General Update

I thought this Thanksgiving break was going to be magical.  In five days, I was sure I could get all of my homework done (including reading four books), catch up on Nanowrimo, draft another essay for my thesis, revise my five essays, write a chapter for my novel by Tuesday, and draft two final papers for class.

What can I say?  I tried.

Here is what I did get done in terms of this project.  I got more active on Twitter, made lists, and downloaded Tweetdeck to my computer to try and sort through all of my tweets. 

I got somewhat caught up on Nanowrimo and searched through different writing groups.  I've learned since starting my own group that joining one that is already functioning is a lot easier that trying to get people to be as excited about it as I am...

I'm now almost finished drafting the introduction to my personal essays for my honors thesis and eBook. 

I also started revising my essays on compassion, marriage, and untold stories.  My goal is to have new drafts of all five of my current essays to my professors by the end of the week. 

As much as I wanted to include seven essays in this project, time is running out.  I'd like to include one more, if possible, but so far I am at 70 pages in my thesis, all of which need serious revision.  My original goal was to have all of my essays in decent drafts by December 1st.  That is this Thursday.  Crazy as it sounds, I still think I'm going to shoot for that by having an intro, acknowledgments page, and six working essays.

Discovering Twitter

Talking with Dr. Burton last week helped me understand how Twitter is a great social media resource to help me get connected with a potential audience for my eBook.  It is also a great way to find out what kinds of discussions are out there so that I can stay in the loop.  Here is a link to my profile.

Until last week I have always been a little resistant to get a Twitter account.  Isn't it just a great big Facebook status update rave?  I’m no Pynchon, but I do appreciate a little anonymity.  No one needs to hear what I ate for breakfast this morning…

But that was the same argument that I originally had against blogging, only to find that academic blogging offers a whole range of possibilities that I had not considered.  So it is with Twitter.

While being real on Twitter and having a personality is important when Tweeting, Dr. Burton helped me realize that there are ways to ensure that I am posting valuable material that others would be interested in.  I just have to think of it from their perspective and try to Tweet valuable information.  There needs to be a healthy blend between personality and focus.  Reposting blog entries, links, videos, and retweets are a great way to start.   It is also nice to attend events and comment on them while you are there.  Photos, which are something which is pretty applicable to my interests, are also easily shared on Twitter.  This means I’m probably going to visit the gravesite of my old Flickr account and update, update, update.