tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4174132353469452442026-05-11T12:08:43.659+02:00The NEEDSer BlogNEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.comBlogger27125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-77122924429844176062011-05-31T19:40:00.003+02:002011-06-05T01:47:17.984+02:00

All good things come to an end and, yes, faithful Fobbies (Friends of Bashful Blagger) even the NEEDSer blog must have its day. No doubt you noticed the long absence of anything new to read from the Bashful Blagger. The explanation is simple. Pressure of work has meant I've had no time spare to compose the loving creations on wordcraft I used to love posting here. The NEEDSer blog may be no

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-43243943623478322582010-04-13T11:58:00.008+02:002010-04-13T12:19:38.925+02:00

This is no time to hide your head. Wilting wallflowers maskerading as freelancers just won’t cut it in these days of cut-throat business. With more people jumping onto the freelance bandwagon every day you have to find ways to make your home-based business stand out from the crowd. Even in my own case as a flourishing freelancer – my business is blooming – I still need to make new clients aware

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-47479082507157764252010-04-01T13:25:00.005+02:002010-04-01T14:02:37.018+02:00

Good things come to those who wait. Oh yeah? Maybe that’s true for itty bitty spiders sitting in wait in their webs for a foolish fly to come into range. But for freelancers like me, making a living through the world wide web, it would be utter stupidity to sit around waiting for work to drop onto our desks. The spider depends on blind luck for his meal ticket. As a freelancer, you can’t afford

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-56811086509697839972010-02-01T21:42:00.008+01:002010-02-02T08:31:28.862+01:00

There are two certain Ds in a freelancer’s life. The first one, the big D, happens to us all in the end. ‘The End’, I should say, meaning: all of us die. The little D may be just as obvious, certainly to the veteran freelancer, but happily this D needn’t be as fatal as its big cousin. Little D in the freelancer’s lexicon stands for Dry, as in Dry Spells, those unplanned periods without work that

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-48880055068464352492009-08-27T16:53:00.005+02:002009-08-27T17:19:41.083+02:00

Back from the beach – at last! – and it’s straight back to work. I’m now editing a bright new paper by one of my favourite professors who fully understands the importance of getting her charmingly Dutch-flavoured English onto the same level as her lucid research findings. It’s a joy to work for such a clever client and… Gracious! Did I just say “straight” in relation to “back to work”? Silly me (

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-58062112469940801792009-07-30T00:02:00.010+02:002009-07-30T14:08:22.427+02:00

Ka’ching! You’ve hit the jackpot, dear Reader. Yes, you’re in for a really big win. Instead of doing the usual, this week your bashful blagger is going to shaddap her pen and leave you to wind and weave your way through a whirlwind of links related to writing, language and life in the fast lane of freelancing. Whoa there, li’l blagger! Sounds like you’re setting readers off on a wild goose chase.

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-86665111272502912542009-07-23T00:54:00.021+02:002009-07-23T02:39:01.455+02:00

Here’s a riddle for all you brainiacs: Q. What is a banano? A. Exactly the same as an ordinary banana, only one billion times smaller. I know, banano, bah no-no! It’s one of my nerdier jokes, but after a long day’s editing of a long, long book (did I tell you this book is looong?) nano nonsense is all my nerdy birdy brain can come up with. So this week’s episode is going to be entertainment,

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-34512735504213703622009-07-16T00:02:00.017+02:002016-06-22T14:30:49.437+02:00

It can be risky fishing for business in the uncharted waters of the internet. What may seem like a goldfish nibbling the bait dangling from your website may be a shark who'll savage your tasty offer and swim off without remorse. In other words, whenever someone you don’t know approaches you through your website, asking for a free sample before committing to paying for your professional

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-47391584835017838582009-07-10T00:02:00.004+02:002009-07-10T00:15:07.361+02:00

Recognise this, all you freelancers? One week you’re faffing about at your desk, with not a lot to do. You’ve done the filing, done the dishes, even done the doggies (taken them for a walk, that is) and now you’re all done. Tempus fidgets slowly and you’re fretting, no frantic about the dire dearth of deadlines. But hey! No use feeling sorry for youself! Off you go, tapping out a short but sweet

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-56523817674195484492009-07-02T00:08:00.017+02:002009-07-04T11:43:52.479+02:00

Have you ever been hit by a word that looks like it’s perfectly good English until you realise you don’t understand it? That happened to me the other day. I was surfing Cadrona snowfields high above Wanaka, my old hometown in New Zealand, when I came across this vivid report. An excerpt:“The NZ Uni snow games was awesome fun. The results were wicked and the peeps and good times rocked harder and

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-4566437352508452222009-06-25T17:51:00.024+02:002009-06-26T16:58:18.358+02:00

No bones about it, we all know length matters. Given the choice between the long straw and the short, I know which one I’d pick, any day. Long is safe, it’s seductive, it’s impressive. The longer, the stronger, they say, and in many cases I’d agree with that happily. In language terms, however, I take the opposite view: the longer, the wronger. Don’t get me wrong. I’ve got nowt against long words

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-24840769661944893112009-06-18T01:06:00.011+02:002009-06-18T11:52:08.863+02:00

In sixteen forty-two, Abel Tasman sailed the ocean blue…This little rhyme taught me when the Dutch explorer Abel Tasman became the first European to discover New Zealand. Somehow it’s stuck in my memory, which is strange because when I was at school I couldn’t have cared less about New Zealand’s historical connection with the Netherlands. Nor would I have dreamed that one day I’d be living a

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-89140361801165988262009-06-11T00:14:00.024+02:002009-06-13T11:52:15.275+02:00

Just imagine. It’s mid-morning, you’re in your peaceful office, fresh cup of coffee close at hand (but at a safe distance from your keyboard), working avidly on your latest exciting assignment (don’t laugh, most stuff I edit manages to excite my neurons). You’re on a high, racing along at your best editing speed when rrrrrrriiiiing-rrrrriiiiiiiiiinnnnng. Oh no! It’s the bell from hell. Who does

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-59307948855976232682009-06-04T00:22:00.009+02:002009-06-04T09:20:17.142+02:00

Meet the amazing Marina Orlova (28), dubbed "the world's sexiest philologist" by New Yorker Magazine. The possesser of not one but two degrees in philology from State University of Nizhni Novgorod Region in the Russian Federation, Marina started off in the United States as an English teacher. In 2007, however, she burst out of the confines of the classrom and stepped onto the world wide stage as

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-87553835528315542972009-05-28T17:46:00.009+02:002009-05-29T10:23:16.117+02:00

Editing on paper, bah! Since I’m cack-handed (nope, it doesn’t mean what you think; check it out) my lousy handwriting has far more in common with a Jackson Pollack painting than the winning entry for a prize in penmanship. Perhaps I should have been a doctor. Then at least my pig pen would have come in handy for writing prescriptions. Luckily for my poor clients, the gruesome days of unruly

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-89984927212231106332009-05-14T14:50:00.040+02:002009-05-18T10:50:56.820+02:00

A writer likes nothing more than being read. And so do my chubby cheeks, like being red, that is, with the poignant flush of a bashful blush. Yes really, I'm still amazed, bemused, and captivated, still dazzled (I’ll spare you the rest of the alphabet) a whole week after being bowled over by a stampede of praise from a herd of business friends and relations, the recipients of last week’s NEEDSer

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-3383587644752803802009-05-07T21:28:00.040+02:002009-05-18T10:50:14.569+02:00

When I was six or eight or thereabouts my parents gave me a book. I forget what the book was called, something symmetrical like 1001 Answers to 1001 Questions, but I do remember that my addiction to questions was driving my parents nuts. They were probably hoping that giving me this compendium for curious kids would get me to shut up. Alas, it didn’t but I loved that very first reference book of

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-33644185413852186632009-04-30T11:52:00.026+02:002009-05-18T10:49:46.763+02:00

Update: May 2, 2009. This episode was written and posted online in all ignorance of the tragic drama at Apeldoorn taking place at the same time. Dutch driver Karst Tates ploughed his car through the crowds in an attempt to attack the Dutch royal party, killing four people and injuring three times as many. To date the death toll, which now includes Tates himself, is seven people. I can't ignore

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-2654466050234873002009-04-23T17:49:00.026+02:002009-05-18T11:05:12.672+02:00

Back in the day when dinosaurs walked and I was but a lowly bottom-feeder – one of several assistant stage managers at the Sydney Opera House – one of my backstage cobbers dubbed me ‘Main Chance Werner.’ Ye gads! I’d been sussed! I’d believed no one could see my burning ambition and all the while it had been blazing in flagrante. To my dismay the nick caught on like bushfire and soon everyone

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-38126467833377726562009-04-16T00:01:00.031+02:002009-05-18T10:53:07.546+02:00

You know the tired old sign that office jokers keep on their desks: "You don't need to be mad to work here but it helps"? Well, for me, “here” has to be “home”. Indeed, it would be sheer madness for this tireless joker NOT to work from home. I sure ain't good at the alternative. All that tweet and greet and blithering about the coffee machine in the corridor gives me the heebie jeebies. No

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-75931047477677884232009-04-09T00:04:00.029+02:002009-05-18T10:47:56.517+02:00

Not so long ago one of my colleagues e-mailed the SENSE forum with a query about a copywriting term. “I need to crowdsource for this one,” she wrote. “What's the name for the key bit of text, often a direct quote, that you extract from an article and feature in a box?” As it turns out the answer is “pull quote” which sounds intriguing but isn’t what I want to talk about now. What really got my

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-71109282633324584892009-04-02T00:04:00.027+02:002009-05-18T10:46:44.063+02:00

One of my best friends is under the mad delusion that as a freelancer I won’t be touched by the economic crisis. Yes, just yesterday Roz (the Follower skulking behind the Fanny Ardant avatar) said to me on the phone, “What crisis? You’ve got nothing to worry about.” She added a mellow, dramatic laugh that sounded like she’d be twirling her moustache if she had one (well, she does have a teensy

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-21182044571526244902009-03-26T00:32:00.017+01:002012-12-06T22:39:26.890+01:00

As Easter draws near it is time for my annual confession. Yes, dear Reader, I’m not Ragini Werner, your freelance editor and author’s friend who’s been faffing about online blowing NEEDSer’s horn to all and sundry (more sundry than all at this early stage). No indeed. I am in fact the Easter Bunny. You’d never have guessed it, but I do declare it’s true. I am the Bunny. Not just any Bunny, the

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-24392903847091941872009-03-19T00:47:00.035+01:002009-05-18T10:45:55.872+02:00

One of the capital pleasures of life as a language editor is the license it gives me to goof off on Google, or to put it in terms the taxman will accept: the time I spend online looking up terminology is justified. For sad nerdlings like the Blagger, badly infected with TICS (“terminally insatiable curiosity syndrome”), unravelling the hidden meanings of acronyms and other initial ISMS is more

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-417413235346945244.post-60303793439208596632009-03-12T00:06:00.004+01:002009-05-18T10:45:26.074+02:00

Lucille the cat was always clear: no one, not even me, her trusted tin-opener, was ever going to touch her tummy. If you strayed too close, out would come those diamond-sharp claws and take that! And that and that and that! Dear little Lucille never learnt the difference between overkill and making a point but who could blame her for being being transparent? Point is, she was always admirably

NEEDSerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08969082038597299707noreply@blogger.com0