Ladies, it’s time to take the fight to cancer at Cancer Research UK’s Race for Life. 

Cancer doesn’t care who it affects. It can ruin lives of individuals and families without thinking twice. Cancer will 
affect one in three of us, so we need to unite and fight this disease. Together, we will beat it. 

"Cancer’s going down. And every single pound we raise pushes it closer to the floor." ~ Race For Life.  

That’s why I'm volunteering at Swindon's Race for Life event this weekend. I am no runner, but this isn't stopping me from getting involved and taking delight in telling cancer that I'm in the fight, and we're coming to get it. Giving a few hours of my weekend is the least I can do. You can do the same, if not more.

The team around the country are still looking for volunteers at this and other Race For Life events. Volunteering can be a valuable personal experience, in which you can receive the benefits of:

 Meeting new people who are as keen to give cancer the finger as you are. 

 Hands-on experience with people from all walks of life.

 Personal satisfaction of knowing you’re helping to make a real difference in the fight against cancer - a very worthwhile cause. 

 The opportunity to help out in your local community. 

Let’s bring cancer to its knees. Sign up to volunteer at Race for Life today; raceforlife.org/volunteer

Until next week,

Lou x

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Born To be A Tourist

Image courtesy of Race For Life

The key to successful writing is being organised and controlled. 

Still need to read on?  

Organisation is a key life skill .

Being organised as a writer is a pretty useful thing to be - especially if you don't (yet) have an agent to keep you in line. Some authors manage it, but I don't recommend it. If you're organised, 

...Tidying your desk (like JK Rowling) and you won't lose that poem you worked so hard on. 

...You won't burst in late to a 'meet the author' session.

...Friends and family *may* start to understand you do hold business hours for writing - and you stick to them! 

...You won't forget where your story is going. 

...There will be no rushing for a deadline of a competition or publishing date. 

As a result, you'll be writing more, maybe faster, and potentially better. 

Control is an entirely different, but again, key life skill. 

This skill is something which compliments being organised very well. 

If you are controlled, 

...You won't get distracted from the job in hand (e.g. that blog post you need to post by lunchtime).

...You will be much more likely to finish what you started. 

...Poems with structure and prose with word limits will manifest themselves more constructively. 

...You'll stay 'on-theme' and not drift into off-subject articles/blogs etc. 

...You won't take on more than you can handle - there's only so many hours in that day!

I am definitely guilty of taking on too much sometimes; running a writing group, writing a monthly column for MK Pulse, along with weekly postings here on my writing blog and my travel blog 'Born to be a Tourist' ... It can get a bit much sometimes!

However, I do have an organised way of writing, and I stay firmly in control of my writing business. 

How do I stay organised and controlled?

My diary is my best friend. I go nowhere without it and use it almost hourly for something or other. If there is something I am especially keen on attending or submitting to, I mark it in my diary and give myself a two week warning on its approach too. 

I hold two blogs and I try to keep them separate.  They are on different subject matter, after all.  Sure, sometimes they overlap, like when I highlight travel literature I've enjoyed on my travel blog, or share a photo I found on my travels as a prompt on my writing blog, but I try to keep the two worlds separate. This helps me to stay on-theme (controlled) and I rarely miss a posting deadline (organised). 

All my Word documents are named appropriately. I am pretty obsessed with this - all my documents ('day job', writing or personal) make sense in the way they're named so I can find them easily when I need them again. I've also started putting the publication date of things which make it to press or web (e.g. my MK Pulse articles) which helps organise my ever-growing harddrive. I'll never again wonder which issue of MK Pulse a specific article appeared in - brill!

I'm a big fan of To-Do Lists. Always have been. I'm currently in the throws of a wedding planning To Do list - and the jobs are growing in number! It's still so satisfying to cross something off my list, though. This tactic helps me to 'kill the frogs' or prioritise your work better too, whichever method I choose that day. 

Wearing a watch really helps. I never really wear a watch unless I am going on a journey or I'm going for an interview, but something to keep track of time is essential when I am running a workshop or participating in an event. No one wants to be an out-of-control, tardy guest speaker who can't keep to the evening's schedule!  

For more tips on how to be more controlled and organised as a writer, take a look at Jeff Abbott's blog on 'Creative Planning'. I found it a useful read, even from underneath my pile of To Do lists. 

****A note to my dear readers****

I will be in Costa Rica for the next two Fridays on a wedding planning 'holiday that's not a holiday'. I doubt I'll be posting (to many things to check off my To Do list 'in country'!), but do stay tuned - I'll be posting something exciting again the first week I'm home. 

Hasta pronto! (See you soon!)

Lou x 

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Born To be A Tourist

Image via Flickr Creative Commons, courtesy of Sally Jean

I've written a blog post today for Lorna Riley, and both she and I would love it if you stopped by and "had a butchers". I've been talking to her about having two blogs (travel and writing/books related). 

Have a great weekend all!

Lou x

Find me on Facebook
...And on Twitter
Born To be A Tourist

I've been reading a lot of new blogs this week and have discovered a lot of new writers, inspiration and ideas. Thanks to Wedding and Wedding Flowers, I have discovered all sorts of weird and wonderful wedding traditions from British and Irish history. 

Did you know...?

The phrase 'tying the knot' comes from the ancient Celtic wedding ritual of handfasting, where the bride's and groom's hands were tied together.

Unnerving... Start as you mean to go on?!

An old wives' tale states that if the younger of two sisters marries first, the older sister must dance barefoot at the wedding or risk never getting married herself. 

Not a problem in my family, I'm the eldest!

Early wedding cakes didn't sound too tasty: flat, round, contained fruit and nuts to symbolise fertility and it was often crumbled over the bride's head.

How horrible! Not my idea of confetti!

It was said to be bad luck of the bride fell when entering the marital home for the first time, which is why being carried over the threshold is such a tradition. It may also derive from the bygone custom of the bride being 'stolen' and carried off by her groom.

Love this one, but the chances of us having our own place when we're married are quite slim at the moment!

In Ireland, a laying hen was, in the past, tied to the bed on the first night of the honeymoon in the hope that some of its fertility would be passed on to the couple. 

Noisy night, anyone?

Finally, and perhaps the strangest one of all, prior to a change in the law (2012), a wedding was only legal in the UK if it took place between 8am - 6pm. Apparently this was due to a concern that the groom wouldn't be able to see his bride's face clearly after dark and could therefore be duped into marrying a stranger. 

What about the bride being duped?! We're being wed at 4pm, so we're both safe on that score!

Aside from the last one, I think my fiancé and I will leave those traditions in history's arms. Sure, we've got some traditional stuff planned (I'm a reluctant traditionalist!), but the little things we do in our ceremony are more symbolic than most of the above, and some just aren't practical. There will be a hen do, a night apart before the big day, and during the ceremony we plan to do a rose exchange in between our two mums to symbolise the joining of the two families. Also, I couldn't walk down the aisle without my dad!

Will you, or did you, include any of these traditions in your ceremony?

Lou x

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Born To be A Tourist

Black and white image courtesy of Cartoon Stock