Dogs Are Smarter Than People: Writing Life, Marriage and Motivation

Screenwriter Blake Snyder and his Save the Cat method really made the term/lingo “B” story and “A” story super popular. And I think sometimes that damn “B” story gets us all confused a bit, right?

So, basically let’s just go over the terms first.

What the heck is an A story and a B story?

The A story is the book or movie’s big essence. People call it the “dramatic” core. It is the big plotline that the hero of the story follows on her journey.

The B story is the subplot basically. It supports the “A” story. It sometimes feels absolutely unrelated.

The FlyingWrestler blog defines it.

“It’s a secondary story that has its own beginning, middle and end, and is focused on its own problem, separate from but intertwined with the A Story.”

The scriptmag writes ,

“The B Story is your character’s secondary motivation or mission – the OTHER thing they have to accomplish. Your B Story may be a second problem or issue that your main character has to fix. And while your A-Story presents itself at the inciting incident and is solidified at the end of the first act with the acceptance of the adventure, your B-Story often can’t be identified UNTIL the second act begins, because it’s what is illuminated by the adventure beginning.

The FlyingWrestler blog again says,

“Just like the main A Story, the B Story’s main character should have a problem involving something external, which has its own significant life stakes. That means the problem isn’t only an internal issue, involving their need to grow and change in some way.”

So, the question becomes: Does my story have a B story? Or is it all A?

You don’t have to have a B story, but it can be helpful.

“The classic use of B Story in a movie is a romantic relationship that is secondary to a non-romantic A Story. The potential romantic partner often pressures the main character, intentionally or not, to deal with their “stuff,” and consider changing. But as with most such internal growth, the character doesn’t engage in it willingly, with “growth” as the goal. No, characters (like real people) tend to avoid change, until really significant external problems force them into it. Typically the pressures of both the A and B Story problems combine to do that. But even then, the hero usually doesn’t really change until some key moment in the final act where they (usually) snatch victory from the jaws of defeat.

“But first, both A and B Story usually reach a rock bottom “All is Lost” moment. So if the B Story is about a relationship, it’s usually broken and over at that point, as are the main character’s hopes for their A Story goal. They will have one last chance to try to solve both in the final act.Flying Wrestler

If the B Story is a romantic relationship, something has to be in the way of it. It has to be focused on a conflict, and not going well. If two people fall for each other and get together and have a lot of sex, etc., without some looming threat to the relationship, that’s not a story. That’s a positive development for the main character. And we audiences get bored by positive developments. We thrive on problems and conflicts.

Scriptmag gives a great example:

The Wizard of Oz – Dorothy’s A-Story is to find the Wizard and get home, but the B-Story becomes helping Oz and her new friends. She had no idea she was going to have to do that until the adventure began.

Usually when a crisis happens the B story acts like John Wayne in a movie and comes in and saves the A story. They merge and the reader goes, “Ah! They were connected the whole damn time. Doh!"

This is true about life, too, right? We all want to become writers, but then we have this B story of another career or self-sabotage and we might resist it, and then it’s like? Will our B story come save our A story?

But that’s about us as writers, not our actual books. So let’s get back to that.

The B story or subplot changes how your reader s

It's 2021 and people are burnt out. There's COVID-19. There's political strife. Systemic bigotries and biases. There's meanies at the grocery store and there's that never-ending effort for some of us to pay for food, shelter, and health care, right?

On Carrie's blog, www.carriejonesbooks.blog, she talked about how you can burnout on self care even, but also how writers seem super susceptible to burnout and why she was a bit burnt out for awhile.

First, let's put some definitions out there.

Writer's block is when you can't figure out what to write.

Writer’s burnout is when you are super stressed and completely mentally and physically exhausted. You have zero motivation.

And surprise surprise this pandemic has burnt out a lot of people--not just writers.

What else causes burnout?

That damn stressNobody supporting youNot being valuedWorking too hardMultitasking like a wild oneChaos

What are the symptoms?

Back in 2016, the Harvard Business Review had an article by Monique Valcour about beating burnout.

Her main three symptoms are

ExhaustionCynicismInefficacy

Add to that:

Zero motivationNot being interested in thingsFeeling like a big failNot feeling attached to anything, especially your work

In Valcour's article, she pulls out four things you can do to combat burnout.

Prioritize self-care.Shift your perspective.Reduce exposure to job stressors.Seek out connections. Valcour

Easier said than done, right?

Over on the blog, TOO MUCH ON HER PLATE, Dr. Melissa writes

Taking care of YOU is not a luxury.

Which makes sense because if you don't take care of yourself and your basic needs, you die.

But I think she's talking a bit beyond those basic needs and writes what happens when you don't take care of yourself! Yes, we're talking to you!

You have less energy and motivation to follow through on your goalsYou are more easily distracted and less focusedMany people tend to turn to “vices” to fill in the gaps that aren’t being filled with in quality ways. Stress eating and other kinds of emotional eating, smoking, drinking too much, wasting time surfing the internet—these are a few things that tend to show up, waste more of your time and energy, distract you, and contribute to a vicious cycle of decreased happiness and less effectiveness.Stress levels are higherSleep is often impaired (or sacrificed)It’s common to feel deprived, irritable, more easily frustrated, or impatientCreativity suffers and life usually includes less play and funHealth is negatively affectedDr. Melissa

So how do you take care of yourself without burning out on taking care of yourself?

Spoiler: Carrie is burnt out on daily five-minute arm exercise videos.

Spoiler: Shaun is burnt out listening to Carrie do those five-minute arm exercise videos.

Anyway, how do you take care of you? Again, Dr. Melissa has some lovely advice:

Start claiming 10-15 minutes a day for yourself. Use this time to connect with yourself and to pay attention to how you feel and what you need. Journal, walk, meditate, soak in the tub. Try not to save this for the end of the day when you are too tired to move and your brain has stopped working. Pay yourself first or, if necessary, take a break during your day.Adopt the following mantras: “I’m doing my best,” and “I can’t do it all.” They are true. Put them where you can see them and remind yourself of them frequently.Create effectiveness in do-able steps. Each evening, identify your top three personal action items for the next day and decide when you will accomplish them. Think do-able. If these daily goals seem overwhelming, make them smaller. A fifteen minute walk that you take is better than the 45 minute one you couldn’t fit in. If possible, knock out your personal priorities early in the day.Plan for food that fuels you—especially when time is tight. Don’t skip breakfast, have a plan for lunch, and don’t starve yourself before dinner. Make sure you

So a lot of writers get rejections that say, “Show, don’t tell.”

And then they are left wondering, what does that even mean?

And then everyone uses the Chekov quote, "Don’t tell me the moon is shining. Show me the glint of light on broken glass."

That’s because writers and editors like to quote other writers and editors because it makes us sound:

Pretentious. Cough. I mean intelligent!Like we know what we’re doing.

Definitions Time

Showing is what it sounds like. You are showing what’s happening in the scene or with the character.

Telling is also what it sounds like. You are blunt and direct and are just stating things. Sometimes you’re stating and summarizing.

Here is a quick example:

Telling:

Shaun was cranky.

Showing:

Gabby the dog barked for hours at the dogs trotting by the house that morning and after a quick pause for a drink from her red water bowl in the kitchen, she’d pranced back to the living room sliding glass door and started again.Shaun tensed. He slammed his fist against his desk and roared, “Will you just shut up already?”

So why do you want to show more and tell less?

It’s more community oriented.

It gives the reader the truth about the character by illustrating it on the page rather than laying it down like an edict.

If I tell you, Carrie is a timid person, then you’re like okay. Whatever.

But if I show you a scene where Carrie steps outside and starts crying because the grass is long and things could be hiding in it and she starts sweating and shaking because she’s so afraid of the grass? You’re going to probably have a better understanding of how timid a person Carrie actually is.

Yeah, showing takes more words, but writers are word magistrates. We are dealers in the sentence and the language. Words are our friends.

The other reason is that telling makes things dull.

It’s hard to be suspenseful when you just say everything all bluntly. When you tell, you are blunt. When you show? You are laying out little truths that compel the reader to turn the page and read on. You are giving the pieces of a meal, one bite at a time, rather than shoving a four-course dinner down their throat and making them gag.

It’s the difference between reading the episode recap for Wanda Vision and actually watching the show.

Telling kills immediacy.

Just like distancing language, telling puts a wall up between the reader and the experience of the characters.

If I write, Carrie heard the bomb explode, it’s not as gripping. You are distanced from the experience.

Compare that to if I write,

The bang rippled through the air. The cops’ radios all began squawking with orders and directives as the cops turned as one towards the source of the sound and the smoke…the smoke billowed out and up. Carrie turned with them. The plastic, the soot, the burning on her tongue made it hard to swallow.

WRITING TIP OF THE POD

Show more. Tell less.

DOG TIP FOR LIFE

Show it as best as you can for all the good treats.

RANDOM THOUGHTS

Our random thoughts this week were about:

A stray dog at Dollar General stealing a purple unicorn. He's okay and found his forever home! Yay! Link from People.

A woman who was allegedly stuck in Florida tunnels and a drain for three weeks. She's okay! Link from the Miami Herald.

How Shaun announced at the Covid vaccine place that Carrie doesn't bleed. He's okay, too. Link from our life.

HEY!

It's my book! It came out June 1! Boo-yah! Another one comes out July 1.

And that one is called  THOSE WHO SURVIVED, which is the first book in the the DUDE GOODFEATHER series.  I hope you’ll read it, like it, and buy it!

The Dude Goodfeather Series - YA mystery by NYT bestseller Carrie Jones

TO TELL US YOUR BRAVE STORY JUST EMAIL BELOW.

SHOUT OUT!

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. 

Here’s a link to that a

This week on Carrie's blog, carriejonesbooks.blog, she's talking all about chapters and so we're talking about them on the podcast, too, because Carrie's controlling like that.

And what we're talking about specifically is chapter titles.

You can divide your books into chapters and just label them numerically, 1, 2, 3... But you can also give them a title like:

Chapter One

Surviving the Podcast

Here's the thing.

Chapter Titles Help Your Readers

How do they help your readers? In a lot of ways.

Grab attention.

You put these bad boys at the top of the chapter. And the reader thinks, “Ah! Look at that! I am paying attention.”

Tell readers who they are focusing on now.

If you have a story with multiple point of views, you can put who this chapter is focused on here.

Show location or time changes.

You can give the reader some help. If you have a time jumping, place jumping novel. You can use this space to say, “Hey, we are in sexy Scotland in 2021.” Or you can say, “Look, we’re in Zambia in August.”

Show theme or the future.

It’s like a happy little spoiler where the reader goes, “Oh, that’s what this chapter is about.” This can be about theme, too.

Show Echoes.

A chapter title can be a first sentence.

Summing it up: And there you go. A quick bit about chapter titles and what they can do for you.

WRITING TIP OF THE POD

Chapter titles are good tools. Use them.

DOG TIP FOR LIFE

Use whatever you can to communicate things to your human. Wag. Growl. Bark. Spin in circles. Hit them with your paw. They are stupid and need a lot of help understanding what you're putting down.

SHOUT OUT!

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. 

Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Summer Spliff” by Broke For Free.

AND we are transitioning to a new writer podcast called WRITE BETTER NOW! You'll be able to check it out here starting in 2022!

We have a podcast, LOVING THE STRANGE, which we stream live on Carrie’s Facebook and Twitter and LinkedIn on Fridays. Her Facebook and Twitter handles are all carriejonesbooks or carriejonesbook.

Carrie is reading one of her poems every week on CARRIE DOES POEMS. And there you go! Whew! That's a lot!

Here’s the link.

Write Better Now - Writing Tips podcast for authors and writers

loving the strange the podcast about embracing the weird

Carrie Does Poems

In our Random Thoughts We Talked About

Bears in the outhouse

Snake in an Inhaler

It's my book! It came out June 1! Boo-yah! Another one comes out July 1.

And that one is called  THOSE WHO SURVIVED, which is the first book in the the DUDE GOODFEATHER series.  I hope you’ll read it, like it, and buy it!

The Dude Goodfeather Series - YA mystery by NYT bestseller Carrie Jones

TO TELL US YOUR BRAVE STORY JUST EMAIL BELOW.

SHOUT OUT!

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. 

Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Summer Spliff” by Broke For Free.

And we have a new podcast, LOVING THE STRANGE, which we stream live on Carrie’s Facebook and Twitter and LinkedIn on Fridays. Her Facebook and Twitter handles are all carriejonesbooks or carriejonesbook.

Here’s the link. This week’s podcast is all about spontaneous combustion and poop styles.

In our random thoughts, we talk about:

Killer trees in MaineFBI agents looking for goldChainsaws being a hot stolen item.

One of the big things that pretty much every traditional story in Western culture needs is conflict.

CHARACTER + WANT + OBSTACLE = CONFLICT

In your story or your life, you have wants? Sometimes there are obstacles in the way. They keep you from getting your want. Therein lies the conflict. The story becomes interesting because of how you or your character deals with that obstacle.

A lot of writers wait a long time to get that conflict into their stories.

Don't do this. It is usually boring when you do this.

Nobody wants to be boring. There are two overall types of conflict - internal (inside the character) and external (outside the character), but they can be broken down even more.

AND There are tons of different types of conflicts. Choose One. MAKE THAT Little Jerk your friend.

First off, there are all sorts of lists about the types of conflict in novels. Sometimes you'll see four. Sometimes you'll see three. Whatever. Nothing is ever set in stone.

Character vs. character -Podcaster Carrie is trying desperately to not get an explicit rating, but her co-podcaster, Shaun, likes being explicit. How will Carrie make $5 a year off her podcast if it is banned?

Character vs. society - Podcaster Shaun must fight against an overly oppressive society that doesn't like his explicit nature. How can Shaun survive in a society that crushes his inherent Shaunie-ness?

Character vs. nature - Nature or an aspect of it is about to kick your ass. Think Jaws. Think tidal waves. Think the moon messing up the Earth's axis. How will there be a podcast if you are fighting off a Sharknado?

Character vs. technology - Your submarine breaks and you have only hours to fix the tech and live. Your mechanical love doll decides to kill you. Your downloads keep buffering. HOW WILL YOU PODCAST?

Character vs. supernatural - The ghosts have invaded the podcast studio and keep whispering, "WHO YOU GONNA CALL" over the audio. HOW WILL YOU PODCAST?

Character vs. self - The Reedsy blog states

Internal strife will stem from a debate that occurs within a character. It might originate from any combination of the character’s expectations, desire, duties, and fears.Reedsy

Carrie has massive social anxiety, but also a hammy tendency. Every time she has to do a podcast, she panics and paces the house. Will she get it together enough to podcast? Can she get over her reluctance to speak aloud because her s's are sloshy in order to finally have a voice?

Character vs. fate - Think Greek tragedy or boy wizards and prophecies. You are fated to die at the hands of a monster, in battle, via evil male wizards. You are stuck throwing an evil ring into a volcano. You are stuck becoming a podcaster in a prescribed fate sent from God. How do you deal with this once you know? How do you fight your fate?

WRITING TIP OF THE POD

Put lots of conflict in your story. Put it in early. You can use more than one kind.

DOG TIP FOR LIFE

Don't create drama in your life when you're bored or for attention. We all know people who try to create grievance and controversy out of random events. We all know people who go trolling on Facebook or Twitter or try to create drama and get that negative attention in their own post or life.

Spoiler: Negative attention isn't the best kind of attention. Go for the positive.

RESOURCES

Articles mentioned in random thoughts are all linked here. And here.

SHOUT OUT!

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. 

Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Summer Spliff” by Broke For Free.

AND we are transitioning to a new writer podcast called WRITE BETTER NOW! You'll be able to check it out here st

In our random thought (not transcribed here), we talk about

Being a trophy wifeA woman finding an abandoned apartment behind her bathroom mirrorAnother couple finding a hidden basement in their rental home.

So a lot of Medium articles and blogs focused on writing are all about:

How to increase your audienceHow to make 60-trillion-dollars a year off your writing.How to be like James Patterson and make 90-trillion-dollars a year.

But all of them seem to forget that writers are creators. Writers are people who make story and art (not just to make money), but also because they are compelled to create, to move, to incite, to inspire.

Especially when so many of us are struggling to make ends meet, it's easy to focus only on the money. But your life is worth more than that. Your brain is about more than that, too.

You aren't just about money. You are about creating.

“The guardians of high culture will try to convince you that the arts belong only to a chosen few, but they are wrong…We are all the chosen few. We are all makers by design.” -Elizabeth Gilbert

Every single one of us creates something.

My dad built bird houses and engines. My mom embroidered like a beast. Neither of them would think of themselves as creators. Shaun's dad painted Bob Ross things. His mom probably does something, too.

We all have urges. Those urges aren't just about food, sex, and survival. There are also urges to create. But so many of us are told, you aren't artistic. You can't draw. You're a math person. We let those moments define us. And we think, "Ah, I'm the left-brained kid." We think, "Ah, I don't have an aritistic bone in my body."

That's what Carrie's mom told her, God love her, even though all Carrie ever wanted to do was draw. That's right. Not write. Draw.

It doesn't matter that Carrie makes very little money painting. It's what gives her joy. So she does it whenever she has time. Writing and creating should be about expression, not just about how to make as much money as possible in as quick amount of time as possible.

Don't be fluff.

There's a guy who writes a zillion Medium articles and has a massive following and makes tons of money. I've read a ton of his articles. I can't remember any of them. That's because he's regurgitating to make money. It's all fluff. Don't be fluff.

The most talented, thought-provoking, game-changing people are never normal. Richard Branson

Don't let other people's assumptions about you hold you back.

The most dangerous idea is silencing people. Naval Ravikant

Shaun's a big man. He's six-six. He looks pretty much like an ex-football player. People are stunned that he's not. But if he wanted to study ballet, the guy should be able to study ballet.

We are born to live. We have to make money to survive. But we have to be about more than money to live. Create things. Explore things. Remember to live, too, okay?

WRITING TIP OF THE POD

Write for the sake of writing.

DOG TIP FOR LIFE

People are more than their looks or being sexy and this goes for dogs, too.

HELP US AND DO AN AWESOME GOOD DEED

Thanks to all of you who keep listening to our weirdness on the DOGS ARE SMARTER THAN PEOPLE podcast and our new LOVING THE STRANGE podcast.

We’re sorry we laugh so much… sort of. 

Please share it and subscribe if you can. Please rate and like us if you are feeling kind, because it matters somehow. There’s a new episode every Tuesday!

Thanks so much for being one of the 263,000 downloads if you’ve given us a listen!

One of our newest LOVING THE STRANGE podcasts is about the strange and adorably weird things people say?

And one of our newest DOGS ARE SMARTER THAN PEOPLE episode is about fear setting and how being swallowed by a whale is bad ass.

And Carrie has new books out! Yay!

You can order now! It's an adult mystery/thriller that takes place in Bar Harbor, Maine. Read an excerpt here!

In the random thoughts part of the podcast we talk about Big Foot, wedgies and how you can tell when predators are looking at you.

THREE BIG STEPS TO LEARN HOW TO WRITE GOOD STUFF

There’s a lot of people out there who say that if you write every day you’ll become a better writer and that’s true … sort of. You also need the basics.

If you write every day, but you don’t learn about writing every day then you don’t get to improve. You just write.

And that’s not good enough.

Learning how to write has to do with a few things. And the first step is to know what you want to write.

FIGURE OUT WHAT YOU’RE INTO

Writing an epic fantasy isn’t the same as writing ad copy and that’s not the same as writing poetry. Pick something. It doesn’t have to be your only style, but pick one way first.

LEARN THE TOOLS

Now here’s the fun part. The learning. How do you learn how to write?

Enroll in courses.Read things like what you want to write.Watch blogs, listen to podcasts, and read books about craft.Talk to other writers who do what you do. They might have cool resources too.Hire a writing coach or editor who loves helping people and not just loves making money.

GO FOR THE GRAMMAR

Yeah. Yeah. We know. Periods aren’t sexy. Most people don’t get turned on by scene structure, but you should!

If your story is awesome, but there is no punctuation or grammar or even sentences?

You’re not going to be understandable to your potential readers. They are just going to stop reading.

Places to Check Get Your Sexy Grammar On

Grammar GirlMerriam Webster DictionaryStrunk and White’s, The Elements of Style.

WRITING TIP OF THE POD

To be the best writer you can be, you need to spend time learning.

DOG TIP FOR LIFE

Dogs don’t give other dogs wedgies. We aren’t dogs, we have to take the time to communicate.

HELP US AND DO AN AWESOME GOOD DEED

Thanks to all of you who keep listening to our weirdness on the DOGS ARE SMARTER THAN PEOPLE podcast and our new LOVING THE STRANGE podcast.

We’re sorry we laugh so much… sort of. 

Please share it and subscribe if you can. Please rate and like us if you are feeling kind, because it matters somehow. There’s a new episode every Tuesday!

Thanks so much for being one of the 263,000 downloads if you’ve given us a listen!

One of our newest LOVING THE STRANGE podcasts is about the strange and adorably weird things people say?

And one of our newest DOGS ARE SMARTER THAN PEOPLE episode is about fear setting and how being swallowed by a whale is bad ass.

And Carrie has new books out! Yay!

You can order now! It's an adult mystery/thriller that takes place in Bar Harbor, Maine. Read an excerpt here!

SHOUT OUT!

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. 

Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Summer Spliff” by Broke For Free.

AND we are transitioning to a new writer podcast called WRITE BETTER NOW! You'll be able to check it out here starting in 2022!

We have a podcast, LOVING THE STRANGE, which we stream live on Carrie’s Facebook and Twitter and LinkedIn on Fridays. Her Facebook and Twitter handles are all carriejonesbooks or carriejonesbook.

Carrie is reading one of her poems every week on CARRIE DOES POEMS. And there you go! Whew! That's a lot!

Here’s the link.

Write Better Now - Writing Tips podcast for authors and writers

loving the strange the podcast about embracing the weird

Carrie Does Poems

If you like what you read, please heart it below or share it, it means the world to this writer. x0- Carrie

So, there’s a lot of scuttlebutt in the children’s book world about agents behaving badly, which sounds like a Spring Fling Road Trip kind of thing, honestly.

But it’s more about agents being dicks and unprofessional. One recent superstar agent has been outed for allegedly “no longer agenting ethically” and not telling clients about their foreign rights, submissions, and speaking badly about authors to other industry professionals or being sexually harassing, bigoted, racists schmucks.

There’s a weird power dynamic that happens between traditionally published authors and their agents. The agents are really gatekeepers to the industry even if they don’t want to be, and it’s good for writers to remember that they can expect to not be treated like crap.

Things you don’t want your agent to:

Ghost you.Be such a tool that most editors don’t want to work with them.Give you hives.Not telling who your book is being submitted to.Sexual harass you, be racist, be too burnt out or wigged out on drugs or alcohol that they don’t represent you well.Be too busy that they don’t represent you well.

We aren’t going to call out agents here because that’s not what we’re about, but here are myths about agents that new authors really need to understand:

They work for you. You don’t work for them.They are human not gods. Be gentle with them, but expect them to be professional.Though it’s awesome when they are, it’s not their job to be your bestie.They may not be your agent for life.

So what is their job?

Get book contracts for you.Negotiate those contracts for you.Submit your manuscripts to get those contracts.Protect your interests.

Doing all this they should always:

Respond in a timely fashion to your inquiries. But don’t be a punk and spam them.Tell you where they are submitting your stories.Tell you when your stories are rejected or accepted and relay feedback.

When you look for an agent, you want to:

Research the hell out of everyone and find your top ten. Make sure they actually represent the kind of book you’re writing.Check to make sure they aren’t villains.Check the proper way to submit to them.Query them in a professional way.

Writers Beware is an awesome site for understanding what agents should or shouldn’t do. The link is here and in our podcast notes. You should check it out.

Writing Tip of The Pod

Don’t be a schmuck. Don’t let your agent be a schumck.

Dog Tip for Life

 When you look for treats, make sure to give them to everyone.

SHOUT OUT!

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. 

Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Summer Spliff” by Broke For Free.

AND we are transitioning to a new writer podcast called WRITE BETTER NOW! You'll be able to check it out here starting in 2022!

We have a podcast, LOVING THE STRANGE, which we stream live on Carrie’s Facebook and Twitter and LinkedIn on Fridays. Her Facebook and Twitter handles are all carriejonesbooks or carriejonesbook.

Carrie is reading one of her poems every week on CARRIE DOES POEMS. And there you go! Whew! That's a lot!

Here’s the link.

Write Better Now - Writing Tips podcast for authors and writers

loving the strange the podcast about embracing the weird

Carrie Does Poems

LET'S HANG OUT!

HEY! DO YOU WANT TO SPEND MORE TIME TOGETHER?

MAYBE TAKE A COURSE, CHILL ON SOCIAL MEDIA, BUY ART OR A BOOK, OR LISTEN TO OUR PODCAST?

Email us at [email protected]

HELP US AND DO AN AWESOME GOOD DEED

Thanks to all of you who keep listening to our weirdness on the DOGS ARE SMARTER THAN PEOPLE podcast and our new LOVING THE STRANGE podcast.

We’re sorry we laugh so much… sort of. 

Please share it and subscribe if you can. Please rate and like us if you are feeling kind, because it matters somehow. Th

In our Random Thought section of the podcast (Notes not transcribed), we talk about how straight men aren't supposed to let the world know they like/have cats on social media. Shaun has thoughts.

The rest of the podcast follows.

Every weekday Carrie posts on her personal Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and Linkedin, inspiring quotes from our dogs and cats.

Sometimes they are just about bacon and naps because bacon and naps can be inspiring.

But it made us think of famous writing quotes and whether or not they are kind of b.s. And how very privileged some quotes are.

Like Marianne Williamson, who we are sure is an incredibly lovely person wrote this:

“Nothing binds you except your thoughts, nothing limits you except your fear; and nothing controls you except your beliefs.”

Which is lovely and partially true, but it comes from the perspective of a really lucky person who is white, who is good looking, who had a lot of advantages as a white American, right? It’s hard to say nothing binds you except your thoughts to a political prisoner who is legit in chains, to a Black man or woman in the U.S. who is jail for pot, for someone who has paralyzing fear because of trauma that’s happened to her or him or them, right?

Generalizations can be so inspiring and they can have truth in them for some people and sometimes even for most people, but it’s never going to work for everyone.

Writing advice and quotes are like that, too.

Like even the most amazing Ray Bradbury wrote

“You must stay drunk on writing so reality cannot destroy you.”

That’s a good quote, right? Us writers are easily destroyed. But being drunk on anything all the time usually means for most of us that we’re not helping create a solution to problems. Instead, we’re being drunk, putting lampshades on our head and saying, “Nah. Nah. Nah. I can’t hear you.”

It’s not the best look, really.

But sometimes the advice is pretty cool.

“Be strategic and resilient in the pursuit of your dreams. That sounds like a cheesy quote, right? But nah, I’m serious. Resilience is one hell of a quality to master and not many have the skin for it.” —Tiffany D. Jackson

“People are going to judge you all the time no matter what you do. . . . Don’t worry about other people. Worry about you.” —Jacqueline Woodson

 “How vain it is to sit down to write when you have not stood up to live.” — Henry David Thoreau

“Write what should not be forgotten.” — Isabel Allende

“Healing begins where the wound was made.” -Alice Walker (The Way Forward Is with a Broken Heart)

WRITING TIP OF THE POD

Blow off the b.s. And realize where it's coming from. Sometimes it's coming from people whose lives and brains are nothing like yours and sometimes it's just coming from people who want to make a butt ton of money selling their advice to you.

DOG TIP FOR LIFE

Cats are okay. They're good to snuggle with, too.

SHOUT OUT!

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. 

Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Summer Spliff” by Broke For Free.

AND we are transitioning to a new writer podcast called WRITE BETTER NOW! You'll be able to check it out here starting in 2022!

We have a podcast, LOVING THE STRANGE, which we stream live on Carrie’s Facebook and Twitter and LinkedIn on Fridays. Her Facebook and Twitter handles are all carriejonesbooks or carriejonesbook.

Carrie is reading one of her poems every week on CARRIE DOES POEMS. And there you go! Whew! That's a lot!

Here’s the link.

Write Better Now - Writing Tips podcast for authors and writers

loving the strange the podcast about embracing the weird

Carrie Does Poems

HELP US AND DO AN AWESOME GOOD DEED

Thanks to all of you who keep listening to our weirdness on the DOGS ARE SMARTER THAN PEOPLE podcast and our new LOVI

RANDOM THOUGHTS

In our random thought, we talk about werewolves on bikes and what would happen if SuperBowl players dressed up like zombies and vampires. Who would win?

Here are the photos we promised.

The Advice Part!

So, advice is cool, right? It’s other people sharing their wisdom, but sometimes advice? It just sucks.

This goes for writing advice and life advice.

I was driving from Manhattan to Long Island with my boyfriend and his parents. These were wealthy people with a really expensive car. The dad was a partner at one of the top firms in the city, and he was brilliant. He was not, however, the best driver.On this drive, my boyfriend and I were in the backseat and suddenly the car was bumping along. We looked up and his dad was legit driving his car on the median of the road, the bumped out divider thing.His mom was screaming and he was just totally oblivious. The traffic was flowing, but heavy and there are signs in the median.“Jimmy!” she screamed.The sign is getting closer and closer.And he said, “It is fine.”He swerved off into oncoming traffic. People screamed. He swore. He veered back up onto the median. The sign was still there, waiting.I was clutching the door handle. My boyfriend yelled, “Dad! You’re going to hit the—”His dad slammed on the breaks. We waited about five minutes for his mom to stop swearing and for someone to let us to get back on the road.And he said, I swear to God, “Let this be a lesson to you kids. Roads are not for everyone. You find your own damn way.”Carrie

Bad advice, right? Sometimes it’s okay to stay on the road. When you deviate off, you want to deviate safely and not run over signs or almost get people killed.

I also had a relative who told me college was for fools and that I read too much so I wouldn’t get anywhere in life.

Also the thought does count, but it usually doesn’t count for the person you’ve kind of failed.

And credit cards aren’t free money, Mom.

There’s good life advice out there too like:

Check your credit card and bank statements a lot.Don’t make big decisions when you’re super angry.Don’t not do things because you’re afraid of rejection.Don’t not speak your mind because you’re afraid of trolls.Floss your teeth so you can keep having teeth.

And there’s bad writing advice out there too like:

You always have to outline. If you see “always,” it’s probably going to be a bad piece of advice.You should never outline. If you see “never,” it’s probably going to be a bad piece of advice.Adverbs are always demons. You really don’t honestly want them to be totally almost every other silly word, but you can totally use them sparingly. Sorry! I couldn’t resist.Semicolons are always demons. They aren’t; sometimes they help when a conjunction just doesn’t work.Write the way you talk. This isn’t necessarily a good idea if you’re a person who talks like Carrie. Plus, it’s limiting. Do you want every character to sound exactly like you? Every book?

WRITING TIP OF THE POD

All advice is not created equally.

DOG TIP FOR LIFE

Live your life for yourself sometimes.

SHOUT OUT!

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. 

Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Summer Spliff” by Broke For Free.

AND we are transitioning to a new writer podcast called WRITE BETTER NOW! You'll be able to check it out here starting in 2022!

We have a podcast, LOVING THE STRANGE, which we stream live on Carrie’s Facebook and Twitter and LinkedIn on Fridays. Her Facebook and Twitter handles are all carriejonesbooks or carriejonesbook.

Carrie is reading one of her poems every week on CARRIE DOES POEMS. And there you go! Whew! That's a lot!

Here’s the link.

Write Better Now - Writing Tips podcast for authors and writers

loving the strange the podcast about embraci