My eldest daughter thinks I spend too much time on my computer. Actually, she says that I spend too much time on Facebook. I tell her it’s work related, but she doesn’t believe me when I share posts on her page regarding the Zombie Apocalypse.
I have 123 actual friends on Facebook. My page for Forever Love has 487 Likes which means that I receive posts from 123 people and 487 people read my posts on Forever Love. That’s a lot of reading material whichever way you look at it.
I read posts that are funny, informative and personal. I pass on the posts I think relate to my friends, my family or my writing. I hide the posts I don’t want taking up valuable space on my page. All the time that I am busy on Facebook, I find links that are invaluable to me for promoting my writing. I find websites that offer free reviews. Others offer free or cheap promotion for authors. I find websites of authors who write in my genre or whose genre I like to read. I subscribe to newsletters, blogs, and contests. I make friends and drop some. I add comments to other’s posts. I keep myself in the loop.
I have eight windows open on my two computer screens as I write this. All but two are related to writing. Accounting software doesn’t count unless writing a cheque counts as actual writing. My iTunes window should count as writing related, since I have playlists related to my characters, but I don’t actually type any words in, so I won’t count it.
I have four email accounts. Two are business related while the other two are for me and my book. It takes about an hour every morning to sort through my emails, print the important business ones out for my husband, read and file my own and trash the rest that have come in over the evening. Throughout the day, I check for the emails that will make my day – book reviews.
Today I revised two chapters of Love’s Promises, entered one book contest, joined www.manicreaders.com, read a new review of my book on Goodreads (the reviewer would have given me 5 stars except for my numerous errors with capitalization and such -what?), checked out my Amazon.com site, followed an author’s blog, and made contact with the local library to donate copies of Forever Love (car trip tomorrow).
While I’ve been doing all of the above, I have done the dishes, unloaded and reloaded the dishwasher, washed two loads of laundry and planned my dinner menu for tonight ( something Zombie Apocalypse daughter can take to work tomorrow for her lunch).
And this is what I do. Stay Calm. Write On.