Jan
29
Parisiana
January 29, 2004 | Comments Off
Parisiana e-zine, The Lovers Guide to Paris. Thanks to Michael and Laurie M. for mentioning this site, and for their story therein, “Sex at Last – First Tango in Paris.”
Jan
29
Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations
January 29, 2004 | Comments Off
Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations at Bartleby.com http://www.bartleby.com/100/ includes with a key word search feature, plus dictionary, thesaurus, encyclopedia, and English usage sections.
Jan
29
Online Encyclopedia and Dictionary
January 29, 2004 | Comments Off
More writers’ resources:
Your dictionary is a comprehensive resource of online dictionaries and other language references. It also features a dictionary and thesaurus word search on its home page — these are provided by Merriam-Webster Online, a good online resource in and of itself.
Encarta provides a searchable encyclopedia (more than 4,500 articles), a dictionary, thesaurus, and an atlas.
Encyclopedia.com, provides “more than 57,000 frequently updated articles,” a “topic tracker to get the latest information on your favorite topic delivered free to your email,” and “eLibrary [free trial available], the comprehensive digital archive for information seekers of all ages. You can search across 13 million documents from full-text newspaper and magazine articles, television and radio transcripts, international newswires, classic books, maps, photographs, as well as major works of literature, art and reference books.”
Jan
29
Of Global Interest
January 29, 2004 | Comments Off
Heather O’Neal at Of Global Interest LLC Adventure Travel (Ann Arbor, Michigan) organizes world-wide trips and administers a Random Acts of Kindness Fund. She also maintains a website with her own travel stories at http://www.ofglobalinterest.com
Jan
29
Creativity and Art
January 29, 2004 | Comments Off
“Creativity is allowing oneself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep.”
– Scott Adams, The Dilbert Principle
Jan
21
Freelance Copywriting
January 21, 2004 | Comments Off
So you want a day job? Thanks to Jim Mannix for pointing me to this series of Writers Market articles by Lynn Wasnak about freelance copywriting, including fee ranges. http://www.writersmarket.com/content/charge.asp
Jan
21
Sky Magazine
January 21, 2004 | Comments Off
A listing from Writers Digest: Sky. 1301 Carolina St., Greensboro, NC 27401. Delta airline’s in-flight publication featuring and emphasizing travel, but also presenting contemporary lifestyle subjects. Terms: Pays $1/word and up. Note: Contact editorial department for complete guidelines.
Jan
21
Connection Cote d’Azur
January 21, 2004 | Comments Off
Thanks to Carla King for telling us about Connection Cote d’Azur: “a great little non-paying market for travel writing about the French Riviera…. The editor tells me she welcomes new writers. Clips clips clips!” http://www.connectioncotedazur.com/
Jan
18
US Airways Attache
January 18, 2004 | Comments Off
Thanks to Jeanne Brophy for sending this request for submissions from an inflight magazine: “Magazine seeks entertaining articles for travelers. Ongoing departments, some features. 350-2000 words. $1/word. Freelance 60%. Pays on acceptance. Contact: US Airways Attache, Pace Communications Inc, 1301 Carolina St, Greensboro NC 27401 OR 336-378-6065 OR http://www.attachemag.com OR attacheedit@attachemag.com” By the way, Jeanne recently traveled to Oaxaca for Day of the Dead. Some of her photographs are posted at http://www.jeannebrophy.com click on Oaxaca.
Jan
18
Global Fusion
January 18, 2004 | Comments Off
Lyn Bishop’s current project, Global Fusion “is working to increase awareness, to spread goodwill, and to facilitate discussion among different people, celebrating the world’s cultures through the artistic medium of visual and verbal art forms.” You can learn more about it at http://www.onelove.com/globalfusion/about.html
Jan
18
Edward Hasbrouck won a Lowell Thomas Award
January 18, 2004 | Comments Off
Speaking of electronic publishing and self-publishing, Edward Hasbrouck won a Lowell Thomas Award for Investigative Reporting for a story he published on his website. You can hear the story, which is about consumer privacy issues in travel, on the KPFA archives (not easy to search) http://www.kpfa.org, or read or listen on Edward’s Practical Nomad site at http://hasbrouck.org/articles/travelprivacy.html Hasbrouck will be speaking about the new, 3rd edition of his book, The Practical Nomad: How to Travel Around the World, at Easy Going (Berkeley) on Feb 19, and at Get Lost (SF) March 24. A calendar of his speaking engagements is at http://hasbrouck.org/events/index.html
Jan
15
Shaw Guides
January 15, 2004 | Comments Off
Thanks to Kalpana Mohan for sending the link to Shaw Guides’ listing of “more than 5,300 sponsors of thousands of learning vacation & creative career programs worldwide.” It’s a Forbes “Best of The Web” site, and includes hundreds of writers’ conferences and workshops around the world and a “Travel Chums” section (looking for someone to travel with?). The their “cultural travel” section is here. My favorite listing is “Snobby Tours,” 1-day to 2-week tours focusing on the arts and historical, architectural, cultural, culinary, & literary aspects of a place.
Jan
15
Backpack Nation
January 15, 2004 | Comments Off
Brad Newsham recently updated the Backpack Nation website http://www.backpacknation.org/with more details about what he has learned from Phase 1 and how Backpack Nation’s Phase 2 will work, as well as more information about the kinds of travel stories he is looking for (you have to scroll down quite a ways to get to this part). By the way, as of January 12, contributions were at $19,258, only $742 short of the $20,000 goal — good going!
Jan
15
Al-Gebra
January 15, 2004 | Comments Off
And now for something truly silly! I don’t know the original source of this (received it via email), but it’s way too good not to pass along:
At New York’s Kennedy Airport today, an individual later discovered to be a public school teacher was arrested trying to board a flight while in possession of a ruler, a protractor, a setsquare, a slide rule, and a calculator.
Jan
11
Advice from John Flinn
January 11, 2004 | Comments Off
Salon Report: John Flinn, Travel Editor at the SF Chron, provided info for freelance travel writers at the WWW/Monticello Salon. I can’t capture John’s wonderful sense of humor, but here are some of my notes:
Jan
11
Lynn Ferrin on Cuba
January 11, 2004 | Comments Off
January, 2004: Lynn Ferrin is just back from Cuba, and we chatted briefly about her trip (which sounded wonderful!): “I wanted to get there before January 1, when Bush Two enforced further restrictions on Americans traveling to Cuba…. I went with Elderhostel–which turned out to be a lively and wise group of old Lefties.
Jan
11
Alaska Northwest Books
January 11, 2004 | Comments Off
A listing from Writers’ Digest: “Alaska Northwest Books publishes 12 titles a year. The editors claim all their titles are ‘written for a general readership, not for experts in the subject.’ Their main travel titles can be found in their Culture Smart series of books, which already cover areas like Australia, France, and Britain. The editors say, ‘Book proposals that are professionally written and polished with a clear understanding of the market, receive our most careful consideration. We are looking for originality.’
Jan
11
Avalon Travel Publishing
January 11, 2004 | Comments Off
A listing from Writers’ Digest: Avalon Travel Publishing publishes 100 titles a year. Established in 1973, Avalon Travel Publishing considers itself the largest travel publisher in the United States. Recent titles include Easy Hiking in Northern California, by Ann Marie Brown, and Great American Motorcycle Tours, by Gary McKechnie. Writers are offered advances of up to $10,000 for strong proposals.
Jan
11
Workman Publishing Co.
January 11, 2004 | Comments Off
A listing from Writers’ Digest: Workman Publishing Co. publishes 40 titles a year. Open to first-time authors, this publisher offers a variable advance. Recent titles include 1,000 Places to See Before You Die, by Patricia Schultz and Pedaling Through Burgundy Cookbook, by Sarah Leah Chase. The editors expect all submissions to be made through the mail only.”
Jan
11
Reference Desk
January 11, 2004 | Comments Off
Check out this online Ref Desk (with many and varied links to references).
You might also want to check out Foreign word
Dictionary.com includes a thesaurus and a grammar and usage section, plus French, German, Italian, Latin, and Spanish dictionaries, and more. Also a translator: German, French, Spanish, Portuguese and Italian to/from English. And, for Premium Subscribers, legal, medical, and crossword dictionaries without ads.
Ref Desk also includes a Thought of the Day. January 9′s was:
Jan
5
New Years’ Sentiment
January 5, 2004 | Comments Off
Thanks to Colleen O’Connor for forwarding this New Years’ sentiment from one of America’s favorite authors: “Now is the accepted time to make your regular annual good resolutions. Next week you can begin paving hell with them as usual. Yesterday, everybody smoked his last cigar, took his last drink, and swore his last oath. Today, we are a pious and exemplary community. Thirty days from now, we shall have cast our reformation to the winds and gone to cutting our ancient shortcomings considerably shorter than ever. We shall also reflect pleasantly upon how we did the same old thing last year about this time. However, go in, community. New Year’s is a harmless annual institution, of no particular use to anybody save as a scapegoat for promiscuous drunks, and friendly calls, and humbug resolutions, and we wish you to enjoy it with a looseness suited to the greatness of the occasion.” — Mark Twain in a Letter to Virginia City Territorial Enterprise, Jan. 1863
Jan
5
Best Rejection
January 5, 2004 | Comments Off
Michael Shapiro wins the “best rejection letter” prize for this note from the travel editor at a midwestern paper: “Really interesting story. I would have liked to use it on Jan. 4 but we have a huge new airport parking lot opening Jan. 5, and the Jan. 4 section will be a consumer guide to parking opportunities at the airport.” Michael says, “This would have really hurt had it been a rejection ‘ fortunately he was just telling me why he was running my story a week later than planned.” Thanks for a good laugh, Michael, and I hope you’ll provide a URL so we can read your story when it finally does appear!
Jan
5
Global Disfluencies
January 5, 2004 | Comments Off
If you’ve resolved to learn all about about global disfluencies in 2004 (or even if you haven’t), a New York Times article by Michael Erard provides the scoop: “People around the world fill pauses in their own languages as naturally as watermelons have seeds. In Britain they say uh but spell it er, just as they pronounce er in butter. The French say something that sounds like euh, and Hebrew speakers say ehhh. Serbs and Croats say ovay, and the Turks say mmmmm. The Japanese say eto (eh-to) and ano (ah-no), the Spanish este, and Mandarin speakers neige (NEH-guh) and jiege (JEH-guh). In Dutch and German you can say uh, um, mmm. In Swedish it’s eh, ah, aah, m, mm, hmm, ooh, a and oh; in Norwegian, e, eh, m and hm.” Erard explains how to reduce one’s ums (drink alcohol), and provides a comparison of overall disfluency rates of men and women (I’m not giving that away!). Read all about it at http://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/03/arts/03TANK.html?th
Jan
5
Michael Johnson on Writing for Radio
January 5, 2004 | Comments Off
Salon Report: Michael Johnson gave the Left Coast Writers an introduction to writing for radio, including advice about where and how to submit scripts and “treatments” (ideas). He has also published a helpful article about minidisc recorders: “Want to record something and you’re looking for a relatively inexpensive way to do it without sacrificing quality? The answer is Minidisc! The medium is a cross between a CD and a floppy disc, small (almost 3″ by 3″ square), and uses magnetic as well as optical methods of recording digital audio. They are re-recordable, and very easy to use.” The complete article, with technical info and useful links, is here.