Last Syllable Communications

Sticky: May/June availability

Rachel — Mon, 20 May 2013 14:07:42 +0000

It’s quite late in May and the weather still can’t decide what season it is: snow early in the month, a few hot days, then a few days of chill rains, and now it’s back to hot sunny days before cooling off again.

As we do every year, my family and I will be attending the Wheatland Music Organization’s Traditional Arts Weekend this coming Memorial Day weekend. I’m booked up with projects for the rest of May otherwise.

June, however, is still fairly open and I’d like to add a few more projects to my schedule. Contact me at editing@lastsyllable.net if you’d like to work with me on an upcoming project.

Housekeeping notes

Rachel — Fri, 03 May 2013 19:38:03 +0000

I’ve changed the URL to the Editorial Services page, so links on old blog posts might be broken. Static pages have been updated with the new URL, and the page is still available in the header, so hopefully this won’t cause too much disruption to anyone looking for the link.

I also installed a plugin to counter the recent botnet attack targeting WordPress sites (if you run a WordPress site and use “admin” as your username, change it now and change your password) and I deleted a bunch of old files on the back end. This shouldn’t affect the visible parts of the site.

Sticky: April/May availability

Rachel — Mon, 22 Apr 2013 14:51:36 +0000

The move is complete! I’m typing this from my shiny new office, complete with proper desk, a door I can close, and my reference books at hand (instead of in a box). As I was saying on Twitter this morning, I can still hear the TV (faintly) and family chatter, but I wanted separation, not total isolation. I’m still close enough to have meals with everyone, help change a diaper, or participate in a game of tag (my daughter’s version is to run over and tag me, then run to her dad and tag him, then run back to me). I’ll still be unpacking boxes and setting up furniture for awhile yet, but I don’t expect any more huge interruptions related to the move.

The rest of April is looking fairly full, but I’m now scheduling projects for May and into June. Contact me at editing@lastsyllable.net.

Getting woo-woo for a moment

Rachel — Mon, 08 Apr 2013 19:22:48 +0000

As I said in the sticky post, I moved my feeds to The Old Reader and have been weeding through blogs I didn’t read or that hadn’t updated in six months or more, and catching up with blogs that I loved but hadn’t had time to really sit with and read deeply.

I’d like to recommend some blogs of the latter type. They aren’t really about editing (see the sidebar for editing/writing blogs I like), but they share a focus on being your own self rather than projecting an image that you think is more likable or better at everything. Maintaining that image takes a lot of unnecessary work, and while the image can be a protective shell or a useful mask, it can also be uncomfortable and limiting. In the years before I took this leap, I was increasingly frustrated by the need to divide myself into a “work” persona and a “real” persona. I didn’t feel that I could be as feminist, as spiritual, as silly, as simply human, or as wholly myself while at work. So part of my work in building Last Syllable Communications is to set that image aside, take the risk of being my authentic self, and trust that clients who want to work with me – not just a warm body with X, Y, Z skills and Q years of experience, but me in particular – will connect with me and we can begin a working relationship, whether for the length of one project or over the course of years.

These are some of the blogs I read that encourage authenticity, risk, being your own self, and nurturing that sense of self.

Captain Awkward, an advice column for the nerdy and awkward among us (self included)
The Freelancery, which I recommend over and over here for freelancing advice and encouragement
Momastery, a blog full of light and love and brutiful life
Nurshable, about gentle parenting (you may find this blog less useful if you’re not a parent or have a very different parenting style)
Beauty Tips for Ministers, advice on dressing fashionably and appropriately at the same time; geared toward clergymembers, but enormously useful to me as I transitioned into my thirties and realized I needed to learn to dress myself again

Sticky: Availability and April updates

Rachel — Mon, 08 Apr 2013 18:48:11 +0000

It’s rainy and gray here, the first of several rainy days forecast, and I’m doing some catching up. Enjoy some updates.

First, we have still not moved house. The delays are really wearing on my optimism, but at least things are getting done. We’re looking at another tentative moving date of “next weekend, probably, or maybe the week after.” So I won’t be scheduling many projects in April, but I am expecting to crank things up in May. Contact e-mail for project scheduling is, as always, editing@lastsyllable.net.

ETA: Yes, we are moving at long last! I’ll be mostly offline from Friday 4/19 through Sunday 4/21 for the move. I’m trying to create a schedule with minimal downtime (since putting projects on hold didn’t work out for me) and expect to be back in action on Monday, April 22.

And now the news:

A novel I edited has just been published! Check out Happy(ish) by Cara Trautman, available on Kindle. It’s a fun read, if I do say so myself, and I enjoyed working on it.

As a follow-up to my last post: I opted to start the trial period of Office 365 Small Business Premium and it might be okay. It’s prompting me to use an on.microsoft.com e-mail address until I go through a complicated process to verify that I own my domain, but I don’t use Outlook and am not sure what else they’d need that information for (I won’t be managing my site through Office). So that’s tabled until I have the spare brain cycles to figure it out. And I haven’t signed up for those classes yet; the accounting class may not end up being as useful as I thought, since what I need is tax advice for freelance editorial professionals (instead of general accounting), and I missed the EFA’s webinar on exactly that subject.

Since the announced demise of Google Reader, I’ve been able to move my feeds to The Old Reader (I’ve also seen recommendations for Feedly and Newsblur, though I haven’t tried to use those services). My initial grump about The Old Reader is that I haven’t found a way to automatically alphabetize feeds. However, when I clicked on something and then clicked the Back button, The Old Reader didn’t lose my place in the feed I was reading, for which I cheer enthusiastically. If I did that in Google Reader, it would take me back to the feed and disappear the post I was in the middle of, making no distinction between “marked as read” and “I’m finished with this, it can go away now.” So if that’s my trade-off, I’ll manually alphabetize my feeds.

And that’s the news of the moment. More as it develops.

Coming up for air

Rachel — Fri, 29 Mar 2013 16:49:48 +0000

I sent an edited book back to its author yesterday and an upcoming project was canceled, so I find myself with some free time this weekend. Relief!

So far, I’ve found that spare time in freelancing is different from wrapping up an office job at 5 p.m. on a Friday. There’s always something more to do, some chore that I’ve been putting off (updating my LinkedIn profile, finishing that business plan, checking out a resource I’d bookmarked awhile ago…). I kind of miss the sense of freedom that comes with leaving work at work and heading off into my weekend. Then again, I love the other sense of freedom I have on a Monday morning: sipping my coffee slowly, making pancakes for breakfast, and easing into my workday as I feel ready.

In other news, I’ve made one investment today and am considering another two. First, I bought a domain name, after reading Why everyone should register a domain name and being surprised that rachelleecherry.com was available. (I’ve owned lastsyllable.net since 2005 and just pointed the new domain here.) Second, I’ve been considering a couple of noncredit college classes to fill in some gaps in my skills: Accounting Fundamentals and Grant Writing A to Z, both offered online through my local community college. There are start dates in April and that looks like a good time to take those classes.

And third, after struggling with Excel after a computer upgrade — my old laptop had Excel Starter but my new desktop doesn’t; I’ve been unimpressed with Open Office/LibreOffice, and Google’s spreadsheets aren’t reliable enough – I’m now weighing the usefulness of a Microsoft Office upgrade and whether to go with the subscription model Microsoft is pushing. The Google Reader shutdown has shaken my confidence in the cloud model. I don’t want to wake up one morning, try to open Word or Excel, and find that I’m out of luck.

Finally, a moving/renovation update: The wood floors have been sanded and finished! We’ll wait a few days for any fumes to dissipate and finally start moving in. Plumbing is all set up, I believe, minus the washer and dryer (which we’re still using at the old house). My office hasn’t been painted yet, but that won’t hold up the move. I can’t wait to get this done!

Sticky: Moving! Probably!

Rachel — Fri, 15 Mar 2013 22:04:46 +0000

Well, it was a good thing I hadn’t booked much in early March, because I had one project extend a little longer than anticipated. We hauled a few loads of things to the new house, but there’s a lot at the old house that still needs to be packed. Over the past couple weeks, we’ve had a lot of interest in the old house and six or seven showings (including a second showing to one buyer), but it still hasn’t resulted in an offer. It has, however, resulted in much grumbling chez nous.

I had planned for us to move on Monday, but delays at the new house — this time, water damage in the kitchen, meaning the countertops had to be replaced — have meant that plumbing is still not working. The new countertop and sink might be installed by now, but I don’t think the main floor bathroom is at all usable yet. (The basement bathroom was gutted and will be finished after we move in.) TV and internet service have not yet been connected.

So Monday isn’t looking good for a moving day, but hopefully we can get in sometime next week. I don’t want to commit to additional projects in March and even early April, just because nothing is nailed down (heh) and I’ve had to write enough apologetic emails about deadlines as I’ve attempted to manage working from a house that’s actively for sale.

It would, however, be a good time to schedule projects that will begin in April and May. Contact me at editing@lastsyllable.net.

Don’t get suckered: National Association of Professional Women

Rachel — Fri, 15 Mar 2013 21:34:12 +0000

This started out as a post to the EFA members’ discussion list, where we’ve recently discussed a couple of scams, but it got a little long so I’m posting it here. I also gave out my URL and was promised it’d be linked to my member profile, so in case that actually does get published anywhere, I want to emphasize here that I am not affiliated with the National Association of Professional Women. Which should also be clear from the rest of the post.

I come with a word of warning about the National Association of Professional Women. They’re advertising heavily on LinkedIn, I hear, and targeting new business owners whose bullshit detectors might not be finely tuned yet. (That would include me, I’m sorry to say.) The organization seems reputable but they’ll use flattery and high-pressure tactics to upsell you on anything they can.

A week or two ago, I got a postcard in the mail offering membership and providing a preapproved membership code. I thought about it, went and checked out the org’s website, and decided it looked legitimate and possibly useful to me. The site said thatevery woman who applies (should have been red flag #0) gets a complimentary basic membership but that there were many membership levels. I entered the code from the mailing, filled out a form, and figured I’d check it out at the free level.

A few days later, I got a phone call from Savina (at a blocked number; red flag #1) wanting to interview me before my membership was approved and leaving the number 866-540-6279, extension 270. I called back today, and the given extension was Pamela Caldwell’s voice mailbox. I left a message anyway, and Savina called me back an hour or so later. (Red flag #2 — there was no mention of “oops, I gave you the wrong extension” or “Pamela gave me your message” or anything like that.)

Savina seemed friendly, but I could also tell she was reading from a script at points. I answered questions about my work experience, my education, my business, where I see myself in five years, what I hoped to get from the organization, what I was most looking forward to, etc. At the end of the interview she said she was pleased to offer me membership. I thanked her, thinking I’d passed some test or received some honor, and we proceeded with the paperwork process. She said there was the Elite membership level, which cost $900-something, or the Premium level, which cost $700-something but didn’t have quite so many benefits, so which did I want to sign up for?

WHOA THERE. I don’t want to sign up for either! However, we’d now spent about 15 minutes talking about me and what I wanted from the organization, so I didn’t want to feel foolish by saying “no thanks, never mind” at this point. (Red flag #3, in retrospect.) Savina said she could offer me a trial membership at $99. I said, didn’t I see something on the website about a free level? She said that was a listing only and didn’t include all the networking and seminars and other benefits I’d just said I wanted. So would that be American Express, Visa, Mastercard…?

At this point I felt trapped enough to give up my credit card information. I wish I’d come up with some other excuse: I wanted to review the welcome packet she promised to send; I wanted to run it by an accountant or a mentor; I wanted an invoice or an online form instead of giving my card info over the phone. (I later found out that others who’d said things like these were told the offer of membership was a now-or-never thing, or that welcome packets or requested invoices never came.)

So once Savina had my card info and enough information to create my member profile, she then offered to sell me a very nice plaque commemorating my acceptance into membership. She read off what the plaque would say and said that they only reserve two plaques for each member, so did I want to buy one or two for $99 each? That, I managed to turn down. To finish the signup process, Savina told me I’d get an email with my member ID and website login, told me I could download the organization’s logo and put it on my own site and business cards and wherever else, and described what would be in the welcome packet

When we ended the call, I felt swindled. I’d had no intention of spending a dime on membership, but because I’d been enthusiastic about membership for most of the call, I felt pressure not to backtrack. The more I thought about the whole thing, the more red flags started to appear, and I did what I should have done in the first place: researched the organization. My phone even offered “national association of professional women scam” when I started to type in the search box. Uh-oh.

I found blog posts and comments from 2007 through January of this year, all telling pretty much the same story, with some of the same names and phone numbers, though the exact dollar amounts changed from year to year. A post, Women Work Smart: Watch Out for Scams Attacking New Business Owners, and comments that echoed the experience I’d just had. An unfavorable article from 2009 that NAPW wanted taken down in 2012. A speaker who’d been offered a complimentary membership, then asked to pay for memberships and awards. A Ripoff Report article that had a fluffy, glowing “special update” at the top and a name removed from the original, critical report. Even negative Yelp reviews of the organization.

The more I read, the more infuriated I got. I called the number back and pressed 0 for “immediate assistance.” An operator transferred me to the Finance division, where I left a stern message saying I did not want membership, do not charge my card, and call me back to tell me there will be no charges. I read more stories of people getting the runaround and called the number again, this time dialing the extension Savina had given me, which again directed me to Pamela’s voice mailbox — only this time, her last name was something like Jean-Michel, not Caldwell (another red flag!). I left another stern message saying not to charge my card.

I expected I’d have to fight a little harder to avoid charges, since Savina had said that all membership orders were final. But an hour after I left the first message, I got a call from Ben (blocked number) from the Finance division. He asked me to confirm that I’d purchased a membership today. I said instead that I’d done a little more research on the organization and decided not to proceed with membership. He said, “So you looked at the website?” I said that I’d looked at the website and some other recommendations online, and I no longer wanted to be a member of NAPW. Ben offered no other resistance and said that he’d reverse the charges, which could take up to 24 hours. And that was that.

My bank account doesn’t show a pending charge yet, so I can’t say what amount they charged or refunded. If anything does come through, I’ll update the post.

ETA, 3/29/13: I think it’s safe to say now that no charges came through at all. It looks like I changed my mind quickly enough that NAPW really didn’t charge my card, instead of completing the transaction and then reversing the charges.

AP Stylebook adds “mental illness” entry

Rachel — Fri, 08 Mar 2013 00:31:51 +0000

The AP Stylebook today added a new entry on mental illness. Read the whole thing, but I’ve excerpted some of the best parts below:

mental illness Do not describe an individual as mentally ill unless it is clearly pertinent to a story and the diagnosis is properly sourced. …

Do not use derogatory terms, such as insane, crazy/crazed, nuts or deranged, unless they are part of a quotation that is essential to the story.

Do not assume that mental illness is a factor in a violent crime, and verify statements to that effect. A past history of mental illness is not necessarily a reliable indicator. Studies have shown that the vast majority of people with mental illness are not violent, and experts say most people who are violent do not suffer from mental illness. …

Avoid descriptions that connote pity, such as afflicted with, suffers from or victim of. Rather, he has obsessive-compulsive disorder. …

Avoid using mental health terms to describe non-health issues. Don’t say that an awards show, for example, was schizophrenic.

This is a tremendously progressive and much-needed addition. As I’ve mentioned in this blog’s comment policy, the terms mentioned above are indeed derogatory. Those and other terms based on illness and disability – lame, crippled, blind used in a metaphorical sense to mean “willfully ignorant,” etc. — only have teeth because we are meant to understand illness and disability as a fundamentally undesirable state of being.

Pertinent to the AP Stylebook’s new entry, biased language like this is also likely to be incorrect and vague, especially when used to describe people. What does it mean for someone to be “acting crazy”? Does a particular diagnosis matter, or do a person’s specific actions matter in a specific context? For example, another part of the entry says “Avoid interpreting behavior common to many people as symptoms of mental illness. Sadness, anger, exuberance and the occasional desire to be alone are normal emotions experienced by people who have mental illness as well as those who don’t.” Which is a more vivid description: a character who’s “kind of OCD” or a character who’s “very organized, and insists on having every jar in the spice rack placed just so, arranged in alphabetical order”? The second description probably fits a lot of people who meet few or none of the diagnostic criteria for obsessive-compulsive disorder, but it also gives the reader more insight into a character than a vague label of OCD would. It also has the benefit of not alienating readers who actually do have obsessive-compulsive disorder and are frustrated by seeing the term misused to describe feelings and actions that are not at all like true OCD.

In summary, I am entirely in favor of and heartened by this addition.

Sticky: Finally moving in March!

Rachel — Sun, 24 Feb 2013 02:22:46 +0000

The rest of my February is booked solid, but I’ll be taking time off and minimizing my workload in the first couple weeks of March. Enough of the renovations will be finished by March 17 that we’ll finally be able to move in!

So I’ll be spending the first part of March packing the rest of our things at the old house. (We’ve moved an awful lot of times in the past 10-12 years and it’s a huge pain to work full-time, come home, and then spend all your free time packing. I have the luxury of not doing that this time, so I’m not going to.) Internet should be installed before moving day, so I should be able to get up and running right away (knock on wood!). I won’t be accepting work with tight turnarounds in mid-March, though, just in case.

As always, I’ll update here with the latest, and my contact email is editing@lastsyllable.net.