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Category: Writing

June 5, 2017June 10, 2017Snowbird of Paradise

Why Does This Message Feel Creepy?

You’ve heard of fake news, but have you heard of a fake personal email? Well, I got one this week. It has become more and more difficult for local businesses to attract our attention because they cannot afford ads on television, few people listen to radio, and flyers are often dropped directly into the recycling […]

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Blogging Research Wordie
April 24, 2017April 24, 2017Snowbird of Paradise

Blogging Awards

I have been nominated for four blogging awards in the past, and I am pleased and honoured to have been considered.  The process, however, requires a kind of chain-letter nomination of other bloggers, and this makes me a little uncomfortable.  In the spirit of recognizing great blogs, though, I do want to thank the people who […]

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Marmalade
April 10, 2017April 10, 2017Snowbird of Paradise

Had had and that that

Try explaining why using “had had” or “that that” can be grammatically correct. For examples: “The woman had had a bad day,” and “I can see that that bothers you.” Go ahead.  I’ll wait. This week I tried to explain this to my English as a Foreign Language student, and instead simply gave more examples […]

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Lecturer with presentation
January 14, 2017January 14, 2017Snowbird of Paradise

Learning in the Dark

PowerPoint must be the most popularly misused software on the planet.  Ever since it first appeared, we have used it badly and for all the wrong reasons. It has so much potential, but we have really made a muck of it, most of the time. Printouts of Slides Yesterday I went to a training workshop […]

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Boy rolling his eyes
December 28, 2016Snowbird of Paradise

The Funny Thing About Unfunny Humour

Someone on the Nextdoor message feed yesterday was complaining about a homeless encampment near his house. He wrote, sarcastically, “Wow, what a wonderful site!” What he probably intended was to write “sight” not “site.” The message could have been read to mean that he liked the encampment, or that he liked the view, when in […]

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October 14, 2016Snowbird of Paradise

Seasonal Affective Decision-making

  How it works This how seasonal affective disorder works. It keeps you in the house, makes you regret every bad decision you ever made, bashes you over the head with your personal shortcomings, and then teases you with all the things you could have done but didn’t. Here I sit in my little apartment, […]

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There's Nothing Wrong With Being Lazy Sometimes by Neda Andel
August 31, 2016August 31, 2016Snowbird of Paradise

Motivate Me, Boss!

  When we say we want to be our own boss, we usually mean  that we don’t want someone else telling us what to do. We don’t really want all the risk and responsibility of running a business single-handedly. We just want the freedom to work and create without limitations or criticisms. People of all […]

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Mouth yelling
July 21, 2016November 11, 2016Snowbird of Paradise

Backlash From a Mixed Review

I just got yelled at, and I’m not used to being yelled at. A very angry man berated me over the phone for giving his company a mixed review online and a 5/10 star rating.  He said it was all lies, he was going to take me to court, he would not honor the warranty, […]

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Open book blurred
July 15, 2016Snowbird of Paradise

Thinking About A Book

I am thinking about turning some of the Snowbird of Paradise blog posts into a book and would very much like to have your feedback. One recommendation I have read about is to select a concept and choose only those blog posts that are associated with that concept.  For examples; being the mother of an […]

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https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/00/Task_Force_Guardian_-_Flickr_-_The_National_Guard_%281%29.jpg
March 3, 2016Snowbird of Paradise

Helicopter Mystery

During the night, at around midnight, a helicopter flew round and round above my neighborhood. I am assuming it was a police helicopter, but it wasn’t chasing anyone because it kept coming back. So, what was it doing? Were they looking for someone? [Interval] For the second day in a row I have listened to the […]

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January 3, 2016Snowbird of Paradise

The Interesting Present

Someone recently asked me what my blog was about. I said it was “kind of like a journal” and instantly regretted it. She didn’t exactly roll her eyes, but her expression clearly said “Oh good lord. How boring.”  Obviously, I need to come up with a new way to define what this blog is about. […]

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December 28, 2015December 28, 2015Snowbird of Paradise

The Tyranny of the Red Line

I used to teach writing, and I pushed that grammar boulder uphill every day. Many students would ask why the rules were what they were, and I didn’t always have an answer. Sometimes the answer was ‘just because,’ which is not satisfying in the least. Occasionally I came up with creative and amusing examples to […]

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June 2, 2015June 2, 2015Snowbird of Paradise

Good Ideas

Sometimes I have just a smidgen of an idea of something I want to write about, then it goes away. Poof. Disappeared. I don’t know where it goes. Usually I have other stuff going on. Often it happens while I’m watching TV, or falling asleep, or reading. By the time I have realized I have a […]

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March 16, 2015November 28, 2018Snowbird of Paradise

Where Vandalism Meets Art

A couple of weeks ago, two American women were arrested for carving their initials into a wall at the Colosseum in Rome. They were caught while taking pictures of themselves in front of the graffiti. The urge to leave one’s mark is not new, and some of those marks are highly prized. As a society […]

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http://www.kaushik.net/avinash/barriers-effective-web-measurement-strategy-solutions/
February 24, 2015Snowbird of Paradise

Any Second Now…

My brain is buzzing. I haven’t had enough sleep. My brother-in-law is in the hospital and I’m waiting to hear how he is doing. I am also trying to reclaim my car that was damaged in a fender-bender I spent an inordinate amount of time on hold with my insurance company this morning, and then […]

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http://www.townandcountrygazette.com/2015/01/08/exclusive-ten-things-2015/
February 15, 2015February 14, 2015Snowbird of Paradise

Lessons Learned

In August 2007 I was in a serious car accident that caused me to have fractured vertebrae in my neck and a long convalescence. After a few months, my friend Jean asked me what was the lesson that I had to learn from the experience.  The following was my response. It will help you in […]

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December 17, 2014December 15, 2014Snowbird of Paradise

Signature Brand

Signatures used to be very important. When I was a secretary, letters would sit on my boss’s desk waiting for his signature. They could not go out of the office without it. The signature meant the document was official, approved, vouched for. Companies with a wide range of products would identify their highest quality goods […]

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August 22, 2014November 11, 2016Snowbird of Paradise

Aunty-Social Media

My children are social media butterflies. They hover around a networking site for a while and then they fly off to check out some other blooming online communication opportunity. Because of this, I have been introduced to MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, WordPress, Tumblr, and probably some others that I have forgotten. It’s quite possible that […]

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https://djvaneska.files.wordpress.com/2009/11/laurenbrown.jpg
July 30, 2014July 29, 2014Snowbird of Paradise

It’s Not You, It’s Me

I always took the time to craft an interesting written online dating profile. However, that whole process made me spend far too much time thinking about myself and my appearance. I also had a hunch that time was wasted, and today I was confirmed in that suspicion. It turns out that people only really look […]

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http://192.145.238.142/~blogel5/test1/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/frustrated-woman-at-laptop.jpg
April 23, 2014July 7, 2014Snowbird of Paradise

Rhymes with Dromebook

I have been travelling with a laptop that is smaller and lighter than my usual laptop, and it has been driving me slightly crazy. At one point I was tempted to throw it out of the window of a high-rise in Chicago. Aside from the fact that I am still familiarizing myself with its capabilities, […]

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