Tag Archives: #notwriting

Jan 21 2012

Wha ‘sup?

One 1 

‘sup.    My wonderful friend Tom Cooley showed me how to make a superscript number in WordPress.  I actually do understand how tags work in HTML and have been known to occasionally venture away from the visual editor and actually edit just a bit of HTML to accomplish some thing or other that I couldn’t quite manage in the visual editor.     And it turns out that the tag  ”sup”  (don’t try to display braces in a blog post– it can be done but it’s a huge pita) is the key to creating superscript numbers.2

I have been trying to learn more about WordPress.com.    In many ways it is the same as the self-hosted WordPress I’ve been using for years now,  although there are some differences.  There are also a number of community aspects that are unique to WP.com which simply don’t apply to self-hosted blogs.   I have figured out how to specify the blog you use the most as your “primary” blog,  which I believe (though do not know for a fact) matters a great deal to how Empire Avenue computes your WordPress.com score.

I have one Empire Avenue acquaintance whose WP.com  icon on his EAv profile connects to a WP error page that says  ”This blog has been suspended to a violation of our Terms Of Service”.    His EAv WP score is 5.   My own WP icon on EAv remains connected to my  book review blog,  even though I changed my primary blog to this one.  (Click here for instructions  if you want to try that.)  And while both my primary and secondary blogs have hundreds of posts and hundreds of comments  AND thanks to Empire Avenue missions  I have been getting lots of traffic,  lots of shares and a pretty high number of comments on this blog,  my WP.com score remains….2.3

Clearly,  I don’t yet understand how Empire Avenue is scoring the WordPress.com  connections.   And somehow I don’t think it would improve Walking Down The Avenue a great deal to add a new section that says  ”after careful observation,  in as much as I can tell,   the scores seem to be assigned pretty much at random”.    Part of me is really enjoying this new personal blog,  and the freedom to write every day about pretty much whatever the heck I darned well feel like.    But the part of me that really wants to get the book updated and a new release published…kind of just wants to scream.

1–this first foot note is purely decorative, and has no function whatsoever.

2–this second foot note is also purely decorative,  though it was thrilling to me to be putting in a second superscript number,  no sweat.

3–this final foot note is a bitter dose of irony

Update:  It occurred to me to disconnect my WP.com from Empire Avenue and reconnect it.  And choose the correct blog on reconnecting.   We’ll see how that works out.

Jan 20 2012

It’s Not Writer’s Block

a blogger suffers from writer's blockAdding a category cloud in the sidebar made me realize that I really need to do something that will allow me to use the #amwriting tag a bit more.   Actually,  I hardly feel as though I have “stopped writing”.    I am publishing a new 500-word or so post every calendar day,  and on some days more than one post.    I am making a real effort to respond to every comment I receive on this site.   I continue to participate in conversations on Facebook and on Twitter,  as well as private chats and IM’s on lots of different sites.   I can’t honestly say that I have taken any meaningful  break from “writing”.    And yet my plan to quickly update Walking Down The Avenue with a new section on Empire Avenue Missions and push out a version 1.2 early in the new year is,  I am just a bit ashamed to admit,  kind of on hiatus so far.

I could blame poor @Dups and the  #EAv team.    It is true that they are listening to user feedback and implementing some refinements to the new featue.   The fact that you can now target your mission by four fairly limited criteria,  does bring additional functionality to the feature,  although I am crossing my fingers that as Brad Grier indicated in a post in the #SocialEmpire group on Facebook that they may make it possible to restrict Missions by the length of time an account has been active on the Avenue.   This functionality would bring Missions from ‘that’s nice’,  ’through Hey!  I can use this to drive traffic to my new blog’  (how many of you first visited this site through an Empire Avenue mission– leave a comment to raise your hand!) to ‘I can use this to target my book to the folks who need it the most’.   Let them earn eaves for reading a book that they really need to read.    It could be my Eureka!  moment on Empire Avenue.

So I resolve again to put the new blog aside and actually work on writing my book.   (I wonder if my successful writer friends like Brent and Susan  go through this procrastinating sort of routine?)   However of course I am not going to do it until I Schedule this post.   (With a daily deadline I am FAR too anal to leave it until it is the day it is due to start working on it.   And if as I intend I put this in the hopper just before midnight on Tuesday January 17,  I will be two days  ahead on the schedule,  and obligated at least in Theory to open up the manuscript and try real hard to force myself to working on the new section.   And yet I know that my Inner Lazybones  (I KNOW I have to give him a name but unlike Holly I’m not quite self-confident to call him something like Prunebutt) can still make endless excuses.

“But I said this new section was going to be part of the advanced guide,  the book for social media professionals  and I’m scared they will laugh at me and tell me in no uncertain terms that I am not one of them.”   (‘You’ve been making and keeping great friends with incredible people through online connections for more than 20 years now.   You’re even smart enough never  to tell people you’ve been “doing social media” for twenty years.  Why even Anise Smith appreciates that.’)  ”But but but…  you’re doing so good and your share price keeps going up,  and the new blog is really doing well.   Surely you don’t want to stop that!!”)   ‘Well of course I don’t.     I’ve got two days in the can.    I might let you talk me into working on and scheduling a third post,  but if there’s three days in the can  I have no other deadline it is inexcusable not to at least try to complete an assignment’.   “BUT BUT BUT….”

I don’t honestly know what Lazybones will come up with after I schedule that third post.    But who knows,   maybe you will see the #amwriting hashtag from me again before too long.