Elevator Pitch

I'm a little late in the game, but I'm going to be working (slowly, no doubt) on ProBlogger's most recent version of the 31 Days To Build a Better Blog Challenge.

Now, I'm not going to be working on this blog -- I might, eventually, if the Challenge works out, but not yet. My primary blog is Reviewing Whatever, so I'll be concentrating on that.

Day One's challenge is to Write and Elevator Pitch For Your Blog.

You can get reviews of the newest and hottest books, movies, and restaurants anywhere, but where do you go to hear about chain restaurants, library finds, several-year-old DVDs, or even tourist traps? Just because it's old or ever-present doesn't mean it's not new to you -- and you deserve to read the reviews in advance even then. So if it's new to me, I'll tell you what I think.

Thoughts? What's your elevator pitch?

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Writing For Happiness

So since I've been in a mood-slump lately (partially explaining, but in no way excusing, my long absence), I decided to start my own Happiness Project. I don't want to get into it too much at this point, but one of my goals/plans for the Project is to recreationally (no work, no forums, no emails) write at least one paragraph daily. This counts!

Does forcing yourself to write increase your happiness, or just increase your stress? Or both?!

NaNoWriMo

How's your novel going?  I really don't know how mine is, because I'm writing most of it out longhand.  I need to do a massive round of typing.

Ethical question

Image via WikipediaI grad school, I wrote several stories, including a few profiles of intereting people.  These never got published, and since a few years have passed, it doesn't seem likely that they would without massive overhauls.  Assuming that I add a disclaimer about possible out-of-date concerns, are there any ethical problems with posting these to my other blog?

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Self-Promotion

Wow, this is sad, isn't it?  I'm in... not a rut, so much as a ditch, really.

One thing that's got me stuck: Say I want to pitch a story, or apply for a writing or copy-editing job.  My weak point is self-promotion.  How do I convince potential employers that I am better than everyone else they're sorting through, when all I know about everyone else is that they are at least as qualified as I am, or they wouldn't be my competition.  How do I figure out what I, and no one else, has to offer, that makes me better for the job than anyone else?  (Besides the fact that I'll work cheap -- I don't want to advertise that too much!)

How do you figure it out?  Do you have any helpful hints?

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Exquisite corpse

Image by aperryz302 via FlickrLately, I've needed quite a kick in the rear to get to writing.  You'll notice that I didn't post my goals -- or much of anything -- for July.  And considering it's the 9th already and I've got a bunch of booked weekends in a row, I'm not sure I should post goals for August, either.  But I do need to get my momentum back.

Who wants to write an exquisite corpse?  If you play, I'd send you a line of poetry with no context, and you would write the next line.  Around and around through several people until we have something that's bizarre, surreal, and/or eerily profound.

Any takers?  Sign up in comments.

Inconvenient Inspiration

Image via WikipediaOddly, I get a ton of inspiration during church. It's unfortunate, because I can't do anything about it at the time, and I feel terribly guilty about not concentrating on the service. And then I get home and 90% of the inspiration is gone.

How do you retain inspiration that comes at a time when you can't even take notes?

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