Night Owl Reviews Contest!

Hey! You can get free stuff if you particpate in Night Owl Reviews Spring Fling! It's a web hunt. You need to be 18 or older to participate as some of the sites and books are erotic. But this contest promises to be fun. Check it out!

Awesome Quote and Creepy News

This from Caitlin Kittredge: "I have the attention span of a six year old hopped up on pixy stix and coke. (The drink, not the drug, although I probably do have a cokehead attention span, when it comes down to it.)"

I hear you, girl. I so hear you.

This little tidbit made me so happy I wanted to run around screaming in glee. Stephen King will be writing at least one episode of The Walking Dead I love the Walking Dead. So much so that it makes me feel warm and fuzzy just thinking of being able to lie on my couch with a bunch of cushions behind me watching it. I'd even venture to say that it makes me feel downright blissful in anticipation.

King also said that he intends to co-write and episode with son Joe Hill, who is a fantastic writer, and creeped the hell out of me with his book Heart-shaped Box. Loved it.

So happy news today. I'm bouncing off now to do some real work, at my job, since my lunch is almost over :)

The Temptation of the New, Sparkly Idea

Paperback Writer did a wonderful post here about how a writer can be harassed by characters and ideas to the point of having to put aside the current story ad start something new. It happens to me a lot. I try to resist, but it's very difficult. That sparkly new idea is so tempting.

Sometimes the new idea or character promises things they can't yet deliver. You follow them on a path that leads to nowhere. But sometimes it's a wild ride that brings you to all kinds of amazing places, so fast it might be hard to keep up. This happened to me with the latest Leah Book, Dirty Business. It's really a lot of fun when that happens, as exhausting as it is.

Currently, I'm trying hard to keep my mind on Dead for Good, the current book which I've already abandoned once, but new ideas and characters for two different books keep injecting themselves into my thoughts. It's terrible, because I'm easily distracted, and the new ideas are always so persuasive.

I'll keep trying to finish this book, though. If only just to finish it. It just isn't right to keep it waiting in the wings.

Mind Shift

This is a fantastic idea. I think back to when I was a kid in school, sitting at a desk in one of several rows, staring out the window because I was bored out of my mind. Having a teacher stand in front of the class and just talk at us from a text book was not the way for me to learn.

I'm the same way today. I need stimulation to learn. I love this project.

Things are much different today. Kids have computers in their classes instead of sitting with just a pen and notebook in front of them, for instance. That's very cool. But there is still need for change.

Sandy Speicher, who leads IDEO's Design for Learning Program, describes the program as, "Unpredictable, inconsistent, and designed to be wildly relevant for learners, their engagement, and their development."

The world is rapidly changing. Old models and paradigms are obsolete.

It's time our ways of teaching change as well.

Creativity and Exercise

I'm in the third week of P90X, and finding myself feeling more creative. I've always found that exercise helped me with creative thinking, but this is amazing. Too bad I haven't figured out how to do the writing AND the P90X at the same time! Here is a cool article outlining various ways that exercise helps brain function in general. One bit in particular stands out:

Physical Exercise Helps Higher Brain Functions-Study

Before enrolling in the trial, and four months later, the cognitive abilities of the participants were tested in four areas: memory, executive functioning, attention/concentration, and psychomotor speed.

Compared to the medication group, the exercisers showed significant improvements in the higher mental processes of memory and in "executive functions" that involve planning, organization, and the ability to mentally juggle different intellectual tasks at the same time.

"What we found so fascinating was that exercise had its beneficial effect in specific areas of cognitive function that are rooted in the frontal and prefrontal regions of the brain," said Blumenthal. "The implications are that exercise might be able to offset some of the mental declines that we often associate with the aging process."11

Very cool. So if you're feeling creatively blocked, try working out. It does help.