Writing up a storm
As you all probably know by now, I’m back at school and back at District. There was no Well #?^% this week because I honestly didn’t have anything to complain about. I’m back to telling dirty jokes,...
View ArticleWell #?^% XXX: Not dirty, and not a one show pony
It would have been fantastic if my 30th “Well #?^%” had some sort of inappropriate joke throughout, but it does not. In fact, I’m going to talk about something that happened last Wednesday and still...
View ArticleWell #?^% XXXII: The second search for a new assistant
I mentioned a couple of weeks ago that my co-editor no longer edits for District, so my assistant got promoted and we need a new assistant. Again. This wouldn’t be so tedious if we weren’t up against a...
View ArticleStrange assignments from the intern’s desk
As I mentioned last week, I’ve graduated from filing to doing actual work at my internship. At first, “actual work” mostly entailed editing a couple of press releases and repeatedly updating a media...
View ArticleA letter to my 17 year old self
Hey you. With college graduation just five days away (eek!), I’ve been thinking a lot about you. I think there are some met and missed opportunities we need to talk about. First off, everyone was right...
View ArticleHow many words does it take to lose a reader?
Writing Wednesday/Thursday this week focuses on a more practical aspect of writing: writing clearly. For fiction writers who someday want to contact an editor, agent or publisher, you need to be able...
View ArticleWell #?^% XXVI: Goodbye, my minion
As this is the last week of the quarter, it is time to bid farewell to my wonderful evil minion. Megan graduates this week, and I’m sad that she is no longer going to be an assistant editor at...
View Article9 Types of Artist Bios Students Write
I’ve been editing the biographies people submitted to accompany the accepted submissions to Port City Review. There’s about 63 of these and the quality ranges from only needing a comma fix to me...
View ArticleWell #?^% XXIX: Day one of my unemployment
For those of you who haven’t yet heard, I quit my job at the movie theater. Yesterday was my last day, complete with one movie selling out, a newish coworker asking dumb questions, weird phone calls,...
View ArticleThe Best and Worst of Critique Comments #2
So we had another full-class critique of short stories. This time, the story had to be 500 words (as opposed to the last story, which was 8-10 pages). After some of the comments I received last time, I...
View ArticleThe Actual Good Part of Critique
After describing some of the ridiculous things my peers said last quarter, I figured I should give some attention to the good things that came out of my fiction class. Even though I returned to my dorm...
View ArticleBest and Worst of Critique Comments #3
As with my fiction class last quarter, our first two stories are critiqued by the whole class. Everyone gets a copy to write on and we read it aloud. A moment of insanity struck me the day we signed up...
View ArticleBest and Worst of Critique Comments #4
The final verbal critique of the quarter. The 500 word short story I wrote for class was one I’m very proud of. I spent a few weeks on it and even volunteered to read first two days before we had to...
View ArticleAdventures in Athens: Day five
[View the story “Adventures in Athens: Day five” on Storify] The post Adventures in Athens: Day five appeared first on Switzy Thoughts.
View ArticleThe Best and Worst of Critique Comments
I finally got to present my short story to my fiction class, and the comments I received were worth the wait. (I had food poisoning the day I was scheduled for critique, so I was in limbo for two...
View ArticleWas a writing degree really worth it?
I think one of the questions I see and hear most often for writers is whether it’s necessary to formally study writing in order to be a writer. Some people seem afraid that they’re unqualified, or that...
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