Twitter and other useful stuff

I know, I know, I'm really bad at keeping this up to date and I just end up making myself feel even more guilty (good Catholic Guilt) every time I read some of the amazing blogs that are out there.

Anyway, recently I've become rather fond of Twitter. First of all I did the whole fan thing and followed Stephen Fry - you have to really, it's a given in the UK that he's a National Treasure and all that, sort of on a par with the Queen Mother (God rest her soul, Knees up Mother Brown, Blitz Spirit and all that). Then I began to nose around a bit and see who else I should follow...

blah, blah, blah
more about my entry into Twitterland
blah, blah, blah


Hugh Laurie, blah, blah, blah

Mrs Stephen Fry, blah, blah, blah

Then...

I began to follow writers, publishers and agents and now...just like every good advert, I'm finding many different interesting things all over the place that I'm using regularly to write with - prompts and so on and also lists of magazines looking for submissions.

I realise that this is the potted version and those of you looking for some real meat to this post will be rather disappointed so far...I know, I need to do better with posting blog entries - I'll try.

Meanwhile, I'll share with you a couple of things that I now use regularly because they help me to plan and to write.

The first thing is Free Mind which is an open source piece of software for Mind Mapping - if you've never given MM a go, do try it - especially if you're at all creative and tend to think in clusters or images.
I've been working on a few Fine Art lectures I've got to give next academic year and Mind Mapping them is the ideal way for me to throw down as many ideas as I can and then begin to link them and organise them effectively.
I've also used MM to plot and develop short stories, it's also great for developing a character. It's easy to list lots of attributes or possible events without tying yourself down to a list of and then, and then.
How to do Mind Mapping is explained nicely here at Lite Mind.
Try it!

Now, the second bit of useful stuff I've discovered on Twitter is an evil way of making you write more which is always an excellent thing to do but as most writers are terrible procrastinators (as I'm writing this I'm avoiding writing an article I've been asked to do) being forced to write is a Good Thing. So, I found this web page called Dr. Wicked's Writing Lab - Write or Die.
Well obviously you don't actually die if you don't write - at least, not on this site - but it is a fiendish way of making you get words down.

And that's what writing and being a writer is all about - getting words down. No one said anything about Great Words - they come in amongst all the rubbish. Writing is a bit like mining for gold I find - lots and lots of spoil comes out and in amongst that you might find something nice and shiny and worth holding on to...sometimes.

Right, that's enough for today.

I'll try to be better about keeping this up...maybe I need to make it more a part of my procrastination.....