Can I Unsubscribe to Phone Calls and Doorbells?

You don't know me but let me check your water heater. Stock image +iStock 

It seems very easy to dismiss advertising emails and spam—I separated the two because advertising emails can be useful, particularly those received from vendors that you do business with or would like to do business with, whereas spam is general emails sent from businesses that purchased your contact information. With a quick preview, the importance of the email can be read in its entirety or deleted on the spot. Sometimes, these emails don’t even make it into your inbox if they spam filters are set in your email. And luckily, if emails from a certain vendor don’t apply to you or you’re not interested in them anymore, you can just hit unsubscribe. If only this can apply to phone calls and doorbells. Emails aren’t invasive. They passively land in your inbox and can be ignored easily. Phone calls and doorbells cannot be ignored. They are especially distracting when you’re trying to write your manuscript and get into a flow with your story.
Why don’t I just ignore the phone calls? Unfortunately, this is an era where people are attached to their phones 24/7. Most of the time, it’s used for the apps—let’s face it, mainly for the games and social media—but it’s hard to ignore a phone ringing. It’s insistent. It makes a noise. It distracts your train of thought. It also doesn’t help if you’re waiting for that very important phone call from a potential employer.
In Canada, we have the National Do Not Call List (DNCL), where you can add your phone number and the telemarketers should know not to call you. However, this doesn’t apply to registered charities, political parties or candidates, surveys, newspapers calling for subscribers, or businesses that you are using.
It’s too bad that I can’t make my phone number exclusive to family, friends, school, and emergency contacts.What also irritates me is the inconvenient times that they decide to call: dinner time, nap time, night-time, and I’m-writing-my-book time.
But phone calls aren’t as bad as someone at the door, ringing the doorbell, during baby’s nap time, when you have a dog. I don’t want to give an invitation to a random technician to check my water heater nor do I want to change my utility billing to some unknown company because I’m eligible for a special rate according to my contract. Unfortunately, many people have been duped by these sales thinking that the company they actually do business with sent the technician. Luckily, the Government of Canada has made commercials about this scam—check photo ID and for a copy of your contract.
So, I put up a sign that stated, “No soliciting.” Just when I thought that my writing time would be undisturbed (I write during the baby’s nap time), the doorbell rings from a religious group. When I pointed to the sign on my door, they merely stated that they were not selling anything—or at least that’s what I think I heard during the banshee screams from a baby that woke up to a loud barking from a doorbell-hating dog. So, I changed the sign to “No soliciting, no canvassing, nor evangelizing.”
Are phone calls and door-to-door sales effective in this day and age? Most of the time, people check online reviews if they want to switch or change something. If they don’t have access to the online world, they ask someone in their family or circle of friends that does. Maybe there are the small few in a major city like Toronto that have to rely on phone calls and door-to-door sales. Businesses need to learn that online reviews and social media are the ways to gain business.
With the digital age and access to online information, getting business through the phone or door-to-door is not as effective as it was in the past. The number of people not connected is decreasing, and many times they rely on the connected generation to provide the best course of action for purchases.

What Do I Do With My Time?

I never thought that I would be a stay-at-home mom. However, I had no choice. While I was on maternity leave, the company that I was working for went bankrupt. I decided to look on the bright side. I’m not pressured to go to work as soon as my maternity leave ends. I get to spend time with my second son and enjoy watching his toddlerhood. Since we only plan on having the two kids, I saw my unemployment as a blessing in disguise. In Canada, maternity leave is one year. I could have looked for a job once my maternity leave finished, however, the cost of daycare for toddlers under the age of 18 months is astronomical. The cost doesn’t get better after 18 months, but to start at entry level at a new company is financially straining.

So, the question I asked myself was, “What should I do with my time outside of caring for my son?” I am applying to various companies, but the job market is slow. I decided to pursue my aspirations as a writer. Reading a plethora of romance novels inspired my dream to be a writer. To do this, I realized that I needed develop skills that were outside those I learned academically. I majored in Biology and Zoology, which is far from related to writing romance—unless the novel involves a science geek, which has its possibilities. I signed up for a variety of online courses, Networking 101 through the Romance Writers Association (RWA), Self-Editing, Editing Camp through Scribendi, Microsoft Office 2010 through ITU Online, and Story Writing for Children through Write Story Books for Children. It may look odd to take a story book writing for children course for romance writing, but the basic concepts are there for writing books. The course for Microsoft Office helped improve my knowledge of software that can be useful for writing and planning my novel.

I was surprised with two particular courses. The networking course showed me the great potential social media has for marketing your book. Being introverted, I hate the concept of selling. The networking course revealed that subtly can work. Just get your brand known and recognized. The other course that surprised me was editing camp. I am still working through it but I have learned a number of new things.  

The main obstacle for me is time management. So far, I go through the courses, network, and write my novel after everyone goes to bed. But, this doesn’t leave me with much sleep. There are also distractions like TV and housework that do not help. I did find a little something helpful, late night cafés that have internet access. So, on evenings like today, I head to the nearest late night café and write this blog. Right after I post this, I will work on my novel. So, until my next post . . .  

Pen Names and Cherries

Trying to figure out what pen name to use is difficult. You want to pick something memorable, something easy to say, and something you would respond to. I thought about using a different first name so that I can keep my personal life from colliding with my author life, but I would never respond to the name Caryn (one of the first names I thought of and liked) or Alexis (a name I decided to use as a character in my WIP because I love the nickname). With the name like mine, there are not many variations that I can come up with. I can't go with my initials because I've never responded to CC. I thought about going with a name that sounds like my name, like Jessica, but I didn't want to use the name Jessica. I realized after hanging with my bestie and her sisters, who are just a hair shy of being my besties too (I tell my best friend slightly more things than I do with her sisters) that the perfect first name for my pen name is Chassy. That's how they refer to me sometimes—usually it's Chassypooh but that doesn't sound like a great romance novelist name.

Now to come up with a last name for my pen name. I didn't want to use something like my current last name because, like I said before, not a fan of worlds colliding. My maiden name is also prone to worlds colliding. Even variations of either name would not do. Also, many places tend to use your maiden name as a security feature, so that was out of the question. Then I thought about my middle name and it seemed appropriate since I would probably respond to the pen name if it was similar to my middle name. And I have plenty of aunts that would call upon me as "Chas dear". Chérie is dear in french. So, I just dropped the e and there we go.

I know that Chéri has nothing to do with cherries. Cherry in french is cerise. It's similar but that's not why I chose cherries as my logo. I love cherries. Oddly enough, I don't like eating the fruit unless they are white cherries. I find that they tend to be too sweet and tart. White cherries are subtle but expensive. I also like the flavor of black cherry or regular cherry in drinks and desserts just not maraschino cherries or black forest cake because I don't like mixing chocolate with anything—chocolate is too divine to muddy its flavor with anything else.

I do love the way cherries look though. Bright red or dark red, round and succulent.They make a great pattern from purses to dresses, of which I own both. So, I made a logo out of cherries and used it for all my social profiles, including the background image on the cover photos. I do plan on posting a picture of myself (I do have one on my website) but I'm waiting for the day when I debut my cute cherry patterned dress and get dolled up the debut of my book. I'm also in the process of making a petticoat to go with the dress so that I can get the full rockabilly look.

Now, back to the petticoat...and writing...and social media...

Book 1 Blurb

I've heard that if you have a little blurb summarizing what the book is about, it helps when you get writer's block. It also helps to keep the book going in the right direction. Here's a draft summary of what book 1: Scent of Attraction is about.

Charlotte Emery has a problem with her nose. It dictates her life but she doesn't know it. She doesn't want to take a possible romance with her textpal, Max, to the next level for fear that she smell something amiss and taint that relationship.
Max Roberts feels a great connection with Charlotte and wants to take it to the next level but he doesn't want to blur the lines between business and pleasure. When they finally meet in person, sparks fly.
Things go well at the beginning, but then her nose gets in the way. Usually, her nose wins. This time her heart's declaring war.

I also have a temporary cover to keep me in line:

Let the writing continue :)!

Networking 101

For some reason, I can't access a previous blog that I've set up on blogspot. So, I'm starting a new one.

I am taking an online course with RWA University on the RWA website. It's taught by the wonderful Catherine Bybee. I love her books and I am delighted to see that she was teaching the course. I can't wait to learn as much as I can to help boost my online presence. I've already started updating my Facebook profile and added a Facebook page for my pen name.
Next on the list of things to do is to continue writing this first book. Ideas keep floating in my head about Charlotte's other friends and how their story will develop. Even though I have gain some free time since my toddler is now sleeping through the night, I seem to flit from many projects. Since I've been out of work (due to my employer going bankrupt while I was on maternity leave), I started a small home business for making pocket squares. On top of that, I've taken online courses from web design, to Adobe Photoshop, to Microsoft Office software, and then to author tools like the one mentioned before. And my other favourite distraction is the release of many new books from my favourite authors. Adding social media networking is just icing on the cake. However, they do say that the best way to write as an author is to continue writing in any form, and that would include blogging. I even try to dabble in some critiquing through Scribophile.
So far, I have 16K words and I'm on Chapter 4. Due to all the distractions, I keep rereading the earlier chapters to see where I think I'm going with the story. Hoping I can figure out a better schedule and efficient time management strategy so that I can get this book out of my brain by the end of the year!