  But I have decided to bite the bullet and make no more excuses.  Life is testing me.  How much do I want to write? 

Like a yo-yo dieter, I have tried every time management tool out there.  I have tried MBO (management by objective), reward systems, and numerous strategies used by other writers and writing gurus.  I have been trying for years and something inside me won’t let me quit.  Why can’t I let myself off the hook?  What is the deep dark place that holds me back from living to my potential?

I write.  I write everyday, but it is not fiction.  My husband thinks I should write non-fiction, because I gravitate toward reading non-fiction material.  Maybe he is right.  I often think of going on a writer’s retreat to get that flow started.  I feel like an engine that needs an oil change.  The oil, viscous and dark, is like sludge gumming up the works. 

Here’s a site about writer’s retreats. If you ever thought about going, this is a good place to start.  http://www.writersretreat.com     (This is a hot link, even though it appears like plain text).

Hey, November is National Novel Writing Month and celebrating its tenth year.  Perhaps, you have already heard of it.  This is the opening content on the home page.  http://www.nanowrimo.org/eng/whatisnano

Nanowrimo stands for National Novel Writing Month.  “It is a fun, seat-of-your-pants approach to novel writing.  Participants begin writing November 1.  The goal is to write a 175 page (50,000-word) novel by midnight, November 30.

If writing is the way you pay for food and keep a roof over your head, then you should have a website.  Think of your website as a virtual business card.  This “card,” however, differs in that so much more of your personality, your bio, your writing is out there for public scrutiny.   Smart writers understand that publishing their writing is only half a story.  Through a website is a pivotal beginning for marketing — the half of the publishing game.

Here are several good reasons how  a website can increase your exposure:

1.  You are reaching 1,463,632,361 potential viewers.  That’s about one-fifth of the world’s population.
2.   You can superficially bond with your audience by sharing with your viewers something of your life and interests.
3.  You can communicate with your virtual fans through your blog or forum. 
4.   You can request your viewers to subscribe to your site, which is a built in audience for selling your books.

5.   You will enjoy the creative process.
6.    You can add all sorts of sections to your website.  You can keep it strictly about writing?  Or if you have a passion for a topic,  you may use this website as your personal virtual library.  Add all sorts of interesting tidbits about music, literature, articles to show the full scope of your interests and writing skills.

No doubt a writer out there sees Alaska’s governor Sarah Palin’s story as the core of a wonderful novel.  You can’t dream up stuff better than this.  Through in some humor, some twists and voila — America’s next bestseller. 

Tonight is the VP debate: Palin vs. Biden.  So novelists, join your political journalist counterparts and take notes.  I swear this is fertile territory for a good movie to boot.