That’s why I’ve been pretty absent here.

But I will start blogging again soon. I’ve not been writing for oh so very long, but after literarily spewing privately, I’ve suddenly found the dams broken.

Isn’t it funny how after a dry and barren spell of wordlessness, after the first words are cast, a deluge starts flowing?

Words and sentences swim around in my head, reminding me that I am by trade a wordsmith. Haunting me. Tormenting me. Depriving me of sleep.

I love how words play on each other and sentences form, making meaning out of nothing. The English language is much unlike the Chinese one, so unsuccinct and unable to stand alone. But if put together the right way, is pure poetry and music to the ear.

I was told before, in my creative writing class, that I was a poet, not a storyteller. I think that was the death of my fiction writing. I’ve tried to write again over the years, but nothing comes out. Till today, I abhor the need to grade one’s art. Journalistic writing, writing as a craft, is one thing. But writing as an art is another.

But maybe, because I am a poet that no longer rhymes, I might still be able to pull sentences out of my arse that might move the everyday man.

This I hope.

Screw creative writing classes.

Writing has always been self-indulgent. I should probably learn to indulge myself once in a while, instead of being ever so cautious.

However, I started this blog with an aim to NOT be self indulgent in my writing. That is still best left for private journalling. But, this blog is my anvil, and life is my hammer. And only by using it can I hone my pen (or keyboard) into a worthy blade.

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This is a holiday, and Lord knows my boyfriend and I need one.

It has been an eventful year. Life isn’t always fair. Massive upheavals have happened recently that need to be mulled over and decided how to act on. Until then, this is going to be a real and well deserved holiday.

(While we work on some things and prepare for the coming year.)

Evildoers beware! – Daisy, from Neil Gaiman’s “Anansi Boys”.

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I started using feed readers around 2006 to keep up with the burst of blogs that suddenly permeated the internet. It was all the craze then, and everyone had a blog. My feed reader consisted mostly of friends and fellow bloggers that I met through the Project Petaling Street community. It was a brave new world then.

Nowadays, most of my friends have stopped blogging, and their section in the feed reader is woefully silent. The feeds that are updated the most are usually informative blogs, and other websites that use RSS feeds.

If my feed reader was a coffee shop, it’s an entirely different crowd now. There are a few regulars from the old days, but the place is mostly buzzing with a different type of read and feed now.

Things have changed.

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This site has been through a couple of revisions, and is still a work in progress. But after some soul searching and some revelations, I now know exactly where to take it.

It’s already shaping up to be the final product… And will get there soon.

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But this is my site, and what it should really be is reflect MEEEEEEEEEEEEEE! And because I’m human, there are too many aspects to me to categorise and classify.

Wheeeee!!!!

Henceforth it shall be rebranded as “the online repository of all things useful and useless”!

All part of The Journey!

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I know that work seems to be impeding my blogging, but I’m stubbornly making it a point to blog because I work as a social media consultant, and therefore must participate and experiment on my own as well, and not talk out of my ass when advising clients.

I’ve also learnt a couple of things about my own social media participation lately as well. At first, I was all for social media integration, but lately I’ve been wondering whether it’s wiser to separate your social and work accounts. But that, my dear readers, is for another post.

And I’ve been wondering whether I should open up more on this blog as well. Longtime readers will probably notice that the passion and fire and brimstone is acutely missing here, just because I’m quite wary that this is the blog that I’m marketing “me” on. But I don’t think this blog is worth it’s name without it’s original soul, is it? So that’s something else to try in this experiment.

Anyway, I’ve had a couple of topics lined up lately. I’ve also been brainstorming for content for the company to package, because I feel that I’ve a lot to share and teach. And even if I don’t get it (I hope I do!), putting my ideas down in writing has given me even more content for this blog.

Now the question is when am I going to write them?

Here are some tentative topics:

1. More Abbreviations 101
2. Should you separate your social media accounts for work and play?
3. What browser would suit you?
4. Review of the Seashell Asus Eee PC (I just bought one! Yay to finally be able to do work over a cup of coffee in a nice Cafe!)
5. And much much much much more on social media and business, depending on how things pan out for work, and the content that I’ll develop or will have to keep company property.
6. And much more from myexperiences working as a waitress and in the newsagency job in Freo. I love Freo; there’s just so many little things about the city.
7. And, possibly reworked posts from my older blogs, especially if they’re relevant.

And I WILL aim to write at least one post a week. Hold me to it.

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1. How to install web apps, both via Fantanstico as well as manually, and tweak read-write-execute permissions.
2. WordPress. How to install it and how to use it. How powerful it is as well as its limitations.
3. Opengoo. After scanning and testing a whole bunch of publishing platforms, wikis and project management web apps, I’ve actually settled on Opengoo as my company’s intranet. It has the combination of being easy to use, open source, free, user-friendly and is able to be hosted on our own servers.
4. User-friendliness – in relation to all the above, no matter how powerful a piece of software is, it it’s hard for the non-tech people to pick up, it’s not going to fly. So I always aim to match software functionality with human needs.
5. Project management – How to start off the project by clarifying client needs, and then the processes of finding the people, tools and strategies to meet those needs, and then the entire process of completing said project. Documentation, clarifications, and more importantly, the face-to-face factor.
6. Project implementation – When I first started, I also had to do the technical end of my early jobs, because we hadn’t expanded yet, and I was (and still am) the techiest person in the company. I had to learn off the bat how to give an estimate of how long I would take on the job, and how to get the job done on time and done well.
7. Dreamweaver – That ties back to process 6. One of the earliest projects I worked on was a legacy website, and I had to learn the tools used to create the website in order to continue to edit it.
8. Dreamweaver can make a pretty website, but that’s all you’re going to get. If you want a proper user-friendly backend, you either pay tons to stay with a Dreamweaver-created site, or you build a site using a Content Management System. Dreamweaver is pretty powerful and all, but if a client wants a site they can update and edit themselves, it would not recommend it as the tool of choice.
9. Legacy websites are a bitch to manage without proper documentati0n.
10. Less jargon, more analogies to illustrate more complex points for non-tech clients.
11. Facebook is powerful stuff.
12. Twitter is powerful updating stuff, especially if you have the right desktop client.
13. Adobe Air is awesome. I can’t code in it, but at least I know it’s simple, functional and powerful. And I’m very happy with the apps I’ve tried on it before.
14. Social media is not a marketing tool, it is merely another channel to today’s increasingly fragmented audience. Be kind to the net, because the net will not be kind to you.
15. What the client wants and needs and what their customers want and need might not always mesh, so it’s the consultant’s job to consult, inform and strategise based on their expertise and information available. Abit the duh, but you’ll be surprised how often consultants get bowled over by clients who want one thing but might not understand the whole process of getting it done.
16. Professionalism is the key to not getting your ass on fire when the shit hits the fan.
17. Project managers need to have their own SOP. There is the entire job SOP, but the project managers have to be most on the ball or else shit will hit the fan.
18. Face to face beats phoning, and phoning beats e-mails. As wonderful as technology is, it can never replace the human connection. Connecting with your clients and colleagues is absolutely vital, because the key to most successful working (and personal) relationships is trust.
19. Keep e-mails short, sweet and simple and written to suit the person it is meant for. This may be Australia, and most of the world may speak English, BUT not everyone writes English well, and sometimes jargon can go over people’s heads.
20. Be open to learning. Things always always change, especially when you’re dealing with technology and the internet. I’ve worked with trainees before, and what annoyed me the most was the phrase “Nah, I don’t know anything about the net. Nah I don’t wanna learn.” Sorry honey, but this is the future of the industry you’re going to be in. Better to hop on the bandwagon sooner than later.
21. Relationships matter. This is probably one of the most important points, and is related to point 18. You’ll learn more about a person in a half-hour coffee break than over a hundred e-mails. Get to know the person you’re working with, what their strengths are, their weaknesses, their approach to work and everything. And then learn how to work with the person, and hopefully hope that they like you enough to want to learn to work with you too.

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And there I have my answer. That’s what my blog is going to be. A place to canvass.

“Canvassing” was the name of the previous blog before this one. That blog was also post-”Cynical-idealist” (my first blog), and it was where I stepped back from the whole blogging exercise and gave it a rest, and only blogging when I saw fit, and when I needed to. And even though that blog is no longer public, the whole idea of a place to canvass everything still resonates with me.

That’s why, as part of my self-discovery here, I’m going to port over the idea of canvassing my ideas and thoughts onto this blog. It’s not new. It’s just giving what I wanted to do here a name anyway.

Starting this blog coincided with my starting an actual job (albiet one that I really don’t earn much at all from yet, because it operates as a partnership) in a field that I’m trained in and would like to progress in.

This has been the year where I’ve learnt tons of new things, as well as realised that I knew more than I actually realised at the same time. Haha.

It’s also been the year I discovered what “account management” meant, and discovered that my calling in life would probably digital account management, as well anything to do with anything on the net. Two years ago, I would never have fathomed that actual digital account management would be an actual job in itself, and today it’s suddenly become the norm. Although I must say that most of those jobs are still over east!

And I wanted to blog about the things I’ve learnt, but because this post is ballooning (and rambling, that’ll be for another post!

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Oh well. I’m disappointed, of course, but at least now I know where I’m headed.

That and I AM having quite a bit of fun at my current job. =) So maybe it’s meant to be after all.

And there is always another time, another test.

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Therefore, I’ve started collecting ideas for posts, and putting down drafts, so that I don’t run out of ideas and topics.

I’ve also canvassed some friends regarding this blog, and the feedback I got was to keep posting the “how-to” posts, because they’re useful. And useful information is always good.

Also, I need to start writing for the web. Meaning I have to start thinking about shortening my posts to short sweet snippets if it suits the topic. I keep telling clients to keep things short and sweet, but sometimes, when it comes to blogging, I’m so used to reading text heavy posts from some of the blogs I follow that I tend to forget that people DO glaze over large chunks of text online.

Better practice what you preach, Char!

Also, I’ve started shortening down my categories, and have started using tags more. Basically, “categories” on blogs are usually used to class your content, while “tags” are the keywords that identify your post. Right now, I’m still tweaking my “categories” and “tags” list so that it suits the content a lot more.

And as for the previous post, some of you might have noticed that the post title has changed about three to four times. At first, I titled it “Host a website and save the world!” because I thought it had a nice ring to it, and would grab some attention.

Then a friend pointed out that carbon neutral just meant that you would not add to climate change, instead of actively saving the world. So I changed it to “Host a website and NOT destroy the world.”

And then Jon went o_0, so I changed it to the most standard, safest thing evar. Yes, I need to improve on my headline/title writing skills, very much. One day I will be able to churn out something witty and to-the-point like the really good headline writers out there. Until then, I guess practice makes perfect!

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