Each Day Already is a Challenge

Monday, Monday (or Fast Food Writing)

What a fast food world we live in. Where did that thought originate?

Well...

On one of the free content sites where you can find some of my writings, there are numerous articles about how to write good free content. These sites are used mostly by people advertising an idea or service, because their real product and/or service web sites can be listed in the article. It's free advertising for them. The articles, then, are used by newsletter editors who can use the articles for free, and those links to the web sites that are selling something tag along every time the article is used. Get it?

Anyway...about those "how-to" articles...

Time and again, they advise that the best way to write one of these articles is to list "10 ways to do such and such" or "The 5 best so-and-so's". People want sound bites for their news and small lists to read instead of real articles. That's the world where we live.

Those same kinds of articles are popping up everywhere. Just pick up any woman's magazine today and you'll see right on the front cover, "5 Quick Meals", "7 Best Decorating Ideas", etc. You know what that means to us as writers? We have to learn to think that way, in small chunks and in lists. I wonder if I'm just too old to think that way. I always hated making outlines, and lists were something you used for two things - chores "to-do" or groceries.

Crossing off items from your list - to-do or grocery - made you feel like you had accomplished something. Every time I read an article that is not much more than a list of items, I'm tempted to take out my pen and cross out the items as I read them. That confuses the heck out of my brain, I think, because I'm also one who never wants to write in (or deface) a book or magazine.

Grrr. I have always embraced change - when it makes sense or when it enhances life or the world around us. I'm just not sure that reducing every complex thought to a few items on a list is good for us. Must we have a fast food mentality about everything??????

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These are a few of the web sites I visited yesterday about high cholesterol. Just needed a place to tuck them away. I am going to go to the library today or tomorrow to see what books I can find about this topic. It seems that the only medical studies being published are those that agree with the taking of Statin drugs. Others are being ignored, but I'm not sure that means they're all bunk. It could just mean that the drug companies are in charge, as many suggest.

http://www.ravnskov.nu/cholesterol.htm

http://www.healthmyths.net/cart/cart.php?target=product&product_id=16143&categor...

Another link to keep and read again later. http://www.newswithviews.com/Ellison/shane28.htm