Tag Archives: blog

Recycling…

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If you spend any time reading the recommendations about “how to be a bestselling author in 978 easy steps” one that they come back to time and again is how important it is to get new material in front of readers as quickly as possible. That sounds well and good until you really start to think about the sheer amount of time and effort that goes into something as seemingly simple as publishing a “short” 150 page book. The reality is that I don’t see any way to do it in less than 18 months that doesn’t involve either giving up my day job or not sleeping. While one of those options would be temporarily awesome, it would inevitably lead to poverty and starvation. recyclingThe other would probably lead to some kind of REM-deprived psychosis. Neither is an option I find particularly attractive for the time being.

There is another option I’ve been kicking around for the last few weeks. I’ve got a blog just sitting here with seven years worth of more or less untapped material. Most people read a post once, maybe twice if it’s really epic, and it’s never seen again. With a little editorial effort, a few thousand words of fresh content, and some flashy layout, I could conceivably have two new books set to press in short order. It’s extraordinarily tempting, if for no other reason than it buys me time to work on something completely fresh while I’m editing these together.

It’s an idea still very much in its infancy, but I’m starting to outline two lines of effort:

1) What Annoys Jeff this Week: 2012 was a Bitch. This would be an anthology of 52 weeks of what is generally the most viewed posts I publish each week. Some I’d freshen up and expand a bit from what appears on the blog, but mostly they could be plucked root and stem and used shamelessly for retail purposes. It has the decided perk of also being a self-licking ice-cream cone – as long as Thursdays each weak feature WAJTW, every year I’ll have popping fresh new material for the next edition.

2) Epic: The Best of jeffreytharp.com. Over the last seven years I’ve posted more than a few epic rants covering everything from work to neighbors to random people at Home Depot. I haven’t dove into the research yet, but I’m betting that there’s more than enough here to turn into a respectable ebook maybe something in the neighborhood on 25-30,000 words. It’s definitely going to require some polish – if you haven’t been reading the Sunday archive updates, take my word for it; some of the early work is pretty rough hewn. Still, I think there’s plenty of meat on the bone.

So will either of these ideas come to pass? Honestly, I don’t know yet, but it does seem like a waste to sit on what’s got to be upwards of half a million words of content and not do anything with it. It would be like running my own personal recycling program… and that’s a good thing, right?

The finest Sunday traditions…

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In keeping with the finest Sunday traditions here at jeffreytharp.com, while you’re out there getting ready for church or making plans for how to spend the day before the start of the work week, I’m here dredging up the past for your reading pleasure. Today’s installment of “from the archives” is from August 2007. Featuring one good bit of soul searching and four smaller bits of commentary on life, it seems that early August six years ago was a bit of a time of introspection… of course sometimes that makes for some pretty good reading. Enjoy this week’s archive posts and I’ll see you back around the same time next week.

In my own name…

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There’s a certain amount of hubris to running a website in your own name. It certainly makes you easy enough to find (*cough* #1 search result for Jeffrey Tharp on Google *cough*). It means there’s nothing to hide behind when you make a mistake or take a position on an issue. All you have is your good name and the words you choose to make your argument. When it’s your name up there in the address bar, you’d better Harrassmentbelieve there’s an incentive to get it right the first time. In more than seven years of blogging, I’ve never posted anything to this site or the ones that came prior to it that I was ashamed or embarrassed to see running with my given name in the byline.

Of course on the internet it’s easy to be mostly anonymous. It’s easy to fire off a comment or an email when there’s no apparent accountability. The truth is, nine times out of ten there isn’t any accountability. That’s just one of the charming ways the internet is still like the Wild West.

With that being said, it is my personal policy and the official policy of jeffreytharp.com to refer any and all comments that are threatening or of a harassing nature to the sender’s service provider with a request to cease and desist and to preserve copies of all associated posts, comments, and emails for use in any criminal or civil investigation and/or litigation that may arise as a result of failing to comply with this request. We are not going to be drug into the ugly internet business of feeding the trolls, regardless of how tempting that might be.

I reserve the right to edit, modify, or delete all comments that do not comply with WordPress terms of service or that I deem inappropriate, harassing, or threatening. I continue to encourage feedback, discussion, and open debate about the issues, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to open this blog as a free for all. If that’s what you’re looking for, I suggest you go buy your own domain name, set up a website, and rant about how unfair life is on your own nickel, because you won’t be doing it on mine.

Yea verily I say unto you, here endeth the lesson.

For my next trick…

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We all know I like to write. You don’t blog for seven years and publish a book if you’re adverse to putting words on paper. Writing is the best sub-minimum wage job I’ve ever had and it more than makes a run at what I’d do full time if I didn’t have pesky concerns like rent and groceries. For all practical purposes that’s a complete pipe dream, but it’s a happy pipe dream at least.

Since I took on the bureaucracy in my debut effort, the question I’ve been struggling with for the last month or so is what comes next. I’m toying with giving my short-lived teaching career the same treatment. I think there’s enough distance between me and that aborted attempt at a career that it could be fun. I worry that two and a half years over a decade ago might not give me quite as much source material as I’d like to have. I wasn’t as good at keeping notes of all the stupid things that happened back then as I am today.

Another option I’ve been kicking around is taking on the whole concept of leadership and management. God knows my brief tenure as a manager left me with enough material to at least get started on something interesting. Plus there’s the whole parade of good and terrible bosses that you encounter over the course of any career. That’s a rich mine of ideas right there, though I’m not entirely sure I want to stick with the business and career genre for another round.

Then there’s fiction. Maybe everyone who writes thinks they have the great American novel in them somewhere. I’m not sure I even have a proto-idea of what that might look like, but fiction is something I’d love to tinker with eventually… but I’d rather start out with the ghost of an idea rather than just a blank sheet of paper.

What’s the point? Yet another thing I don’t know. Something’s going to be next, but what’s that is just hasn’t occurred to me yet.

Best of breed…

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I’ve been using the blog a lot lately to hock my own merchandise. I’m going to spare you from a round of that this evening in the understanding that as much as I wish it might be otherwise, you might be interested in hearing a voice other than mine from time to time. In that spirit, I wanted to take this opportunity to feature three blogs that I read and enjoy on a regular basis because they’re some combination of funny, inappropriate, or informative.
I’m listing these in no particular order other than the way my bookmark folder has them organized:

1. ChowderHead – Wildly funny and decidedly inappropriate. Do you need more reasons to click over and give it a read?

2. 25ToFly – Commentary on life, blogging, and the hilarity that ensues. She’s good stuff.

3. Break Room Stories – I did a four year hitch with McDonald’s, but I was always mercifully protected from the general public by two or three flat-top grills. This blog confirms what a good idea staying in the kitchen was.

One of the things about blogging is that you tend to do a lot of reading of other blogs in your travels around the internet. Some, obviously, are better than others. If you don’t have quite as much time to wander around the internet looking for the good bits as I do, these three blogs are some of the best of breed. Give them a read. I’m sure you won’t be disappointed.

What I know about marketing…

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I considered just leaving the body of this post blank to make my point more dramatic, but that’s not quite a fair assessment. I know some of the basics – like having a webpage and blog, using social media to get your message out, and even some old school tricks like punching out a press release. What I don’t know yet, is how to teach myself what I need to know about the business of marketing to someone other than your friends and fans on Facebook and whoever happens to stumble across your blog.

According to Google, everyone is apparently a marketing expert – or they’re trying to sell their own 16-sept program to super-powered sales. That’s fine. Everyone’s got to make a buck one way or another. It’s a little absurd to rant about someone shilling their own products when I’m spending so much time doing the same thing.

What I’ve found here at the end of the writing and publishing process, is the wide open, undefined space of “what’s next?” I’m going to try to spend some time in the next few weeks giving myself a crash course in marketing and sales… or at least looking around to see what seems to be working for other people in the same boat. Fortunately, I’m not the first guy to ever try doing this so there should be plenty of evidence out there of what works and what doesn’t. Still, I’m really wishing I would have paid more attention to that marketing class when I was getting my MBA. Stupid hindsight wins again.

Take Out the Trash Day…

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In an episode of the West Wing, Josh and Donna have a conversation about why Friday is called “Take Out the Trash Day.” To boil it down, Friday is the day that the week’s bad news stories get released to the media. That’s mostly because except for a few hard core news junkies, people don’t tend to pay much attention to the news over the weekend. What little attention a bad story gets in the weekend press is swallowed whole by the new cycle before anyone logs in to the Washington Post on Monday morning.

While the chances of breaking a national scandal wide open here by yours truly is pretty slim, blogging faces much the same hazard as most other kinds of media – namely that Friday and Saturday tend to be low-volume events. It generally means what you’re reading on those days isn’t exactly “A” level material. When you throw in the fact that it’s a fair size portion of the country will be acknowledging Easter this Sunday, the viewership statistics drop right through the floor. Apparently, people spend Easter doing something other than tending to status updates on Facebook and catching up on the blogs they follow – to each their own, I suppose.

Don’t worry though, I’ll be right here posting my regular updates throughout the weekend, like some kind of evil, godless heathen. It’s ok, you can thank me later. I hope you didn’t mind this little bit of inside baseball discussion. It’s Friday after all and it only seemed fitting in celebration of Take Out the Trash Day.

Hear my voice…

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No one recognizes the irony of posting voices from the past when my current voice is a bit ragged. Conveniently here in the 21st century, I don’t need to use my shredded vocal chords and raw-feeling throat to get the word out. Sitting at a keyboard and spreading my own version of the good news feels more natural anyway.

Anyway, we’re back on a regular Sunday schedule which means that the latest offerings from the archives are up and ready for your enjoyment. Featuring five posts from May 2007, we cover plenty of ground – from the joys of business travel to photography. One of the things that “expert” bloggers always tell you is to find your niche and stay in it. Fortunately, it seems my niche is being a cranky commentator on whatever happens to cross my mind on any given day. I guess it does help if you’re writing what you know.

Scheduling conflict…

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So there was a bit of a scheduling conflict this weekend. Between kicking the book out the door, driving to Western Maryland and back, and trying to squeeze in some quality time, something had to slip… and because you guys are mostly good at not raising hell about it, it was weekend blogging that took the hit. I’d say I was sorry about that, but it was a really good weekend, so I’m really not very sorry at all. Since I like you too much to spout fake apologies, we’ll just leave it at that, ok?

I know, this won’t make up for missing yesterday, but for your reading pleasure five new “old” posts are now available in the archives. Now that the book is out and all I’m busy doing is hectoring people into buying it, we should be back on track from here on out… unless someone wants to hire me for a speaking engagement, symposium, signing, or birthday party. In that case, you’ll get updates when you get them.

Throwback…

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If you’re reading this, it must mean you’ve stopped in for your regular dose of Sunday throwback posts. Coming to you from way back in April 2007, the five archive posts this morning are mostly slice-of-life commentary. Sorry, I can’t promise every week is going to feature some kind of epic rant… but with 34,000 words and more than a year’s worth of old posts still in the queue, I think it’s safe to say there will continue to be some interesting reading headed your way for the foreseeable future. I mean, would you rather start the day with the Sunday paper or Get Off My Lawn? Yeah. That’s what I thought.