Writing journal for cousera

I am going to be using this blog for my writing journal for my current coursera writing course.

The assignment was to write nouns and adjectives describing a scene.
                                                             

1. bed
2. computer
3. printer
4. books
5. clothes
6. light
7. closet
8. walls
9. chair
10. desk

Here is a list of adjectives:

1. blue
2. messy
3. clean
4. cold
5. warm
6. green
7. light
8. dark
9. three
10. seven
11.  

March

Things are changing.

My coursera courses are almost finished.  Yea!

Snow is melting.  We actually got almost 17 inches the other.  On top of 6 or 7 from previous snowfalls, so there is quite a bit of snow that will have to melt.

Today is sunny which makes everyone feel better and think that spring is finally on the way.  However, there is still the tournaments.  Minnesota tends to get at least one more storm during Boy's basketball tournament.  I am not sure what happens in WI.  Haven't been here that long.

Camp NaNoWriMo is next month.  I may use that to rewrite Jill's story.  I know that was ok at one time, but it needs updating and an ending.

There is Writer's Digest Writing competitions in May.  I am going to seriously think about those as well.

Book club is in about two weeks.  I have finished reading the book (again).  I still want to go over what happens in each chapter so I have the story straight.

It's the end of February.  Not much has been accomplished this month.

I start my Romance book club discussions next month.

I have shoveled a lot of snow.  Today as I look out my window, we have 14.5 inches (supposedly) on the ground and it is heavy and wet.  I haven't done a lot of shoveling, but what I did was tough.  I have already been outside three times for a total of about 2 1/2 hours and still can't get from the house to the garage.  I do have the front shoveled out.

Still no job.  Been to one on-site interview this month.  Have plenty of applications out there.  Was hoping something would work out. But alas.

As for the novel, got started on forms and looking at it, but really haven't done much else.  Always seems like something else needs to get done first.  I have a bare bones book, but not much else.  Seems like I am very good at starting a project, but not so hot at finishing.

Started several more afghans and crocheted items this month.  Maybe that's the direction I should head. Still thinking.....

February

Well, I haven't done much writing.  A lot of thinking about writing and learning what not to do while writing.  I haven't even spent time rewriting.

Although I should.

Still looking for meaning ful work, however, I am starting a new volunteer position as a book club facilitator at the local library.  I am still Storyspotting for Storybird.  And I did some work for the Naval Ship Association.

So I volunteer.  I also have been taking classes through Coursera.  One on writing, one on gamification, evolution and nutrition.  I was also involved in the once Coursera class that crashed a system.  It just wasn't working.

I am reading a lot about writing mysteries and romance novels trying to figure out why my plots don't really go anywhere, (as I find out that is one way truly to be rejected).  I need to find out or rather, maybe outline where my stories are supposed to go.  My biggest problem is ending the story.  i can write dialogue and a sentence that makes sense.

My characters are flat and wooden so I need to work on that, and I need to put in more description of the setting and other parts of the story.  (Maybe it's because I have written plays and they didn't need much more that dialogue.)

Any way, my biggest thing now is trying to figure out my way in life.  Maybe this is the part of my life where I spend my time writing the trashy romance novels that I described back in 2001 or so when I had to make some comment about where i wanted to go with my life.

January starts

The good news is that I have had several interviews with companies that I would like to work for.  So far, though no one has offered me a job.  I am still looking.

The bad news is while my resolution included working on my novels and starting to rewrite, all I have really done is organize my materials in notebooks and on my computers.  But at least I have thought about it.

I am taking some free courses, as while they take up a lot of my time, I have been spending time doing things other than writing.  I am amazed that I actually was able to write 50,000 words at all this year.

I am going to take one day per week and start this week with at least reading through what I have written, then I am going to think about how I can make it better.

January resolutions

My biggest resolution for 2013 is to find meaningful work.

That might mean a paid position or not.  It might be voluntary or whatever.

Writing wise, my one resolution is to rewrite one of several manuscripts that I have started.  I have several novels that I was working on through National Novel Writing Month.  All of them need reworking.

I have several short stories that I could also re-write and send to publishers as well as some research articles that I have done.  These could be sent to places like TECH TRENDS or other technology magazines.

I have several volunteer opportunities as well as my crafts.  However, none of this is actually paying me anything.