I have about twenty or so of those paper journals, like the one shown above, lying about...some do get written in when I'm feeling like taking a pencil or pen up in my hands. 

But most of my journaling is done in the cloud these days. And creative writing note-taking...and story planning. And poetry writing. And private blogging/cathartic writing. 

I was doing a lot of it on Google Docs until I read that Google like probably can read everything I write and maybe share my shit against my will with people I don't want to read it. Not fucking cool, Google. 

So I searched on my Safari (totally safe Mac browser...as far as I know) for a private way to get my thoughts on the screen and into a space...before I share them in any other spaces (if I choose to do so). 

I found penzu...the totally private and secure online web journalling experience. 

The basic one journal with basic bells and whistles is free. But you can pay just a little bit more and get lots more features, including unlimited number of journals, covers and page and pad images you can change, extra cool fonts, etc. For me, it was worth it to pay for the PRO+ version, butt the free or regular PRO version will probably do for most. PRO+ wasn't that much more expensive than PRO and it has extra level encryption. (Even though I'm saving up for something else I might need later on that's kind of expensive but as a writer who wants to self publish, I will probably need eventually and I'm planning on taking my blogs to the pro level as well). 

​Below is a look at my Home screen with all my journals (so far)...

The one I've worked most recently in, Writing Projects, is positioned top left and largest on the screen. The others are around in, clockwise rotation order according to when I last worked in them. I have used my own images for the covers of each. They look pretty cool don't they? 

I'm not suggesting you buy the PRO or PRO+ version. I happened to get it when it was on a deal where they threw in another year for half  off, so it was a good deal. You can add images and tags to your posts just like a blog and you can also privately share links to it with people...if you want to do that. 

I chose to do PRO because my first journal I made in there, 'wandering starseed,' is where I'm pre-writing some of the more sensitive personal posts of my dealings with weird phenomenon that I normally post on my other blog... "reo_k's weirdworldview" but these are really sensitive posts and will not get posted to the main blog, but to private content pages of that blog once I have that part of the blog up and running. For discreet and special eyes only.

The page layout is simple to use and you can also time-stamp your entries if you want to keep track of when you started writing them. That's helpful for me...lets me know when I'm taking too long on something and need to get my ass in gear. 

​Below is a view of the writing area layout:
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It looks pretty much like any other blogging app but there are some extra cool features. That light bulb in the upper right? If you are stuck for something to write, in total writer's block hell, you can click on that for prompts. How awesome is that? And everything is100% private, unless you choose to share it with someone. 

penzu app for private journaling. Free, PRO for $19.99 per year and PRO+ for $49.99 per year. Sometimes they have sales for an extra year at half off. Worth checking out if you can afford it. See more at https://penzu.com .

File under..."Cool Tools for Writers, Bloggers, and Journal-Keepers". 

A shorter clip of this was posted on Facebook earlier in the year, and it resonated with me. So I decided to watch the longer version of the YouTube clip of a commencement speech given by J.K. Rowling on the subject of the unexpected benefits of failure. 

The beginning of the New Year is typically the time we begin to re-evaluate the past year and make up our minds to better ourselves in the future. But we often have difficulty admitting defeat, even to ourselves, because in our modern society failure carries a negative connotation rather than a positive one. But perhpas it should be different. It's normal to feel some negativity and self-loathing after failing, but that should not last long. It should be soon followed by positive re-focusing of one's energies to strive to be better next time. Joanne nails these points in her own brilliant way. 

It's a little longer than the clip posted on Facebook, but well worth watching. The author of the famous Harry Potter series talks about the most valuable lesson she ever learned in one of the best commencement speeches I've ever heard. 

I've been meaning to post this talk of Joanne's for awhile now, but today it hits home more, so I'm finishing this post and sharing it with the world. Because sometimes you need silver linings when the rainbow fades to pale. 

​May we shoulder onward through our defeats and come out victorious in the end!

This is a crossover post from my Senior Portfolio class from last Fall 2015 semester. I am posting it here because I know a lot of my reader friends dig reading cool free stores online. Researching things like this is pretty much what my Senior Capstone was all about.

Source: Jones, Josh. "100 Great Sci-Fi Stories by Women Writers (Read 20 for Free Online)." Open Culture: The Best Free Cultural & Educational Media on the Web. N.p., 1 Aug. 2013. Web. 7 Oct. 2015.


Link: http://www.openculture.com/2013/08/the-100-best-sci-fi-stories-by-women-writers.html


The whole list of 100 best sci-fi stories by women can be found here: http://iansales.com/2013/07/10/the-list-100-great-science-fiction-stories-by-women/

Researching other resources for this project of planning a class in women's speculative fiction goes has been intense and educational for me. Research for this project goes beyond the standard critical journal articles on theory or analysis. Sometimes you have other ideas for how to view your audience. 

Now, who is my audience, beyond the literature professors here at USFSP who will be viewing the course Google Site I created for the project and who I will be presenting for at the send of the semester? The answer is, of course, any future students who decide that want to cast their lot with me and spend a semester reading and discussing otherworldly, fantastic, and creepy books and stories. I know they will be college students. And as a college student myself, I know that many of them will be flat broke and working two-to-three part time jobs just to afford to sit in my classroom. Therefore, I have determined to make it one of my personal goals to make the course reading materials as cheap as possible, and you can't get any cheaper than free! 

I just happened today to do a general Google search on "best women science fiction short stories" and the first result was the link posted above from a free educational blog. The article was posted by a gentleman, I'm going to assume he is a literature teacher based on the other articles he has posted to Open Culture (I found those by clicking on his byline link at the end of the article). The article contains information about a list compiled on another man in the field of science fiction. The original poster's page had a list of one-hundred of the best science fiction short stories written by women, along with a link to see where the stories could be found: anthology, collection, or online sources were given. Mr. Josh Jones took this list and narrowed it down to only those stories which could be read online for FREE. Mr. Jones' list is comprised of twenty stories that can be read online for free. Don't you just love the Internet? I do. 

Mr. Jones' article was posted to Open Culture in August 2013, so there is the possibility that some of the links don't work anymore. I'm going to have to check them all, and if I use any of them they will have to be checked periodically to make sure they are still active. I know from the experience of being a student that there is nothing more frustrating than having reading assignments online and when you click the links to read them...ERROR! FILE NOT FOUND! Going to do my damnedest as a professor to avoid that scenario. 

There are short stories on this list that I may add to the reading canon, namely: ‘The Cartographer Bees and the Anarchist Wasps’ by E Lily Yu, ‘Spider the Artist’ by Nnedi Okrafor, ‘Eros, Philia, Agape’ by Rachel Swirsky, ‘A Vector Alphabet of Interstellar Travel’ by Yoon Ha Lee, and ‘The Lady Astronaut of Mars’ by Mary Robinette Kowal. Of the original one-hunded story list, five of them are on my canon already. I need to evaluate more of them.