Andrew Jones’ Blog

After dealing with cognitive issues, and obstacles to sleep (though a lot of it is the other side to encouraging sleep) you can then continue the behavioral therapy by addressing the following 3 main areas:

Sleep Environment - a comfortable bed, a bedroom that is quiet, dark and the right temperature

Sleep Discipline - use your bed for sleeping (and sex) only, watch TV etc. elsewhere

Sleep Conditioning - creating a routine, going to bed and getting up at the same time

It’s all pretty obvious really isn’t it? Get your bed and bedroom right, create a routine including using the bed only for sleep (and sex, if you’re lucky! - which can sometime lead to feeling sleepy afterwards…) so that you are getting your subconscious on your side. Basically so that when you go to bed you have as much mental and physical support for just going to sleep, but without putting pressure on yourself, causing Fear or Anxiety Insomnia!

I know that doesn’t go into detail, maybe I’ll expand it later!

Cheers,

Andy

Ignoring medical and mental primary causes, which are outside my expertise…

Another way of putting the obstacles to sleep is by three main areas:

Sleep Environment - Is your bed too firm or lumpy and uncomfortable? Is the room too hot or too cold? Is it too light or too noisy?

Behaviour - if you have trouble sleeping, there’s a good chance you’re sleep discipline is poor… going to bed late, sleeping late, napping during the day… can all disrupt the sleep cycle.

Sleep Conditioning - Are you habitually watching TV, playing computer games or reading in bed?

Address these and you are well on the way to getting a better night’s sleep.

Chrres,

Andy

The first thing to do when tackling insomnia is to remove the obstacles to sleep.

Caffeine and other chemical stimulants… They’re stimulants, what more do you need to know - if you want sleep, don’t take stimulants… (e.g. don’t drink coffee after lunchtime as a rough guide)

Mental stimulants… Watching exciting TV programs, reading real page-turner, can’t-put-down novels, or doing anything else that gets you mentally stimulated just before going to bed is not going to help you sleep!

Mental obstacles… Stress and anxiety - these are more difficult to control, but one method that should help is making a break between work and personal life - by either mentally unwinding (watch TV, read a book etc. to break the hold of work related thoughts), or physically, by doing regular exercise – especially after the work day ends - a long walk, jogging, the gym… this also relaxes you mentally as well as tiring you physically - but don’t do it close to bed time, as it can also wake you up!

If you have a problem such as fear, due to real threats; or grief due to a recent bereavement, then it would be advisable to seek professional help or counseling – as solving that underlying problem will have a greater effect than trying tackle the insomnia which this serious underlying situation is causing. The same applies to physical problems such as painful conditions or illnesses – i.e. seek professional help for any know medical causes first!

So that’s it - next is what to do to encourage sleep!

Cheers,

Andy

This editing isn’t as much fun as the rough draft writing was! It’s been going slowly…

I started off with the idea of putting post-its on a wall and moving them around, but they kept falling off! So then I copied all that info into a spread sheet instead and shuffled the scenes that way, to get a better flow, which worked OK.

After the above scene shuffling I only had one scene I didn’t want anymore (I might even redo that one) - so I decided the next step should be fixing spelling and grammar… and I’m still at it! I must have spent about 25 hours so far, and all I’ve got is a clean copy of the rough draft.

The good news is that I finished the spelling and grammar today, and shuffled the scenes in the document - so I’m ready to start writing the new scenes I identified in step 2 (of Started editing my novel)

More next week!

Cheers,

Andy.

The Insomnia sleep disorder is also known as Wakefulness or Dysomnia and is an inability to sleep, or to sleep for long enough to get a proper night’s rest. It can have the effect of making you feel constantly tired.

Sleep is necessary to repair the body and provide mental and physical rest – to recharge your batteries. Without sleep, or when sleep is insufficient or disturbed over a long period, you may find your concentration and coordination is poor and you may become irritable.

A typical sleep cycle has 5 stages: drowsiness, light sleep, two deep sleep stages followed by REM (Rapid Eye Movement) sleep, where most dreams occur. This first five stage cycle usually lasts about 90 minutes. The REM stage for subsequent cycles may be longer. You may have five of these cycles in a typical night’s sleep.

The amount of sleep needed by people varies: Babies need about 17 hours sleep a day, a child nine to ten hours per night, and an adult seven to eight hours each night, though that typically decreases as you get older. If you don’t need much sleep, get up early to do things – don’t spend too long in bed as this can help trigger insomnia.

There are two main types of insomnia:

Primary Insomnia – where there is no underlying medical cause for the difficulty in sleeping.

Secondary Insomnia – where there is an underlying medical cause disturbing sleep.

By duration:

transient ——-> short term ————-> long term (chronic)

few nights —–> up to 3 weeks ——–> more than 3 weeks

Fear Insomnia - after failing to sleep for a few nights, you become anxious fearing that you won’t sleep again, which then further prevents the onset of natural sleep.

Seasonal Affective Disorder – due to changes in length of Day & Night

Sleep Apnea: this is a condition where the sufferer stops breathing for a short time

If you suspect that you an underlying condition, including Sleep Apnea or Seasonal Affective Disorder which is causing your insomnia, then you should consult a doctor.

So that’s the basics on what insomnia is, check other posts for how to tackle it!

Cheers,

Andy.

Here’s a list of blogs which I have found useful:

Online Money making -

John Thornhill’s Blog

Lee McIntyre’s Blog

Paula Brett’s Blog

Randolf Smith’s Blog - home of Randy’s Ramblings

Warrior Forum

Plus… this site is hosted by D9 Hosting, who have done a fine job! Check out their excellent prices and features at D9 Hosting.

I finished the first pass of editing - rereading the rough draft, making notes on scenes etc. (numbered post-its) and some proof reading highlighting. I also made some notes about new scenes to put in, which will add another thread to the storyline.

The next step is to reorganise the scenes to improve flow, clarity, readability and add in the new scenes (i.e. write them!)

Cheers,

Andy

Well I started on 1st of March, but didn’t write it up because my broadband was down, Thanks Pipex! - I’m moving from Pipex internet to Pipex Homecall, evidently two different organisations - it took me over a week to get a migration code from Pipex internet, then Pipex Homecall don’t use it & I have to get another one (only took three day though)

So the target for NaNoEdMo is to spend 50 hours editing during March - hopefully ending up with a much improved novel - even more hopefully a manuscript that’s ready to send to a publisher!

There are a few strategies outlined on the NaNoEdMo site, which seem to boil down to printing off the rough draft then going though it making notes* - which you can do in a computer document, but is probably easier on a printout. So I printed it out last Wednesday, which took several hours and 195 pages!

*The process of editing involves:

• Rereading the novel, making notes (e.g. post card or post-it) of any significant scenes or plot points - things which may later be resequenced to improve the flow or structure of the story.
• Notes of any new scenes or points to include in the rewrite.
• Notes on time-line and characters to spot continuity and other discrepancies.
• You can either note/correct spelling and grammar as you go through, or leave that for a later pass.

You then try re-sequencing the noted scenes/plot-points to improve the flow, time-line, continuity - removing irrelevant or bad ones and inserting new ones until you are happy with it. Then, if now already done, fix formatting, wording, spelling and grammar. Oh, and think of a best-selling title too!
I only doing so-so so far… a couple of hours on Saturday and Sunday and about an hour and a half last night. So far I’ve gone through to page 120 of 195 making scene/plot-point post-it notes and margin notes (about wording mainly) and some spelling and grammar markings.

If my internet connection is working, I’ll post more progress notes as I go!

Cheers,

Andy.

You’ve now done most of the site set-up, and it’s time to start tuning…

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is the process of tuning your web page(s) and links to help improve your page position in Search Engine Result Pages (SERPs).This is important because when people are searching for something they often only click through to the first few results. The first page, above the ‘fold’ (i.e. what shows immediately, without having to scroll down) is the prime real estate in the world of SERPs. Below the fold, but still on the first page is good too. Then as you get further down, your chance of click through, or Click Through Rate diminishes rapidly.

So what can you do to improve your SERPs position? Several things:

1. Optimise for ‘long tail’ keyword searches, rather than just a single word – as the ‘big boys’ will have huge budgets for popular single word searches, so you won’t be able to compete. Also, generally speaking, people using several words to zero in on a more specific target are more likely to be in a buying frame of mind.
2. Optimise your page(s) to be search engine (crawler/robot) friendly, by helping them load quickly, having the right keywords in the right approximate density, having other necessary components such as terms and conditions, privacy policy as appropriate to improve your page ranking.
3. Have a good structure to your website, linking between pages in the right ways.
4. Get links TO your page(s) ‘backlinks’ – preferably from good, established sites. These may be blogs and article sites – helping to drive more traffic directly as well as improving your SERP position.

Points 1 to 3 are ‘on-page’ optimisation, point 4 is ‘off-page’ optimisation.

Do your on-page optimisation first, then the off-page. Do not use spamming type optimisation, as Google will penalise you for it. e.g. keyword spamming is using artificially high density of the relevant keywords on your page – whether visible or not, i.e. don’t colour keyword text to make it invisible, don’t repeat words in meta tags, titles, images’ alt text etc. to try and artificially increase the keyword density – it won’t help and will probably get flagged as keyword spamming, then you get penalised for it. Keep the keyword density natural, e.g. once in the title(s) and perhaps two or three times in a long paragraph. It should read naturally, and be well written – not that it has to be award winning or anything, but you should make it as informative and interesting as you can, in the time you allot to writing it. So don’t over use keywords, but do use them! Use them in the title, meta tags, image alt text, and the Anchor text for your links from other pages (see backlinks below)

Backlinks: one-way links (to your site) rank higher than reciprocal/2-way links – where you might arrange to have your site link on their page in return for putting their site link on your page. Also take into account the anchor (visible) text for the link to your page, and the (Google) page rank of the originating page. The anchor text you provide for your link will rank better if it contains your keywords. The Anchor text for your links is rated highly, especially from highly rated originating pages. The page rank of the originating site can be seen if you have the Google toolbar – a higher page rank is better. Also the originating site should also be relevant to the subject – i.e. your keyword subject. A link from a gardening site to an online pet supplies site won’t rank as highly as a link from a pet owners related site (all other factors being equal)

Be careful of building your links too quickly, as Google may penalise you if they think your links are not genuine – i.e. added purely for SEO purposes… to ‘stay under the radar’ keep it to between 5 and 10 added per day (remember that someone else may also add links spontaneously though, so don’t add 10 every single day!)

There are different ways to get backlinks:

• add them yourself, or outsource (pay someone), by posting reviews or articles to blogs or article sites.
• submit a press release about some event related to your site (search on “submit press release” to find where to submit this) – you’ll need to write the press release first! And make it interesting.
• arrange for reciprocal links with relevant good sites (do a search and check out the top sites from the results)
• buy links or pay a service to buy them for you (link building service, link directories, links networks).

Getting a domain name

As recommended for my initial web presence I have tried to get my own name as a .COM domain:
I tried the following, until I found one that was still available:
andrewjones.com
andyjones.com
andrew-jones.com
andy-jones.com
andrewpjones.com

And finally:
andrew-p-jones.com

As recommended I used www.1and1.co.uk – since I live in the UK
(www.1and1.com if you live elsewhere)

The sign up process is easy, and the cost small – currently a .com is £8.99 a year (min 1 year)
and .co.uk is £2.79 a year (min 2 years) – but there are sometimes special offers.

Hosting

The next step was to get a hosting package, again I took the recommended one: http://d9hosting.com
D9 Hosting 12 Months @ £5.95pm

IF you do decide to go for a separate domain registering from your hosting company, then you will need to link the two together:

In order to link the two together you have to log in to 1&1
(you’ll be sent the login info by email shortly after you sign up)
and change the DNS to point to the D9 servers, for my D9 hosting it was as below, but be aware yours might be different, again you’ll be sent the login & DNS info etc. by email shortly after you sign up – see below.

Nameserver 1: ns5.d9hosting.com
Nameserver 2: ns6.d9hosting.com

There will be some delay (probably 24-48 hours) between the DNS info and it taking effect.

Next step will be setting up your blog. (Obviously, I’ve already done this, but not written it up yet - I want to get a video of doing it going first)