dandelionfiles

I desperately need to negotiate payment with a decent editor. Many writers resent editors. I am NOT one of them. Trust me, if you're valid and know enough about what makes stories work as well as are knowledgeable about the grammar preferred by editors at papers or short story writers (humor and horror--yep, I'm a genre girl at the moment--although I even have some things that friends assure me may even be literary in nature) I won't resent you at all. I will be very, VERY grateful. It's too easy to get "married" to rotten prose or stuff that bogs a story down--throw in the fact I have MS and there are a couple of brain lesions that make errors easier for me to make (and harder to see)--I really need a good editor. Let me know how you want to be credited in my work or even if you need a percentage of whatever I make off of something--that's fair, and I'm OK with that.

I want to pay you for your trouble. I'm hoping for the barter system, (I will even do chores such as housecleaning and massages--I'm very strong, have been taught by a certified massage therapist, and have fixed a few people's backs. I've been told I give amazing massages) but I'll sell books, CD's, whatever, to make your fee.

Here's what I'm looking for--

1.) Please--be specific about what's wrong. Don't just use red ink with no explanation--if a sentence is awkward, please let me know and explain WHY it doesn't work! Please let me know exactly what's not working in the story format. If a scene detracts, if a character is vague or badly written, clue me in and let me know how to fix the errors. I once made the mistake of trying to get a guy who claimed to be an editor to look over a play I'd written for a class and, as it turned out, he was actually so jealous of my ability (which is strange to me--I have a VERY long way to go until I'm a good writer) that he simply crossed out nearly everything. I couldn't understand what he was talking about or what the deal was, so I ended up turning the play in "as is"--and got the highest grade in the class (as well as had the thing acted out during a skit week) as well as received a cheesy award for it. Looking over it now, it's too wordy and the rhythm of the character's diaglouge is off--but then again, this was a college class, not the "real world".

2.) Please let me negotiate payment with you. No, I'm not rich--however, I can give sweat instead of dollars and save you a lot of time and frustration in your life. (And, as I explained, I give killer massages.) I currently try to do chores, grade papers, etc., for a friend of mine who is kind enough to let me do laundry at her place. If you do need cash, though--can you accept payments? Tony's been encouraging me for years to work on developing my writing and making cash off of that, and that's what I'd like to do here.

Let me know if anybody's interested. My yahoo mail is lynx_cat2005@yahoo.com

Thanks!

Cox Arboretum, which houses a structure known only as "the butterfly house", does not allow guests to visit within it after four p.m. Recently, little ten-year-old Timmy recently found out why.

"I told him not to go in there. I told him that the dare was stupid. But he insisted, so I made sure that I got custody of his Game Boy first," his younger brother Stevie insisted. "Now I get to play with all his games whenever I want. Mom and Dad are grief-stricken--but he had cool games!"

Last night, little Timmy accepted a dare so that he could be the top kid of his cub scout pack. It was then that he learned the awful truth about the kinds of butterflies Cox Arboretum tries to hide from the public eye.

" Blood was everywhere!" Mark, a fellow cub scout, insisted. "It was just like one of them movies we sneak around to see. He walked into the tent, all confident like and taking off his cap. Then--only then--did we see them."

"I never knew butterflies were dangerous," Shelby, a nerdy scout said. "I screamed for him to get out, but then the other guys gathered around and beat me up." Shelby still had bandages on his nose from the incident. "All the sudden, he was surrounded, I can still hear his voice screaming, 'I didn't think they had teeth'. I can still hear the beating of their colorful wings!"

Despite a lawsuit brought about by Timmy's parents, Cox Arboretum refuses to acknowledge any liability.

"Look--we said the thing was closed. Did he LISTEN? No. He CHOSE to go in there." One ranger of the park said.

Tune in for further updates!

BLOG PSA: Please do your part to help the folks in New Orleans. God knows FEMA isn't. At least Bush is FINALLY getting called on his mistakes (I wondered if he had more teflon than Reagan did!). Contact the Red Cross, follow the link Jacklyn posted...anything you can. Those people are in a fix and they deserve all the help they can get.

OK--so's I'm not that good at being too serious. My other blog, "Dandelion Wine" (www.dandelionsinbloom.com) was supposed to be a serious blog--but I'm going to be straight with you--I can be very serious, but I've learned the hard way that sometimes the only way to deal with anything is to laugh at it. As Molly Ivins put it, "It's so much better for you than crying or throwing up".

COMING SOON. A touching, nature oriented piece (that may indeed be making fun of a certain network)that deals with the sensitive issue of the relationship between bugs and humans:

I like to call it "WHEN BUTTERFLIES ATTACK"