Notes from One Writer to Another
If you’re like me, planning can be a problem. Here’s an interesting alternative approach for creative people. I haven’t tried it, but it may be worth a look. (It’s also an example of an effective marketing strategy.)
Click on the link if it sounds appealing for one reason or another.
On this blog, I offer links to all sorts of writing advice. Here is some solid information from Susan Adrian about how to use what is offered.
When setting goals for the new year, inspiration can be helpful. Here’s some advice from John Cleese about creativity.
John Cleese, Monty Python Icon, on How to Be Creative | Open Culture.
Here’s the second in a series of posts about people who have changed my life. This one is about my dad, a California Scene painter, and his influence on me as an artist, so I posted it first to my neglected art blog, Notes from a Virtual Easel. The link is below. I mention it here because writing is an art, too, and many of the same attitudes and disciplines apply.
I found this wonderful site through the Picture Book Idea Month Facebook page. It is from a summer challenge that lasted eight weeks. That means you can check out seven more of these delightful idea machines! If you are in need of wild fiction inspiration, click on the link below and you are sure to find help.
Susanna Leonard Hill: Welcome To Summer Short And Sweets!!!.
Here’s a blog that will keep you up on the latest news in creativity. Today’s post discusses the importance of commitment. Too often, we put everything else first.
Annual November creativity challenges such as Picture Book Idea Month give us permission to put our creative lives front and center. The resulting excitement inevitably spills out into the rest of the year.
Today’s prompt on the PAD blog is about technological innovation. This is kind of spooky, because while eating breakfast, my husband and I watched a documentary about Howard Hughes, who, like Henry Ford, changed the entire world with his inventions. Before something can be created, someone must realize that it is needed. November is a great month for ideas. What can you come up with? Read today’s works on the the blog (link below) and then add your own. Nothing is too outrageous. I wrote three! Couldn’t help myself. One of them is here below the link.
2012 November PAD Chapbook Challenge: Day 12 | New Technology Poem | WritersDigest.com.
Education
The teacher monitors
each twenty minutes
the students spend
on scheduled lessons,
each designed to build
on the last and all moving
at different speeds
like cars on a long highway
headed for the same
destination, and then the
machines shut off
and the students
have a discussion
about what it means
to be human in a world
where there is so much
to learn and so much
to love.
copyright Linda Armstrong, 11/12/2012. All rights reserved.
From Kristi Holl, here are some great suggestions for freshening up your writing. For example, turn off the computer and go outside.
Here’s another blog filled with great advice for writers. This post offers a solution that sounds easy, but it’s magic. If you’re stuck, give it a try. Use a timer of some kind so you don’t have to watch the clock.
AdviceToWriters – Advice to Writers – Force Yourself to Write Non-Stop.
Here’s my first poem for this month’s challenge. Poets, add your own on the blog. At the end of the month, you will have a chapbook. See the blog for submission details and to read the work of other participants.
2012 November PAD Chapbook Challenge: Day 1 | Matches Poem | WritersDigest.com
One Way to Wonder 
We’re a match,
the two of us,
you with your
temper and me
too tempered
you with your
careful pacing
and me
with my wild
last minute
dashes.
We’re a match
of seeming
opposites, seamed
so closely together
that sometimes
there is no space
between us
like sky
and sea at
sunset on the
Pacific.
copyright Linda Armstrong, November 3, 2012. All rights reserved.