Writing and Research

Whether you work as a contract researcher operating out of a university, or you are a freelancer interested in community research, at some point you may be called upon to tender for a project. This white paper gives you a basic understanding of the main points that such a document should cover.

Contract Researchers Guide to the Research Galaxy My apoologies to Douglas Adams author of Hitchikers Guide to the Galaxy, but just lately the research side of my life is encountering problems that I didn't know existed. Just to backtrack a little, I work on occasion as a contract researcher, and one of the projects I am dealing with is causing me more headaches than it's worth. In my experience projects rise or fail depending on how they are managed,

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I sit myself by the tv,

Put my laptop on my knee, when the phone rings

So I answer it you see.

I forget about my tea, resting at the side of me

Til it flows towards my laptop

Full of glee.

But I think you ought to know

I moved quite quick and missed the flow,

Which must have had my laptop sighing with relief.

It's reallly not set up

To handle liquid from a cup.

Too much of that, and its life would be quite brief. 

Don't do what I have done

A ruined laptop's not much fun

Eschew the armchair when you're sitting down to write.

Remove that cuppa by your arm

Don't be smitten by its charm,

You never know when it is looking for a fight. 

Wordpress

A couple of months ago I finally got a proper domain name - the url has a deliberate spelling mistake as I particularly wanted it to be http://squidincwritngandresearch.com but in order to get it I had to leave off the i between the t and the n. You might think that it was all plain sailing after that. You'd be wrong. Trying to work out the intricacies of both cpanel and wordpress have proved too much for me on more than one occasion - but today, I cracked it. Woohoo.

Adsense Ready

I picked a theme that was adsense ready thinking that it would be easier - don't be fooled. In my naivety I didn't think that the reason the ads were showing up on my blog was because the Adsense system had the theme author's code in it.  However, I have now changed all that and added some adbrite adds for good measure.

The Latest Evil

My  doctoral thesis covered feminism, domestic violence and theology; which is probably why I sometimes think in theological terms like good and evil. I have to tell you that plugins are an instrument of torture designed by Wordpress to trap poor, unsuspecting, only slightly web savvy, writers like me. Be warned! Plugins should not be taken lightly. Once I got the hang of them I fell into the usual trap of adding one thing after another - result - I have been sat over my laptop all day playing with my Wordpress site.

My plan for tomorrow is not to interact with wordpress and their plugins in the hope that I will catch up on all the lost writing time of today. Just thought I would share my Wordpress woes, what are yours?

P.S. If you are totally web savvy then please treat this post as you would the ramblings of an unhinged mind - we can't all be web entrepreneurs.