An Early Publishing Credit

/ ronni, writing

I was eighteen, and I’d graduated from high school earlier that summer. Some of the Mousketeers from the All New Mickey Mouse Club came to Cleveland to promote their new album MMC (I have two copies, one of them still sealed!). I’d wanted to originally interview one of the ‘teers for the teen section of The Plain Dealer (called Next), but someone beat me and my best friend Charla to it. So, I got the next best thing. I got to review the record.

Disney sent me a press kit with photos, a press release, and a copy of the MMC CD. But I’d already had the CD—I’d won it in a contest for Teen Beat a few months prior (along with a water bottle and a signed poster. Now, mind you, after meeting them, I had tons of signed MMC stuff, so that just added to my collection.) So I was ready to review it.

This wasn’t my first publishing credit, but it was the first article I actually got paid money for. You can click the picture for a larger, more readable size. :)

I even have the little slip of paper that says how much I got paid, and what for. I had a lot of confidence in my writing back then. I hope I can get it back soon.

(fyi – commenting is closed to anonymous and non-friends until Sunday. just a precaution…)

(Originally published at Anywhere Is…)

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OMGHAHA Big Brother FTW!!!

/ lol

Oh man, oh man, oh man. HAHAHAHAHAHA.

The drama is going down tonight!!! I LOVE IT!!

It’s JENsational. Oh wow, did I just do that?

There are rumors that Jen is here on behalf of Chilltown. CHILL-freakin-TOWN. There is only one Chilltown. I don’t want Jen to be a part of it.

*misses Dr. Will*

Seriously, there is this drinking game. Every time Jen says “I” you’re to take a drink. If I were playing, I’d be SO DRUNK right now…….

FTR, I am on Team Daniele. For now, anyway.

Time for the veto competition. I already know who gets it, but I hope more drama occurs.

ETA: Man, I hate it when I like both of the people on the block. 🙁

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Whatevs.

/ Uncategorized

BIG THANK YOU TO varianjohnson! Thanks to him, I can listen to Do Me! by BBD anytime I feel like it. Awesome, awesome, awesome.

And AWESOME.

I owe the IRS money. They’re going to start taking money out of my account on September 15th. That sucks. And they’re all “you didn’t pay your taxes in full blah blah blah so we’re going to charge penalties and interest blah blah blah” but at least I know when money is going to start coming out so I can budget accordingly. Just know that very few people will be getting presents from me for birthdays and holidays for a long time.

Whatever. As I just told adamselzer, I’m a financial black hole. 🙁 He says one day we’ll be so rich we will look back at this and laugh. Here’s hoping.

But now that I think of it, I couldn’t be a black hole, because that would mean I’m sucking all the money in and it’ll never come out again. All of my money flies away from me at a frightening and alarming rate as costs rise while income stays stagnant… yeah. Whatever. I owe money and it sucks. It’s just like a damn credit card bill and I got rid of those stupid things in April. Grr.

Anyway.

I got drink coupons from Southwest! I earned my first Rapid Reward last month (free flight, hello!), and I asked for drink coupons. They gave me four!

I was going through all my CDs over the weekend, looking for Motownphilly (didn’t find it), and I came across a CD single for Crazy by Aerosmith. I don’t remember when I got it, probably last summer. I’d apparently never bothered to listen to it (it was $1), but there are these orchestral versions of Crazy and Amazin’ (my favorite Aerosmith song) that are just lovely. There’s also an acoustic Crazy.

Oh, and zenosidal wants me to tell you that Longaberger has online shopping now: http://www.longaberger.com/onlineExpress.aspx
He says if you buy something to enter his consultant number in checkout: 1762744

Hit the library today, the first time in a while. I got out four books and the soundtrack for Oklahoma!. For fun, I reserved the new Harry Potter book. I was number 2707. Bwah? I took myself off the list after I saw that. Some people are going to be waiting a long time. I wonder how many copies the library ordered?

What are everyone’s plans for the Harry Potter release craziness? Some place around here is even having a party on his birthday (July 31st?).

Big Brother tonight. I read the blog of someone who watches the feeds, so I already know who won POV. I’m interested to see what goes down as a result of that.

I’m in the mood to watch Mad Hot Ballroom. I need to eventually own that movie. I’ll reserve it again, as I’ve put Netflix on hold until October 15, and I will probably cancel it altogether once the hold comes off of my account. I love that they let you do that, though. But let’s see, what do I want more? A couple of hours watching a DVD at night, or to move to Chicago? Yeah, thought so. Bye, bye Netflix. Especially considering I have at least six DVDs that are still sealed! Plus, there is always the library.

Besides all of these reasons for moving to Chicago:
1. adamselzer
2. saintscribble, projectlost1, jebbyk, libbydabomb, firessong, ralinad, and other assorted people who aren’t on LJ but are still v. cool
3. There is always something to do
4. GD
5. Lake Michigan
6. D’amatos bread
7. Hot Doug’s
8. Sip
9. all kinds of other sweeet stuff

There is Anderson’s Bookshop. This shop hosts the yearly Children’s Literature Breakfast, but it also gets the most awesome authors in for signings and readings and such. For example, next month, they’re getting Stephenie Meyer, Gail Carson Levine, Jennifer Crusie & Bob Mayer. In May, they had Meg Cabot. They also had Lauren Myracle at some point. It’s in the burbs, but as I’ll have my car, it’ll be easy to get there.

The travel bug’s biting. Anyone want to fly me somewhere to hang out? Kidding. Sort of.

That’s all for now.

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Tagged by tinaya

/ meme

The rules:

* Each player starts with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
* People who are tagged need to write their own blog about their eight things and post these rules.

1. I try my best to conserve paper. But I am neurotic about mistakes. If I’m in the right (or maybe WRONG) mood, I will throw away** an entire sheet of paper and start all over. Perfection is what I strive for. (**when I say “throw away” I mean throw into recycling)

2. White vehicles annoy me. The make and model doesn’t matter to me. It can be a pick up truck, a minivan, a sedan, a van, whatever. I just don’t like white vehicles—especailly white vans. Ugh.

3. My favorite type of pen is the Pilot Precise V5 Rolling Ball. I’ve been using that kind for at least 12 years. And it’s like, the official pen of Zaner-Bloser (red for us copy editors) so yes. That’s awesome. They also make them in funky colors like pink, so that’s even more awesome.

4. I know I already mentioned this, but I am certified to model and instruct Zaner-Bloser handwriting.

5. I just brushed and flossed, and of course, I’m starting to get hungry.

6. About ten minutes after I finish a plate of spaghetti, I get endorphins. I really do. I get these wonderful tingly feelings all throughout my body. It’s not unlike those warm fuzzies you get when you take a pain killer and it starts to kick in, right before you fall asleep. Or a Nyquil. Much milder, but the same feeling. Maybe that’s why I love spaghetti so much. Plus the fact that it just tastes good….

7. I took two Tylenol PM before my bath (filled with lavendar bubbles) and moisturizing (with lavendar lotion), I’ve been up since 4:40am with the exception of a 15 minute nap at lunch, and I’m still not tired. >.< 8. Last week, I got irritated at Magical Mountain Disney News because I noticed yet another error in one of their headlines. There had been consistent errors in their headlines for weeks now, and I finally got irritated enough to say something about it. It said: Disney Movies Makes There Way To Downloadable HD. And one more: Disney World’s Spaceship Earth Going Back To It’s Roots. Can anyone identify the errors and correct them? No fair cheating!!

I emailed them and told them about the errors, and they wrote back two emails thanking me and they fixed it that night! They fixed them both, which I am thrilled about. YAY. They also asked me to email them anytime I found errors. Heh.

I really would love a job consulting Web sites, stores who make signs, menu printers, etc. Seriously. I know I’m needed, but I don’t know how to go about breaking into it. Although, now I have BUSINESS CARDS (my first time having them!), so maybe I can get people to hire me. We’ll see.

Wow, #8 was a long one. And I think all the calm/sleep stuff is finally starting to kick in. I’m beginning to feel that blissful, heavy feeling. Although I could really go for a small amount of spaghetti… but I won’t. I promise!

P.S. I would really love if someone would send me an mp3 of Do Me by BBD. REALLY LOVE IT. It might help me get spaghetti-endorphins.

———————

I normally don’t tag because well, I don’t. Also, this one’s made its rounds on the ‘net, looks like. Still, I’d be interested in hearing from:
swankivy, drkangelmommy, meimeigui, starlit12, and aruth. 🙂

Night!

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Food Cravings

/ food, ronni, Uncategorized

I keep having repeated, strong cravings for ice cream, Mexican food (good Mexican, not Chipotle or Taco Bell), green vegetables, and KFC. Not necessarily together. They kind of alternate. Like, right now, it’s ice cream. Chocolate with M&M mix-in from Cold Stone Creamery.

I wonder if it’s because July is National Ice Cream Month?

At any rate, I have loads of ice cream in my freezer, simply because I don’t eat it a whole lot, so I have plenty to indulge in. But I know that I can eat an entire pint of Ben & Jerry’s Neopolitan Dynamite and STILL crave that chocolate with M&M mix-in from Cold Stone.

Last time I had these cravings, I found out I was expecting Aidan.

I know for sure nothing like that is the case now.

Still. WEIRD.

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