Lillie Ammann's Blog, page 131

Gone from My Sight

[image error]My beloved husband Jack went to Heaven this morning. I will miss him terribly but I am so glad that he is no longer in pain and no longer confused. May Light Perpetual shine upon him.

O GOD, whose mercies cannot be numbered; Accept our prayers on behalf of the soul of thy servant departed, and grant him an entrance into the land of light and joy, in the fellowship of thy saints; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. – 1928 Book of Common Prayer

Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also. ~ John 14:1-3 (KJV)

Gone From My Sight

by Henry Van Dyke

I am standing upon the seashore. A ship, at my side,

spreads her white sails to the moving breeze and starts

for the blue ocean. She is an object of beauty and strength.

I stand and watch her until, at length, she hangs like a speck

of white cloud just where the sea and sky come to mingle with each other.

Then, someone at my side says, “There, she is gone”

Gone where?

Gone from my sight. That is all. She is just as large in mast,

hull and spar as she was when she left my side.

And, she is just as able to bear her load of living freight to her destined port.

Her diminished size is in me — not in her.

And, just at the moment when someone says, “There, she is gone,”

there are other eyes watching her coming, and other voices

ready to take up the glad shout, “Here she comes!”

And that is dying…

Related Posts:Prayers for Tucson, AZ VictimsDevotion for Fourth Sunday in Lent 2012Scripture for the Third Wednesday in Advent 2010Wishing You a Blessed ThanksgivingScripture for Christmas EvePowered by Contextual Related PostsGone from My Sight was first posted on September 23, 2012 at 7:42 pm.
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Out of Pocket Update

Thank you all for the kind words, thoughts, and prayers. After spending nearly two weeks in a hospital and a nursing home, we plan to take Jack home on Wednesday. I have been with him all the time except for a couple of trips to get something to eat. My sister Nancy has been a big help–she facilitated getting Jack into a nursing home on short notice and arranged for me to have a bed in his room as well as bringing food to both of us. Jack isn’t eating much except a few sips of milkshakes, but Nancy has made valiant efforts to induce him to eat a little more.

Although we are a lovely new facility and  people are taking good care of us, Jack and I are both ready to get home!

My helper, Betsy, has overseen the installation of a handicap ramp, and tomorrow she will take delivery of a hospital bed and meet the cable technician to extend the cable so we can move the TV into the bedroom. Betsy has come up with a caregiver schedule that will leave me alone with Jack for only two hours every day. The rest of the time there will be two people so we can turn and lift him. He will be evaluated by hospice after we get home, and if he is accepted (which we have every reason to believe will happen), the hospice agency will provide additional nursing care and personal hygiene assistance.

I am moderating and responding to comments rather sporadically. Thank you for your patience–I will start posting again after Jack gets acclimated to his new environment and the caregivers and I establish a routine.

Related Posts:Birthdays and ThanksHappy 45th Anniversary to Us!Falling behind … and feeling thankfulA Tale of Two Companies: the Worst and the BestNot-So-Random Acts of KindnessPowered by Contextual Related PostsOut of Pocket Update was first posted on September 18, 2012 at 12:12 am.
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Out of Pocket

I may not be around much for a little while as my husband is experiencing some health issues. You may not see new posts, and there may be delays in my approving and responding to comments. Thank you for your patience!

Related Posts:Experiencing the PsalmsInteresting studyComments, Spam, and Comment SpamFifth Saturday in Lent 2011Bloggers Unite in Acts of KindnessPowered by Contextual Related PostsOut of Pocket was first posted on September 10, 2012 at 1:27 am.
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If Your Comment Doesn’t Appear …

First, I must apologize to someone who emailed me to say she had left several comments and none had appeared. I saved the email in my inbox (at least I thought I did) and planned to check spam and see if her comments were going into spam. However, I must have had a senior moment and accidentally deleted the message. So if you emailed me and I did not respond, please contact me again, and I will more careful next time!

I encourage commenters to email me if their comments don’t appear. Usually the comments have ended up in spam for some reason. I just delete spam wholesale without looking at it unless I am aware someone is having trouble commenting, in which case I go through spam comments to see if the missing comments are there. If they are, I mark them “not spam” and approve them (assuming they are relevant).

A couple of people have left comments that just disappeared. They weren’t in the moderation queue and they weren’t in spam. If that happens, I ask the commenter to copy the comment into an email before submitting. If it doesn’t appear, send the comment to me and explain what happened, and I will post the comment for you. This is a rare occurrence, and I have no idea why it happens, but if it happens to you, please let me know.

I will respond unless I have another senior moment! If you don’t get a response from me within a couple of days, please send another message. I don’t ignore emails from readers.

photo credit: csc1950

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Labor Day 2012

Jim Blasingame, The Small Business Advocate, wrote in his newsletter:

Labor Day was created primarily to recognize union members. Today, this group represents barely 11% of total workers and has declined to less than 7% of the private sector.

Small businesses represent over 98% of all U.S. businesses, produce over half of the U.S. GDP, and sign the FRONT of the paychecks of over half (70 million) of all U.S. workers. Let’s see: big deal on Labor Day; but no Small Business Day. What’s wrong with this picture?

I certainly don’t begrudge union members having a holiday, but I agree there should be an observance for small business owners.

Fortunately, we can all observe Labor Day and enjoy a holiday free of labor and filled with fun. Happy Labor Day!

photo credit: Ianz

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The Importance of Accuracy

[image error]You’ve heard a lot from me about editing your work and eliminating as many errors as possible.

Yesterday, we experienced a dramatic example of how serious the simple transposition of two numbers can be.

I was in the kitchen making a sandwich for Jack, and our helper Betsy was nearby  preparing Jack’s medications. Suddenly we heard Jack yelling, sounding frightened. He has fallen several times, twice in the last week, so we hurried into the den, fully expecting him to be helpless on the floor, even hurt.

Instead he pointed toward the sliding glass door. There were two young men on our patio. We thought our backyard was completely secure, so we were shocked to see strangers looking into our den,

I opened the door and asked what they wanted. They were obviously as shocked as we were and both started talking  at once.

“We’re here to look at the place to rent advertised on Craig’s List.” They went on to say they were told to come through the side gate into the backyard, then come through the open back door into the empty house. They realized they were in the wrong place as soon as they saw people inside.

They hurried away and through the side gate. Betsy went out the front door to make sure the men left. Their pickup truck was parked in the driveway, and they stood by the truck to use a cell phone to call the person who had placed the ad. It turned out that the address was incorrect in the ad. The house for rent was at 630; we live at 603.  Betsy watched the men drive down the street and go through the side gate of the house with a “For Rent” sign on the front lawn.

Then Betsy and I put a chain and new padlock on the side gate, glad that at least this experience showed us that gate wasn’t secure.

More careful editing could have prevented a frightening and potentially dangerous situation. We thought someone meant to do us harm, and the intruders feared we would overreact to their shocking appearance at our backdoor. Fortunately, the incident ended with no significant repercussions. But it demonstrates that a seemingly insignificant mistake can have serious consequences.

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Thanks to Readers

Each month I thank all my commenters for the previous month. On my latest thank-you post, I had a comment from a regular saying the list was a nice tribute to readers, but he wasn’t listed.

This is part of my reply:

Actually this is a tribute to commenters. I would like to recognize all readers, but I don’t know who they are. I only know you’ve been here is if you leave a comment. … If you come and read posts and don’t comment, I appreciate it very much. But I have way of knowing that, so I can’t thank you.

I started thinking about this, though, and realized I need to let readers who don’t comment that I appreciate them also. I have a lot more readers than commenters, usually 12,000 to 15,000 visitors but only 100 to 200 comments each month. I want the thousands of readers who don’t comment to know that I am glad they take the time to visit and read my blog.

I certainly understand why people don’t comment. I subscribe to a couple hundred blogs and review them in my feed reader. Sometimes I read the headline and first couple of sentences and mark the post as read because the topic doesn’t interest. Usually I read the entire post in the reader and never go to the blog site. Rarely a post is so compelling that I click over to the blog and leave a comment.

If the feed is only a partial post, it’s very unlikely that I will bother to click over to the blog to read the entire post. There are about three blogs I like so much, I will read them in spite of having only partial feeds. But those are special blogs, indeed. I suspect a large percentage of blog readers have similar reading habits.

If you read but don’t comment, thank you. I appreciate your taking the time to visit and read my words. I know how much competition there is for your reading time, and I’m delighted that you spend some of that time here. I hope one day you’ll find a post so compelling that you feel that you have to comment. But even if that never happens, I appreciate you!

Related Posts:Why Do So Many Keywords Visit My Blog?©2012 "Lillie Ammann, Writer & Editor". Use of this feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this reading this article in your feed reader, then the site is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact me at lillie@lillieammann.com

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Thanks to July 2012 Comments

Thank you to the 55 commenters who left 81 comments in July. Your comments extended the conversation and added value and interest, and I enjoyed replying to every one of them.

Every month when I post thanks to commenters, I get questions about how I compile this list. I have explained my system in detail in Compiling Thanks to Commenters.

Top Contributor (7 comments)


Christopher Roberts
Christopher Roberts


Major Contributors (4-5 comments)


Jane
Recover Deleted Files


Carolyn Howard-Johnson
How to Do It Frugally


Jane
Migration Expert – US Visa


Outstanding Contributors (2-3 comments)


Ilayda
Misses Dressy


Sam
Pushkar Tour


David
The Love Guru Revview


Dawn Colclasure
Dawn Colclasure’s Blog


Diana Lesire Brandmeyer
Author Desire Lesire Brandmeyer


Leo
Account Salary Info/CPA


Martin Cooney
Geek and Jock


Significant Contributors


Adam
n/a


Aileen
Bahtstore


Ann
How to Motivate Yourself


Audrey
n/a


Carley
CNA Classes Online


Chris
Kopleo Brazow


Dana
Hyve


David
Cheap Hotels


David Abramson
Excite Steps


Deb Sistrunk
Kimchi One Day at a Time


Debra Chapoton
Edge of Escape


Doris Plaster
Hold My Hand


Edward
My Weblog


Gerald
Cheapest Merchant Accounts


Gina
Bangkok Pool Club


Harry
Atlantic.net


Jack
Impact Church


James
n/a


James
Lavish Dream Hair


James
Saturday Night Jive


Jay
The Outhouse SEO


Jeff Chapman
Jeff Chapman, Writer


Jennifer
My Family Home


kcclamb
Alyssa


Kory
Affordable Landscape Services


Larry
Gout Diet Hub


Liza
Bordspecialisten


Marco
Migration Expert


Mark



Mary
Article Marketing QNA



Accent Training Center






Mazhar
Born Virtual


Neil P
57 NP


Rachel
Bespoke Roofing


Ray
Techno Freaks


Sam
Bangkok Pool Cue


Sergio
Genius Travel


Sunny
Edmonton Oilers Tickets


Thomas
Elias Painting & Contracting


Thomas M.
Wyst?pienia Publiczne


T.Nathan
Net Business Designs


Tom
Make and Manage Change


Tracy
Bangladesh Central


Victoria
Reveal Great Skin



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Guest Post from Scott Bartlett: The Writing Process for Royal Flush

The first draft of my humor novel Royal Flush took me 18 days to write.

I wrote it for a contest. 18 days before the deadline, I decided to turn a series of short stories I’d been working on into a novel. I started writing, at a rate of 10-15 pages a day. I had no social life for the duration.

When I finally submitted it—after pulling an all-nighter and writing the final word at 6 AM the day of the deadline—I was incredibly satisfied. Well, actually, I was incredibly sleepy. I slept most of the day.

After I woke up, though, I was incredibly satisfied. “Awesome!” I said to myself. “One novel down! Done! Completed! On to the next one!”

But I didn’t move on to the next one—not that summer. I took a writing break. (I don’t recommend those, incidentally.) And when the contest was announced, Royal Flush got an honorable mention but did not place in the top three.

My great expectations were summarily deflated. When I received my manuscript back from the judges, I opened to the beginning, incredulous that my work hadn’t been lavished with praise and money (the top prize was $5,000). And then I spotted it: a grievous typo, right on the first page.

I experienced a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. How utterly unprofessional. I continued reading. There were at least three or four mistakes per page, of both the grammatical and the orthographical kind. Some of these completely changed the meaning of what I was trying to say—or to have the characters say.

There were also a lot of plot holes and contradictions. Characters that completely changed their views throughout the manuscript, without cause. Timelines that overlapped. Weeks with two Thursdays. That kind of thing

Gradually, it dawned on me that this book was far from “completed.” And, as I started editing and revising in earnest, I realized that most of my work was still ahead of me. In fact, having written three novels by now, I think it’s fair to say that at least 90% of the work awaits a writer after the first draft is complete.

As Ernest Hemingway so eloquently put it: “The first draft of anything is s**t.” (Note from Lillie: I like Lary Crews’s term, “pure green dreck.”)

The last thing you want is for your reader to get jerked out of the story’s flow because of a glaring mistake. But that’s what you risk by failing to edit properly.

I ended up going through ten drafts of Royal Flush. But don’t just read a manuscript over yourself—have multiple others read it as well. As a self-published author, I haven’t had the benefit of a professional editor to review my manuscript. However, over 100 people have read my early drafts—this includes friends, family, coworkers, and users of Authonomy.com. Whenever I give my writing to someone else to read, I always ask them to give me honest feedback, assuring them I can take it. Honest feedback is the only kind that’s of any use to me.

I generally don’t request that others read my work—I’ve been lucky enough that a lot of people have taken an interest in my writing over the years and have asked to see it themselves. But I do have three or four ‘first readers,’ who I feel comfortable asking to provide feedback on new work. The reason I feel comfortable is that I reciprocate—these are fellow writers, for the most part, and they know I’m always willing to review their work, as well. I’d recommend putting in the time to cultivate these sorts of relationships.

Even after all this effort to ensure your manuscript is thoroughly edited, chances are it will still contain a few mistakes. Every book is a work-in-progress—‘finished’ is just a word for when you’re able to let it go. But proper editing is about drastically reducing the probability that your reader will get yanked unceremoniously from the world of your story.

[image error]Scott Bartlett has been writing fiction since he was fifteen. His recently released novel, Royal Flush, is a recipient of the H. R. (Bill) Percy Prize.

Royal Flush is available in print and Kindle editions.

Read Lillie’s review of Royal Flush

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©2012 "Lillie Ammann, Writer & Editor". Use of this feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this reading this article in your feed reader, then the site is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact me at lillie@lillieammann.com

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Print Books vs. Ebooks

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Related Posts:Scripture for the Sixth Saturday in LentDevotion for Sixth Saturday in Lent 2012Scripture for the First Thursday in Advent 2010Resources for WritersNational Day of Prayer 2012Powered by Contextual Related PostsPrint Books vs. Ebooks was first posted on August 18, 2012 at 11:12 pm.
©2012 "Lillie Ammann, Writer & Editor". Use of this feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this reading this article in your feed reader, then the site is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact me at lillie@lillieammann.com

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