15 Tedious Tasks for Writers

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Nancy J. Cohen

Lately my mind has been a blank when it comes to writing blogs. It could be due to the influx of out of town visitors we have been hosting this month that makes it difficult to concentrate. Or it could be due to my WIP revisions on a book that’s over 104,000 words long. This might sap my mental energy. Regardless of the reason, it’s a good time for some mindless activity in between polishing the prose or escorting visitors around town. Here are some photos of the activities that have been leading me astray (not to mention gaining another pound).

I look a bit too relaxed there, don’t I?

Consider these tasks when you feel brain dead, too distracted or too tired to think straight. Here’s a list of jobs to do when you want to be productive without much mental effort.

• Organize your Internet Bookmarks/Favorites and verify that the links are still active.
• Verify that the links you recommend on your Website and your Blogroll are still valid.
• Update mailing lists and remove bounces and unsubscribes.
• Back up your files to the Cloud or to other media.
• Clean out and sort your files on the computer and in your office drawers.
• Convert old file formats to current ones.
• Delete unnecessary messages from your email Inbox.
• Eliminate duplicate photos stored on your computer.
• Delete old contacts from your address book.
• Unfollow people from Twitter who are no longer following you.
• Delete friends from Facebook who have deactivated their accounts.
• Sort your Twitter friends into Lists.
• Post reviews of books you’ve read to Goodreads, Amazon, Shelfari & Library Thing.
• Get caught up on a tax deduction list for your writing expenses.
• Index your blog posts by date and subject so you have a quick reference.

What else would you add?

35 thoughts on “15 Tedious Tasks for Writers”

  1. Love this topic!

    1) Read those back issues of Writer’s Digest that are piled up – then give them away.

    2) Sort/organize your books. Fiction vs. nonfiction. Alphabetize by author or group by genre/category. Is your collection daunting? Start small: one shelf at a time.

    3) Purge your book collection. If you do the sort thang mentioned above, it’s a great time to think about letting go. Baby steps: just pick 10 books to get rid of. Or maybe 5. Or really be a baby and only pick 1. 🙂

    4) Restack/reevaluate your TBR pile. Remove some of the stale titles. Add a few new ones. Maybe obliterate your TBRs totally and let your next reading choice be a surprise.

    • Amen, Nancy!

      And another could be: Prune RSS/blog feeds and/or emailed newsletter subscriptions. My desire to learn/stay current sometimes crosses wires with my Inner Paranoid who’s afraid she’ll miss something.

    • A couple times a day I email my WIP to myself at gmail with a date and word count on it. That way I have a copy of it in various stages until it is finalized.

      Backing up is always a good thing, but sometimes the little disciplines help too.

      Sorry you lost all that work, Peter. Have you tried recovering your hard drive? When mine crashed, my nephew recovered my files.

    • Ouch, that would hurt. I use Dropbox for all my writing files and also have automatic online backup with Mozy, although I’m thinking of switching to Carbonite. Emailing yourself a file to another email address is another good idea.

    • I have an external hard drive AND I write in Dropbox. The external drive “knows” that it’s supposed to back up any file in specified folders that I touch, so I don’t have to worry about remembering to save them to the right place. (Once I thought I’d lost my most recent MS file, but I’d saved it in my daughter’s folder in Dropbox–didn’t realize I wasn’t saving it in mine. She lives in Ireland, and she keeps a copy of my WIP. I figure the odds of us both having major crashes at the same time are slim.)
      I save my MS with a new date extension every day, so I can see the progress, and also know that if I screw up saving a day’s work, it’s only one day’s work.

  5. You’d think that over the years organizing your Favorites would get easier, but I still find it tedious to do. I have to be really really desperate to even attempt it.

    BTW, I don’t know what that chocolate dessert is, but it looks YUMMY!

  6. Great list, Nancy, particularly for those of us whose operating status could often be summed up as “sometimes I sits and thinks and sometimes I just sits.” Thank you!

  8. Oh, my goodness. Your photo just made me tear up. I worked at Jaxson’s ice cream parlour for years. That hot fudge sundae cost $3.50 in 1984, and it was by far the most popular item on the menu. I can remember the abbreviation we wrote on our tickets: HF/– What does it cost now? I think it’s wonderful that Jaxson’s is still in business. 🙂

    Oh–for non-writing but sort-of writing tasks, I’d add sorting through the inevitable pile of papers next to my computer. There’s usually flyers or newsletters for events that are already over, and I can make the pile smaller just by throwing that type of stuff out. This benefits my writing because it eliminates that nagging feeling that I should clean up that pile of papers!

  9. The sundae may have cost around $9; I don’t remember. But it was 2 scoops and I shared it with my husband. Jaxson’s still is popular.

    Oh yes, sorting through the piles of papers on one’s desk should make the list. I have 3 separate piles: One for things that I need to file; One for things I need to act on; and One for household business. By the time I get around to sorting through them, those “Act On” items are ready to get filed or thrown out.

    • I’ve learned to tell myself I’m going to deal with a specific number of pieces of paper–somehow, saying “You only have to file 5 of these” makes it less daunting. And I usually go beyond my minimum. Ideally, I’d file more than come in–which sometimes happens.

  11. Was up til 2 a.m. watching Heat game. I can barely type this today let alone do anything that requires real brain power.

    My hat is off to you, as usual, Nancy. I am in awe of your discipline. 🙂

    • There’s always goofing off as an alternative: going out to lunch, drinking wine as you suggest, reading magazines, watching TV. But if you want to feel you’re accomplishing something without using your creative brain, pick a task.

  14. When I’m brain dead things just don’t happen. If I’m too fuzzy brained to write then digital organizing is probably not a safe venture either. I’d end up forgetting where I put everything and make it worse. Instead when I’m in that position my optioins generally tend to float between doing manual labour in the yard or some kind of house project, or taking a nap. The latter often wins the toss.

    • I didn’t include household tasks, but those can always be substituted for the tedious chores above. You may do yard work, while I might sort through my recipe clippings. A nap sounds the best.

  15. 1. Read my fav blogs I’ve been neglecting.

    2. Kick myself because I missed a contest or critique or something cool in those blogs.

    3. Troll political pages on Facebook or get into an argument with someone of the opposite political party (useful if I have excess anger issues to deal with that day)

    Terri

    • Yes, reading and commenting on other people’s blogs and FB posts can be added to the list. However, I’d avoid anything of a political or religious nature online anywhere. You risk alienating people, and the goal of social networking is to connect with others, establish community, and make friends…not enemies.

    • Dropbox is a free download file sharing program. It allows you to share your files and coincidentally acts as a backup. For example, I have Dropbox installed on my home desktop computer. I’ve moved my writing folders into my Dropbox. When I turn on my laptop or condo computer, both of which have Dropbox installed, these files automatically updated so I can work on them elsewhere. https://www.dropbox.com/

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