Coming Home

I love returning from a trip to find two checks waiting for me, plus a copy of Moon New Jersey, in which I’m thanked in the acknowledgments as “copy editor extraordinaire.” It’s almost enough to get me excited about getting back to work—and being back in Jersey! But apparently my subconscious wasn’t quite so enthusiastic—I had a dream last night that when I turned on my computer this morning I found that the operating system—and all of my files—had disappeared and been replaced with some strange Garfield-themed environment that kept crashing. Bizarre, and thankfully not at all based in reality.

Honduras was great. I wanted to blog from the road but couldn’t remember my password, giving me flashbacks to similarly frustrating moments at internet cafes in Bangkok on my first visit to Asia. More on the trip soon, including pictures, of course.

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Really Spiffy

Thanks to everyone for their comments, feedback, and tech support. I’ve ended up with a totally different design that I’m actually very happy with, so here’s the very newest, and very lovely, www.nomadeditorial.com. If you’re late to this whole debate and are curious about the process, the links to the earlier designs in the last entry still work (except for the last one, which just takes you to the main site now). But don’t go writing and telling me you like one of those better! Too late.

Spiffy

I’ve finally finished redesigning my work website, www.nomadeditorial.com, and it looks pretty damn good, if I do say so myself. I modeled it on the relatively new www.nomadchronicles.com, saving me the headache of figuring out another color and design scheme that I like and the coding to go with it. Now I’m off to search for some new clients—wahoo! And remember, if you ever encounter someone who needs an editor (whether they know it or not), send them my way. I’ve worked on blogs and books and everything in between, including magazine articles and graduate theses.

UPDATE: I’ve received some feedback that makes me think I need to keep working on this, so I’m changing it back to the old version for the moment. Here’s a preview of the initial redesign, however, if you’re still curious. I’ve been told it’s too dark and cold by one person and that it’s too hard to read the white text on a dark background by several people, so I’m thinking of a new color scheme, which may mean ditching my little logo. Boo. Any other suggestions are welcome, as are offers to come up with a new logo, gratis (with credit given where due, of course). I’m a design idiot. Here’s another possibility. And another one. What do you think?

Editor Humor

I just spent most of the day redesigning my work website (relaunch to be announced soon) and am pretty wiped out, but Mia forwarded me a hilarious piece from McSweeney’s that will allow me to leave my desk smiling. I laughed out loud more than once while reading this—not much writing seems to do that for me these days. Is this only funny to editors? You tell me. I am always tactful when telling writers that their writing needs serious work, but there are times I certainly wish I could say some of these things (Delete. Fix. Do something… Never show me such phrases again.) without losing all of my clients.

Dream World

I dreamt that:

• I asked a guidebook writer I know if he needed help updating his South America books
• my cell phone got hit by lightning
• I stayed in a really cool place—or maybe it was my place, and I was showing guests around

Lots of work to do, good for the bank account, but bad for striking a balance with all the other things I want to do. You'd think my current reading would help with all this.

Current reading: Your Money or Your Life, The Copyeditor's Handbook (no really)

Current listening: Franz Ferdinand, Orquesta Tipica Imperial, Gram Parsons