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Inspiration required.. i'm stuck.
I know the good folk of TB will leap to the rescue. I am doing a WB writing course and amboline's success has inspired me to have another go at it. But i really REALLY dont know what to write about. I'm supposed to write several articles suitable for magazine submission (non fiction) and i guess i'm really not that interesting as i have nothing to say and ABSOLUTELY NO B****Y idea what to write!
I love horses, cats, writing (of course) but i dont feel i'm qualified to write anything suitable for those markets! Help! ANY suggestions welcome (polite or otherwise). Its actually making me feel abit miserable as i seriously cant think of anything.
I love horses, cats, writing (of course) but i dont feel i'm qualified to write anything suitable for those markets! Help! ANY suggestions welcome (polite or otherwise). Its actually making me feel abit miserable as i seriously cant think of anything.
Comments
The secret in topic finding is to allocate yourself a topic and then to persue it regardless of sideline distractions.
Any help.
It must have been frustrating when people had to write with a chisel on stone, or other forms of inscription - the Romans, I think, used clay tablets to write to each other. This might be worth investigating for an article, the different methods through the the ages, or in different cultures, different materials eg wood, clay,reeds, etc.
Any help?
What about your days? Think about your days the way we were thinking about conflict, where you go, what you see, your thoughts on shopping, travel, etc.
Have a look at women's magazines and where you might find something suitable for a readers' letter, see if it will expand into an article. I've written about housework, house plants, emotional problems (always a good seller!) - for starters.
(If you didn't see it when I put the link up a few weeks ago- it can be found at http://www.nottinghamshiretimes.co.uk/ShoppingDIY.html )
Have a look at what sort of things are appearing in magazines currently- then apply that to your list.
What sort of magazines would want more general interest items? You both have mentioned fantastic ideas - where would i pitch them? (thats one of the things i need for the assignment).
Most of the womens' magazines have articles, but it does vary on what they will except from freelancers.
But the pets moving abroad idea would be very useful- personal experience is invaluable. And both Mutley and Cooper have personal experiences of this.
Where on earth did you find enough info on the gorse? i'm totally thick about using the web to find things!
I had a couple of books on native plants at home, and I googled gorse in conjunction with things that I imagined it might be connected to - herbalism (applies to just about every plant on the planet as far as I can see), local names, farming, food, etc. Then followed links from one site to another. Wikipedia is quite a good starting point. You just need to make sure you cross-reference if you're using the internet, to make sure the info has some authority. That can bring up some interesting differences which you can also follow up.
I think the sifting of info is one of the main skills in writing articles. Then making it sound lively.
And it's not too soon to be thinking of Christmas articles - or, as it's for your course so can be saved to fit later, any other festival.
10 things you didn't know about
Shakespeare?
St Swithin
Independence day? etc etc
Jenny, thanks for the tip i'm in the uk in a week or so and i'll nip and get a copy. I can't BELIEVE how much stuff is out there!
Alternatively if you put: refining google searches into a google search (which is what I just did!), you could probably find out straight away! Try it first without quotes round the words - the results on the first page look more interesting!
Good luck
Horses: to shoe, or not to shoe - that is the question
The debate rages back here where our horse grazes, for example my daughters horse is a thoroughbred and has been shod for the past 14 years. He is a "rescued" ex-race horse, was retired because he tended to injure himself alot (bearing in mind he was only 3 at this stage), and didnt do well on the few times he was on the track. Anyway, he has shows from spring to early winter, then gets go shoeless for the winter. Sometimes he has to be in shoes all year round because if he is going in any events, the shoes help steady him in yukky weather, and if he has any tenderness in his legs the shoes give him some firmness etc etc. Well our boy grazes with several horses, one of them being another TB, and he is also a rescued horse from the meat works so to speak. His owners have schooled up on natural horsemanship and all other things natural, and the horse does not wear shoes at all at any time of the year, and does not get a cover during the wet/cold months - reason being "they dont have shoes and covers in the wild". Farrier & other horsey people alike who have had more experience with horses all comment that this particular horse was never "in the wild", he has been shod and worn covers for most of his life. TB's were never wild full stop. They were bred for the race and track conditions. Now were this horse a rescued "Kaimanawa" horse (check out wikipedia for more professional definition, but essentially this is a horse that roams free in the hills in central north Island of NZ & every now and then conversation dept goes out and rounds up as many as possible to cull the herd, and horse enthusiasts who know alot about kaimanawa help find appropriate placements for as many as possible), now if the domestic/TB horse had been raised in the wild then well'n'good but TB's are not, and as such have not evolved over time any mechanisms to adapt to "wild". Well the debate goes on.
Another topic: should townies be restricted to the number of cats they can have in one household - there have been rumblings here and in Australia I think, that there should be a restriction to say two cats, as opposed to someone I know who has nine cats. (We have six but I live on three acres in the country and I ensure they are all speyed & neutered). There are neighbours to be concerned about (in the city) their gardens being dug up etc, some consider cats to be "dirty" animals, domestic cats that have been left behind by previous owners roam and if not desexed cause a lot of problems with fighting; kittens are left abandoned by mother cats & end up having litters of their own; the little birdlife in the city is at risk of dessimation from both feral and tame cats. On the reverse of this argument though is that most cat owners are responsible, and desex their cats, have them vaccinated, and fed so they dont tend to wander too far, and some put bells etc on cat collars so the birds can hear the cats coming. It is interesting that local council dont suggest that families should restrict the population of humans - i.e. only so many babies per family, because of the "potential" trouble they may cause, and the contribution they will make to an already deteriorating environment i.e. they may end up owning a car, they may pollute the air with sounds of loud music, they may roam the streets at night, spray can in hand etc. Crazy idea but may give you something to write about in amoungst all that.
Ours was a rescue cat, she'd been taken back to the shelter 3 times as she had constant diarrhea. I did a food diary and found she had an allergy to maize, probably brought about by being taken away from her mum too early and fed proprietary cat food (maize is in them all).
So you could write about the fact that things like this can happen, ask for quotes from a vet etc.
When we took her down our vets she was quite ill. They also offered homeopathy -so you could write about that as well -alternative therapies for animals. Do they work?
Because Milla could not eat maize or grains, we had to keep her out of the kitchen so she didn't pick up crumbs. She will not cross the threshold now, she sits and watches us. We trained her with a water pistol -it works a treat. We used it to keep her off surfaces we did not want her on, like shelves with ornaments etc. It even worked when she HAD been allowed to do something -she used to be able to sit on the sofas but when we got new ones i didn't want cat hair on them so we used the water pistol on her any time she leapt up, and now she never attempts to get on. She does however know she can leap on our lap when we are sitting on them. There is a also a Russian who has taught cats to do all sorts of things using just treats.
Don't know if any of this will give you ideas.
A way of finding things to write about is to do an internet search - strange facts about cats, or dogs or horses or whatever.
Phil.