"Sunset over Sloatsburg, New York, July 31, 2002" By Howard Fielding. Offered under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.

Week in Review: Week 31

Reading Time: < 1 minutes
"Sunset over Sloatsburg, New York, July 31, 2002" By Howard Fielding. Offered under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.
“Sunset over Sloatsburg, New York, July 31, 2002” By Howard Fielding. Offered under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.

More serendipity came my way this week.

On a trip back from New Jersey, we pulled into parking garage at the Sloatsburg rest area on the New York Thruway. Glancing at the exit as we walked toward the building, we spotted this sunset over the Ramapo Mountains.

We collect sunsets. Someday we may have a separate blog about them. So we made our way along the narrow path of the exit road to the western side of the building to get this photo. It’s not the best–it’s hard to crop out the freeway and the southbound rest area–but it is worth sharing. And if we hadn’t gone around that way, we would never have found this intriguing historic marker at the little-used west entrance.

Observations: I am getting more “Likes” from other bloggers.

Interaction: Blogger-writer Stuart Danker commented on “Clickety-Clack, the Typewriter’s Back!” that he prefers a mechanical keyboard with a soft touch. Probably a manual typewriter is not for him, he says. He’s right. Stuart is of the modern screen generation and his lively blog has many followers; probably he would find a manual typewriter excruciatingly cumbersome. Really hard to post, too.

Professional development: Re-reading William Zinsser’s “Writing With a Word Processor,” 40 years later, for entertainment and tips. Listening to podcast “The Essential Guide to Writing a Novel.”

Next week: Several days with long blocks of time and access to the “Margery” research, so probably I’ll press ahead with that.

In case you missed it

  • Tsk-tsk! (1979)

    Tsk-tsk! (1979)

    Reading Time: 2 minutes Not contacting the state offices was practically journalistic malpractice. You need to get the official word, even if it’s “no comment.”

  • A good time for groundwork, 1979

    A good time for groundwork, 1979

    Reading Time: 2 minutes I had visions of collecting my school essays into books of criticism about how not to write papers. Does that sound like what I’m doing here?

  • Puff and fluff, 1979

    Puff and fluff, 1979

    Reading Time: 2 minutes Any local news editor understands the delicate balance between what readers and advertisers expect and what you think is important.

  • In Other Words … Season 2, Episode 19

    In Other Words … Season 2, Episode 19

    Reading Time: 2 minutes Many people don’t even have the time or focus for an entire book. The culture of short videos and podcasts has taken over, to our detriment.

  • Top-of-the-head inventory, 1979

    Top-of-the-head inventory, 1979

    Reading Time: 2 minutes “Items in Stock” was, in truth, a misnomer. Some were complete, or ready for a final draft or a rewrite. Others were ideas or characters in search of a plot.

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