A major writing milestone
No Comments »25th January, 2015; Category: Articles, Blogging, Events, Fiction, Poetry, Reviews, The Writer's Life
Over the years I have plodded along with my writing on this site with little attention to milestones along the way. Only today I suddenly realised that I have passed two significant points quite recently.
Milestones:
- I have now written over 1000 posts here on Trevor’s Writing.
- I have now written approximately three million words over the last 22 years.
Not all of those words were on this site – the figure includes several novels, a daily journal, dozens of essays for my Masters degree, more than 2600 articles on my other sites Trevor’s Birding and Trevor’s Travels, and thousands of emails and letters. Oh… I forgot – I also do all of the maintenance and most of the writing for our church website here.
No wonder my fingers are tired.
Archives
The archives of this site now contain over 1000 articles about writing, writing ideas, reading, books, teaching, reviews, poems and short stories. You can access this amazing resource here, or go to the Archives button above.
You can also access articles on various themes or topics in 3 other ways:
- The Contents section on the sidebar.
- The Categories on the sidebar.
- The search button near the top of each page.
The future
As impressive as all of the above is – in my mind anyway – there is one thing I would like to add: “You ain’t seen nothing yet, folks.” Planned for the future include:
- Many thousands more articles about writing.
- More reviews and essays.
- More writing hints and ideas.
- More poems and stories.
- News of forthcoming ebooks and printed books.
Please help me:
I am open to suggestions about what my readers would like to see here on this site. Please respond in the comments, or send me a short email via the Contact form above.
Good writing and reading.
I think I need to give my fingers a rest – and go read a book.
Here we go again – writing, writing, writing
Here we go again – I am writing, writing, writing… after a long break.
I haven’t posted any new material here in over 3 months, and not on a regular basis for over a year. I hope that 2015 is different and that the words – and the posts – will flow freely again. Thanks to all of my devoted readers who haven’t deserted me. I have great things planned for this site as well as my other sites (click Trevor’s Birding and Trevor’s Travels.)
Illness
The reason for a lack of posting on this (and my other sites) is that I have had a few serious issues with my health. Most of these have been dealt with, or will be in the coming weeks. One of the major issues has been dealing with severe sleep apnoea. Before I had a CPAP machine to help me sleep I was constantly falling asleep in front of my computer screen. Reading was also very difficult; every time I picked up a book or magazine I would blink – and not open my eyes for 5 or more minutes. I am now getting a good night’s sleep every night and devouring books from my unread piles at a great rate. I am no longer falling asleep at the computer, so the words are flowing again.
Great plans
In the coming months I have some interesting plans for this site – and the other sites too – as well as some important news to announce. This includes plenty of writing advice, examples of my poetry and fiction and the publication of my first ebooks and perhaps even a few pbooks (paper books) – I can dream can’t I? Stay tuned.
Current writing
In recent months I have done some writing as my health issues have allowed. Most of this writing has appeared on yet another site I manage. You can read this site here and any articles with TH at the end were written by me. Many more articles will appear there in the coming months.
Good writing – and reading.
Writing prompt: close encounters
Sulphur-crested Cockatoo, Lane Cove National Park
Earlier this week my wife and I had a few hours free from grand-children caring duties. We drove the short distance from our son’s home where we are staying. About 15 minutes later we were in the Lane Cove National Park, just a short distance north of the CBD of Sydney.
In the national park there are numerous delightful picnic areas next to the Lane Cove River. We choose one of them to have our lunch (see photo below).
Our picnic area in the Lane Cove National Park
As my wife starting eating her lunch she had a close encounter with a Sulphur-crested Cockatoo (see photo below). I didn’t manage a close-up photo because I was about 50 metres away taking photos of other birds. The cockatoo decided that my wife’s lunch was worthy of investigating, and landed on the table next to her. My wife quickly covered up her sandwiches!
Sulphur-crested Cockatoo on our picnic table
Later I was able to catch up with the cockatoo and another one as they were also having lunch on some nearby flowers (see photo at the top of this post).
Writing prompts: close encounters with birds:
- Write about a close encounter you had with a bird.
- Describe a time a bird snatched food from your picnic table.
- Write a poem about the pet bird or wild birds in your life.
- Do some research about the birds in your local area. Write an article about your discoveries and observations and submit it to a local newspaper.
- Take some photos of birds in your garden and write a caption for each.
- If you write a blog, write about your close encounters and include photos of the birds seen.
- Write about time you had a sudden, unexpected or frightening experience of a close encounter with a bird.
- Have you ever found an injured or dead bird? Write about your feelings. Tell how you helped the injured bird. What happened to the dead bird?
Good writing.
What I am reading
I hope that my regular readers have not deserted this site entirely. I’ve been preoccupied with many other matters over the last six months which has left little time or energy for this site, nor for my other sites Trevor’s Birding and Trevor’s Travels.Sadly, I’ve also had very time for writing in my preferred areas of children’s novels, short stories and poems.
My work situation has changed since Christmas, so I am planning on getting back to posting articles, stories and poems here on a far more regular basis. I also have plans to include articles about writing, book reviews and writing hints and ideas. Like I have in the past, I’ll also be documenting my journey and experiences as a writer: the trials, the difficulties, the joys and the frustrations. I hope I can also share a few news items about my publication successes.
The Right to Write
by Julia Cameron.
In November I attended the book launch of the annual anthology of the writing programme of Tabor Adelaide where I did my Masters a few years ago. I had three poems published in this volume, and I also did the editing of the poetry section. The guest speaker who launched the anthology read an excerpt from Julia Cameron’s book The right to write: an invitation and initiation into the writing life (Penguin Putman). On returning home I ordered my own copy.
This book consists of many short chapters, each one a reflection on some well accepted writing practices – and then urging the reader to reassess and then adopt a different approach. Each chapter ends with practical writing activities to develop new skills. I’ve only read a few chapters so far, but if the first half dozen are any indication, this is a valuable resource. I intend over coming weeks to share some short quotes from this book, commenting on them from my own experiences.
Good reading. Good writing.
Some benefits of blogging
The more I write posts here on this site and on my other two sites (here and here), the more I find that I’m invited to speak about my passions: travel, writing and birding. I had another request yesterday to talk about Australian birds but I had to turn it down due to a lecturing commitment.
Today I had the delight and privilege of talking about blogging. I was the guest lecturer at the university where I already lecture, Tabor Adelaide. This was where I completed my Master of Arts in Creative Writing recently (read about that course here).
As regular readers of this site would know, I’ve been blogging now for almost 7 years. Over that time I’ve learned a few things about blogging and enjoy many of the benefits of this writing genre. One of the unexpected spin-offs of blogging has been speaking to various community groups. During my lecture I highlighted some of the other unexpected benefits:
Unexpected benefits of blogging
- Having my photographs published in some unexpected places.
- Earning some income from my photographs.
- Seeing my poems, stories and articles published in some quite unexpected places.
- Building a sense of community amongst readers of my sites.
- The many comments on my articles from people all over the world.
Other benefits of blogging
These benefits are in addition to the better known benefits of blogging:
- Improving my writing skills; the more your write, the better you get at it.
- Feedback from readers in the way of comments.
- The creation of some income.
- The opening up of various opportunities.
Good writing.