Feeling Like Lady GaGa (Successful, Not Bisexual)
After a sudden gut-wrenching bout of serious writer's block and mini-nervous breakdown last week, I've managed to emerge this week in top form, which was as unexpected as it is welcome.
My second edition of the new This Gay Month in Sports column reached at least the third spot on the "Most Viewed" list over the weekend, and you know I'm always pleased to make either top five list, especially now with the new format that is by design less prone to celestial hit numbers. My editor informed us of a new deadline policy on Monday that in light of my collapse last week I endeavored to adhere to rigidly, turning in my Tuesday submission on Monday instead of several hours overdue as has been my M.O. I happened to stumble on a nude photo leak story involving a wrestler I'd never heard of, which is always a no-brainer for my topic. I didn't realize how new the story was, as typically my stories are based on information already spreading or spread across the blogosphere, be it the small gay sports blogosphere or the general blogosphere, as I'm not so much a scoop reporter as I find and repackage sports stories for a specific kind of audience.
The next day a search on Google for Matt Striker, the subject of the article, brought up my article as the main "news" item, and I also discovered that several other sites credited me and linked to the piece in their coverage of the story. My editor told me the piece had been getting scores of hits, and it was fun feeling a bit more visible than usual, even for fifteen minutes.
So I was pleased if not shocked to see it move from fourth position to the top spot between Tuesday and this afternoon; I forget what this brings my number of #1 Top Viewed articles (I believe it's four). It's also one of the rare times I have had two articles on the top five list simultaneously (Gay Month in Sports remains at number four as of this afternoon and got one of the "Hot Topics" links at the top of the home page). Yay for me.
I did a crapload of writing today as well as I managed to pitch two articles about the Tony Awards to my editor and convincing him to allow me to take the assignment in the wake of my Freelance FAIL last week. I submitted a behemoth of a piece early this afternoon, 50% longer than my longest op-eds were, a Preview/What to Watch with a few predictions thrown in for fun and to counteract the Tony Predictions article the site ran a few weeks back that I found...I'll politically say "insufficient," and I also have my first super-time-sensitive reporting piece, a ceremony wrap-up due shortly after the telecast ends Sunday. Luckily I'll be at Amber's; it's as if I had to cover a golf tournament while I happened to be staying at Tiger Woods' place for the night.
David's comeback is so far working better than Lisa Kudrow's.
"Ooooooh, I'm a STAR! And the audience loves me. And I love them. And they love me for loving them and I love them for loving me. And we looooove each other."
My second edition of the new This Gay Month in Sports column reached at least the third spot on the "Most Viewed" list over the weekend, and you know I'm always pleased to make either top five list, especially now with the new format that is by design less prone to celestial hit numbers. My editor informed us of a new deadline policy on Monday that in light of my collapse last week I endeavored to adhere to rigidly, turning in my Tuesday submission on Monday instead of several hours overdue as has been my M.O. I happened to stumble on a nude photo leak story involving a wrestler I'd never heard of, which is always a no-brainer for my topic. I didn't realize how new the story was, as typically my stories are based on information already spreading or spread across the blogosphere, be it the small gay sports blogosphere or the general blogosphere, as I'm not so much a scoop reporter as I find and repackage sports stories for a specific kind of audience.
The next day a search on Google for Matt Striker, the subject of the article, brought up my article as the main "news" item, and I also discovered that several other sites credited me and linked to the piece in their coverage of the story. My editor told me the piece had been getting scores of hits, and it was fun feeling a bit more visible than usual, even for fifteen minutes.
So I was pleased if not shocked to see it move from fourth position to the top spot between Tuesday and this afternoon; I forget what this brings my number of #1 Top Viewed articles (I believe it's four). It's also one of the rare times I have had two articles on the top five list simultaneously (Gay Month in Sports remains at number four as of this afternoon and got one of the "Hot Topics" links at the top of the home page). Yay for me.
I did a crapload of writing today as well as I managed to pitch two articles about the Tony Awards to my editor and convincing him to allow me to take the assignment in the wake of my Freelance FAIL last week. I submitted a behemoth of a piece early this afternoon, 50% longer than my longest op-eds were, a Preview/What to Watch with a few predictions thrown in for fun and to counteract the Tony Predictions article the site ran a few weeks back that I found...I'll politically say "insufficient," and I also have my first super-time-sensitive reporting piece, a ceremony wrap-up due shortly after the telecast ends Sunday. Luckily I'll be at Amber's; it's as if I had to cover a golf tournament while I happened to be staying at Tiger Woods' place for the night.
David's comeback is so far working better than Lisa Kudrow's.
"Ooooooh, I'm a STAR! And the audience loves me. And I love them. And they love me for loving them and I love them for loving me. And we looooove each other."