Web Wonderland

No proper post today as I've spent the last six hours redesigning (if you can call my basic manoeuvres 'design') my web page. There's still a lot of filler needed, but you can take a look at www.marsha-moore.com.

And if you think it's rubbish... please, don't tell me!

Coming up tomorrow: if your desk could talk, what would it say?

Two Years Old! Someone Once Told Me

It's been around for two years and rightfully so. Someone Once Told Me is a great idea. I first blogged about it about a year ago, then became a part of it myself!

Check it out for some random daily inspiration.

City Stories

I've just run across this great website, Hitotoki. It give snapshots of city life -- in words. Here's an example by Dylan Carline from the London section:

We were to meet outside the tube station in Brixton. She was an old friend I hadn’t seen for years. The premise: a date. Riding up the escalator into the night, my first time here, I noticed acute drops in temperature with each weary clunk, and a regular metallic grinding that quite clearly meant ‘please use the stairs’.

It was colder than I expected. A still night, but dry compared to what I had become used to. Trails of breath lingered, their form and meaning suspended in transient beauty, inexorably decaying from this fragile state. Once gone, they were replaced, in seamless exchange, by the heavily breathing procession of people around me. I wondered if I was the only person here without an imminent need to be in another place, and therefore the only one capable of appreciating this scene. I briefly entertained the notion that it was entirely for me. Abruptly, someone buffeted me from behind. Evidently I was in the way. Rousing myself with a deep, icy breath, I realised that I had begun to tingle slightly.

The dense ball of excitement in my stomach wouldn’t attribute itself specifically to either the forthcoming event or the fact that I was back in London. It probably comprised an amount of both. Where I live (the Lake District, in case you’re interested), you don’t see that many people, especially at night, and the ones you do see are generally all made in the same factory. I spent ten minutes waiting at the top of the escalator, but could have happily been there for an hour.

To read more, click here.

Split Personality: The Boss versus Herself

I've just finished my second week in my new job: full-time writer. Since non-voluntarily retiring from my part-time job, I decided to give up the wonderful world of the service industry to focus only on my writing. I'm in a very privileged position, I realise, to have both the encouragement from The Man and the financial means to rely on one income so that I can pursue my dream.

Still, can I just say that writing from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., Monday to Friday (and sometimes on the weekend) is really, REALLY hard? And that sometimes I would give anything to sit in an office and chat with my colleagues? Sure, rolling out of bed and into the next room sounds great. But part of me actually misses the ritual of getting dressed in my gear and joining the legions as they march to work.

When you're employed by a corporation, you don't feel that guilty slacking off sometimes. But when you're employed by you, the constant tug of war between making excuses and chastising yourself can drive you mad. Even now as I'm writing this, I'm thinking about the chapter I should be editing.

It's great to have uninterrupted flow, but I have to admit I am starting to feel a bit stir-crazy! Twitter is great, but an evil you also need to guard against. Can someone tell me: How can I stay sane working from home, yet on-task at the same time?

I'm a Star! (Of My Own Story)

Thanks to Mario at Someone Once Told Me for inviting me to send in my photo! I discovered the website thanks to Londonist, and blogged about what a cool concept it was. To my excitement (doesn't take much!), Mario emailed and asked me to send in my own photo.

'You are the story' is something a news director told me when I was interviewing for a TV reporting job in Canada. It stuck with me because it went against everything I learned in journalism school. But it is true - we are the star in the story of our lives.

Someone Once Told Me

'The story you tell yourself about your life is what your life becomes.'

I should be writing but I was distracted (as usual) by a great website, Someone Once Told Me. It's a brilliant idea by a Maltese artist living in London. People from around the world take black-and-white shots of themselves holding a sign they've written. Simple idea, but stunningly captivating. Even more so when you're procrastinating!

'Be yourself. Everyone else is taken.'

I'm struggling now to think of what I would write. 'I'm going to get published if it kills me' (uttered this morning around 7 a.m. to the Man)? 'People deserve the government they get' (contentious statement over dinner last night, discussing American Bush-isms).

What would yours be?