Confession & Revamp

You know when you've been lazy or stupid or something else ridiculous entirely and you are eventually forced to grudgingly or shamefully confess that to people around you?

Well, ladies and gentlemen, it's my confession time.

What did you do this time, Bree?

I've been avoiding posting on here for two reasons.  First of all, I know I am one very small voice in a once-small but now vast world of online geek blogging, and I have not felt like it was worth putting in my two cents into the Bank of Geekdom.  Call it a lack of confidence in my ability to uniquely articulate and separate my thoughts from the herd.

Second, I haven't posted in a while because I've been focusing on developing my freelance career.  Since I quit my teaching job, I've been figuring how to work for myself and actually make a living off of it.  It's time-consuming and often when I'm done researching about writing I'd rather not sit down to actually write.  Mass Effect or Halo seem like better options for stress-release.

Have any of you ever felt the same?  Comment below and let me know!

So what about this site?

Geek My Life has been instrumental in getting me writing again and consistently interacting with new people and experiences.  I also talked to a few friends (kudos to Erin of Geek Girl, Nerd Boy and Eric of iGeektrooper) who advised me to write what I feel like writing.  As such, I've decided to keep this site going but with some new approaches, starting with a revamp of content.  From hereon out, posts will be related to and organized by one of these topics:

1. Geek Gigs - I've adored conducting interviews with industry professionals in media, tech, entertainment, and gaming.  I'll continue to post any interviews I conduct here (assuming that I am not pitching the interview to a paying market, of course).
2. Nerd Networking - This is a new interest of mine: the geek situations IRL (in real life).  How do you explain to your mom why you want to be a game designer?  Why is it important to note your social media knowledge on a résumé?  I want to address these types of questions in an advice column format.
3. Media Musings - I wanted to do movie and television reviews since high school, but never thought there was a reason to since so many others already do that.  I don't care anymore - I will write my observations here, except I will try to focus on the themes, morals, foreshadowing, etc. that most sites ignore in favor of the "his acting was fantastic" commentary.
4. Geek My Life - I'll still write about all my geek discoveries and experiments, the reason I opened this blog in the first place.  If you find my reactions to new material too much to handle, I apologize in advance but you have been warned.
5. Spotty Speculations - Anything seemingly random will go here, such as my frustration with gender in the geek world, or pictures of awesome stuff I simply can't pass up.  Or whatever.  That's what "spotty" means.  

More interviews (not just with Amy) to come!

I may add more content categories at some point, but I'm not going to push it now.  Additionally, I'm looking into more clean, sleek layouts.  I'm also considering moving the site to Wordpress because I adore the way they utilize both categories and tags.  

Sound good?  Let me know in a comment below, on Twitter, or through my contact page!

Time to Catch Up, GGN Style

So I've been... busy.

Quitting your job would seem like it'd free up more time for you to write, wouldn't it?  So far, that hasn't been the case.  I keep finding lots of house chores, freelance writing decisions, and geek websites to distract me from posting on here.  However, I realized that part of why I've been busy is because I'm writing two articles per week for Geek Girls Network (GGN).  Did I ever reveal that before on this blog?  No?  Shame on me.

As a writing intern for GGN, I get to wax eloquent every Thursday and Friday over anything I get opinionated about in the geek world.  It's a great way to get my raging and raving rants out of my head, and also to meet new people who may or may not agree with me.

In case you haven't been following my articles over there, I've collected all of them for you (this is obviously not a humble brag post), because there's no one link I can send you to over at GGN to see my articles listed on their own.  Feel free to pick and choose, read them all, or disregard, though that last option may make you the unfortunate subject of my next article.

I won't keep posting these on Geek My Life every week; I'm only doing so now because I know some of my followers are email-only friends and family who may not be aware of how to find my articles.  So, yes, you can stop calling me vain.

"Tauriel, Shmauriel: Does 'The Hobbit' NEED a Female Character?" - posted August 2

"Christian Bale: Indisputably Incredible" - posted August 2

"The Next Top Role Model: Ashley Eckstein" - posted August 3

"Xbox Live Clans Are The Devil." - posted August 3

"Megan Fox: Certified Bimbo" - posted August 9

"Cosplay Critics Have Their Own Issues" - posted August 10

"Stop Inviting Me to Klout, or Why Klout Has Crossed a Line" - posted August 16

"Wedding Wares For The Geeky Couple!" - posted August 17

"I Don't Wear Geek, Therefore I Am Not Geek" - posted August 23

"Dream Job: Rooster Teeth FTW!" - posted August 24

"Why I Despise Not Having TV" - posted August 30

"I Love Not Having TV" - posted August 31

"Shadow and Bone: Let's See What Book 2 Brings" - posted September 6

"Who's Really at Fault for the Sexualization of Women in Geek Culture?" - posted September 7

"Felicia Day Gave Me Her Number (In My Dream, and Not Like That)" - posted September 13

"On Occasion, Being a Geek Stresses Me Out" - posted September 14

The Geek Gig: Amy Ratcliffe

When I think about how much effort I've put into this blog thus far, I almost start to pat myself on the back.  Then I remember Miss Amy Ratcliffe, and how she has been doing the same thing for far longer, has built a reputation from it, and continues to provide quality geek content for all her readers on a regular basis.  I need to pull my arm away from my back at this point.

An operations/logistics worker by day and blogger by night, Amy Ratcliffe blogs over at Geek with Curves, which boasts over 600 readers.  This is nothing in comparison to her Twitter handle where an impressive 12,000+ followers await her every 140 characters.  "Being a geek is such a big part of my life that it was only natural to write about it," she says in an email interview.  "It's fun to share my experiences and meet like-minded people."

The geekery all started for Amy when she caught an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation.  "I was instantly hooked, partially due to Wil Wheaton, but mostly because it was an awesome show and unlike anything I'd seen before," she says.  "TNG was on the downward slope by the time I caught that episode, and I remember watching a few of 'best of' marathons before the series finale aired. Those were some perfect weekend afternoons." 

Despite her success with geek blogging, this direction for her life was not clear from the start.  "I'm sort of a late bloomer," Amy admits.  She mentions that her interests in careers varied from marine biologist, to psychologist, and eventually to forensic anthropology.  Realizing these degrees took too much effort for her taste, Amy quit college and only eventually returned to get a degree in business administration.

"I had no idea what I wanted to be when I grew up until five or so years ago," she explains.  "I always enjoyed writing though.  I wrote short stories and essays and occasionally contributed to newsletters I stumbled across... but I couldn't make it click.  Finally, two years ago after a few false starts with blogs focusing on food and travel and various things, I found my niche: I decided to write about geeky stuff.  I put in all my effort and it's worked out."  Amy blogs about geek crafting, conventions she attends, her thoughts on the latest Game of Thrones episode, and even the occasional sci-fi parody video.

In addition to her own blog, Amy writes for such sites as Fashionably Geek, IGN, and The Mary Sue.  Her writing has provided her many geek-out moments of meeting people she admires.  In particular, she remembers talking to supervising director Dave Filoni at the premiere of Star Wars: The Clone Wars as she covered the event for Newsarama.  "I asked him a question about whether certain characters in the The Clone Wars were at all inspired by the Bene Gesserit in Dune. There was a connection and he elaborated on it. I mean, I got to talk about Dune and Star Wars with Dave Filoni and I was getting paid to do it. It was definitely a 'pinch myself' sort of moment."

Amy continues to write and publish her work across the Internet.  She provides some solid advice and encouragement for geek writers when she says, "If you'd like to get involved in blogging, geeky or otherwise, you've got to dive in and realize that it takes hard work and time.  A friend of mine constantly says, 'Don't tell me how bad you want it, show me.'  If you're starting with the intent of showing your writing chops, building a brand, or wanting to get paid for your writing later, you've got to take it seriously.  Write every day and understand that it is rare to get paid for content right away."

"Most importantly though, writing about the topics you're passionate about makes writing about a bajillion times more fun (and easy) and that travels through the words to your readers."

For more of Amy Ratcliffe's geek wisdom and writings, visit her blog Geek with Curves and follow her on Twitter @amy_geek!

When not writing, Amy can often be found crafting geeky
items, like these Star Wars heels.