Friday 19 August 2011

Paper Hangover, Beer Festival and Lucille Austero

I've had a cold hovering for the last ten days and it hit yesterday with a vengeance. Today it's even worse, and I look disturbingly like Rudolph the red nosed reindeer crossed with a laboratory mouse i.e., all red nose and watery eyes.

Still, tonight I have to go out because it's beer festival time. Remember I was writing part of the programme for a beer festival a few weeks ago? Well it's on tonight, and as the husband and I are beer buffs, and as we both wrote in the programme, we're heading along. I love offbeat, imported beers so this promises to be fun times.

Anyone read about the world markets? It's vertigo-inducingly scary. In a Lucille Austero way...


Got to love Arrested Development.



 Every week Paper Hangover gives a blog prompt for the YA writing community, and this week they want to know the five apps that you use most for writing or recreation. So here are mine:

1. Focus Booster : This is a great app for reducing procrastination. It is a little window that changes colour as the time you set to complete a certain task runs out. It makes you more concious of your time, and therefore more productive.

2. Write Or Die : This menacingly named app lets you write in a window, which turns pink when you've gone too long without typing. When it reaches dark red it plays a punishment sound, such as a baby crying or Hanson's Mmmbop. This app forces you to keep writing, thereby increasing the number of words you can churn out in a set amount of time. Great app, but for first drafts only.

3. Tweetdeck : This is a great app. I use it for scheduling tweets about my blog, which is handy because most of my readers live in different time zones to me.

4. Kindle for PC : I haven't yet succumbed to the lure of the Kindle, but this app means I can read self-published books by my writer friends on my computer.

5. Angry Birds : I haven;t yet succumbed to the lure of the smartphone, but I play this regularly on my husband's Samsung Galaxy. Seriously glad I don't have it to hand, as it would be another large thief of time.

What about you? Any useful apps that you couldn't live without? Hope you all have a great weekend!
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11 comments:

  1. Kelley19 August 2011 at 13:41

    #2 an 5 for the win. Let's see. Apps I love...

    I just found Iheartradio last night. Where has that been my whole life?!?! It's amazing. Free radio all over the country and by genre. And you can shake the iPod to have it pick a station for you. Wow, I sound like a commercial (I'm not, just easily excitable).

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  2. Alicia Gregoire19 August 2011 at 13:58

    I <3 write or die. It's helped me A LOT this year.

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  3. Hart Johnson19 August 2011 at 15:38

    Oh, poor baby, having to go to a beer festival... Man, I'd LOVE that obligation... Here it is the micros I get so excited about.

    And I'd never heard of those applications that pull you back to it--interesting! I tend to write long-hand with no possibility of doing what I'm not supposed to, but I can see how those would help a lot. I do need to look into Tweetdeck... and I've heard of Hoot Suite, too--to coordinate your media. I just need to figure out how to use it.

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  4. Roland D. Yeomans19 August 2011 at 16:58

    Summer colds seem worse for the beauty all around you. Somehow, it feels more fitting to be sniffling when it is cold and rainy! Get better soon, Roland

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  5. Jen19 August 2011 at 17:36

    Hi Christine! I just came over to visit from my blog, and I see you're an Arrested Development fan! Taste the happy! Also, it's 2.30 in the morning here, and I just skipped a line in your About Me section. I read it as: "living with my husband Labrador in Dublin." For a moment I thought your husband had a very, very weird name...

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  6. Erin L. Schneider19 August 2011 at 21:17

    Hi Christine! I really hope you're feeling better soon - although I'm positive the beer festival is REALLY going to help! And if this helps, I have one mother of a sun blister on my upper lip, which is now proudly, the size of a small planet. I'm so pretty, oh so pretty...yeah, no.

    Love your FF list - #5 made mine as well! So addicted!

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  7. Lydia Kang19 August 2011 at 22:56

    I'm a little app-stupid. But I do use Tweetdeck, though not to it's full potential.
    Have a great weekend!

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  8. Heather20 August 2011 at 00:16

    I hope you have a good time at the festival and that the cold gets better super fast!

    Heather

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  9. Alison Miller20 August 2011 at 12:37

    You have sold me on Tweetdeck and Focus Booster. And after seeing other posts, I'm a little glad I have not yet played Angry Birds. I have a feeling I'd be addicted.

    Have a great weekend!

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  10. Misha Gerrick20 August 2011 at 12:40

    I actually live a pretty app-free existence. Only blogger, twitter and yWriter...

    Hope you feel better soon.

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    ReplyDelete

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