I surely do.  I recently spent twelve tortuous days that were an illustration by God:  somewhere, sometime, I did a very bad something.  And He remembered.

On the other hand, if I look that those days from a different perspective:  the fact that they weren’t worse–and didn’t involve a couple of circumstances that surely should have happened–given Mother Nature and the law of averages–I was clearly rewarded for being a saint.

I started out believing Karma had it in for me … and ended being grateful for my wonderful good luck.  As the famous Donald McHenry is quoted in Taking the Mystery Out of Business:  9 Fundamentals for Professional Success:

“Why is it that successful people seem to have a lot of good luck?  Successful people make their own luck by putting themselves in so many good situations good luck seems to follow them.  Ergo: the harder you work, the luckier you are.”

These days, I work real hard at maintaining a positive attitude.  And I’m lucky–it’s working for me.

How’s Karma treating you lately?

I thought I’d share an article Lois co-wrote with fellow speaker, Steve Weber, not only because it’s interesting but also to illustrate that if you think it’s tough speaking in public as yourself, imagine what it would be like to be Louis or Forrest Gump!  Here’s the link to the article they co-wrote for the national magazine, Speaker Article.

Feel free to share your thoughts about public speaking…

And remember that true friends are just as important on Valentine’s Day as our other loved ones!  I love you, Lois!

In October 2003, I moved to Montana where I lived until last February, and it’s a 2,700-mile drive from Attleboro to Evaro, the tiny town 20 miles north of Missoula where I settled in the mountains on 10 acres of forested land.  (I was born in New York City and moved to Massachusetts when I was 11 years old; I’ve lived most of my life in Massachusetts.)

Yes, the picture appearing at the top of this post is what I saw when I stood on the front porch of my Montana house and looked north.  It’s pretty much what I saw when I looked south, east, and west as well–although only between the months of November and April!  A few of my favorite Montana pics, taken by yours truly, pepper this post.

When you head west by car, you can literally feel things calm down:  the frenetic pace of motorists disappears, speech patterns slow, and people become more warm and open.  The landscape, as you’d imagine, changes too.  The rolling hills of New England and Pennsylvania turn flat as you drive between endless cornfields, silver silos, and big, red barns.  Fog embraces you when you skirt Lake Michigan, obscuring the skyline of Chicago, and the wind nearly blows you off the arrow-straight highway as you make your way across the badlands of South Dakota.

When you head east on the way back, the scenery is even more beautiful.  There’s nothing quite like looking down as you drive through  a mountain pass over the Continental Divide at an elevation of 6,300 feet.  The stark beauty of the Crow Indian Reservation reminds you about the history of the wild west and prepares you to drive through the towns of Sundance and Buffalo in Wyoming and Spearfish and Deadwood in South Dakota.

In addition to the awe-inspiring views, the variety of wildlife takes your breath away:  the enormous bald eagle standing right beside the highway, trying to figure a way to chase off the three turkey vultures munching on a carcass.  White-tail deer, mule deer, elks, antelope, coyotes, hawks, marmots, muskrats, raccoons–you name it, we saw it.

I didn’t take any pictures as I completed this fourth, and probably final, trip between Attleboro and Evaro.  I want to remember all the joy I experienced in Montana–not the sadness of leaving it.  They say people are the same everywhere but I don’t believe it.  The people in Montana were the warmest, most welcoming people I ever met.  (Click here for my magazine article, I’m Home, which was published in Three Rivers Lifestyle magazine in 2006.)

My family, however, is here in Masschusetts and they hold a bigger piece of my heart than Montana does.  Which is as it should be.  My family taught me about love, and about following my heart wherever it leads me.  I’m a richer, happier person for having lived in Montana and experienced the last best place.  I’m richer still as I surround myself with my father, siblings, children, and grandchildren.

Home isn’t a place.  It’s a safe haven wrapped in the arms of people who love you.

Yes, I’m more of an auditory communicator and learner than a visual or kinesthetic one.  Yes, I can play musical instruments.  And yes, I listen to music often–but not all the time.

What do you think it means?  Is my unconscious trying to tell me something?  Should I sift through the musical messages to find fodder for the new mystery novel I’m writing?  Am I too dense to realize I have ESP and someone’s speaking to me?  Am I going nuts?

Do you know what prompts your never-ending-tune?  What do you do about it?

So, in an effort to educate those without any publishing experience, here’s a brief outline of some facts I think you should know when considering to self-publish.  Of course, this is only my personal opinion so I’m counting on the rest of you–published and self-published alike–to chime in here to assist the uneducated.

Traditional publishing:  The writer sells his or her work to a publisher, who pays the author for the rights to publish it.  The publisher pays the costs associated with transforming the writer’s manuscript into a book–whether it’s a hardcover, paperback, or ebook.  This includes editing, printing, some publicity, etc.  The author doesn’t pay the publisher anything.  Depending upon whether the publisher is a large conglomerate  or a small press, the writer will either receive an advance and royalties in exchange for the rights to publish the book or will simply receive royalties. 

• Examples of large conglomerate traditional publishers include St. Martin’s Press, Simon & Schuster, and Harlequin
• Examples of small, independent publishers include Norlights Press, Oak Tree Books, and Red Sage Publishing

Self-publishing:  The writer controls all aspects of the publication of the work–and pays all the costs associated with publication.  This includes editing, printing, and publicity.  The self-published author may pay a publisher to handle publication (sometimes called a vanity, or subsidy, publisher) or can handle everything himself or herself.

All the details about book publication are negotiated and spelled out in a contract when a writer contracts with any type of publisher.

The popularity of print on demand services (the publisher prints books as they’re ordered rather than printing a large quantity at one time, before most orders are received) has given many people the impression that writers published by small, independent presses are self-published.  Not true.  A self-published writer may certainly get his or her books to market via print on demand services, but so can an independent press or a traditional publisher.

With the proliferation of small, independent presses, it’s a lot easier for writers to get published these days.  The publication of ebooks is also helping writers get published more easily.

I provided a couple of links for you to check out if you’d like a little more detail.  What does anyone else have to add?

• What is an Independent Publisher?
• Top 101 Independent Book Publishers by John Kremer
• Independent Book Publishers Association
• Independent Publisher Book Awards
• Self-publishing a book: 25 things you need to know
• Is Self-Publishing for You
• What is Self-Publishing?
• Writer Beware

With the wide screen monitors in the photo shown above (which sit on the desk in my office), I can have 4 documents or screens open at the same time.  This eliminates the need for much of the paper on my desk, including the easel that took up a lot of space in the area I preferred to use for writing notes.  Of course, if you’re not blind as a bat like I am, you might be able to move the easel more than arm’s distance away!

I find the dual monitors especially helpful when I’m conducting online research or when I’m writing and have to copy information or need to refer to details.  The larger the monitor, the large the font size I can use, which really saves on eye strain.  Hint:  my super-smart, computer geek son-in-law informed me you can reduce eye strain by making sure the room in which you sit when working at the computer is neither too bright nor too dark.  I always thought bright light was best but he says it isn’t–and he’s right!  I also found that if the light in the room is indirect (not overhead and not within my field of vision when looking straight ahead) I don’t suffer as much eye strain.

I purchased my second monitor (the one on the right side of the photo) for $99.  Brendon (the genius son-in-law) referred me to an online site where I purchased the video card for my computer.  For under $200 and one beer (that was Brendon’s fee), my monitor was installed and operational in about 15 minutes.  Of course, that was after I ordered the video card online and waited for it to be delivered!

Seriously, you should consider the dual monitors.  Anyone else out there use them?  Care to share your thoughts?

Here’s the free lesson.  Apostrophes are used for the following major purposes:  (1) To indicate one or more letters have been omitted, as in a contraction: don’t (the “o” is missing); and (2) To indicate possession, as in Linda’s rant about apostrophes.

There are other reasons to use apostrophes, but they are all related to the preceding.  So, how do I see apostrophes being misused? Let me count the ways:

I heard that song in the 1970′s. What’s the omitted letter? Where is the possession? It should be the 1970s.

The slate outside your front door says The Faulkner’s. If you want the sign to indicate that the house belongs to the Faulkners (i.e., possession), I guess it’s okay. But if you want the sign to indicate two or more people named Faulkner live in the house, the slate should say The Faulkners – as in the plural of a singular Faulkner.  (Each of us is exceptionally singular, by the way.)

Merry Christmas from the Smith’s:  Bert, Bertha, Bertie, and Bertina.  NO APOSTROPHE!  The Smiths is the plural of a singular Smith. 4 Smiths = plural; 1 Smith = singular. The Christmas message isn’t about possession.

Now that you get the idea, please report apostrophe abuse by commenting here.  Maybe we can eradicate the damned nuisances.

Personally, I don’t care for pornography.  But you know what?  No one has ever forced me to watch it.  In fact, I’ve never accidentally “stumbled” upon it, either–unless you count one or two pop-ups on my computer.  And once I had the proper Internet security in place, that stopped!

If you don’t like the idea of censorship, here are a few links I checked out while I researched this SOPA thing.  Hope they help!

• PSA:  Writers, Censorship, and SOPA by Melissa Donovan
• What Wikipedia has to say
• The most recent Forbes article
• H.R. 3261 on the Library of Congress website

Feel free to comment and provide us with additional links and perspectives.

I was 12 years old when she explained what I needed to do to contact the publishers of magazines to submit my work for consideration.  No one was interested in buying stories about the adventures of Throckmorton the frog, but the experience of submitting my work–and receiving rejections–stayed with me for years.  In a good sense.  I felt important because the publishers actually responded to my submissions!  You see, my family didn’t think it was possible for a kid to get published.

Fast forward 34 years to the event of the publication of my first newspaper column.  During the next 7 years I published numerous magazine articles, insurance education books and courses, and my first novel.  During a radio interview about the upcoming release of my mystery Second Time Around,  the interviewer asked me what motivated me to be a published writer.

I immediately thought of two women:  my mother–who told me I could do anything I set my mind to, and Pat Goldman–who showed me how to do what I’d set my mind to.

My life wouldn’t be the same without those two women and their support … and belief in me.

Who changed YOUR life?

I bribed my friends, fans, and business associates to visit my new website with the promise of entering them in a drawing for a free book if they’d comment in response to my January 4th blog post.  Well, it worked.  I got lots of visits to the website, many comments on the blog, and even more personal emails.

If you left your website along with your comment, I’ll be cross-promoting and marketing you on Twitter and/or Facebook as a thank you for your support.

And, if you didn’t leave your website with a previous comment, doing so in the future will net the same results.

Thanks for all your kind comments and good wishes.

Happy, healthy, prosperous 2012!