Category Archives: Blogging 101

Blogging 101 | Post 3 – ‘ritin’ rampage!

cropped-new_writesomethingtoday1.jpgDecision to Quit

When I signed up for this course, I decided come hell or high water, I would complete it this time. I got behind, as expected, woefully behind. In fact, this is only my third post of the sixteen assignments we’ve been given so far. I actually decided this past weekend that I was going to give up on this again.

What Decision?

I woke up this morning and changed my mind. I decided, right or wrong, that I am going to get caught up before Friday and complete this course – finally. So, I’m starting a writing marathon, no, like the title says, a ‘ritin’ rampage. That’s what I’m going to do – go on a freaking rampage and write thousands and thousands of words and publish them all.
Let’s get started with this.

All good boys deserve a favor.

Four score and twenty years ago.

Whistle while you work.

Fly away little Starling…fly, fly, fly.

Ooooops!

Sorry about that! Those quotes are completely unrelated to the topic at hand. They were just some poor, pitiful attempts at humor from poor, pitiful me. The topic is writing to get caught up, and I am starting with today’s assignment, since it’s easy – it’s already done.

Sharing and Publicizing, Oh My!

This is the real assignment for today, and like I said, I am already doing it. Currently, whenever I publish something on this blog, it automatically notifies or posts on these social media services: Facebook, Google+, Twitter, Tumblr, and Path. I have to admit though, either all the articles I’ve shared on social media were lousy, or the people who look at my social media sites aren’t interested in reading. Who knows, but I’ll keep at it.

So, This One is Done

The rampage is started, the coffee is flowing, and somehow the words are falling out of my brain onto the keyboard. Call this assignment done, if you will. If not, I will. Next up, I believe, will be a two-fer, if I can make it work.

Stay tuned!

Blogging 101 | Post 2 – Did the Photo Entice You?

Winslow SunsetAbout The Photo

First, let me ask you a question. Did the photo entice you in any way to read this post? Was there any appeal? Do you think you would have bothered to read this without the photo? We’ll get back to this in a few minutes.

Failure to Lunch

It’s well past lunchtime. I decided not to take part, again. I’m too involved with the coffee I am still drinking, again. And I guess you might say I am involved with writing for this course. Again! I tried this past weekend to get caught up, though if I’m honest, I didn’t try very hard. Staying up all night to watch 12 straight hours of The Walking Dead then sleeping most of the following day doesn’t qualify as writing for this blog.

My Title and Tagline

But I am here now, missing lunch and drinking my coffee, to get back on track. As I said previously, I am determined to complete this course this time. The post I wrote for my earlier attempt to complete Blogging 101 pretty much covers my thoughts on my title and tagline. They both still describe what I want to accomplish with this blog. I’m not changing them.

Quoting My Own Article – Cool!

Although this is pretty cool, quoting myself is not the real purpose. Since I have blogged here for a while, I’m going to share a couple of tidbits that I have learned and wrote about. The quotes come from the article I published last November.

While we are taking this course, we kind of have a captive, willing, and participative audience. We all want other BU101er’s to read and comment, and maybe even follow our blogs. Michelle gives us the assignments and guidance, we do the work (even when it’s late) and post our links to The Commons, which gets us interacting with each other.

When this course is finished, and you start posting in the “Wild World of WordPress,” without the benefit of The Commons, this is what happens.

You write and write and write and edit and revise and write and edit and revise some more. Finally, you get ready to hit that publish button. First, though, you need to get your categories set and then pick your oh-so-important tags. Then you hit that magic button.

Within seconds, your post makes it to the top of the list for the tags you selected. For example, suppose you chose blogging as a tag. If you looked at the WordPress tag cloud page and selected the blogging tag, you would end up on this page, where you would find your post at or near the top of the page. But not for long! As soon as more bloggers post their content, they capture the top spot, and just like on Google, the top is the prime page real estate. That is why I wrote this.

Exposure [on WordPress], I believe, is a momentary piece of timing and luck. In other words, you have a very short period of time for readers to view your post and be compelled enough to read it and decide if it merits enough effort to investigate your blog further.~Rich Richardson, from my post Writing Success on WordPress

Back to the Picture

You’ve figured out by now that the photo is not related in any way to content in this post. That is why I asked the questions. Go back to the page with the blogging tags. Scan down and look at several posts. How many do you see with a photo at the top? I’ll venture that more than half of them do. My picture is there to entice you to read this, and if it helped at all, it served its purpose. That is why I wrote this, which is quoted from the same article.

Third: I believe anything you post is going to fail the timing and exposure tests unless you have a great, or at least good photo to go along with it. I believe this based on my own experience: To date, I have published 88 posts to this blog. Of those 88, the top three posts with the most “Likes” all included decent photographs. In descending order, they are: Weekly Photo Challenge: Street Life | 2, “Super Sport” | Photo Challenge – Letters, and Weekly Photo Challenge: Street Life.~Rich Richardson, from my post Writing Success on WordPress

 Good Writers Write Good

Good writing, as with any other endeavor, requires mastering the fundamentals. For me, it means once again reviewing the basics, which is why I decided to enroll in the Coursera course Crafting an Effective Writer: Tools of the Trade. It provides a really good review of the basic mechanics of writing English prose.

I’m also enrolled in Pre-College English, a free, online course from Saylor Academy.

If you feel like you need help with your writing, by all means keep writing, but find a course that suits you. There are plenty of offerings on the ‘net – just look.

Good luck to all.

Blogging 101| Introducing Me and “Three” – Part 2

Blogging 101 LogoThe Number Three(s)

To fully understand and appreciate this, you should read Part 1. You can read it here. It’s like serial fiction from the “olden” days, back when I was young and could write more than one paragraph without falling asleep – as I am about to do.

Since publishing the first part of this and now, I had a rethink, and discovered that I shorted myself by two three’s in Part 1. (See what I mean? If you didn’t read Part 1, you don’t have a clue about the three’s, do you?) It turns out, after my rethink, that I am exactly three days behind in this course and exactly three posts behind to get caught up in all the daily assignments. That is two more three’s to add to the existing five, so applying a little math now gives me seven three’s.

Now I know enough from watching television shows on different educational networks and learning a little about gambling over the years to know that seven is a lucky number. So I claimed my luck from the earlier post, but now I am truly claiming my lucky number seven, and all the three’s it took to get there.

Watch Closely, Now!

So now that I have you truly confused, I have you exactly where I want you. In your confusion I have you in a weakened and vulnerable state and I can perform great feats of magic and sleight of hand and mystical feats – so much that you will be overwhelmed with my great talent and be greatly persuaded that you have never read such great writing as you are now.

It’s all in the misdirection.               Look over there, it’s a UFO!!!

See how easy that was.

Now, About That Introduction

This is actually the easy part. Since this is my third attempt to complete this – as I stated earlier, and you would know if you bothered to read Part 1 – but if you didn’t, yes it is true, this is my third try at Blogging 101. It’s not as if it is terribly hard, it’s just I have terrible issues – one being a complete inability to manage my time. So I get a little behind and stressed over being a little behind and then I get a little further behind and stressed over that and get even further behind and even more stressed. Then I quit.

At least that describes my previous two attempts. Not this time, though. Yes, it is true I am a little behind; and yes, I’ll confess to being a little stressed about it. But…this time I am writing until I drop to get caught up.

Three attempts means this is my third time writing an introduction, so I am making this easy. I am “repurposing” the introductions from my first two attempts. Between the two, you will get a pretty good idea of who I am and why I am here.

The “Introduction” links from the previous attempts to complete Blogging 101 are here. First attempt on April 16, 2014. Second attempt on November 14, 2014.