I love catalogs. Always have. One year for Christmas my family and I set a $2 per person budget. My sister gave me $2 worth of candy and a massive box of catalogs. One of the. Best. Presents. Ever.
And because I love catalogs, I cherish my Crate & Barrel and Pottery Barn catalogs, reading and re-reading them again and again—until I’m reminded of my Dave Ramsey budget. :)
Still, it doesn’t cost a thing to look at these impressive catalogs. And today I noticed something especially nice about the current Crate & Barrel catalog and a total miss with the current Pottery Barn catalog.
Both have Twitter and Facebook mentions on the back side of the catalog … but only Crate & Barrel gives a specific screen name and URL. Pottery Barn presumes that I’ll take the time to find them. Harrumph. Nope. Not gonna.
But thanks to Crate & Barrel’s thoughtfulness, I’m now following them on Twitter. Very nice. Very friendly.
What up, Pottery Barn? You’ve got about 1,000 more followers than C&B (for now) but you gonna help a girl out next time?
My sister got laid off the other day.
She is, er, was, the office manager for a small architectural firm. Been there almost 16 years. Started the week our mom died. (She’s dedicated, let me tell ya.)
The whole place shut down. Three people, including one whose wife battling cancer, are out of work. The building’s going up for sale.
No matter how you look at it, it’s just plain sad. It’s been such a downer that I feel like I got laid off. (Did I mention that I take things personally?)
While I’m excited that she has a new chapter ahead of her, the whole family is still reeling from the news. In fact, it’s made just about everything a little bit harder. Including writing.
No matter what’s happening in your world, big or small, chaotic or catastrophic, there are those days, whether by happenstance or circumstance when writing is such a chore.
Here are some super-simple ways to overcome:
Having conquered my fear of canning a couple of weeks ago, I decided to try my hand at pickling and canning hot peppers. Jalapeno and banana peppers to be exact.
Mind you, this was last night after a long work day and after sprinting through a few household chores, including whipping up a classic Mollie Katzen recipe.
Somehow, near-midnight canning seemed like a smart thing to do. At least in the annals of my exhausted, irrational brain.
Although pre-warned from years of watching my favorite cooking shows, I chose to ignore the expert advice to wear gloves while handling hot peppers.
“Whatchu talkin’ ’bout,” I thought as I hand-washed, sliced and de-seeded a couple dozen hot peppers. “They’re not hot. They’re so mild it’s ridiculous. Besides, gloves are for sissies.”
Oh. My. Heavens.
Apparently, you can’t see hot but you can feel it.
My hands turned red and started burning. First from the outside. Then from the inside. Badly. Really badly. Cry-to-my-mommy badly.
Hot, fiery pain.
Meanwhile, my dear one was off elsewhere in the house, blissfully unaware of my blistering pain. What was the remedy for hot pepper burns? Oh ow oh ow ow. I did not want to tip him off to my current stupidity so …
I tried washing – worse.
Milk – temporary.
Butter – soothing.
Alcohol – crazy.
Gojo
Lemon juice – eeh.
Baking soda – ahh.
Aloe vera – uh huh.
All of them all at once – yes, yes, When Harry Met Sally
So, everything I do (even canning) brings me back to my thing: writing.
Writing? Really? What does this pickled pepper pain story and writing have in common, you ask?
Only this:
Learn from others. Heed and follow best practices.
Cooks: Handling hot peppers requires wearing gloves.
Writers: Writing well requires thoughtful and purposeful placement of words followed by ruthless editing.
P.S. My efforts yielded exactly two, count ‘em two, jars of pickled peppers, including this one:
Last week I went to the SWAY Workshop in Athens.
Here’s a photo of me (the too-blonde on the right) with Nancy Huston, a doula and B&B owner who, like me, wanted to learn more about social media and search marketing.
Nancy would honestly admit that she’s a veritable, ahem, newborn on the topic, while I’m an SEO copywriter well-versed in search marketing.
Still, we both got plenty out of the workshop.
For Nancy, it was an opportunity to be exposed to terminology, concepts and ideas for the first time. For me, it was a reminder of things I know and teach, presented with a few new twists. More importantly, for both of us it was a day out of the office focusing on our businesses.
When’s the last time you did something for you or your business? When’s the last time you took a refresher course? When’s the last time you revisited a topic you thought you knew (er, like writing …)?
Yes, it was common sense stuff to a veteran like me, but it was still extremely valuable. That’s how common sense stuff works. It takes being reminded of it again and again.
That’s how the king of common sense, Dr. Phil, gained his following. I love him, btw, and not just because I was on the show, but because he takes that all that common sense stuff we forget and retells it in a way that we can remember.
Isn’t it time you invested time, money or resources into a little common sense training to refresh and re-energize you or your business? What would you like to learn? What would you hope to gain? Post a comment here and I’ll share some ideas with you.
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