Tag: facebook

My Head’s Aswirl

p32802932-150x150-8136536Writing is really hard for me. I’m undisciplined, lazy, easily distracted, have a bad memory and too many other interests. Now that my novella (it’s not long enough to be a novel) is finished. I’ve already got a publisher, A Cappela Publishing, a beautiful cover and my book is ready to print, but I find that the PR, mostly on the internet, is much harder than writing.

I’ve lost control. The online world is too much with me. All I want to do is go outside,  smell the flowers, walk the woods. But no – I must sit down at the dread computer to the point of backache and hone in on the world of technology. If it wasn’t for my son Ray, his vast knowledge of the internet and his constant help, I’d quit. Check out his 15 year and running, No. 1  U of Florida college sports website gatorcountry.com. So here’s what’s looming:

  • Website – Got my domain freetobloombook.com, but don’t go there yet. My son has just started working on it. It should be up in February.
  • Facebook Page – Okay, I can do this. Step 1 – I name it – FreeToBloom. Wow, it shows up. Step 2 – I try adding the photo of my bloom the way I learned on FB exporter. Doesn’t work. I look up the jpg number, which takes a lot longer, and there it is. Magic. Step 3 – I try to invite all my friends to the site. I click all friends. Nothing. I click send invitations. Nothing. I do this several times. Shit. In frustration I chat help! to my son, and make him administrator on the site. Before he gets back to me I go to FB and a bunch of people like my new page. Huh? How did they get there? Step 4-6 later.
  • Twitter – Can’t even go there yet. Been dragging a Twitter how to book (comforting) back and forth from Florida to Costa Rica and haven’t yet read a page.
  • Amazon – OMG a universe of new information. Beware what categories you place your book in. One could make it a best seller, another relegate it to oblivion.
  • Print books – POD (print on demand) or regular.
  • Ebooks – as print books become obsolete ebooks with all their frills move in. First you need a good formatter, one that knows Kindle, Smashwords, Nook, etc.. formats. I found one, Rob Siders at 52novels.com, through Joe Konrath’s A Newbie’s Guide to Publishing and his website jakonrath.com.
  • Radio interviews – My first was on EZ Rock Radio with Sue on Love and Lipstick
  • Reviews – You need reviews. To get them you must write reviews, TV spots, youtube.
  • If you print – book signings, readings, women’s club meetings.

Yikes. Enough for today.

Yeas and Nays of Facebook

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Nowadays
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Olden Days

Just got a message on Facebook from a long lost close friend of the family that I haven’t seen since she was a little girl.  Looking at the photos on her profile page brought back some wonderful old memories, tears to my eyes and a promise to reconnect.. I’ve found many old classmates, friends and family members through Facebook that I otherwise would probably never hear from again. I can see how quickly everyone’s getting old in the photo albums, babies and elders alike. Just like the trees I planted around my house a few years ago, they are already giants needing to be trimmed off the roof.

On the other hand a computer challenged friend called me from afar:

  • Hi Jill, are you okay?
  • Hi, I’m fine. Why?
  • Well my son told me about a Facebook message he got from you that had me worried.
  • I didn’t send him a message. What’d it say?
  • It said, ‘I’m currently making some changes in my life. If you don’t hear from me you might be one of them.’ Are you getting married or something? Did we hurt your feelings? Are you divorcing us?
  • LOL. OMG, I do remember seeing that comment by a smart-ass friend of mine, laughing, and hitting the “like” button.

I’ve been feeling pretty computer savvy, but something like this knocks me back down a few notches. I didn’t know that hitting the “like” button would broadcast that saying as mine. First it pisses me off, especially when I try to delete it and I can’t figure out how. Then it scares me. I thought I’d punched all the buttons to make my site safe from all kinds of predators. I don’t play those games or join causes that, when you sign up, say you must give permission to divulge all your basic personal information including your email address, but I obviously don’t know enough.Of course I rely on my techie son for the difficult stuff, but I’m not going to bother him for this piddly thing.

I bother him anyway. He says my email address is available to everyone on Facebook. He’s on it, so I guess he doesn’t mind. But he also says that any good hacker can get almost anything they want from social websites, hard drives, or anywhere. In fact anything I delete from my computer is really not gone. Shit.

But here I am, still rambling on my blog for anyone to read and wishing more people would. Life is such a contradiction. Next I must get another website to sell my book that’s almost done. The writing’s hard enough, but the PR’s going to be much worse. I’ve never been a sales person and then to have to do it on line is not something I’m looking forward to. I have little discipline and get bored easily. I like to call myself a Sagittarian Renaissance woman. In business world terms, a Generalist. Hooray for Specialists to fill in the gaps.