Too Much P in My Life!

I finished the rough draft of my book last Friday. I even celebrated a little. But although that was a major milestone, I didn't get TOO excited because I was all too aware of how much work is yet to be done.

And there are so many distractions keeping me from focusing on this Project!

Yes, there are an amazing plethora of P's in my life right now. . .

People. People need fed. People need clean clothes. People need you to bring them phones they forget, or pick up lawnmower belts, or... whatever. Need to talk to people. People are important. Can't forget the people. But takes time, sometimes distracting. . .

Plants & Pots. I planted some seeds in a flat. They sprouted. They grew. Now I've got to transplant them into bigger Pots. Yes, I'm going to pot, and it takes time, and it's another P!

Pictures. A photography resource book needs pictures. I can buy stock photos, but to save money, I use some of my own when I can. However, after searching through my files time and again to find an appropriate photo, I have about decided I need to trash the lot! Where are the technically correct pictures with good composition and detail??? I don't know. I see a lot more trash than treasure in those files. Yes, it's a bunch of Pathetic Photos!! And here's another couple of "P" words ... Purge the Pictures!

Proofreading. I am on my own. Everyone is too busy to read a book they're not interested in. But sometimes it is difficult to proofread your own work. You can go over the same page again and again, and totally miss some left out word. Or a word that shouldn't be there. Or.. whatever. This is really slowing me down, and where's an editor when I need one???

And while I'm proofreading/editing, I need to add links to other resources, and insert the aforementioned pictures, put in headers and page numbers, make a table of contents, and then. . .

Pdf file. This is an ebook, so need to convert the Word document to a .pdf file when it's finally finished. And then...

Pages on the web. Yes, after pages and pages of text for a book, now I need more pages! A sales page, an information page, a whole lot of other pages!!!

Projects, other. As in, I was supposed to start a new project this week. Oops. I am still trying to finish up a previous project! That means I'm...

Pressed for time. This needs to get finished. Can't make any $$$ until it's actually for sale.

Pokey. That's me. I think I must just be terribly slow. I started researching this project two months ago, and I'm still not done.

Pitiful Post. Wasn't this the most pitiful post you've ever read???

P.S. Did I mention I have too much P in my life???

24 Down!

I'm sitting here sipping on a rum and coke (hey, it's raining, so it's for medicinal purposes!), and celebrating a little. I just finished the last chapter on different specialties, the biggest section of the book I'm writing.
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24 chapters down, 5 or 6 to go.

A week or two ago I told my friend, RR, that I figured I'd have about 100 pages when I was done. She informed me she knew how much research and detail I put into things, so I'd have more than 100 pages.

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Well, she wins, cause she was right. I don't know what she wins, but since the book is already up to 110 pages, and not finished, yep, over 100 pages for sure.

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I started this project not quite two months ago. The first few weeks were spent listening to videos and doing homework, researching what would be a good niche, the competition, and deciding on the product. It's been an exhaustive and exhausting process.

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If all goes well, I hope to finish the book this week, so I can get it on the market. I've already got a website up with a blog about it, working on gaining rank in the search engines.

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As a matter of fact, I really, really MUST get it done this week. I have another project starting Saturday, so the major part of this particular one has GOT to be DONE. And the major part is, without a doubt, the book!

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It's going to be a wild week.

Fried Brains

No, it's not one of those strange southern dishes. You can't have them for lunch, cause those fried brains are still in my head. Where I'm hoping they'll regenerate a little, cause I could really use them. . .

I had hoped to finish my writing project this week. No such luck. Life happens. For instance, I figured on getting 3 chapters done today, and only finished one because of some unexpected interruptions.

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In fact, I really should be working now... but have I mentioned my fried brains?

Somehow I've got to get it finished within this next week, because I've got another project coming down the pike that is starting the following week, and this one needs to be DONE first. Well, the book part anyway. There's more to be done to go along with it, but not as intense as trying to get the book written.

It just means I'll have to be working on more than one project at a time once I get the book done, but I'm used to that.

What I'm still getting used to is training and keeping worksheets up to date for 1 1/2 minions. (That's one full time, and one part timer.) I have to be sure they have a new worksheet that lists what they need to do next before they finish the one they're working on, so they always have something to keep them busy.
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It makes me be thinking and planning ahead a little more than I'm used to, but that's not all bad.

Right now it's just as crazy work-wise for Jess as it is for me. It never fails. He can sit around for days with nothing to do, then all of a sudden 3 or 4 people want something done at the same time. He's going to have to do some work at home tomorrow to be able to have a bid ready in time on Monday.
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Otherwise, we're all fine, just busy.
Except for that fried brains part.

Three Generations of Shoes

I finally got my new shoes. I don't buy new shoes very often. Guess you can probably tell that from this picture:

I usually have one pair of shoes I wear when I go outside to do chores, and another pair of shoes I wear inside or when I'm going to the grocery store.

Can you tell which is which? Ha!

The old shoes got so bad that even duct tape, which holds the universe together, wouldn't stay put on my shoes and hold them together.

Jess and I went for a walk in the woods over the weekend, and every five minutes I had to stop and find the duct tape that fell off one of my shoes.

Guess it's time to retire the old black shoes. They've been faithful and loyal servants, taking good care of my feet. And when you have neuropathy in your feet, that's saying a lot.

Well done thou good and faithful servants.

Once they've gone to that great shoe heaven in the sky, the scruffy looking white shoes will take their place as my work shoes, and the spiffy new white shoes will be my inside shoes and going to the grocery store shoes.

My, I lead such an exciting life when I can do an entire blog post on three generations of shoes.

Taking a break...

I thought I'd take a break from writing.


Oh wait! I'm writing again!


Well, this is different.

I'm not going to do any research for this post.

I am not going to worry that I am 100% correctly factual.

I may even lie to you. (I just turned 39 my last birthday... isn't it amazing I have kids that are 30+ years old?)

Okay, here's something that is no lie. Building a business is not for sissies. I have an increased respect for every successful business person out there. It means they stuck it out when the going got tough and that they've had the combination of savvy and good fortune to make it.

Building an online business reminds me a lot of coding in html. Everything has to be done just right for it all to work. If you mess up one part, it doesn't matter how good the other parts are, the whole thing is messed up. Did you forget to put a measly little . (period!) in there? Too bad, nothing will work until you figure out what you did wrong.

Okay, it might not be quite that stringent, but there are still a lot of parts that have to come together. And a lot of decisions to be made. All very tough for the person with ADD and focus problems (Look! A squirrel's in the front yard! Is that the bird hollering for a taxi ride? What's the dog barking at? Oh, look, there's an article of interest. Look! I could use that info later. Wow! Who would have thought of that....)

Not that I would know ANYTHING about all that....

Was there a point to all this?

Probably not. It's just nice to write and not have to get it all as perfect as possible. I figure it's my blog and I can write whatever I want. You don't have to read it, right? Right.

Okay, break time's over... time to get back to work.

M.O.R.E. R.E.S.E.A.R.C.H. N.O.W.

(More Of Reading Everything -- Really Entirely SUPER Entirely A Real Crushing Helping -- Not Overly Wonderful)