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Wednesday 23 January 2013

Courses I wish I had time for...

I have often moaned written about the fact that I am currently studying GCSE maths with the National Extension College. 

I also re-took English A' Level with the NEC and I think they are really great if you want to study from home.  I received their newsletter the other day with some links to different courses for, but not exclusive to, writers.

You can check out the links to the following courses here

Creative Writing


Writing Short Stories

Writing for a Living

If you sign up or have taken the course in the past it would be great to hear your thoughts on them as I'd like to take them when I free up some study time.

Monday 14 January 2013

Resolution Generator

If you were planning to make some new years resolutions and need a little inspiration this generator may help.

My one and only resolution as a result of this is 'read a Dr. Seuss book' - I still haven't gotten around to reading my twilight books yet so that may have to be a resolution for 2014 (or much much later).

Can anyone recommend a Dr Seuss. book?

Friday 11 January 2013

Happy New Year!

Slightly later than I had planned but here is my first blog post of 2013.  It's been busy at work with lots of events happening on the GP calendar (I work for the NHS now).  Wednesday I got to go to Buckfast Abbey conference centre and time keep by blowing a whistle every 10, 8 and 2 minutes.  This was my view from the freezing cold corridor:

A lovely view (my camera phone doesn't do it justice) and best of all I got time to write.  Not just this post but a story too.  I was inspired by an episode of duck hunters and it got my creative juices flowing. I'm about 400 odd words into a first draft and now I actually feel the January blues ebbing away.  It's a great feeling starting with a blank page and seeing a story appear as if by magic and I often find myself thinking 'Did I write that?' - sometimes in a bad way but sometimes in a good way too.

I didn't make any resolutions because I never stick to them but I've made a list of things to get done.

- blog at least once a week
- sub a story every other month
- contribute more to my writing group
- drink more water
- do things that make me happy

It's not a challenging list but its something similar to what I did at school and it works for me, keeps me going.  I was really good at spelling at school for a couple of years running I set 'Do better at spelling' as my goals.  Every year I'd be rewarded with a mars bar from my teacher.  I'm not sure whether my love of chocolate came before my love of writing but they go hand in hand I guess.  I didn't get away with it my third year when I was told my goal should be to improve my maths.  Suffice to say I didn't get that mars bar again (and I'm retaking GCSE maths!)