Kansas City Freelance Writer Liz Craig

When I was visiting at my grandmother Barebo’s house one summer, she demonstrated how to tell a male kitten from a female kitten. Someone had brought a fuzzy little kit and said, “I don’t know if it’s a male or a female.” Mom B. seized the surprised kitten, whipped it upside-down, and peered beneath its tail. “That’s a male,” she declared.

Amazed, I asked, “How do you know?” She replied, “If it’s a male, there’s a colon under its tail. If it’s a female, it’s a semicolon.” Picking up the kitten, I took a look, and sure enough, I saw two black dots punctuating the kitten’s backside.

So now you know how to tell the difference between a boy cat and a girl one by their respective rear-end punctuation marks. But do you know the different uses of those two punctuation marks?

It’s not hard to figure out when to use a colon or a semicolon, but many writers give up and use long dashes instead. The long dash, or em-dash, has become the “There I fixed it” punctuation mark, and these days, it and its cousin, the short dash, or en-dash, are seldom used correctly. But dashes were the topic of an earlier post here. So it’s on to semicolons and colons.

A semicolon is used at the end of one independent clause to introduce another, related, independent clause. Example: (Hey, that’s one way to use a colon, by the way.) “We gave up waiting in the rain to get in to see the new Kauffman Performing Arts Center; it just wasn’t worth it.”

The semicolon acts as an “almost-period,” but it’s not as final. It signals the end of one thought and the beginning of a related thought, or a further comment on the first thought. It often appears where an “and” or “but” might also have been used.

The semicolon can also be used to separate items in a list that might be confusing if you used commas instead. For example, you might write, “Sally had a list of things to do that day that included taking the car to be washed; having her hair re-dyed (the color it was supposed to be in the first place); and driving Nellie, the poodle pup, to the vet, Dr. Neiman, to be spayed.”

If you wanted to introduce a colon into the mix, you could write:

“Sally had a list of things to do that day: take the car…” and then proceed with the rest of the sentence as shown above, changing the verbs from gerunds to regular verbs (“take” instead of “taking”). The colon in this case says, “Here’s the list.”

The colon also can be used after “following,” as in “To create a username and PIN, do the following:” Other words or phrases that precede the colon include “as follows,” “to-wit,” and other words introducing a list of steps or items.

The colon can be used instead of a comma in a sentence like, “Washington Irving said: ‘…..” Or likewise, it can be substituted for a comma in a formal letter salutation, as in “Dear sir:”

For more uses of these kitty-sex-detecting clues, here’s a good source.

So now, each time you see a kitten, you’ll think of the proper way to use colons and semicolons. Right?

Virginia Barebo Schumacher, 95, of Jefferson City, MO, passed away Thursday, September 29, 2011, at Jefferson City Manor Care Center. She was born February 19, 1916 in O’Fallon, MO, the daughter of the late Millard Andrew and Viola Mary (Kessler) Barebo. Virginia, known to friends as “Dink” for her petite stature, was Charlemo Queen at St. Charles High School in 1933, the year she graduated. On November 23, 1938, in St. Charles, Missouri, she married Roy Edward Schumacher, who preceded her in death in 1986.

A natural singer with a beautiful soprano voice, Virginia at one time sang popular and semi-classical music each week on her own half-hour radio program at St. Louis University. In 1949, she gave birth to a daughter, Elizabeth Virginia.

Virginia was a dedicated Christian Scientist who volunteered her time to the church as Music Chairman, Sunday School teacher, and Assistant Clerk. She smiled always, laughed often, and was unfailingly gentle and kind.

She is survived by her daughter, Elizabeth Craig, of Mission, Kansas; one grandson, Jonathan W. Fields, of Shanghai, China; one niece, four grand-nephews and one grand-niece. She was preceded in death by one sister, Mildred Barebo Sebacher, and one brother, Hally Lee Barebo.

I proofread documents for several departments of a national financial services company. When they’re pleased, I’m pleased. Here’s a note I received yesterday:

Thank you, Liz, for the quick turnaround and for the edits you made. Excellent changes!

“Liz Craig is wicked smart and a wizard with words. Do your brand a favor and hire her.”
— Joleen K David on Jul 28, 2011

When I moved to Omaha in 1985, I worked as an Associate Creative Director for 19 hellish months at Bozell & Jacobs. I won’t go into detail, but let me say I was not the only creative there who was suffering the slings and arrows of an outrageous GM who crumbled and ate writers and art directors for breakfast like Frosted Mini-Wheats. Nearly everyone in the creative department was taking Xanax, seeing shrinks, or nurturing ulcers.

So it was a sweet relief to be let go during a mass layoff. My art director partner and I rolled our stuff out to the parking lot in a mail cart, and we laughed and laughed and laughed at our great good fortune to have been set free from whatever ring of Dante’s Inferno we’d been inhabiting.

I took the next couple of months off enjoying Thanksgiving and Christmas, and glory be! in January, I got hired at a local ad agency called Smith Kaplan Allen & Reynolds, aka SKAR. My colleague and head of the writers was the kind of woman some women might hate because they’re jealous. A delightfully smart, funny, gorgeous woman named Joleen. I respected her in every way—for her brains, for her client savvy, for her superb strategic thinking and writing, and most of all, for her wacky sense of humor.

These days, we keep in touch via email, and I’ve been back a couple of times to see her and the agency. As the daughter of Wayne Smith, the Smith in Smith Kaplan, now she’s heading up the agency. Under her guidance, the place has been transformed from what was a rather dowdy cubicle city to a cool, sleek, inviting haven for some of the best creatives in the Midwest. Joleen is a natural leader/innovator, and she follows the David Ogilvy philosophy of trying to hire people who are smarter than she is. Which is nearly impossible. But she finds good people and draws the very best out of them.

So thanks, Joleen, for the great recommendation, so many years since I ended my 10-year stint at SKAR., Sometimes I wish I’d stayed, but Kansas City lured me back home, and 15 years and three agencies later, here I am, happily freelancing and recalling the good people and good times at SKAR.

Joleen, I hope you continue to have fun, make money, and always remember me. I’ll remember you, I promise.

“The best way to get a good Google ranking is to blog relevantly and frequently,” I always advise my clients. So imagine how sheepish I feel having ignored my own advice for nearly three weeks. But I have an excuse. Moving.

And not just moving, but casting at least half my belongings overboard beforehand. Have you ever tried to fit 20 pounds into a 5-pound sack? That’s roughly what it’s like moving from a 4-bedroom, 2-bathroom house with finished basement to a 2-bedroom apartment. Oy! The stuff I have/had/still have/don’t know what to do with!

Being an only child whose grandparents and one parent have gone to the Great Beyond, I have inherited glassware, tableware, furniture, and—most emotionally charged of all— photographs. My Gawd, my people must have documented every second of their lives on film! A friend of mine has taken four or five moving boxes full of loose photos of my family and lots of people I don’t even know and is keeping them in his dining room for now, because they wouldn’t fit into my new digs. My mission impossible is to winnow down the photos so they’ll fit in a couple of shoe boxes. Or scan and save some on CDs. I’d send some to my son in China, but (a) he doesn’t care about them; and (b) to mail them to him would cost me as much as a week in the Shanghai Hilton.

At my garage sale before the move, I netted a few hundred bucks. I admire the gritty determination of the people who dragged themselves out to dicker over my lounge chair, rusty wheelbarrow, notepads, plastic cups, lizard squeeze-toy, and various and sundry knickknacks in searing 100-degree heat. There’s no stopping true bargain-hunters when the scent of “cheap stuff” is drifting in the fetid air.

But I still have a trunk full of glassware that’s too good to simply give away, and two sets of beautiful china from my mother and grandmother. When this Saharan heat subsides, I’ll try to sell them at an antique mall. That’s what I did with my mother’s Royal Ruby glassware and gorgeous milk glass. If I’d had the time to market it online, I might have gotten more, but time was the one thing I didn’t have.

As I was fretting over getting rid of hand-me-down furniture from two generations, my boyfriend remarked, “You’re going to have to decide if you want to live in your house or your mother’s or grandmother’s house.” He stunned me with that statement, and he was absolutely right. I’m still wondering what “my house” is going to look like when their stuff is gone.

So I am moved into smaller quarters more appropriate to a carefree single lifestyle, and though I’m still surrounded by boxes whose contents I know not where to put, I am back at work as a freelance writer in the Kansas City area, approximately two miles from where I used to live. Two miles, hundreds of worries, a thousand tears and ten thousand sweat droplets away from a house that always was too big for little me. And now, I am experiencing the joy of freedom! I am liberated from lawn mowing, mulching, snow shoveling, property taxes, weed killing, tree trimming, pruning, and all the other things required to maintain a homestead in suburbia. I have no more lawn-related equipment, having traded my mower to my lawn mowing fellow for three last mows. Ah, what a relief it is!

If I might quote the Rev. Martin Luther King, I’m free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, I’m free at last—from home ownership! And ready to get back to being a happy freelance copywriter, instead of a hot, exhausted suburban refugee. How sweet it is to be back in the saddle again!

If you’re an independent creative working from home, do you ever feel like a latter-day Jacob Marley, your clanking chains making you the prisoner of your computer? Or like chain-gang member Woody Allen in “Take the Money and Run?” (If you like to laugh, please check it out.) Or have you broken your bonds, like escapee Paul Muni in “I Am a Fugitive From a Chain Gang?”

The reason I feel compelled to sit at my desk all day is that most jobs come to me via email, and some must be done post-haste. So when I have to go to the grocery store or pharmacy, I feel as if I’m playing hooky, and I high-tail it back home as soon as I can to check my email.

To feel a captive in one’s own office is not good. There’s a whole wide world out there waiting to be explored! So how can I get out there more?

First idea was to get a smartphone, so I could tell when email came in, and whether I needed to tend to it right away. FAIL! Got a paygo plan that offered a free Samsung phone. Now I know why the phone was free! It stinks. Oh, yes, you can check email, but it takes flippin’ (as dear Sarah P. would say) forever. And the batteries hold power like a sieve holds water.

Okay, I know some people who have ditched their landlines and gotten iPhones or other smartphones that let them do everything but clip their toenails with them, but am I ready for that? I have both cell phone and landline, the equivalent of wearing suspenders with a belt. But someone pointed out to me that if you only have a cell phone, when the power to the cell tower goes out, you have no phone. HELP! No phone at all?

Right now isn’t the best time to think about going out on the town, or in the town, actually. I’m preparing to move a certain amount of my stuff from my 4-bedroom house to a 2-bedroom apartment nearby. Right-sizing my lifestyle. Problem is, I’ve inherited a lot of stuff (beautiful dishes, linens, etc.) from two generations before me, that I never use. Like my mother before me, I have kept them in storage in the basement because they’re “too nice to use.” Now, there’s a silly idea. As long as I keep them, I’m chained to this stuff, too.

I’ve got some lovely pieces of Royal Ruby glassware on Craigslist, and today I’m listing my mother’s milk glass. All of that stuff is beautiful, but I have to think of the 3′ X 4″ storage cage at my new apartment, and exactly how much will go into it. Not much, that’s how much. And my son in Shanghai doesn’t give a chopstick for any of it. Not to mention, it would cost more than the national debt to send it to him.

In an attempt to downsize, I took five U-matic cassettes containing all of the TV commercials I’ve ever written and produced to a fellow nearby who is transferring them to DVD, so I won’t have to lug these obsolete plastic boxes of tape around forever. I also gave a 16mm film my dad had made back in the 50s for Purina to a friend in communication studies, and someday, he says he’ll transfer that to DVD. So I’m at least shrinking my media load.

Remember George Carlin’s terrific riff on “stuff?” It’s all true. And moving stuff is very trying. Moving while trying to get some work done is doubly trying. Oh, AND trying to organize a big garage sale (though you get more for your stuff at an “estate sale,” I’ve heard). Never have I done a garage sale, and this will be a pretty big one. Anybody have folding tables I could borrow?

Anyhow, when I am finally ensconced in the new apartment, I dearly hope I will not feel chained to my desk and stuff. As I recall from living in an apartment before, I tended to go out more. Say, tree leaves are still green, aren’t they?

Popcorn Girl
Short Story – 860 words
©2011 Liz Craig

My name is Dorthy Parrott. I live in Mexico, Missouri, population 13,000. It’s the kind of place you get born in, get brain-dead from boredom in, and forget to leave.

Excitement is pretty scarce around here. Driving around the courthouse square with its miniature Statue of Liberty is about it. Oh, one time Roy Clark came to town to appear at the Audrain County Fair. I saw him at the Acapulco Lanes after his show drinking beer out of a plastic cup, but I didn’t want to bother him.

As a native Mexicoan, my expectations have never been high. Until recently, I spent most of my waking hours sweeping up popcorn off the floor of the Liberty Theater, which keeps you looking down in general. The best thing about the job was getting to see all the movies for free. Watching the beautiful stars up there, I could forget Mexico, being fat, wishing for a boyfriend, and Mama bugging me to do something with myself.

It was pretty much the same routine every night. Watch a movie, sweep up the popcorn and Milk Duds afterward. Tie up trash bags and lug to dumpster. Repeat.

But then one day, something different happened. Larry Bright gave me a Powerball ticket to repay me for letting him in for free whenever Mr. Doumanian, the owner, wasn’t around. I had a crush on Larry, but I knew he’d always see me as the lump I was in high school, even if I slimmed down to my ideal weight according to Cosmo. I thanked him for the ticket and stuck it in my uniform pants pocket, then forgot about it.

A couple of days later, though, I found the ticket when I was about to wash my uniform. I thought, “No way will I win more than a couple of bucks.” But when I compared my numbers with the winning numbers in the paper, I nearly passed out on the kitchen linoleum. Then I started screaming, and I couldn’t stop. Mama ran in from the yard to see what was wrong. When I told her I had won $110 million with Larry’s Powerball ticket, she started screaming, too, and when we were all out of screams, we entwined our arms the way they do on TV at New Year’s and toasted my luck with a 10 a.m. beer.

Mama wanted me to build us a house in Branson, so she could go see that Japanese fiddle-player any time she wanted. I said nobody actually lives in Branson. Besides, the sight of all those seniors from Arkansas in plaid polyester outfits would depress a person after awhile.

The question was, what did I want to do with the money? What did I want in life, anyway?

First, I decided to give a million to Larry. Mama started yelling, but I stood firm because I thought it was the right thing to do. After all, he had been nice enough to give me the ticket. A million would ease his suffering over having blown it.

Then I quit my job and let the money (still about 6 mil after they took out the taxes) sit in the bank while I figured out what to do next.

A few days later, I had a dream. I was thin and gorgeous, and I was dressed in a long white satin gown. I swiveled my hips sinuously as I glided down a long white marble staircase to meet a crowd of screaming fans waving autograph books. I smiled graciously and signed my name in their books, making each fan feel they were the most important person in the world for just a moment. They all loved me. Then I sashayed out to my sleek silver limousine and waved like the Queen, turning my hand in little circles, as it pulled away from the curb. I woke up with a warm feeling in my heart and a clear idea of what I wanted to do.

So this is it: I’m going to hire a personal trainer and a nutritionist and get down to my ideal weight, and then I’m going to have my face re-sculpted and my teeth capped, and I’m going to get into the movies. I know you can buy your way into Hollywood. Look at Pia Zadora. Well, maybe she’s not such a good example. But anyway, Mama just wants to take one of those “See the Stars’ Homes” tours, but I told her nobody who lives in Hollywood takes those tours. Because you know all the people who live there, and they invite you over.

United Van Lines just pulled up. We’re only taking a few things to get us started; I’ll buy good stuff when we get to Beverly Hills. The real estate agent found us a house there that once belonged to Jean Harlow. We saw the pictures of it, and it’s fabulous. The best thing about the house is that it has a movie theater and a popcorn machine. You know, I might even sweep it out now and then, just for old times’ sake. Come and see me sometime–in the movies.

- 30 -

The unfortunate reality in social media marketing today is this: many clients think “someone on the staff” can handle the company’s social media program “in their spare time.”

“Social media? Not worth wasting time or money on.”
Some clients see social media planning as an afterthought that’s not important to waste money on. They don’t see any need to hire a dedicated social media manager or train someone on staff to conduct the social media program full-time, let alone hire an experienced consultant to create an effective social media marketing strategy.

Who has time for strategy? Why not just go ahead and implement?

To a “naive” social media marketer (meaning someone who is just getting into it), it may not even be obvious that a strategy is necessary. Heck, social media is free, isn’t it? So why bother? Just do it! Tweet, blog, get a FB page, and you’re golden, right? WRONG.

Social media marketing requires a strategy, just like traditional advertising and marketing. And a sound strategy comes about by knowing the answers to some very specific marketing-related questions.

Not every staff member you might pay to tweet or blog for you will know how to ask the right questions to inform a marketing strategy. You don’t jump into even the simplest purchase at Walmart before asking a few questions, do you? So why would your company’s image on the Web be less important than the functionality of the camping stove you asked a hundred questions about? Ask the right questions, or regret it when your social media marketing program either dies or blows up in your face.

What are the right questions?
What is it we want to sell (Often not as simple as “a widget.”)? What’s our unique benefit? What’s our message? Who do we want to hear it? What’s our tone? Where do we need to show up so our audience will hear us? How do we combine social media with traditional media?

Okay. Now I know the right questions. So what?
Answering the questions is only the first step. Companies need expert help in formulating and executing a social media marketing plan based on the answers to those questions, just as companies have needed it in any other communication endeavor. And yes, time and money will need to be spent. It’s a fact of social media life.

Who can help?
The person who puts together your social media strategy can be a stated “expert in social media marketing plans,” a social-media-hip agency, or an independent contractor. But whoever you hire, make sure they know the right questions to ask. Anyone who has spent time as a writer at advertising agencies should have a basic list of questions to ask before suggesting you jump into execution of an ad hoc marketing plan. And some idea of how to proceed from there.

During my couple of decades as a senior ad agency writer, I learned how to develop marketing strategies, then added two other tools that help fine-tune the communication needs of the client and the campaign. Armed with these tools and my experience, I can help any client develop an effectively targeted, well-written and pitch-perfectly voiced marketing plan in traditional and/or social media.

Fact is, I don’t know HTML from STP, and there are lots of people you can get to write code. But when you plan a marketing campaign, whether traditional or social media, you need the ability to think like a successful marketer. You need to ask (and answer) the right questions before you plunge into implementation. And I can help you do that.

My budget’s too small to hire an expert.
If you have a small budget, you can’t afford NOT to hire an expert to help you focus your traditional or social media marketing efforts as sharply as possible. If you need your marketing brain sharpened, give me a call at 913.236.7595. Let’s think together— about making your campaign a success to be proud of.

Someone recently stuck this flyer in my door. I was about to throw it away, when I became riveted by the copy. Not because of the content, but because spelling errors dotted its landscape like landmines. See how many you can spot.

I imagine English is not the first language of the author of this flyer. I hope s/he finds someone to look over future advertising pieces. Poor spelling gives the impression you don’t care about detail, at the very least. Or that you are dumb, at the very worst.

Need a good proofreader to make you and your business look its best? Give me a call. 913-236-7595.

Is it rude to ask a client to sign a contract and pay you some money before you do any work for him or her?
Hmm. Some freelancers seem to think so. They rush headlong into client relationships without even the promise of a kiss, then sometimes end up being jilted and cheated of what we all work for: money.

To those timid freelance graphic designers or writers, I ask, is it rude for Time Warner Cable to ask you to sign a contract? Or a remodeling contractor to have you sign off on an estimate before he gets to work? Of course not! That’s bidness, y’all.

If you’re a freelancer who is scared stupid to ask a client to sign on the line with you for fear you’ll lose him or her, I have three words of advice: Get Over It. Someone who won’t agree to sign onto normal terms of payment is someone who doesn’t see paying you as an absolute necessity. You don’t want a shaky or shady client anyhow, do you?

We freelancers constantly have to remind ourselves that we are a business. And any business requires a contract that cements a legal bond between them and their clients. It should help both parties feel safe, because you’ve agreed on the rules in writing. And freelancers should feel particularly safe, because in most jurisdictions, a written contract is considered binding, even if it isn’t too fancy.

In 10 years of freelancing, I never had a contract. Or let’s say, I never had one I could get clients to sign. I think there are two reasons why.

1. I didn’t project confidence in asking them to sign it.
I felt embarrassed to ask for them to agree to pay me money, a common freelancer disorder. The vaccine against it is a hard look at your income and outgo every month. If the first is smaller than the second, then screw your courage to the sticking point and ask for the signature and some upfront money. Because your time and effort are worthy of recompense.

2. They were not financially stable, so they weren’t sure they could honor it.
They were the wrong clients. You have to kiss some froggy, financially strapped clients before you find the princes and princesses… but heck, you don’t have to go steady with them. Why waste time you could be spending on clients who will sign a contract with you?

Now I have an Engagement Agreement, a one-page document that sets out my terms. It deals with how I will bill the client, how much per hour, what constitutes billable activity, what happens if they don’t pay within 30 days (a 1.5% daily add-on or being strapped down and forced to listen to indie hip-hop 24/7 until they pay–just kidding!), and so on. My last two new clients have signed it and paid me the deposit I requested, too. Will wonders never cease.

If you decide to work a tightrope without a net, okay and good luck. It worked for me nearly all the time (except for the solid year I dunned a client for a measly $400). But there will be times when you’ll wish you’d had one.

And if you’re a client who’s on the up-and-up, you absolutely should expect to sign a contract with your freelancer. It prevents misunderstandings that can ruin a nice relationship.

To contract or not to contract? I say, “Contract.”