Delilah S. Dawson's Blog, page 45
December 21, 2011
input needed. no bears needed.
Things are a little different around here.
A bit grayer.
I'm combining this blog and my stylish but utterly unused writing blog. I'm trying to merge my personality as a blogger and my personality as a writer, and I'd like to know if the new look *works*.
I mean, I love duck and I love cake, but they don't combine well.
Can you imagine a cake with webbed feet? Me neither.
I'd love to hear your thoughts and advice on the new color scheme and layout!
*
December 19, 2011
I think this explains it.
The next post down is all about things not to do on Twitter, but I decided an infographic might work better.
The only problem is that if you're the bear, you're not reading this. You're sending me auto-DMs to get a follow-back so I'll buy your bear book.
how to twit
1. Join up with a purpose.
It's not like Facebook, where you just show up and make fun of your high school friends and dead dictators. You need to be there to talk about something you like. For me, that's books and publishing. I know other people who are in there for marketing, for food blogs, for Disney, for hockey. But you need a reason to communicate, an ice breaker to start conversations.
2. Post an avatar.
When you join Twitter, your default avatar is an egg. No one follows eggs or talks to eggs. Everyone hates eggs. But your avatar is tiny, so choose something interesting, clear, and intriguing, preferably not something that looks like a porn star. Unless you are a porn star.
3. Choose an @ name that doesn't sound like a spammer.
Spam accounts on Twitter tend to have lots of numbers, lots of capital letters, or could possibly be the name of someone in a foreign country trying to trick you. Recent annoying people spamming my account include QriiOCpquom1 and FredericaHauz348Q2.
4. Don't follow a bunch of people but never post.
You will look like a spammer.
5. Don't post a bunch of links to your book/blog/website and nothing else.
People will think you *are* a spammer.
6. Don't follow people and immediately @ them with a link to your book/blog/website.
At that point, you *are* a spammer.
7. When someone follows you, don't send them a generic or automatic Direct Message.
If you'd like me to unfollow you, send me a DM along these lines: Thanks for the follow back LOL!:-) Check out my book HOW TO SPAM for Kindle LOL!
8. When you follow someone and they do not immediately follow you, NEVER send a DM demanding that they follow you immediately.
That's a recipe for being unfollowed/blocked, my friend.
9. Don't be boring or complain constantly.
I mean, complaints are parts of social media, but your tweetstream should be a mixture of interesting updates, retweeted posts that you found amusing or helpful, and conversations with other tweeps. When someone follows me or joins a conversation and I'm considering following them, I look at the first 3 tweets in their stream. If those 3 tweets don't entice me, I don't follow. That's your first impression, right there.
10. Don't follow, then unfollow, then refollow someone hoping for a follow.
That's like walking up to someone and saying, "Hi, want to hang out?" And they look at you and say, "Sorry, I don't think we have a lot in common." And then you walk out the door, wait five minutes, and walk back in, then say, "Hi, want to hang out NOW?" No one falls for this gambit.
11. Remember that the whole point of Twitter is to have conversations.
On Twitter, the best advertising you can have for your book/product/brand is by being so interesting, helpful, or funny that people retweet you or recommend that others follow you. If you're annoying, repetitive, disrespectful, or whiny, no one will ever want to read what you're saying. People are pretty smart, and hitting them with 20 links a day to the same thing doesn't come across as socially savvy. It's spam, and we know it. Entice us. Intrigue us. Help us. Join us.
*
December 18, 2011
geek stories: the worst New Years ever
Remember all that flap about Y2K?
I do. But mainly I remember it as The Worst New Year's Eve Ever.
I was at my first post-college job, and I hadn't yet grown savvy to certain social conversations. For example, when your boss asks if you have any New Years plans, you say YES, or else you will be babysitting.
I stopped at Publix for supper-- a sandwich, a Cherry Coke, and a box of cupcakes for the kids, because I hadn't yet connected sugar with insanity in those under the age of 20. Back in the car, I was depressed at being single and not knowing anyone and annoyed at myself for getting hornswaggled into babysitting. I was driving fast, singing along with Cowboy Mouth, drinking my Cherry Coke.
And that's when a German Shepherd ran out into the road, right into my car.
It was the most sickening crunch ever, and I squealed my brakes and ran off the road into a field. It was dusk, and it was cold, and I was covered in Cherry Coke, as was my brand new purple Honda Civic, Trigger. I walked up and down the field, venturing into the woods as far as I could see, calling, "Here, doggie! Here, boy! Please tell me I didn't kill you, because I'll never be able to live with myself!"
But I never found the dog, and I never found any blood. I even stopped in the same place the next morning, but there was no sign that anything had happened.
I spent Y2K near tears on my boss's couch, wishing that I had a boyfriend and just regular friends and the ability to lie so that I could have spent that night being depressed on my own terms in the basement apartment where I was living. I woke up in my boss's spare bedroom the next morning with a lion on my chest.
Okay, so it was really a ginger Persian cat *shaved* like a lion, but it was surprising nonetheless.
And what did I learn?
1. Always make plans for New Years or learn to lie about it.
2. Don't drink Cherry Coke.
3. The world didn't end on Y2K.
4. It's good to have friends.
5. Keep your dogs inside.
6. If you have a ginger Persian, you should shave it as a lion.
If you live on King Road and your German shepherd came home hurt almost twelve years ago, I'm so sorry. Please consider an electric fence.
*
I do. But mainly I remember it as The Worst New Year's Eve Ever.
I was at my first post-college job, and I hadn't yet grown savvy to certain social conversations. For example, when your boss asks if you have any New Years plans, you say YES, or else you will be babysitting.
I stopped at Publix for supper-- a sandwich, a Cherry Coke, and a box of cupcakes for the kids, because I hadn't yet connected sugar with insanity in those under the age of 20. Back in the car, I was depressed at being single and not knowing anyone and annoyed at myself for getting hornswaggled into babysitting. I was driving fast, singing along with Cowboy Mouth, drinking my Cherry Coke.
And that's when a German Shepherd ran out into the road, right into my car.
It was the most sickening crunch ever, and I squealed my brakes and ran off the road into a field. It was dusk, and it was cold, and I was covered in Cherry Coke, as was my brand new purple Honda Civic, Trigger. I walked up and down the field, venturing into the woods as far as I could see, calling, "Here, doggie! Here, boy! Please tell me I didn't kill you, because I'll never be able to live with myself!"
But I never found the dog, and I never found any blood. I even stopped in the same place the next morning, but there was no sign that anything had happened.
I spent Y2K near tears on my boss's couch, wishing that I had a boyfriend and just regular friends and the ability to lie so that I could have spent that night being depressed on my own terms in the basement apartment where I was living. I woke up in my boss's spare bedroom the next morning with a lion on my chest.
Okay, so it was really a ginger Persian cat *shaved* like a lion, but it was surprising nonetheless.
And what did I learn?
1. Always make plans for New Years or learn to lie about it.
2. Don't drink Cherry Coke.
3. The world didn't end on Y2K.
4. It's good to have friends.
5. Keep your dogs inside.
6. If you have a ginger Persian, you should shave it as a lion.
If you live on King Road and your German shepherd came home hurt almost twelve years ago, I'm so sorry. Please consider an electric fence.
*
December 17, 2011
my otherwhere
So there are certain things that happen again and again in my dreams, so much so that I've started to think there's some strange, parallel universe. Like I have my own Neverwhere, but it's more of an Otherwhere.
In the Otherwhere, there are black tattoos up the inside of my left arm. There's a raven holding a key on a ribbon, a swirling line of forgotten punctuation like the pilcrow, and a series of red-winged blackbirds taking flight. There's a room I go to sometimes where the walls are made of parchment and are scrawled with all the words from poems and books I never finished. The doors are draped in red velvet with gold tassels, and the bed is a twin on the floor with sheets the deep purple of an emperor's robe.
In my dreams, there are bizarro versions of some of the places I've lived. There's a Dark Athens with twisting streets and the best bookstore in the world, not to mention a coffee bar where the espresso machine is shaped like a copper clockwork penguin and the barista wears a domino mask and is dressed like a mime. There's a bizarro mall where all the mannequins have been stripped down by strange mallrat people who believe zombies have taken over the outside world. And there's a tower-like college dormitory much like the one from Hogwarts where I keep all of my things stored in steamer trunks in case I need them. I often forget I'm in school, and when someone tells me I'm about to fail, I laugh and go to my dorm room to feed my goldfish.
I find pets that I've forgotten, skeletal snakes and dusty rats and dried-out fish tanks and my poor guinea pig who was bitten in half by my roommate's puppy. Sometimes he's been taped back together with duct tape and whistles for lettuce and monkey biscuits, and other times, he's just like I found him the day he died, in two easy pieces connected by intestines, like the slinky dog in Toy Story. One time, I put him on my head like earmuffs, and he whistled a song.
My least favorite dreams are about being chased by shadow things, things I can never escape. One time, Abraham Lincoln was chasing me around a baseball field with an axe, and I just ran around the bases again and again.
When I was little, my mom told me that dreams were the mind's playground.
Recently, I came to terms with the fact that I do some of my best work on the playground.
I'm listening, Otherwhere. Tell me more.
*
In the Otherwhere, there are black tattoos up the inside of my left arm. There's a raven holding a key on a ribbon, a swirling line of forgotten punctuation like the pilcrow, and a series of red-winged blackbirds taking flight. There's a room I go to sometimes where the walls are made of parchment and are scrawled with all the words from poems and books I never finished. The doors are draped in red velvet with gold tassels, and the bed is a twin on the floor with sheets the deep purple of an emperor's robe.
In my dreams, there are bizarro versions of some of the places I've lived. There's a Dark Athens with twisting streets and the best bookstore in the world, not to mention a coffee bar where the espresso machine is shaped like a copper clockwork penguin and the barista wears a domino mask and is dressed like a mime. There's a bizarro mall where all the mannequins have been stripped down by strange mallrat people who believe zombies have taken over the outside world. And there's a tower-like college dormitory much like the one from Hogwarts where I keep all of my things stored in steamer trunks in case I need them. I often forget I'm in school, and when someone tells me I'm about to fail, I laugh and go to my dorm room to feed my goldfish.
I find pets that I've forgotten, skeletal snakes and dusty rats and dried-out fish tanks and my poor guinea pig who was bitten in half by my roommate's puppy. Sometimes he's been taped back together with duct tape and whistles for lettuce and monkey biscuits, and other times, he's just like I found him the day he died, in two easy pieces connected by intestines, like the slinky dog in Toy Story. One time, I put him on my head like earmuffs, and he whistled a song.
My least favorite dreams are about being chased by shadow things, things I can never escape. One time, Abraham Lincoln was chasing me around a baseball field with an axe, and I just ran around the bases again and again.
When I was little, my mom told me that dreams were the mind's playground.
Recently, I came to terms with the fact that I do some of my best work on the playground.
I'm listening, Otherwhere. Tell me more.
*
December 15, 2011
build your own OMIGAH, IT'S CRIMINY PONY!
If the male lead in my book was a My Little Pony, he would look just like that.
Build your own My Little Pony right here.
But be careful-- it's seriously addictive.
*
December 14, 2011
steampunk beiber - bieber = STEAMPUNK
This is what I love about the world.
You can take something I seriously don't care about:
Justin Bieber's steampunk Christmas video.
You subtract the Bieber.
You add MOAR STEAMPUNK.
And then you get this amazing video, which I've watched twice now.
Joy to the world indeed, yo.
*
December 13, 2011
we interrupt this squeeing for a quick ? - betas?
If you acted as a beta reader or crit partner on WICKED AS THEY COME, nee BLUD, please let me know!
I have listed: Ericka, Carrie, Debbie, Austin, Charis, Kathy, and Janet.
Sybil? Beth? Krista? Were y'all in on it?
I can't find it all in my notes. ACK.
I... think we're pretty close to the deadline. Speak now or... forever... I'll feel like an ungrateful ass.
Back to my regularly scheduled, ultra-gummy squeefest down below.
I have listed: Ericka, Carrie, Debbie, Austin, Charis, Kathy, and Janet.
Sybil? Beth? Krista? Were y'all in on it?
I can't find it all in my notes. ACK.
I... think we're pretty close to the deadline. Speak now or... forever... I'll feel like an ungrateful ass.
Back to my regularly scheduled, ultra-gummy squeefest down below.
GALLEYS!
I'd like you guys to think that this is what I looked like when I opened the package on my front porch and found five galleys of my book.
Calm. Collected. Professional. Unflappable.
But... I didn't look anything like that.
The first photo was screaming...
The second photo was gummy.
Like, seriously gummy.
Like, bouncing here and there and everywhere, high adventure that's beyond compare gummy.
And then, after jumping up and down for twenty minutes, I finally captured that first photo.
But inside, I'm screaming and gummy.
It's my first galley, y'all.
My book is a book.
The cover's not on yet. But the words are there. And that's what's really important, right?
If you see me any time soon, expect that I will shove this light blue book in your face and yell, "OH MY GOD, SMELL IT. IT'S REAL," and then I'll grab it back and yell, "DON'T GET STAINS ON IT, YOU WALKING APE! I'VE ONLY GOT FIVE."
One step closer to my dreams.
*
December 12, 2011
snippets
Life moves pretty fast.
I take all these pictures, thinking, "If I don't blog about that, I'll forget it, and I don't want to forget it, even if it's silly."
So here are a few of the random photos on my camera.
Things that make little sense and will never show up in the albums.
Snippets.
*
Elf on the Shelf?
No way.
That little voyeur can stay in the armoire. We have a different sort of holiday vigilante.
Ginger.
This is the gingerbread man who's been amusingly terrorizing our house. He swings from chandeliers, climbs trees, and lines up all the shoes.
My daughter is half in love with him. And half terrified.
Kind of like Twilight, but made of ginger.
*
These are my new fleece pants.
I have never worn fleece pants before.
Now... I may never wear anything else.
My other pair features polar bears in bobble caps.
If you haven't worn fleece pants before, do yourself a favor.
Go buy some. They're only, like, $10.
Buy the silliest ones you can.
You will fall in love with them. You will write sonnets to them.
Oh fleecy pants / thou art to me / the fuzziest thing / that I could seeLike clouds of love / upon my legs / the bastard child of marshmallows and L'Eggs.
They're that good.
*
This is my eyeball.
I'm getting Lasik in February.
I'm giddy. The thought of waking up in the middle of the night and being able to see the alarm clock is so exciting I just about can't stand it. Not to mention not having to juggle contacts and geek glasses on airplanes. And the ocean! I'll be able to swim *and* see!
When asked my eye color, I say, "Lake-ish."
Or hazel. Depending.
They have a surgery now that can turn your eyes blue. When I was younger, I used to think that if I prayed hard enough, I would wake up with blue eyes, and I would be the prettiest girl on earth. Then I read THE BLUEST EYE and decided I was a horrible person who really had things pretty good and could not complain.
Sometimes, I still dream that they're blue.
*
I take all these pictures, thinking, "If I don't blog about that, I'll forget it, and I don't want to forget it, even if it's silly."
So here are a few of the random photos on my camera.
Things that make little sense and will never show up in the albums.
Snippets.
*
Elf on the Shelf?
No way.
That little voyeur can stay in the armoire. We have a different sort of holiday vigilante.
Ginger.
This is the gingerbread man who's been amusingly terrorizing our house. He swings from chandeliers, climbs trees, and lines up all the shoes.
My daughter is half in love with him. And half terrified.
Kind of like Twilight, but made of ginger.
*
These are my new fleece pants.
I have never worn fleece pants before.
Now... I may never wear anything else.
My other pair features polar bears in bobble caps.
If you haven't worn fleece pants before, do yourself a favor.
Go buy some. They're only, like, $10.
Buy the silliest ones you can.
You will fall in love with them. You will write sonnets to them.
Oh fleecy pants / thou art to me / the fuzziest thing / that I could seeLike clouds of love / upon my legs / the bastard child of marshmallows and L'Eggs.
They're that good.
*
This is my eyeball.
I'm getting Lasik in February.
I'm giddy. The thought of waking up in the middle of the night and being able to see the alarm clock is so exciting I just about can't stand it. Not to mention not having to juggle contacts and geek glasses on airplanes. And the ocean! I'll be able to swim *and* see!
When asked my eye color, I say, "Lake-ish."
Or hazel. Depending.
They have a surgery now that can turn your eyes blue. When I was younger, I used to think that if I prayed hard enough, I would wake up with blue eyes, and I would be the prettiest girl on earth. Then I read THE BLUEST EYE and decided I was a horrible person who really had things pretty good and could not complain.
Sometimes, I still dream that they're blue.
*
