Liz Argall

The Pleasure of Analytics

Tuesday, August 17th, 2010 | News update | 2 Comments

Now that I’m posting more regularly I have the heart to check out my website on Google Analytics.

The list of search terms lead to my website is always interesting. The prize for best search term is…

life detangle blog -hair -pigeon -sun -necklaces

Oh internet you are a strange strange creature. I mean really? I am more pigeoney than most people you know! Who else do you know that’s bred pigeons and killed them with their own bare hands?… well ok, screwed up killing them with her own bare hands and used kitchen scissors instead…

In other analytic news my blog post about Chrome, Comics and Scott McCloud continues to be my number one source of spam comments. Google, level with me here, is it because I mention you?

Daily Science Fiction has excellent taste

Monday, August 16th, 2010 | News update | 2 Comments

Daily Science Fiction, a new digital science fiction magazine, clearly has good taste because they’ve purchased stories from fellow Portlandian writer pals, Mary Robinette Kowal and David Levine. And now they have bought a story from me! Ok, ok, I’m not a Portlandian anymore, I live in Seattle, but I wrote this story while I was in Portland… so that counts, right?… Right?

They’re not yet live, but you can subscribe to the advance copy e-mail version in preparation.

“Dear Ms Moon” has found a home. My writertopia bio now has four stories pending. Hooray!

Yup, the Clarion Blog Archive has been updated again

Friday, August 13th, 2010 | News update | No Comments

Something Old and two lots of Something New… Class of ’94 & Class of 2010 http://lizargall.com/2009/03/clarion-blogs/

Now for the borrowed and the blue (and remember Clarion grads are a bit like Brides, it takes at least three years for us to stop talking about it and showing photos to everyone!)

PlayWrites BlueMouseMonkey Acting Good Comics

Monday, August 9th, 2010 | News update | 4 Comments

I may have wanted to stick a bunch of cool nouns in the subject heading… you have a point there. My website has been a bit fragmented of late, so here’s what I’ve been up to the past few months.

PlayWrite – a funky not for profite I do a whole swag of work for. I’ve been working closely with them to develop a new website. PlayWrite has a lot of complex needs and responsibilities and it’s been quite the journey. I’ve been their communications gal since late last year and my role will be changing soon (my visa type is changing, doh, so I must change with it), but I’ll stay involved, even if it’s as a volunteer. See, new shiny website! The PlayWrite website was built by Blue Mouse Monkey Design (working with Acts of Good) on the ExpressionEngine Content Management System. I’m still learning the back end, but it looks pretty robust. They have been super helpful teaching me the back end so we can manage the site ourselves (it’s a bit more complex than wordpress, but my heavens, the functionality is much bigger too).

I’ve also been working with Blue Mouse Monkey Design on another website. For that crew I’ve been writing copy and making some major structural changes to how information is presented and accessed. The client’s been super nice to work with, we’re not done yet, but I’ve really enjoyed the challenges. The work has drawn on my depth of knowledge around good practice in the community sector and the needs of their constituents and has been fun. Most of the work on that one is done and I’ll let you know when that piece goes live. I really love discrete projects, go in work hard, get the job done right. There’s not much in life that’s actually like that, so it’s important to treasure.

In the past couple of months I’ve also written several work for hire educational comics, fact checking for a number of other comics and trained up a few people around the work I do. It’s a small paragraph, but it’s been a lot of my time, both the doing and the creative recharge afterwards. It can be interesting work, but is also the most draining work I do.

Clarion Write-a-thon, ’tis finished. I’m not sure if we met our $10,000 target. I feel a bit bad for not promoting it more, my energy needed to be focused on comics for most of the duration. If you want to help us sneak over the finishing line you can still contribute on the website. The write-a-thon did help me keep the novel nagging away at my mind and while most of the creative words I put down during the write-a-thon were work for hire I did have a major breakthrough on my novel as well. I’m very pleased I did it and next year I’m going to do something extra special.

So that’s stuff that’s happening, hope you’re all having a grand time. I should get back to the educational comics work!

Posting every day – elsewhere

Tuesday, June 29th, 2010 | News update | 3 Comments

Just after I announced I’d post every day during the write-a-thon I found out that we have a special place on the internet for sponsors. To support the worthy cause I’ll be posting updates on a sponsor and writer only forum. Donate $1 or more to anyone and you will get access.

You can sponsor me – hint hint, nudge nudge.

Out of this world, sprawling and moving

Thursday, May 27th, 2010 | News update | 2 Comments

Publishing News update

Maia Blue is Going Home, one of my favourite short stories has found a place to call its own. She’ll be finding print in the Anywhere But Earth Anthology, by Coeur du Lion in late 2011.

Seed Dreams, a short comic magnificently brought to life by Matt Hyunh, will be republished in Sprawl Anthology by 12th Planet Press.

Moving and Traveling

M and I are moving to Seattle! This weekend! Work takes us there and while we are sad to be leaving Portland it’s good to know that I work (working with fabulous people like PlayWrite and Blue Mouse Monkey Design) will take me back to Stumptown regularly. On the down side I have a bit of a crazy travel schedule, popping up and down like a cork. We hope to have a farewell of some sort in Portland soon.

I will also be attending Readercon this year, and fully intend to go to World Fantasy Con (I just need to sort out the logistics). Sadly I shall have to turn in my badge for Comicon in San Diego this year and will not be attending. Living in St Johns in Portland without a car has taught me ‘lite working on public transport skills that I plan to use to their full extent as my travel schedule heats up.

Happy travels all!

Liz

PlayWrite WordVoice Showcase 25 May

Monday, April 26th, 2010 | News update | No Comments

One of the awesome organisations I work with will be strutting its funky stuff on 25 May. Check it out for a lot of fresh, strange, character driven, emotion driven, non-human (characters are animals or created objects) plays and song written by youth at the edge in Portland. ’tis free! ’tis on 25 May at 5pm and 8pm.

_____

Join us for a magical night of innovative theater and song.

Original work written and directed by young writers in the Portland region and performed by some of our finest actors and musicians.

One day only, 25 May and due to popular demand now with two shows, 5pm or 8pm.

Tickets are free… register now to guarantee a seat

Photography by Stage
Right Performance Photography

Ignite Portland, plus a bit of roller derby.

Monday, March 8th, 2010 | News update | 2 Comments

Speaking at Ignite Portland was a blast. It was scary and interesting and challenging and filled me with a manic kind of energy.

You can see my talk here

and you can see the full list of talks here.

All these videos are brought to you by the fabulous folks at Blaze Streaming Media who do cool things like livestream and then archive Roller Derby Bouts for Portland’s Rose City Rollers. If you’ve ever been curious about roller derby I think these are the best videos of it I’ve seen around and every bout they work to make it better.

Mike has been helping out as a camera man (so you’ll see some of his camera work on some of the videos) and he is now an Assistant Coach for Portland’s roller gals. It’s nice to see him skating around (he was speed skater) and I am very proud of him.

I didn’t know toes could do that!

Monday, March 1st, 2010 | News update | 2 Comments

I spent a lot of last week flat on my back plagued by a fearsome cold (or as we say in Australia, and the UK, a fearsome lurgy). On Saturday, recovering at last I did a bit of work on the laptop with my feet folded under me. I like to sit that way, it makes me feel like a hardcore martial artist… or tea ceremony gal. I must be doing it wrong, because these days my feet go numb very easily. Maybe I’m leaning back on my ankles too much. Anyway, unbeknownst to me my left foot had fallen deeply asleep and my right foot was lightly snoozing › Continue reading

Tags: injuries

My Campbell Year

Monday, February 15th, 2010 | News update | No Comments

Ever since I heard of the Campbell Awards I have loved them. The Campbell Award, given every year during WorldCon, recognises new emerging writers. Once you have received your first ok pay cheque for writing sf/f a clock starts to tick and you have two calendar years to prove yourself worthy of nomination. Carving out a life as a writer is a long marathon and it’s nice to see relatively close goals that you can aim for towards the start of the journey.

I’ve enjoyed thinking about how in 2010 and 2011 would be my years to chase the Campbell dream, to prove myself worthy, to aim high. In a strange twist of fate my first Campbell Award eligible work came out in December 2009, starting the clock a year earlier than I had dreamed (my Campbell bio is now up). I am delighted that Cracked Leather found a place to be published and has been so warmly received. I wouldn’t change it for the world (well maybe the world). It just means my tidy little fantasy of 2010 and 2011 to prove my worthiness for voting in 2012 has been truncated by a year.

The challenge is significant and I am not sure if I will prove my worthiness in time, but it is still worth striving for. I will throw myself as much as I can. This is a challenge to myself and not in competition. I plan to soar with my fellow nominees – we are in this crazy dream together. I will write, I will edit, I will send work to publishers, I will read, I will learn from my peers – as I do every year. But this year I will have an extra spur to my sides that I plan to use. This year will never come again.

2010 is my Campbell year. I’m going to enjoy the challenge.

Tags: campbell, TheLiz, writing