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3/14/02 18:01:43 Opening "Chat Log 3/14/02" LynnAColeman: lol HOST WRTR Foxy: Hi, Cat LynnAColeman: why doesn't his room have a link anymore DiagoCat: Good evening all. LynnAColeman: It's hard telling folks how to get here HOST WRTR WYates: They changed everything. HOST WRTR Foxy: Lynn, the closest you can get to sending a link is on the Chat Room page...then just tell them to click The Workshop LynnAColeman: ahh HOST WRTR Foxy: The rooms themselves don't have the 'hearts' anymore. LynnAColeman: Romance rooms do HOST WRTR Foxy: I know...guess they're special? LynnAColeman: Romance Writer's chatrooms do LynnAColeman: lol HOST WRTR Foxy: I wouldn't be surprised if the Poets Place does, too. Hummingbird41956: I think it's just the iUniverse ones, Lyn Hummingbird41956: Hi DiagoCat... didn't see you sneak in! Hummingbird41956: lol Madav1: Hi LYNN*** Hummingbird41956: and hello all you other newcomers! LynnAColeman: Hi Maggie, good to see you Hummingbird41956: guess I need to pay more attention to the chat! Hummingbird41956: lol Madav1: what workshop is this? LynnAColeman: Christian Writer's Workshop Madav1: OK Lynn, thanks LynnAColeman: you're welcome HOST WRTR WYates: We'll get started in a minute or two at most... LynnAColeman: Hi Charlotte DiagoCat: Me, too. I have a daughter trying to talk to me in an IM at the same time. CharMaclay: Hi Lynn et al Hummingbird41956: H char :-) Faithe12: Hi Char HOST WRTR WYates: Welcome to the Christian Writer's Workshop! CharMaclay: Do y'all know if Carrie's chat comes after this one? HOST WRTR WYates: Tonight our guest is Lynn Coleman who will help us get organized! HOST WRTR WYates: The Poet's chat follows this workshop. CharMaclay: tx HOST WRTR WYates: We will be under protocol... HOST WRTR WYates: Type ? to ask a question... HOST WRTR WYates: Type ! to make a comment HOST WRTR WYates: Please type / or ga when you are done. HOST WRTR WYates: We'll open with a short prayer from Foxy (Peg)... HOST WRTR Foxy: Heavenly Father, we thank you for this opportunity to learn to work to your glory. Be with Lynn as she shares some organizational tips with us...something we all need. In Jesus' name,Amen. HOST WRTR WYates: AMEN! LynnAColeman: Amen DiagoCat: Amen. Faithe12: Amen Faithe12: AMEN!!!! now we're speaking my language :) Hummingbird41956: Amen :-) HOST WRTR WYates: Lynn is an accomplished writer and teacher. Thanks Lynn for being our guest speaker tonight! How do we get organized???? :) LynnAColeman: lol. Well organization is as different to each writer as dna. To pick a plan that was designed by someone else and do it and succeed with it is quite difficult. Usually you start for a few days, do really well, then by the end of two weeks you're off the plan. It's much the same with diets but we won't go there tonight (G) HOST WRTR Foxy: (amen) HOST WRTR Foxy: Good! Faithe12: you mean this isn't a weight loss clinic??? LynnAColeman: My first question is for you to ask yourself Am I organized? Can I make better use of my time? Am I wasting time? If you've answered any one of these questions with a negative answer or the last with a positive answer then there is hope for you to change your habits, and organization is a habit. LynnAColeman My first advice is to suggest to the writer to plot their days. Keep a pad and pencil with you and write down what you've done for the past half hour. Do this for a week. Most writer's don't see the need of this and cheat. By cheating they are cheating themselves. So, if you're serious about wanting to increase your productivity, I challenge you to do this simple task. LynnAColeman: The reason: So that you'll have a good idea of how you spend your time, where you need to spend your time, and where you can change how you spend your time. LynnAColeman: How many of you actually sit and watch the evening news? HOST WRTR WYates: Me... Faithe12: ! LynnAColeman: How many of you who watch that evening news watch it more than once? HOST WRTR WYates: Me... Hummingbird41956: <-------doesn't miss that tv one little bit!!!!!! HOST WRTR Foxy: yup Faithe12: I don't watch the news, they always focus on what everyone does wrong unless I'm waiting to find out what happened in sports LynnAColeman: Local broadcasts are recycled every half hour. There is no need to watch for an hour, an hour and a half. So this is a possible place to pick up a half hour or more of writing time. However, this isn't the only place. And I offer that as a suggestion to look over your schedule once you've spent the week tracking yourself. HOST WRTR Foxy: <---seldom watches any tv...news included. LynnAColeman: The second part of organizing is learning to organize our computer for easier finding of our files. Many people just do a save and put it in the documents folder. They end up with hundreds of documents in one place. What I suggest is to make individual folders per writing project. ga Faithe12: ? HOST WRTR WYates: Faithe12... Faithe12: What would you suggest I do, as one who has ADD, where things like that are much harder to do. Not sure what you know about ADD, though ??? LynnAColeman: Attention Deficit Disorder? Faithe12: yeah LynnAColeman: (G) LynnAColeman: Color code your files. Do what it takes for you to easily find and save your files. Color coding tends to work well with ADD Faithe12: the file organization isn't my worry, it's the weekly log part that worries me LynnAColeman: ahh, sorry Faithe12: that's ok LynnAColeman: That's why I said once every half hour, simple jotting of what you did. If you work a job you can automatically block out a huge hunk of time. Most bosses don't want us working on our writing while we're suppose to be working on the job before us. (G) HOST WRTR Foxy: LOL LynnAColeman: Those inexpensive spiral pocked notebooks might be an easier tracker for you Paul. Any other questions or should I continue? ga Ddilcher77: ! HOST WRTR WYates: Ddilcher77... Ddilcher77: I always carry a small notebook in my purse so I can catch ideas as they come. ga LynnAColeman: (G) good idea, I've gone high tech and have a Palm Pilot. Back to the computer files. Within the individual proposals folder I place, research, graphics, notes, outlines, profiles of my characters, synopsis, and the actual work I've done on the book. as well as letters to editors, queries and proposals. Then the items are easily available in one glance. ga HOST WRTR Foxy: ? HOST WRTR WYates: Foxy... HOST WRTR Foxy: Is that per project? ga LynnAColeman: yes, I do this per project, per book HOST WRTR Foxy: (thanks) LynnAColeman: Which makes backing up easy. Which is another part of being organized, back up copies. Please make more than one. You never know when a diskette will fail, and trust me they can and will fail. Hummingbird41956: ! LynnAColeman: From my hard drive here's a list of each folder: Documents/Mom/Future/Cords of Love/the general information. ga HOST WRTR WYates: Hummingbird41956... Hummingbird41956: don't forget that the CDRs and CDRWs can get scratched and fail too! Make extras even with them! ga ;-) LynnAColeman: definitely HOST WRTR WYates: (especially if you don't have a floppy drive!) LynnAColeman: I've had a CD fail of my husband's commentary. Thankfully when the laptop was returned from the shop it was still on it and intact LynnAColeman: The next area of organizing is our research LynnAColeman: One way people organize is with a project notebook. This is a three ring binder. You purchase several different binder sizes, start with a half inch and work your way up to three inches or more depending on the length of the project. LynnAColeman: What goes in the notebook: Articles, news clippings, pictures, diary excerpts, any research you've gathered for the project. A way to put some of these items in the book is to use the plastic page protectors. LynnAColeman: Tracking Record: Is another item in the notebook. This record tracks money spent on research, time spent on the novel and anything else you particularly want to track. Please note this is an excellent reference if the IRS ever comes a calling and wants to verify your expenses. LynnAColeman: Character Profile Sheets, should be included. For all your characters. If you give someone a bit part in the book, put together a brief character sheet on that person. This is helpful if you ever want to write a sequel or if you simply give the character a second appearance. What was his name? What did he look like? You don't want your secondary character going through instant weight loss or changing hair and eye color on you. Unless that is part of the plot. (G) LynnAColeman: Synopsis LynnAColeman: The Novel or story LynnAColeman: Correspondence with all editors you've sent the project to. I generally put a spread sheet together to keep track of who and where this get sent for that quick at a glance feel. (But we're discussing research materials today) Backup copy of the work on diskette. Or CDs LynnAColeman: This is the notebook style for organizing a novel LynnAColeman: However many of us use the computer more and more LynnAColeman: I do the same with the computer and it's various files. LynnAColeman: If I have an article, I scan it, a picture, I scan that. Every possible item I can put on the computer saves time and space as well as giving me searching ability. ga HOST WRTR WYates: ! HOST WRTR WYates: WTYates... HOST WRTR WYates: It never hurts to have a hard copy of your computer files (except for the space) HOST WRTR WYates: / LynnAColeman: I keep a hard copy of each novel. LynnAColeman: I've found that the boxes from Amazon when I order books is perfect. It's a strong box and about the size of a sheet of paper. I label the outside of the box with the contents. I will put brochures and maps of things I can't scan in these boxes as well. LynnAColeman: But the reason for the computer copies is the easy searching feature. This saves me time, hunting down information. I'll make one huge document of all my research as well as the individual documents. This alows me to use the search and find of my wp program LynnAColeman: Are there any questions? ga HOST WRTR Foxy: ? Ddilcher77: ! HOST WRTR WYates: Foxy... HOST WRTR Foxy: How much time does all this take? ga LynnAColeman: if you do it as you go, seconds HOST WRTR WYates: Ddilcher77... LynnAColeman: If you haven't done it and need to organize it will take you a bit longer. Perhaps a day or two depending on the amount of research you have. ga HOST WRTR Foxy: Go ahead, Dd... Ddilcher77: I have a special file box for my writing projects. In each file I have notes, newspaper clippings, and magazine articles pertaining to what I am working on. I was fortunate to find an old National Geographic magazine on the Berlin Airlift for material I am working on for a novel. ga. HOST WRTR WYates: Ddilcher77... HOST WRTR WYates: OK... Faithe12: ? HOST WRTR WYates: Faithe12... Faithe12: I'm curious Lynn. How long do you keep your boxed hard copies since you have everything backed up? LynnAColeman: I keep the hard copies until the novel is printed. Than that becomes my hard copy. The research I keep on cd and diskettes. My feeling is that I may need to use that research again with another project. Faithe12: I see. LynnAColeman: If I found an article like Dd shared, I would scan the pictures and the text and put it in my research document. I also include in that document all the bibliographical information for quoting my source. Say I remember reading in an article about the ants giving the researchers a hard time. I can do a search for ants and come to the exact place in the article. < Ddilcher77: ! HOST WRTR WYates: Ddilcher77... Ddilcher77: Thank you for the advice, Lynn. ga LynnAColeman: you're welcome Dd. ga HOST WRTR Foxy: ? LynnAColeman: I do use file cabinets, because paper copies are necessary. And I do use the boxes in my closet because there's all sorts of printed material in one box. ga HOST WRTR WYates: Foxy... HOST WRTR Foxy: Lynn, you mentioned keeping a 'track' per project/book on expenses incurred. Do you keep a general expense record as well? ga LynnAColeman: Yes, and that was my next point HOST WRTR Foxy: :) LynnAColeman: Keeping track of our projects and various tracking systems. However, I'm looking at the clock and not sure we can get through this before the hour is upon us. Hummingbird41956: :-( HOST WRTR WYates: We can schedule another session.. . HOST WRTR Foxy: I'm showing about 10 minutes... HOST WRTR WYates: Right LynnAColeman: To quickly encapsulate something which is much larger, I use a spread sheet to track correspondence, when sent to who, when to expect a reply by LynnAColeman: I use another spread sheet for travel expenses and another for all other writing related expenses LynnAColeman: The hardest to keep track of is our projects. Especially if you're submitting to magazines. You can have 30 or more out there at one time LynnAColeman: Where are they, who's published them, when, how long do they have the rights to them,when can you send them to someone else. All of this can be kept in your spread sheet as well as how much you were paid for it. One article can be sold many many times and over the years can put a nice little some in your pockets LynnAColeman: If you're a novel writer like myself, You can use your research to write articles for various magazines. LynnAColeman: I have found a couple of trial offers on the internet of tracking systems You can do a search at google and see if a system is right for you. ga HOST WRTR Foxy: ? LynnAColeman: Sorry to be so rushed on that point. ga HOST WRTR WYates: Foxy... HOST WRTR Foxy: What key words would you use to search for them? ga LynnAColeman: Writing Tracking systems LynnAColeman: Novel tracking systems HOST WRTR Foxy: thanks LynnAColeman: you're welcome LynnAColeman: several were shareware programs and quite reasonable. ga HOST WRTR Foxy: 5 minutes LynnAColeman: I appologize for being slow with my typing tonight. I have carpal tunnel and am learning to sign so I can communicate with my grandson. Needless to say I practiced to long yesterday. ga Hummingbird41956: ! HOST WRTR WYates: Hummingbird41956... Hummingbird41956: Lyn, do you have an ergonomic keyboard to ease some of that pain when typing? IT REALLY helps :-) LynnAColeman: no, I haven't bought one of those yet. (G) Hummingbird41956: it's a great investment :-) ga HOST WRTR Foxy: They do make a difference! HOST WRTR WYates: 2-minute warning LynnAColeman: yeah, they are but I also put the keyboard in my lap and my feet up on my desk (G). HOST WRTR Foxy: LOL HOST WRTR WYates: Now we know... :) HOST WRTR WYates: Lynn, this has been a great session... LynnAColeman: thank you for inviting me, tonight. I hope the information I shared was helpful. HOST WRTR Foxy: My new computer has a cordless keyboard & mouse. HOST WRTR WYates: Maybe we could persuade you to return some time soon for more? HOST WRTR Foxy: Oh, Lynn, it's been great! LynnAColeman: Sure, I'd love to. HOST WRTR Foxy: Agreed! But not until after the first week in April :) HOST WRTR Foxy: I'll get with you, Lynn. LynnAColeman: If you'd like to check out my writing my web page is http://www.lynncoleman.com DiagoCat: Thanks Lynn. I really enjoyed your tips. (Especially the one about the feet up.) HOST WRTR WYates: Thansk to all! The chat log will be posted on the CWW website within a week... Faithe12: Thank you Lynn for the great suggestions. LynnAColeman: lol Cat, you're welcome HOST WRTR Foxy: Thanks, Lynn. HOST WRTR WYates: If anyone wants to get the newsletter, let me know... HOST WRTR WYates: Peg, would you close in prayer for us? HOST WRTR Foxy: Lord, thanks you for this productive, informative hour. Keep us all safe in your hands and bring us back again next week. In Jesus' name,Amen. HOST WRTR WYates: AMEN! Faithe12: AMEN!! ...... HOST WRTR WYates: The poets are here!! Hummingbird41956: Amen LynnAColeman: Amen, good night all, thanks for having me. HOST WRTR WYates: Thanks,all! Hummingbird41956: Goodnight :-) DiagoCat: Amen. Good night everyone. HOST WRTR Foxy: Goodnight, everyone...God Bless! HOST WRTR WYates: Night! 3/14/02 19:02:28 Closing "Chat Log 3/14/02" |
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