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Happy Earth Day! Here's A Poetry Broadside to Celebrate

22 Apr

Reblogged from Compassionate Rebel:

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Celebrate

dolphin play, steelhead run, pelican peer

Channel Islands sail, Anacapa arch

salt lips, rock rolls, finch dawns, fog noons, moon climbs

sea, sycamore, sage, lupine jeffrey scents

Topa Topa light, Pine Mountain Star night

life, work, growth amidst our sacred landscape

Today is Earth Day! To celebrate, I am posting a poem I wrote a few years ago celebrating my local landscape.The broadside was published in ArtLife Limited Editions; it features a reproduction of a much more colorful body print I did of myself as the coastline in spring.

Read more… 11 more words

Next poetry reading: May 8 at the Artists Union Gallery. See you there! Happy Earth Day and Happy National Poetry Month!

Poetry Month Events in Santa Barbara This Weekend Include Art Predator!

14 Apr

Reblogged from art predator:

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Happy National Poetry Month! If you’re in driving distance of Santa Barbara, there are a number of wonderful readings scheduled to celebrate!

Read more… 275 more words

Upcoming readings: Saturday April 14 in Santa Barbara as well as Tuesday May 8 in Ventura. Poetry month and Mother's Day specials: Get two copies of the book for $20 (save $2.95 on each copy) Get two ebooks for the price of one (save $6.95!) Buy one print copy at $12.95 and get an ebook FREE!

triiibes retreat: Brenegar on The Flow of Leadership

16 Mar

He proposes we take on a life of leadership by learning on how and where we are leaders arlready and strengthen that and build on that, and form a community to support each other.

Leadership is about taking initiative. It’s not about being an authority, or being in charge but taking charge.

What do you bring to the table to contribute? Be confident! Don’t be afraid!

Here are some very very rough notes: (more…)

Jeff Veen’s Brief Explanation of the Web: by way of a narrative about ice & gold

14 Aug

Jeff Veen

How the Web Works“ Jeff Veen, along with Greg Veen, is a co-founder of Typekit.

“The web is going to be more like the way that we live and not just the way that we work” @Veen #wcsf

Back in the day, no one had cold drinks–except in winter–until someone, a doctor, figured out how to make ice which helped people. But it was up to an entrepreneur to figure out how to get it to people–how to  store it, and market it. Not to make cold drinks but to repserve food and thereby to make it safer and people healthier. (And the really brilliant idea wasn’t to deliver ice to people but to deliver a way to make your own ice to the people–good health and cold drinks!

You might have noticed that gold is heavy. (Well, maybe you’ve never been lucky enough to hold enough gold in your hand to notice its weight!) The race was on to ship it, move it quickly and safely from point A to B. The brilliant idea that changed how we deal with gold was when someone realized that you didn’t have to physically move the gold. You could keep ledgers of the gold and transfer it. Wealth became data and the industry transformed.

The web, Jeff Veen argues, is no longer about selling assets but providing services that makes experiencing what’s on the web seamless.

How can we make sure that we are looking at the web in a way that will keep us relevant as the race =for tech change increases?

The qualities that contribute to the web are what will make us users successful.

He tells a story about how competitive the web was and how showing running code built consensus. His story concludes with the lesson to listen to and work with your user base. You might want to get it out as soon as possible–so do it! And get feedback. And when you do, don’t apologize.

The speed of iteration beats quality of iteration.

Here are some quotes he shared during his presentation which support this concept:

Be liberal in what you accept and conservative in what you send. Jon Postel

Small pieces loosely joined….can accomplish amazing things. (?? will find out)

Information wants to be free. Stewart Brand.

We put everything, even our most previous memories, our photos on the web. We trust the web. It’s available, it’s democratic.

And it’s about to spill out of our computers.

All of the data we’ve been aggregating everywhere together is going to be available everywhere.

The web works best when it’s free and available for everyone. People are selfish. But those selfish people will lose out in the end.

Well that’s it for the first session! Food blogging is next! I’m going to post that over on Wine Predator–share the wealth…

Sorry for typos –just trying to get it out! (Oh, wait –what was that Jeff said? Don’t apologize?? Just do it! So here it is!)

Tuesday Tips: More On “It’s” & “Its” — what about “Its’”?

28 Jun

For last week’s Tuesday Tips, I discussed how to use it’s and its. In an email today from a PR firm, I came across this sentence:

“VOGA Italia hails from Italy, the country best known for producing some of the world’s best wine as well as its’ keen sense of style.”

which reminded me I didn’t even mention the third its’: this one is ALWAYS wrong. Just like hers and his, its is a possessive that doesn’t require an apostrophe. Its’ is not a word.

It is tempting to also question the sentence further (can a country make wine or have style?) but I’m not. At least not today!

Remember if you have copy that needs work, or if you need some coaching for your writing, let me know! I’m happy to help you.

Tuesday Tips: On "It's" & "Its" Here are two wonderful and important concepts from a blog post I was reading and which inspired me to write this morning: Social Networking at it’s very foundation is building relationships with people… Social networking at it’s finest: making friends and helping each other at the same time. Do you know the difference between “it’s” and “its”? Chances are that you don’t. There’s even a Facebook page about it’s and its (that’s where I found the gr … Read More

via The Write Alley

Happy Holidays!

24 Dec

“The thing about trains,” says the conductor on the Polar Express, ” it doesn’t matter where they’re going. What matters is deciding to get on.”

I’ll be stepping off the blogging train here at The Write Alley and jumping on the holiday train until 2011! While I may slip in a post here or there (maybe one or two on New Year’s Resolutions?), I will resume my regularly blogging schedule of posts about improving your writing and using social media tools for yourself and your business in the New Year.

So light a candle, gather some friends, enjoy the stars, and have a wonderful time!

Tuesday Tips: 3 Take Aways From Seth Godin’s LA Talk 11/10

7 Dec

I took pages and pages of notes from Seth Godin’s talk in LA to a small intimate and devoted group of Linchpins.

And since Seth has suggested that Linchpins everywhere meet and connect today in person, I thought for today’s Tuesday Tips I’d share three ideas that stuck with me and are inspiring me the most to rev people up.

In some ways, in his talk, Seth rehashed some of the themes in his book, Linchpins. But he also built on those themes, and he applied them to specific questions that people in attendance posed for him. I promise I will share more.

But today, here are three big ideas I took away last month, the ideas that stuck with me and reverberate the most:

1. Instead of going to graduate school, spend your money on starting your own business. If you succeed, great. If you don’t, analyze what you did wrong.

2. Anything anyone might want to know is out there on the internet. Anything anyone would like to read, to view, to listen to. So why buy art or books? For a keepsake. To hold it in your hands. To share with someone else. To feel a sense of belonging.

3. Take risks. Failure is instructive.

I’ve been thinking a lot recently about what it means to be a linchpin and I was wondering whether it could be taught because it has come so naturally to me.

I realize it can. I’ve been coaching someone in how to become a linchpin in his office. It’s scary and it feels risky to him, but what has he got to lose? He’d like the business he works for to stay open, to keep his job. That’s only going to happen if he becomes a linchpin, because the market is changing, and the company he’s working for is not. If he’s not able to make some changes, at least he took risks and he tried, and he’ll be able to use those lessons in his next job.

So what about you? Are YOU a linchpin? Do you want to be?

Tuesday Tips: Get Your Writing Going

2 Nov

In an article published on Copyblogger yesterday, fellow writing coach James Chartrand points out that for most writers, once we get going on a writing project, we know what we’re doing and we’re confident we have the tools and strategies to put together a polished product.

(Need help on developing strategies so you know your writing is right? Contact us–we’d love to coach you to confidence!)

But we all have to face that “blank” page that often chases the best ideas out of the most seasoned writer’s brain. We all write that “shitty first draft” as Anne Lamott puts it in her essay from Bird By Bird (you can read it here). Then we revise and revise it into something we’re willing to put our name on.

(And yes, we at The Write Alley can help you develop revision strategies, too!)

The biggest hurdle is getting started, getting going. Once I’m going, stay out of my way! Until I get on a roll, I struggle with the same challenges as Chartrand discusses–and I bet you do too.

So here are three strategies that will help you get your writing going: (more…)

Watch Wine Predator In WBC Documentary Teaser! (via Wine Predator)

21 Jul

Head Coach Gwendolyn Alley aka Art Predator aka Wine Predator was interviewed about wine writing for a documentary while attending the Wine Blogger’s Conference in Walla Walla Washington in June 2010. Here’s a blog post about it and link to see a teaser.

At the Wine Blogger's Conference last month in Walla Walla, Catavino (aka Ryan and Gabriella Opaz) invited me to sit for an interview with documentary film maker and photographer Zev Robinson. He's doing a film on the Wine Bloggers Conferences with a focus on European WBC organizers Gabriella and Ryan Opaz and Catavino. They wanted me to discuss my experiences at the three North American Wine B … Read More

via Wine Predator

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