Adopt a Cat Here

I know, I missed inserting a LOLcat for silly Saturday.  Herewith, in honor of Adopt-a-Pet week or month or whatever is my recommendation for writers:

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More Caturday!

Bringing back Silly Saturday because this is definitely how I feel:

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Christie Mystery Character

I couldn't resist sharing this Christie mystery character:

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Emptying the Email Trash

Ways to waste your money, time and talent:  Some guy just emailed me to call him. That's all he said.  I have no idea who he is, and I am certainly not going to open his attached file or call him.

Last week someone said he had found my website through an image search for "California Spangled Cats." He wanted me to hire him to optimize my site for better image search returns, because mine was 22nd in the list. Like, I care? Anyway, it's "California Dreamcats," the first one I did for a class in site design, and I don't think it's on the web. Now, that's creepy.

Another persisted (until I blocked the address) in telling me that my writing site can't be found in foreign search engines.  Why should I be concerned when it is only for English-speaking people, or those who want to learn and search on English terms.

Other hilarious favorites are the vendors who tell me that they have redesigned my websites, and I can see the improvements by clicking on a link. They fail to notice that I design and optimize sites.  Often they fail to discover my name, too.

But the all-time best is the guy who sent me the same message three times in an 18-month period, offering free articles.  Now, I like to feature guest posts, and some of the free articles on this site are by other writers who I know.  But this guy signed his emails with three different female names and directed me to the same two websites where the articles appeared.  Only, he kept mixing up the signature names and the by-line names.  I'm not sure he knew who he was. A little research discovered his true gender and name.

I'm also a little sad because yesterday I turned down two book manuscript editing jobs. Ironically, one was too well-written. I told the author that most of the changes I might make, I thought amounted to quibbles.  The other manuscript looked like a brain dump with little punctuation or capitalization and no quotation marks.  I told the author that either it is a new form of a novel, or the manuscript needs to be rewritten, which is a very costly effort.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm being tested.

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What a Picture is Worth

It's silly Saturday at the Hancock Hacienda.
The same could be said of lemons (except for the price):

Not bad. Not bad at all, and certainly not as bad as my 

Cancer Bananas!

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Editorial Assistants

Many writers seek manuscript editors at this time of year.  They have many questions, too.  This is just to let you know that I refer all mundane and boring, repetitive questions to my editorial assistant, depicted below:

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See Bad Grammar, Bad Editor

Uptight liguisists and editors, avert your eyes. For a good time, watch Hot for Grammar twice, once just for the sights and sounds and a second time, reading the subtitles. Both are hilarious. Maybe us anal retentive editors should watch this video every day to improve our attitudes and facial expressions. 8-)



YouTube - Bad Grammar - The Way I Are Parody ft. HotforWords

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Letters to the Editor

Responses to the editors' comments about manuscripts are pouring in. This client's message was particularly moving.

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Today is a Palindrome

How is today a palindrome? You may ask if you know that a palindrome reads the same, literally, backwards and forwards.  It is said that palindromes are the oldest literary oddity—half joke, half puzzle.  That's probably why someone crafted:

"Madam I'm Adam" as Adam's introduction to Eve in the Garden of Eden. To see the palindrome, smush the letters all together in lower case: madamimadam.  It is also said that the shortest poem is:

Fleas

Adam had 'em.

Is that another palindrome?  adamhadem/medahmada  No. So how is today a palindrome?  Today is 01022010 (not computer-speak, but one of the many formats for depicting a data:  01/02/2010 is January 2, 2010).  One of the more boring definitions comes from the Glossary of terms used in molecular genetics:

palindrome a double stranded DNA sequence in which the sequence of one strand in the 5´ to 3´ direction is the same as the sequence of the (oppositely orientated) complementary strand in the 5´ to 3´ direction.

Snore...

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LOLtech Strikes Again!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

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"Twilight" by Cats

Oh, Lord! You must see this LOLcat send-up of Twitlight! Keep scrolling down.

Microsuede: Movie Review: The Twilight Saga: New Moon

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Blue Pyramid Book Quiz II

You're Much Ado About Nothing!You're not really sure what all the fuss is about, but it seems like it's all a lot of overreaction. Light and playful, you tend to be the one making dirty jokes in the corner, or even in front of a whole bunch of people. You end up being more or less unable to keep a straight face, even when something serious seems to be on the line. Despite this, you still have something to say about gender equality. In the end, you're just looking for a hero.

Take the Book Quiz II at the Blue Pyramid.

Oh, this is so NOT ME!

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Use An Apostrophe

The right ways to use an apostrophe (in illustrated form) from:
How To Use An Apostrophe - The Oatmeal

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Downfall of Grammar

YouTube - Downfall of Grammar
Don't worry if you don't speak German; they added subtitles in English.

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National Cat Day

(LOL) Thursday, October 29 iz National Kitteh Day! We know that everyday is Caturday, but on National Cat Day we git to show our kittehs sum extra speshul lurv and give them the much deserved attention they demand.

To celebrate National Cat Day, we’re running a Treat Your Cat Like Royalty Contest. Send us a picture of you celebrating your king or queen kitteh on National Cat Day and we’ll pick the most awesum winner to receive an autographed copy (by Cheezburger) of ICHC’s new book How To Take Over Teh Wurld: A LOLCat Guide 2 Winning.

Email your picture to icanhascheezburger+nationalcatday@gmail.com by Friday, October 30, 5pm PT and we’ll post up the winner on Monday, November 2.

Happy National Cat Day to all of the kittehs around the world!

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Ima Emma

Just to show you how inaccurate these funny little quizzes are: I can't recall ever reading any Jane Austen book. I hear you all gasping, I know, but 'struth! Bad enough we had to read that Heathcliff thing in high school. Oh, wait! That isn't an Austen book, is it?

Take the Quiz here!

And how could you ever forget the fabulous, Jane Austen doll?

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Writers' Vocabularies

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Vumpire Gear

Nit Wits #48: Vumpire Gear (Vampires + Baseball) Coloring Creativity by Chris Dunmire

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Top 10 for Freelancing

With the Letterman brouhaha on our minds, I could not resist sharing this "top ten" article found at FreelanceSwitch.com: Top 10 Reasons you should quit your job today and become a freelancer. My favorite, always, is:

Number 3:

Because for freelancers casual fridays [sic] means working in your underpants

If you follow me on Twitter, you may recall "Pantsless Freelancing Day" or was it "Put on your Pants Day"? Either way, the author of the FreelanceSwitch article, Jack Knight, has a keen sense of humor. Thanks for the reminders, Jack, why some of us do it our way!

What is it about freelancing that makes you the happiest?

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F-ing Lost

Going off at half-cock: The Daily Express's Ant and Dec headline,caught between editions.

The Daily Express had a prime example over the weekend of what can happen when you fiddle around with a headline.

Via Media Monkey.

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Big Caturday Celebration

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

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Shakespeare Gum

For soothe-ing parch'd tungs & hurling ripe posts.
From the inimitable Archie McPhee

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Writers Salad Days

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Take Over Teh Wurld

I Can Has Cheezburger’s new lolbook, How To Take Over Teh Wurld: A LOLcat Guide 2 Winning, will be coming out on September 1! You can pre-order ur copy today at:

» Amazon.com

» Borders

» B&N

Added Bonus: When you pre-order How To Take Over Teh Wurld, email your receipt to tehwurld@gmail.com, to receive a limited edition I Can Has Cheezburger desktop iconz (win and mac) for free!

It is on my Personal Wish List at Amazon. Hint: October is a big month for me!

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Cat Naps Books

Courtesy Layla Morgan Wilde

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Engineers' Cat Guide

Thanks to Word Thief: Study Finds Cats Control Humans.

And don't miss the even longer Cat Yodeling video. Stick with it to the fantastic finale!

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MusicLOL in NYC

I'm so jealous! A "Fringe" festival with a musical based on LOLcats!


According to today's feed from "I Can Has Cheezburger":

Two Cheez Frends, Katherine and Kristyn, have written an original musical called I Can Has Cheezburger: The MusicLOL! which is based on I Can Has Cheezburger.

If you are in the New York area, the musical will be part of the New York International Fringe Festival and will be performed on August 14, August 15, August 18, August 26, and August 28 at the Cherry Lane Theater. Click here for more information about I Can Has Cheezburger: The MusicLOL! and to purchase tickets for the musical!

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A Wordle's Edge

Wordle - A Writer's Edge Words

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Golden Marmot Award

All I wrote was:

Hot naked editing–join those split infinitives! Slash those adverbs! Add those articles (everyone writes like tweets now!) #copy_editors

And it won


"Golden Marmot Award winners on Twitter are cheeky, wise, witty or profound (sometimes all at the same time), always in 140 characters or less," says sage Debbie Ohi, the original Inky Girl.

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Dangers of Journaling

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Cat Writer's Block

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Put on Your Pants Day

July 10th is the First Annual “Freelancers Put On Your Pants” Day « ASSME: American Society of Shitcanned Media Elites

I cribbed this one from KOKEdit's tweet. Couldn't resist posting it here to give my compadres an early warning. Vis a vis my comment, I'm rummaging around in my drawers to find the ones marked "Friday."

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Cat Book Reviewer Dilemma

HALP! get me down I is ten stories up

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Writers Eat Absinthe Now

Absinthe Mints

Absinthe is a strong, herb-infused, alcoholic beverage that was extremely popular with artists and authors in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Due to its green color and purported hallucinogenic qualities, it is often referred to as “The Green Fairy.”

Available from the inimitable Archie McPhee website.

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Writer Resource Roundup

If you're a freelancer in Canada or one who works for Canadian clients, you may be confused about what to charge or what pay to expect. The writers.ca • find a professional writer in canada site can help you out. It offers useful information for all freelancers, including sections on professional practices and copyrights.

Have a book for sale on Amazon.com? Are you participating in whatever they call their authors' blogs--a good marketing move. Another, more hidden, bonus is the Amazon Vine™ Program, which "enables a select group of Amazon customers to post opinions about new and pre-release items to help their fellow customers make educated purchase decisions. Customers are invited to become Amazon Vine™ Voices based on the trust they have earned in the Amazon community for writing accurate and insightful reviews."

Who doesn't need more pictures to choose from? Shareapic - The pic sharing site that gives back! is a newer resource. I intend to join because of the front page tease (ignoring all the exclamation points):

We pay $0.22 per 1000 pic views.. that's more than some major ad networks pay their publishers!
- We allow you to add your Bidvertiser © code to your image and gallery pages.
- We pay out within 30 days!
- One click posting to Facebook, Myspace, Blogger, Orkut, and more!

Now, it's back to the cat race.

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Urban Shakespeare

Shakespeare in the city!

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Shakespeare on the Beach

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Postmodernism

The largest amount of gobbledy gook I've seen since my own master's thesis:

The Postmodernism Generator

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Happy Birthday to AWE

A Writer's Edge is

Five Years Old Today!

Best Wishes for Friends,
Fans, Followers,

RSS and Email Receivers,
and all Visitors!

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Bing ... Binging?

If MSN's new (new? When did "Live" go out of beta?) search engine is called "Bing", does that mean when we use it, we'll be binging? Bingging? Bingeing?

If "bing" is verbed-up, how shall we spell it? Where is an editor when you need one?

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Cat Writer Production

From Cat Boxes comics.

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Comic Shakespeare

Shakespeare in the Comics at Bitstrips.com

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Huffpo Wants You to Pay

"Jumpstart Your Career in the Blogsphere With An Eye Opening Internship at The Huffington Post in New York or Washington"

After promoting Writers Worth Day yesterday, I couldn't resist a sadly amusing follow-up about the rich blogger wannabee who has bid $13,000 for an internship at the Huffington Post. I'm not kidding! The digipub, according to Nat Ives at the Silicon Alley:

features tons of content generated free by bloggers and celebrities just happy to have a platform. HuffPo did recently start a fund to employ some laid-off investigative reporters, but the company thrives primarily on "citizen" journalism and news that other outlets spend money reporting.

In a cogent comment at Bloggasm, Simon Owens opined:

I know that this is for a charity and so I’m perhaps being too cynical, but given that Huffington Post has raised over $25 million in seed money so that it can continue to profit off the work of thousands of unpaid “citizen journalists,” you would think they could afford to just write a check for the damn $13,000.

Interested in paying to be a writer? You have until May 28, 2009 at 1:16:00 PM EDT to place your bid. If you do -- SUX 2 B U!

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Readers Experience

Unshelved by Bill Barnes and Gene Ambaum

Unshelved is a daily comic strip about a library. At http://www.unshelved.com you can read the complete archive, buy stuff, or get Unshelved every day for free by Email, RSS feed, and LiveJournal. This is for my book club, which just read a Bryson book, and now we all feel like we've trekked Australia.

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Cat Soap Opera

If TV scriptwriters were cats ...

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Props to the Editor

Thanks to Greg Laden for putting me onto What is an Editor? It is a most amusing and comprehensive description of the functions an editor fulfills. Stephanie, I noticed your great writing--have you considered comedy?

"And editors are there to kick writers in the butt when they try to coast." Stephanie Zvan

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Writers Job Interview

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Writing Joke for Spring

What do you get if you pour boiling water down a rabbit hole?

Hot, cross bunnies!

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Book Title Failure

see more pwn and owned pictures

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Spaghetti Harvest

BBC ON THIS DAY | 1 | 1957: BBC fools the nation

Isn't she lovely? Watch the video. Best hoax ever!

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The End

YouTube - UR END IS NEER (SIGN #1)

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Creative License to Kill Time

Isn't this too cute? I received it for entering a writing contest at the website Creativity Portal.

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LOLcat Spells

T-Shirts, Hoodies, & Tote Bags at Noisebot.com

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Famous Author

Title and copyright notice spotted on the web:

Unto the Breach!

Posted on 2007-07-13

Copyright © 2006 Your name here.

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Epic Writer's Block

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Bad Grammar Makes Me [Sic]

From the OneHorseShy.com stable.

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Valentine's Day Love from AWE

THE PURRRFECT GIFT!

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Happy Birthday, Cali

Divine wisdom from the Oracle on Escobar:

Know what happened this week back in 1850, 158 years ago?

California became a state.
The State had no electricity.
The State had no money.
Almost everyone spoke Spanish.
There were gunfights in the streets.

So basically, it was just like California today; except back then, women had real breasts and the men didn't hold hands.

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View on Writer's Block

Cartoon by Dave Walker. Find more cartoons you can freely re-use on your blog at We Blog Cartoons.

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What to Write About

Cartoon by Dave Walker. Find more cartoons you can freely re-use on your blog at We Blog Cartoons.

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Caturday -- Silly Saturday Returns

Another inimitable catshot from I Can Haz Cheezburger and LOLcats on the Interweb.

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