little bit of this and that...

A little bit of this and a little bit of that....

So bloggers been screwed up since Wednesday... which figures since I was ready to blog LOL But it worked out well since I wrote my blogs in Word and only had to cut and paste and add pics. 

Citizens Bank Park

CBP - Isn't it Beautiful?

I am so excited that a formal announcement has been made about the flyers hosting the 2012 winter classic. On January 2^nd the CBP will become an ice rink and the world will watch the flyers play the rangers. It’s a huge honor and a real chance for us to get to know all about Philly and the flyers behind the scenes. HBO will be filming documentary style from the moment the first hammer falls on the building of the rink all the way thru the after game celebrations.

Ashton Kutcher has inked a deal to replace Charlie sheen on 2 and ½ men. I don’t watch the show but I think it’s great that everyone else who works on it will not lose their jobs because of one crack addicted megalomaniac. Now we can only hope that Ashton brings rating that go thru the roof as a huge FU to Charlie sheen.

I am all about the flowers this year for some reason, but as I am a certified commitment phobe, I will be planting them in a big ol container I can place in my yard. God forbid I should commit and place them in the actual ground.

maybe not quite this many LOL

 I will make sure to take pictures. Should be sometime after Wednesday since I will have a little bit of money then to make something beautiful. If I had my way it would be a huge English garden with no rhyme or reason just a ton of beautiful bloom. But at least this way I don’t have to deal with bugs and creepy crawlys.

Working some things thru that will make my ability to move to beach come to fruition around September, October if not sooner. Not going to really go into too many details since my blog is open. But I have someone who will be willing to take over my apt lease and my landlord won’t even have to lift a paint brush. And they will move in with four months’ rent taken care of! Fingers crossed all works out.

Is it sad or inspiring that if I could move tomorrow I would? I am not leaving any one or running away, just ready to start the next chapter of my life living in Lewes Delaware. I will miss my family and friends but know in my soul I am making the right decision. Plus – who doesn’t want a friend with a beach house? I have a feeling I will be seeing all my buddies more when I move then I do now lol. I think it may be a logistical nightmare though – trying to figure out how to get a place to live without a job and a job without a place to live… BUT all will work out, of this I am certain. And all of this right around my birthday and the book publication date too. WOW hello new life!

Copyrights and Trademarks and Lawyers, Oh My!

So I am working on branding myself, my words, my website etc. In the world of marketing and advertising, branding yourself is the best way to gain some success. It creates that first and lasting impression, makes your product memorable and helps you stick out in a field of similar products. For me, my brand is my quotes, my affirmations. What I am putting in the book. It's what I want to be able to help drive my message of positivity that will get me in the door and on the stage to give motivational speeches. You get what I am saying right? So the first step is to actually have something you can trademark, something that makes you recognizable. for me that is the phrase, This is me damn it! So I start to do some research on my phrase and see if trademarking is a viable option.


Keep in mind I have my words copyrighted. but as we will find out, that just isn't enough. 


So in my research I come across a cool website called blurb.com. It started as a way to make actual books out of your pictures and has grown into a self publishing website. If you want one book or 1000 it has the goods to make it happen. I have looked into this website before, when I decided that the tone of my book was going to be heavily artistic with drawings and pictures to accompany  my words. What I missed on my first pass thru it tho, was a book I had now found called, This Is Me Damn It! 


http://www.blurb.com/bookstore/detail/712839


Yes - let me let that sink in for you.... My book title - already produced. FUCK!!!


Ok I think - lot's of people have ideas for titles and books can be called the same thing. Anyway, i have a secondary title that goes with my book, something along the lines of "Surviving & thriving no matter what life throws at you" (something like that...I am still ironing that part out). I can still possibly trademark it. And then I look inside the book...


http://www.blurb.com/books/712839


This book isn't just titled This is me damn it, It IS This Is Me Damn IT! it's my quote, my words in someone else's book.  Double FUCK! If you can, click on the links above and preview the book. If you can't, well basically a 21 yr old girl in England took my words and combined them with individual pictures to create a book. The idea itself is great, but ... and this is a BIG 'OL BUT... THIS IS MY STUFF DAMN IT!  I am at least thankful that she credited me in the last 2 pages of the book, but come on! 


So I send her a few comments and an email trying to get her to discuss this issues with me and i get no response. So now, it's time for the lawyers. I contact a copyright & intellectual property lawyer explain my situation, agree to pay his fee and then receive his answer about 4 hours later. My question was" I had my quote copyrighted and now this person has used it for their own monetary gain. What is my recourse?"


His answer was...
Copyright normally does not cover short phrases or titles, unfortunately. So if all you have is copyright, you might not have a good legal response. Your best bet would have been to use state or federal trademark law -- assuming you either registered (which you didn't) or used the phrase to identify your products in the marketplace (which it doesn't sound like you did either.) It's discouraging, I know, but clever titles and short quotes are just hard to protect in isolation. The law leaves them out in the cold. Sorry. Good luck.


In his defense, I was told if I wasn't satisfied with his answer that i didn't have to pay his fee. But come on, this is me we are talking about here. Of course I paid his fee. Just because it wasn't the answer I wanted doesn't mean he didn't work for me to get it. Now the fee was only $30.00. Which is reasonable. And I got my answer in about 4 hours. but it was $30 I didn't have to spare.


To me it's just so bizarre that I have to pay a lawyer to find out that my own stuff, my intellectual property, my heart and soul and work, is not just my own. It could be used anywhere that anyone wanted to use it.


Very discouraging to say the least. So needless to say, I am now on the path of researching how I can trademark all of my writing. I have found out, that it would be easier & less expensive, if i just wrote a book and owned the copyright (and therefore the rights) to all of the content. Hmmm write a book? Now there's an idea. Sometimes, when you least expect it, the universe actual comes full circle.

Stuff's coming... promise!

So, I am crushed with a huge amount of Eagles jersey sewing right now. Which is good for me and for my friend who owns the business, not so good for blog or book writing. On top of that i am sleep deprived and battling this stupid cold that everyone seems to have come down with.   Please bear (or is it bare? ) with me because I promise I have new blogs coming soon. I am working on a one about my recent lawyer trip. In trying to trademark  and deal with my copyrights for the book an interesting and disturbing issue came up...


Also - I am working on a blog about being sick and lonely... LOL woohoo sounds uplifting doesn't it? But come on you know me well enough by now to know that it will end up being funny or positive. Promise.


I have a few other tricks up my sleeve as well! I should be able to post something tomorrow (friday).


Then i will get back on an every other day schedule again. I miss it - the writing and the creativity. 

"The pages are still blank, but there is a miraculous feeling of the words being there, written in invisible ink and clamoring to become visible. " ~Vladimir Nabakov

A little change is good... a lot of change is Fan-friggin-tastic!

“The key to change... is to let go of fear.”~Rosanne Cash


Soooo I changed the blog background etc. You likey? Time to try on something new. It doesn't make my butt look big does it? My old set up was messing up the videos and had a lot of empty space so I wanted to widen things up.


Also, on Wednesday... you ready for this? I am buying my domain name for the book website! WOOHOO!!! I spent some time doing research this weekend and found the webhost AND my domain name is available. I will be going DOT COM baby!!! Very exciting!


This of course means that I have to stick with the name of the book I have chosen which is so friggin final but okay too. I haven't thought about calling it anything else in the past 9 months so I guess the name will stick.


Now I have to decide if I should move everything over to the dot-com site or keep it totally separate for the book. That's a whole other decision I am not prepared to make right now LOL. God forbid I over tax myself.


I am also going to buy staceygatescharter.com as well. Not sure what I am doing with that one yet. And in case you were wondering, umm no, I did not win the lottery. My webhost (as most web hosts are) is extremely affordable. Like, $3.50 a month affordable. which is what...$42.00 bucks a year. Or $84.00 a year for both sites. It will be my Christmas present to myself! I am going with one of the top 10 web hosts available and am very excited! I will tell more about the host and the domain name once the deal is done... Promise!


Hey what can I say I'm Irish and don't want to jinx anything. We are a superstitious group.


That means I will have 2 websites, this blog (if i don't convert it over), my personal Facebook page and my Spread the Positivity Now Facebook page. WHEW!!  It also means this weekend coming up will be full of website design and writing. Which is a great thing since I will be heading to the beach from Friday thru Monday. Then with a little luck I will also be at the beach for the weekend after Thanksgiving as well.


So the times, they are a changin' and it's a wonderful thing!!


“Change is the essence of life.Be willing to surrender what you are for what you could become.” ~Unknown


...and that quote just about says it all, doesn't it?

Operation 7 Day Facebook Blackout begins...

"cough,couch, ahem, cough... You want me to what??" Pretty much my reaction when my life-coach presented me with my next homework assignment. Deactivate my Facebook account for 7 days. Every time i want to go on Facebook, i will write the outline and if possible, parts of my book.

I accepted because I am currently in a holding pattern, with my toes on the starting line. But no one ever says "GO"! The book I have wanted to write for years is there, but i am holding back on starting it. A fear of the ball rolling faster then I can handle it. And also, I am not one to refuse a challenge. So as of 9am Saturday July 3rd I have been Facebook free. You will not be able to see my profile at all either.

Now listen, when Saturday, July 10th, 9am rolls around, believe me... I WILL reactivate my account. I love and get too much out of my Facebook interactions to give it up!

But hopefully, when I complete this assignment and sign back on to Facebook, I will also have an outline for my book completed and I'll be ready to keep rolling. Um let me rephrase that...not hopefully, but DEFINITELY!