Strange Days Indeed

Today has just been an off day. Don't know why it started like that, but it keeps going on. Work is slim pickin' at the end of the month, but for some reason I didn't think the end of the month was here yet. It definitely is! So I split my work time this morning between hunting new projects and genealogy. Genealogy got interesting and eventually crushed the new project hunting. I was sick all last week and managed to get my daily tasks done, but now that I'm better, I guess I just needed a little break.

But tomorrow is another day, and of course I still have all afternoon and evening to do something productive. I just hope the whole week isn't off because of this! I don't like living in these temporary alternate universes of time-sucking doldrums. Or something like that. :)

Poem of the Day: No

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A Little Foggy

--my head is a little foggy, not the weather. I'm pretty sure I'm suffering from allergies right now. I must admit, I do regret going "na-na-na-na-boo-boo" to my brother as a child when he was suffering from them every spring. Since the onset of my 20's, I have been getting them in the fall mostly, but some spring allergies do creep up now and again. I'm lucky I was able to get anything done today between the sneezing, but I did get a few things taken care of. And tomorrow I may not finish my writing to-do list either, but it's because I'm heading out to a cemetery to take pictures of my ancestors' gravestones. This is just the first stop of many this year for my genealogy research--should be fun in a not-creepy-and-totally-respectful way.

Poem of the Day: Forget

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Marching into March

I knew once I was settled into my tiny little room, I would feel a lot better about my current and future situations. The trick for me is to have a solid plan going forth. I have just that. Although my plans still do not guarantee any type of success, I'm more optimistic than I was just a few days ago.

I also have some exciting news for upcoming features to this blog. Anyone who is a dedicated writer will know that April is an extremely busy month for writers. Not only does ScriptFrenzy take place, but it is also National Poetry Month. I have some very exciting posts and events planned for April--and you can participate too! Once I put the final touches on everything, I will let you all know how to can join in on the festivities.

I also managed to finally publish a new article today: Resources for Vintage Photographs. A great article if you are into family history/genealogy. 

Monday, Monday

This week has started off better than I thought it would. I had way too much coffee and other caffeinated drinks before bed last night. I spent half the night awake and wondering why it wasn't time to get up yet! I should have just got out of bed at 3 a.m. to do my work. I gave up on sleep about 5:30... and now I'm really close to finishing work for the day. If I resist a nap, I can do almost anything--writing, photography, genealogy... the possibilities are endless. I haven't had this much free time in two months. I better enjoy it while I can. :)

Quick update

For those who are interested, I did start a blog for my genealogy work. It's called Ancestry Musings. There is absolutely no information on the blog yet and I cannot guarantee when there will be, but if you are interested in following it you can go ahead and bookmark it.

Now it's back to work. My swan song for this project, if you will. Hey, at least there's more work for the next day and a half.

A Tale of Two Passions

I have decided that I can't live without writing or genealogy. I have made it a point to combine the two for awhile. My first endeavor was to write about the Top Five Free Genealogy Websites. I never want to pay for anything I do, so it's a pretty good list of things that are actually free, and not just free to search.

I'm also looking into starting a blog about my family genealogy. I feel weird about sharing that kind of information, so I don't know if I'll do that just yet - I might wait until I have better information on ancestors that go back farther than the ones I've been researching lately.

The one thing I do know that I will definitely start is collecting research for a book I want to write. It's about gangsters and all that, so it should be fun. Let's just hope it doesn't end up in the trash like so many other ideas that I had. Usually when I try to research for something, six months into it someone will publish the exact same book I was trying to write. I come up with good ideas all the time, it's just usually not at the right time. Maybe I'll get lucky one of these days.

It's almost over

It feels surreal that the project I've been working on for the better part of a year is going to end soon. If I'm lucky and stick to my schedule, it will end on Thursday. While that gives me a wonderful three day weekend, it still means I have to scramble to find a new project. While I love to write, this time I think I want an editing project. After all, that will provide me with an excuse to brush up on grammar without making it feel like a study session. I just have to find an editing project that doesn't require me to send in a lot of references. I've only edited one e-book before, and I'm not sure I still have the client's contact info. Oh well. Anyone need anything edited? :)

Even if I do have a lag in work, I can get back to my novel and genealogy. The novel is priority, but I'm having way too much fun looking for old newspaper articles about my ancestors. Too bad I'm only allowed to save a specific number of a specific type of pages that are available. I will have to break down one day and just pay for a subscription. There's too many genealogical gems. I can't pass them up.

And that's how it all comes full circle. I need a new job to pay for my hobbies. I really feel like singing "The Circle of Life" but I will resist!

One more related post

I continue to work on genealogy in my spare time, but since it started taken over my life I hid my research. I also hid the tempting website links where I go to do my research. But I did want to share one more little find for historical/genealogical writers out there. Yesterday I found a website called Genwriters. This is exactly what I needed to see. I was feeling really guilty about doing this research because I didn't know what I could do with it once it was all collected. After reading some things at Genwriters, now I finally know what I can do. And once I actually finish my novel in progress, I think this could be the next project to replace it. But that's going to be some time, for both finishing 277 Miles and for getting enough research to start a genealogical writing project.

Other than all of that hoopla, I finally found a schedule I can stick with. It gives me plenty of time for all types of writing, lets me meet my monthly goals, and also provides a little wiggle room for earning extra cash if I need to (and who doesn't?). I'm a slacker when it comes to my own projects though. I never finished my Indianapolis project, so I will have to push back the next city I wanted to write about. The poll winner was Jamestown, NY with two votes. I'm going to have a lot of fun with that one, since it's the hometown of Lucille Ball.

I also have some great ideas for blog posts, but those are still in the planning stages, so I will reveal more later. Get excited.

A combination of two passions

I'm finally back to writing full time. Genealogy is once again on the back burner, at least until I have some time next weekend. But when I searched through some new resources for my family history, I found that Newspaper Archive has a section devoted to writers. The website provides access to thousands of newspaper articles (none of which are any use to me at the moment) and the writers section is for those that want to have their historical memoirs or other type of historical article featured. If I had more information on my family, and at least one great newspaper article, I would certainly consider this.

I like that this offers a chance for me to kill to birds with one stone. I didn't know if I could really do anything with my research, but as long as I have all the facts straight, I think I can create something that is the perfect combination of my two greatest passions – at the moment. I might start with that bio I found of my great-great-grandfather and build off of that. It might be an interesting tale. Who knows? But until I can do more research, it is back to the novel.

Distracted or Determined: You Decide

Writers can be fickle people, and I'm no exception. Work was slow at the beginning of the week (but that's not the case anymore!) so I switched off my writer's hat and put on my genealogist's hat. Since I thought I had utilized every free source on the Internet to look for my ancestors, I didn't think I would find anything. Wrong! I found a publication from 1915 called “A Standard History of White County Indiana” that features a page-long biography on my great-great grandfather. It even gave me new information on his parents and grandparents. I was so excited last night that when I found it, I ran around the apartment a couple of times. But is this kind of work distracting my from my real work? I don't get paid for researching my family. I get paid for writing.

And it's not just genealogy. Almost anything can lure me to go astray from my writer duties – paid or otherwise. Even writing this blog is technically an excuse to get away from stuff I don't like to write. I'm trying to change this blah attitude... but at least I can say I'm not lazy anymore. I just need to focus my attention and drive on what is really important, otherwise I'll never escape from freelancing into the real publishing world. My word for June is: PRIORITIES.

Such a great day

I can't believe this, but I was able to meet my deadlines about 24 hours early. This means that today is absolutely free for doing what I want. But instead of wasting it in front of the television, I am going to split my time. The first half of the day I'm writing some extra articles and working on my novel, 277 Miles. I know by the second half of the day I'll be back, knee-deep in genealogy research. There's not really much left to find online for my family, so it's off to message boards to compare notes with others. Seriously, this will be such a great day! Who knew work and research would be this much fun??

A little rant

I have been interested in tracing my family roots for the past six months or so. My goal was to collect all of these interesting information and put it together in a book for other members of my family. Well, it's a lot harder than I thought, and it's all because of the internet.

The internet is a great way to research family history -- if you have money. This is what I think may be the silliest thing I have ever hear of. While it's true it does take a lot of time and effort to put historical documents online, why should I have to pay for something I can get for free? (as long as I know where it is located, of course). I have signed up for all the free trials I could get with these sites, but those only last so long and I don't have two weeks to take off for the best use of that trial period.

I was thinking about changing my attitude about all of this. That is until I saw that sites that make good money on yearly memberships have volunteers working on everything. So if you have a staff of volunteers, where's the money going? I'm bitter, I know. I'm sure there are plenty of paid staff.

The money isn't even the biggest issue. It's the fact that in order to see if I need to pay for a historical document, I have to buy it first. Well, I'm not going to get sucked into that. I think I found the newspaper that announced the graduating class of my mom (with senior pics) but the preview of the doc is so small that I can't tell whether I have the right page or not. That's really what started this outrage.I shouldn't complain though. When I have used web sources directly related to the county or state of my ancestors, I have found them very helpful and very free.

So I guess this little family project will have to go on the back burner again. Someday I hope more than just the Social Security Death index will be available for free.