My job

On my way into work today (bus, not bike: I'm too tired and having to transport the laptop as well was the final straw) I seriously considered going and telling my boss that in fact I have been lying misrepresenting the facts when speaking to her recently. I rehearsed in my head as the bus went along Portsmouth Road how I had thought that saying I was happy with my work would be the most politic course of action. I went over the Itchen Bridge relishing the feel of the words "To be honest, I hate this job. It's just filling in pointless forms recording things that I couldn't care less about." And I arrived in town pleased that my mental health would no longer be adversely affected by having to smile and pretend that all this corporate nonsense held even the slightest interest to me.

Then I walked past Blackwells and was immediately seduced by a "Buy One Get One Free" offer on Teach Yourself books. On going into the shop, I found that in a small display, there were three books on writing (this, this and this). It was the work of a moment to acquire an even number of books, and I was out of the shop, reflecting on the kindness of Divine Providence in putting inexpensive guides to writing for a career in my way just when I was utterly sick of my current employment. (The more rational and sceptical of my readers will be relieved to know that I also reflected on my propensity to invoke the Divine for doing something I really wanted to do anyway - particularly when it involved spending money.)

My boss wasn't in the office this afternoon, so I didn't have an opportunity to ask her for a quiet chat. I did spend a little time submitting an article (which I'd written previously - not during work time today) to Triond, and followed a link from there to Helium, which looks quite promising. I have to say, even the sniff of a chance to earn money from writing has cheered me up - so much so that I sat in a meeting and agreed to work on the Quality section of the Community Services Contract and barely felt an urge to run screaming from the room.

Supermarkets

For your delight and delectation, another piece published via Triond.

Please take a moment to go to the page and, if you would, another moment to tell others about it.

Thank you kindly

Writing for pennies (2)

Suddenly, it's all worthwhile: screenshot from my Triond page

Writing for pennies

I've thought for a long time about trying to earn some extra money by writing: I'm fairly confident that I can string a sentence together, and I occasionally have what seems to me to be an original idea. The problem has been that writing novels takes a lot of time, non-commissioned TV scripts rarely get accepted and sending short stories to magazines is an excellent way of building up an impressive collection of rejection slips (which all writers get, I know).

I had a look at freelance writing online, which looks possible - there are a lot of sites offering work writing short articles - but it helps a lot to have a body of previous work at which prospective employers can look. I've therefore decided to try Triond, who will accept articles, pictures, etc. on any subject, and then publish it on one of their syndicated websites. Using a formula involving page views and ad clicks, they then pay a few cents into my Paypal account.

The first such piece of mine is here. I know it's not exactly literature, but I'd be extraordinarily grateful if either or both of my readers could go have a look at it, and if possible mark it with their favourite social bookmarking site (Digg, StumbleUpon, etc.) and email their friends to say "Hey, read this." Doing so may make the difference between Hovis and Tesco Value bread for me come the end of the month...

Ideas that are more personal will still appear from time to time on this blog, but those times when I get a thought in my head and think "I could maybe blog about that sometime" will hopefully turn into articles for general consumption.