I just signed up for my own Dear Miss Mermaid subscription to see what kind of emails my subscribers were getting. It's partly handled by a 3rd company, so I wanted to see how they worked out.
Well, I noticed that yesterday, when I included a video, it didn't show up in the email subscription, but if you click on the Title at the top, then it takes you back to the original page where I posted, the video. You techno savvy folks, probably already knew this, but I sure didn't. The links aren't underlined in the email subscription, apparently I have no control over this at the moment, but the links do work. At least the few I tested seemed to work.
I apologize for lousy formatting. That's from me and At&t fussing about the internet. They were cutting me off every few minutes, and somehow my formatting was being posted randomly as I resumed.
I apologize for lousy formatting. That's from me and At&t fussing about the internet. They were cutting me off every few minutes, and somehow my formatting was being posted randomly as I resumed.
The pictures I post, seem to show up in the email subscriptions too. If you click on them, they usually give you the much larger version, if you so desire.
By the way, you can sign up for the email posts, without buying a subscription. Someone asked me WHY would anyone buy a subscription when they can get it for free?
Well, here's the deal. Several of my gentle readers suggested I offer up subscriptions as a means and ways to raise cash to combat my huge hospital and medical credit card bills. (Never sign anything while you are under the influence of heavily sedated drugs or you'll end up in a huge jam.) I woke up last year, in the hospital, to a nightmare.
Yes, I am fighting left, right and center, to avoid bankruptcy and just pay my bills. I've always paid my bills. A lifelong habit. I've had a good credit rating since I was barely an adult. Just that suddenly, I was plunged into massive debt, my income plummeted, the bank interest is overwhelming and mounting up at an astonishing rate.
I feel like I am treading water, chained to unweildly bricks.
The thought of personal bankruptcy, just makes me want to tie a noose and get life over with already. I even have the book that tells how.
I just want to work, pay all my bills and live another day. I keep toiling away working and trying to get well. I'm open to suggestions, so I took the suggestion, offering up subscriptions. When a few paid subscriptions came in (BLESS YOU ALL!) I felt mightily encouraged. I would trade that rope and noose instructions for pounding away on a refurbished laptop.
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I also realized, HEY, I am by far not the only one with financial nightmares in these strange times. So I continued to offer the email subscriptions for free too. I didn't want anyone left out, if they are under the gun too. So you can get the email subscription for free or you can sign up to pay for it at 3 pennies a day. I love pennies! With enough pennies I can make dollars.
A big thank you to the readers that suggested the subscriptions and a huge thank you to all my readers, whether you subscribe or not.
I have taken on more work, writing assignments, that are eventually getting published. Of course there is a huge delay between writing the article and getting paid, usually about 90-180 days, but eventually the money shows up and by then, the work of course has long been done.
As my body gets stronger, I find a clearer head to work more often.
Today, I was DELIGHTED to receive an email that my article Nine Feel Good Movies is featured on Cinemaroll.com. If you read the article, I just noticed there is a button you can click for "I liked it!".
Yippie! I need more hours in the day to get well and keep writing. I have no trouble writing, it's the tedious part of editing, checking facts, doing research if needed, sticking to the word count (my hardest problem), gathering the pictures to go with it, citing sources and so on.
I submitted an article yesterday, it was assigned at 400 words, I banged out my version, checked and it was 700+ words. I had to read and pare over and over until I finally ended up with 416 words. I am not sure if it's been accepted or not.
Recently I was engaged by another company to produce articles. I will find out soon if my stuff is being utilized (bought) or not. I feel real iffy about them, because the assignment desk, where you can pick up work is rather depressing at times. But they also accept freelance articles, just takes a while for them to decide if it will be published or not.
Some of the assignments that I thought were rather depressing were:
- First Person Story: Travel Nightmares
- 10 Worst Things About Family Vacations
- Your Experience with Ovarian Cancer
- Your Experience with Pelvic Inflammatory Disease
Maybe people like depressing articles, but I decided to decline these articles in favor of more positive writing. I am trying so hard to stay positive each and every day, to push my body to the limits, to literally force it to live another day with little or no medical intervention. Having said that, I try to avoid all the negative things that I can sidestep.
It's not easy either.
It's not easy either.
I could write some humorous stuff based on those titles, but the guidelines didn't specify humor, so they might just end up in the editor's trash heap. Still I started on "10 Worst Things About Family Vacations" with an eye towards humor, but it still sounded so depressing, I gave up. Let someone else write about that depressing stuff.
On another note, puppy and I are touring our temporary suburbia every day on our walks. Yesterday I was in so much pain, poor doggy didn't get his fill of walking. We barely (read that me) made it around the block. I don't think anything short of 10 or 20 miles would wear him out or give him his fill of walking.
The other night, someone called me on my cell phone right when I was leaving for a puppy walk. So for the next hour, by the light of the street lamps, I briskly walked with the canine kid, while chatting with my friend. I'm learning to multi-task!
I had to ask them to hold twice, without explaining why. Actually, I needed both hands for a moment, while I juggled the leash, the phone and cleaning up after the dog with puppy poop baggies.
Ponderances:
Why does my pooch pick the nicest gardens or prettiest landscaping to do his poop? What's wrong with the overgrown weed-ridden electric company's right-of-way lot? Either way, I clean up after him, so no one feels the need to scream at us, or worse, shoot me or him. By the way, at 10 months old, puppy weighs an astonishing 6 pounds now.
He doesn't know this.
He thinks he is a robust 100 pound dog, that fears nothing (but the neighbor's 25 pound cat does have him on edge...) The cat spooked us one dark night, by hiding in the bushes, then hissing at us. We both levitated, much to the cat's amusement. I was under the impression a snake had hissed at us, and I don't much care for snakes, no matter what you say to try to convince me otherwise.
Just yesterday, my motorhome repair list started expanding again, what's worse is half of it is stuff I can't fix by myself. It all takes time out of my day too. I pray for angels, pray for miracles. I am trying to live on my teensy erratic income, staying far away from doctors and prescriptions, but if I don't find a natural cure to this endless pain soon, I may be forced to seek help. Lately, the pain is eating up too much of my life. I am trying all sorts of alternative free or super cheap methods to combat this problem. I just want to live one more day, one more week, one more month, a frigging lifetime!
On the other hand, I've done a lot of creative, adventurous living, had some exotically fun times, others frighteningly bad, so I've no need to whine or complain. But why stop the adventure now? Who decides it's over?
So I am pushing my "Hurricanes and Hangovers" book. I'm urging all you gift-giving types to consider a long list of people to give my book to for Christmas.
Might as well be honest here. I'm putting out the begging cup.
But the book is funny (see the reviews, if you haven't read it yet) so it should work as a great modest priced gift for anyone who likes to laugh (isn't that most everybody?) Chances are they don't have a copy already so it might just work for you/them. Amazon is offering it at 15% off too (we all like bargains!)
Just for grins, I will promise to buy the book back, if they don't like it. They can use the money to go buy something else then. So it's a win-win situation. Money back guarantee.
If you have lots of out-of-town people to buy for, Amazon will include a card and gift wrap it (with ribbons too). I now, always start my cards with "Don't open until Christmas". Growing up, we were never ever allowed to open any gifts before Christmas. They went under the tree. We had great fun imagining what might be in each one. Books. We always got one or more books. Sometimes we could tell by the wrapping and the sheer heft that is was a book. But we had no idea which book until Christmas day. I remember being distraught was Christmas, as a small child, because I accidentally ripped a coloring book while opening the wrapping. I was upset because we had been taught to treat books like a great treasure, do not fold, spindle or mutilate.
Ahoy!
Dear Miss Mermaid
relies on Angels, Subscriptions and Book Sales
THANK YOU for your support.
Dear Miss Mermaid
relies on Angels, Subscriptions and Book Sales
THANK YOU for your support.
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