How To Blog Like A Pro

I've been blogging for... a while now. Like, not a long time, but long enough to know the in's and the out's of running an almost tolerable blog here on the World Wide Web. I know that you should probably not post things that are offensive to lots of people or anything that may come back to dig its very sharp teeth very deep into your rotund ass. Also, you should probably not post nudes unless you're willing to get creepy messages from strange men in the deep south of Nigeria... or if you're not older than 18. That may get you in legal trouble.

Anyway, I've learned some stuff, and I have come here today to share some of my novice wisdom with the rest of the blogging world. You ready for this?

1. You don't have to blog about what you think the world will care about. You should just write what you know or what you're curious about or whatever you're friggin passionate about. It doesn't matter. People really don't care. You just gotta do you. 

2. Commenting on other people's blogs will probably help other people find you. It's worked for me. Try it, and if it doesn't work, your blog must really suck. I'm sorry.

3. Post regularly or as often as you can. If your readers are familiar with your pattern for posting, they'll know when to visit your blog to see if you've updated. If you're so sporadic that you don't even know when you're going to sit down and write, how do you expect anyone else to? Let your blog be reliable for the people who actually read it.

4. Only write when you're ready to write and feel like writing. Never feel pressured to put out content. That'll just make you hate writing. And if you really love writing, you shouldn't want to do anything to make you hate it. I mean, would if you love macaroni and cheese, would you ruin it by putting mint toothpaste in it? Probably not.

5. Page views and fame and followers don't come overnight. Give it time. And, hey, you might actually have to work at publicizing your blog. Try different networking strategies. Utilize the websites you already use (i.e.. Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Plurk, etc). You'll be surprised what happens just from that.

6. Tags! For the love all that is bright and beautiful and amazing, tag your posts with all the things that might be goldmines for traffic! Yeah, I tag almost everything I could possibly tag. Often times it's things like "Boobs" and "Penis flaps" or "Hot men" but it's usually pretty relevant.  I mean, take a look at what people search to find me-

If I took a shot every time penis showed up, I'd be pretty wasted. That's all. 

7. Don't be afraid to take a risk. Try it. See what comes out of it. You may be surprised.

So, there you go. Some blogging tips from a girl who's been blogging off and on for the last million years. Hopefully you'll actually try to take my tips into consideration so your blog won't suck so much. I'm just kidding. No I'm not. I'm sorry. Please don't take me seriously.

(Wait.. what?)

I Write The Things That No One Reads

I've been thinking lately about writing. I like to think that I'm a writer, I guess, so I should know a thing or two about writing. Maybe? 

I realized the other day that I began writing way back when strictly on paper with an extra sharp Dixon Ticonderoga #2 pencil (Let's face it, they take the cake with those super soft erasers that won't rip your paper when you're furiously erasing half a math test in the 5th grade when you realize you've been using the wrong formulas for circles) and only for school stuff. I want to say with confidence that I am pretty sure the first paper I ever wrote on a computer was a report on hurricanes for 5th grade English. Before that, every single thing I wrote was written by hand.

I can picture so clearly the time one of my teachers assigned my class to write 100-word essays on something probably really stupid and I had to count the words on this piece of college-ruled notebook paper as I went. It seemed like too many words at the time. 100 words was an infinity. It was the dictionary. It was a Charles Dicken's novel. Now, that's like two or three sentences if I'm trying to be really fancy and have a strange need to write everything in really drawn out language like most of the sentences in this blog. Maybe a small paragraph if I'm feeling super lazy and unmotivated. Today, I just have to look down at the bottom of Microsoft Word to see how many words I've written.

Sadly, I don't write on paper with an actual writing utensil as much anymore as I would like to say. There's still something awesome about hearing the grinding of pencil lead on a sheet of lined notebook paper as you suddenly get hit with inspiration or finally figure out the perfect way to state whatever kind of bullshit you've been unscrambling in your mind.  I do most of my writing on the computer now.  It's fast and it causes way fewer hand cramps at the end of an hour of writing, ya know?

At the beginning of 2013, I decided I wanted to keep a composition notebook style journal over the course of the year. So, that worked out just fine for January, but when February hit, I lost all ability to write anything with my hands. So, now I have a month of random journal entries about boobs and school and my inability to not be nervous about everything that happens in my life and a few half-finished entries that took me 2 weeks to write. But, for some reason, I've kept up with this blog for almost four months or so. I don't know what logic is anymore.

Writing, while something that not everyone seems to like or be good at even if they try and try and try and be okay at it, is something I'm kind of pretty sure doesn't have to be done in any certain way, but it's just strange to think about how my methods of writing have change over time as technology changed. Like, when was the last time I turned in a handwritten assignment that was actually graded? I don't know!

Like, are there writers who write by hand and think they are just better than all the writers who write on
computers and typewriters? Probably. Pretentious writers. 

And then there's me. I write on all the platforms, but no one ever reads it.

You and Me and My Erotica

As of recently, having discovered where the real money is in writing, I've decided I'm going to pursue the great art of erotic paperbacks (yes, you know, the ones grocery stores stick in the corner by the magazines and coloring books). Despite my own lack of sexual allure, I've read enough Hancest (Hanson incest) fan fiction and I've spent like 4 years on Tumblr, so you know, I know about the sex. It really can't be that hard if you really think about it. I mean, Fifty Shades of Grey, which originally was written as Twilight fan fiction, got published and has sold like one bagillion copies. So, what I'm thinking is I have to get in on that sweetness because money.

So, you might be thinking that I am totally not the person to be writing such filth, and I definitely agree with you on that. Like, what do I know about romance or making the sex happen? I'm 20, perpetually single, and only attract guys who religiously watch Doctor Who. That's not enough credibility to make me a candidate for such a career, but seriously.

So, what's my game plan? Well, pretty much, I have a four-step plan for my success as an erotica novelist.



1. Read lots of bad erotica to get a grasp on plots and writing techniques. Plus, I really need to find out where all the hot Fabio-esque models are, so I can have the absolute best men on my covers. That's
probably the real key to making money off these pieces of literature. Just saying. The secrets are in the lush, blonde locks. 

2. Create a cool, sexy pen name because there is no way I'm putting my name on this trash (plus, my name just wouldn't look good on a book. That's why I need to get married soon and get a new last name. WHERE ARE MY SUITORS?). Once I have a cool, sexy pen name, the rest will come magically.

3. Write erotica. Yeah. Pretty much. And, honestly, I'd probably write all of them while listening to the only sexual song of my youth. Yes, I'm talking about "Digital Get Down" by NSYNC. Shhh. I know. I don't know why I was allowed to listen to that either.

4. Make so much money they actually have to bring it to my house in wheelbarrows and put it in those cloth sacks with big green dollar signs on them. I'll finally be able to afford to over-compensate for my lack of sexual allure with tons of money.

See? It's totally a great plan.

The sad thing about all this is that I would probably write some really fantastic erotica if I actually sat down and tried. So, maybe one day. Perhaps, sooner than anyone thinks.

But you may never know because of my sexy, cool pen name. Then again, I might give myself away with all the references to the steamy cage scene in LOST. But that might just be coincidental. You don't know my life!

Release.

[The following is an excerpt from April 1, 2013]

It comes once the sun has risen and the beeping alarm blares once again in my ear. A moment of panic. A moment of mere heartache that thumps and pounds and thrashes inside of my chest at the speed of life. A gust of breath fills my lungs, and I remember why I didn't sleep well and why the gastric acids in my stomach are churning once again. Like every morning since the endless night.

I check my phone. The light blinds me briefly. My eyes adjust. Nothing. 


Am I a skeleton or girl? I cross my toes for luck. Get out of bed.

Please...

I brush my teeth, wash my face in the dark, put on a fresh pair of clothes that don't match or fit correctly because it doesn't matter either way. Like clockwork, I prepare for a day I must face exhausted and dazed and stressed beyond oblivion.  Guzzle 4 glasses full. Put on socks.

Did you put on socks this morning?

Check my email. Spam. Spam. Spam. Worthless school announcements. Spam. Facebook notifications. Spam. Delete my emails. All of them.

Should I eat? Am I hungry? Do I need this? I grab a cereal bar and call it a day with a side of multivitamins. Swig and swallow. Wrong pipe. Ouch. 

Did you remember to eat? 

40 days and 40 nights. A sigh of relief. A sigh of desperation calling for one more night, one more touch, one more heartbeat lullaby singing you softly to sleep. Hush. Hush. Don't wake. Don't stir. Hold me closer, tiny dancer....

The agenda is simple. Class. Eat. Class. Eat. Workout. Shower. Sit in wonder, procrastinating away until the due dates zoom in on the points of panic attacks and sleepless nights and falling eyelashes and bags of Sour Patch Kids on my tongue. And I wonder why I'm no fun. 15 minutes to kill.

Did you have a good yesterday? I wanna know. 

My mind blanks. I wonder about why it happened and why me and why you and why us and why the sun still shines even when you're not smiling. Can't stop thinking. I could have stopped this. I could have cried wolf. I could have saved you. Shame on me. Tsk tsk tsk.

Please...

Log-in. Tightened shoelace lungs. Dust bowl tongue. Goosebumps like rockets.

5 hours. 

Release. 

An Excuse to Write

It's said that it takes something like 10,000 hours of practice to master a skill or career. At least, that's what the guy who wrote that Outliers book said (which, btw, if you've never read that particular book, go spend your heroin money on something that won't rot your braincells). Ever since I read this little bit of information my senior year of high school, I haven't really given much thought to how much time 10,000 hours really is. That's a whole lot of time, if you hadn't figured it out yet. I mean, what else have a I spent 10,000 hours doing? Sleeping? Eating? Clicking my heels together while wishing that he'd finally man up and plant a wet one on me? I don't know. And then I think about my writing. How many hours have I spent writing shitty research papers while shamelessly citing Nick Jonas' diabetes? Writing passive aggressive poetry? Blogging about things that don't necessarily matter to anyone (even myself, sometimes)? I don't know.

Realistically, I probably am nowhere near 10,000 hours of writing, but I see this as a reason to write more and to keep writing. Maybe this whole "keep a blog for school because blogging is the next big job market and thing that will put bread on your table so you don't resort to becoming the next (who am I) 24601" that I keep hearing isn't just because, yeah, one day I might get a job with a company because they need someone with experience with blogging. Maybe it's an easy way to cumulate some hours of writing so I get the suck and lack-of-experience out of my system.

So, what do I write about? 

This is the hard part. You see, I am always listening. Always watching. Always wondering what's going to happen next. That being said, I have years of blackmail at my disposal. This, mind you, is one of the amazing perks to being A) an ignored and forgotten middle child and B) someone no one truly considers a threat. I could write about that thing that someone did or said while totally wasted. About equal rights for the left and right boob during awkwardly irresistible encounters with second base etiquette. About every inch of oppressed anger and frustration that lingers in my veins. About my failed attempt to steal the wedding band of the lead singer of Switchfoot during a gig in Oklahoma City.  About car wrecks and sprained ankles and unappealing ankle tattoos on PE teachers and casseroles that didn't give my intestines the heebie-jeebies and books that made me laugh and cry at the same time and how I got matching bruises on my shins and roadside attraction spankings on family vacations. I have a lifetime of stories to tell, but where do I dare to begin?

I need an excuse to write. I need prompts. I need inspiration. I need someone to say, "Hey, tell me about that time...." and trigger multiple heart attacks due to the stress of having to actually talk about an era of my less-than-enthusing life. I want someone to ask to be told about something. Otherwise, these stories may go completely unheard and, consequently, forgotten.

Sure, this blog post is an excuse for me to write, but I feel like that's okay. I've used this blank canvas for other things. Why not use it to increase some writing time? I see no harm in that. Actually, all blogs should be an excuse to write.

The things tales, stories I've mentioned in this entry may one day be read or heard, but, right now, I think I'll keep them to myself. Save them for a rainy day... When I need another excuse to write.