I sat down Sunday and put together a short list of writing topics, for Squidoo and other sites, and am now hacking away at them. On Monday I put together a lens about pressure cookers. I always considered them a bit scary and old fashioned but I had been given one many, many years ago. I started using it several years ago for a few specific dishes and I rather liked the results. In the past few years they seem to have caught on with new and improved designs. Recently too I noticed some of the well known chefs like Wolfgang Puck use them. They do save time and cut back on energy usage. They also have the advantage of leaving more of the nutrients in your food than many traditional cooking methods.

Following this, on Tuesday, I put together a lens on a Beef Stroganoff recipe. Yes, it uses the pressure cooker for preparing the meat.

With this said, it’s time to move on to the second week contest and this one is hosted by Mickie_G. Topic of Contest: selling on Squidoo. She have set the rules by saying: “Make a lens that is not Spammy! Be subtle. Give personal reviews. Do not be pushy.” Now, we have 13 lenses submitted by members of Fresh Wonders on the plexo, ready for your voting and choosing the best selling-but-not-pushy lens!

Like during our 1st contest, there is a second plexo open for all the members of Squidoo. This is where you can add those selling lenses you created and can be used as an examples of the great selling lenses!

I know - awesome, right?!

Here are the deets ...

We are on the hunt for the Master of the Digital Universe, the gadget freak to end all gadget freaks. The Master might have the most gadgets, or the coolest gadgets, or both. The Master might rack up 200,000 frequent flier miles a year and do business in 25 countries, while traveling with an extraordinary tech arsenal. The Master might have drawers and closets full of more retired gadgets than anyone else. The Master might have all of the above.

If you think you deserve to be named Master of the Digital Universe, we want to hear from you. We want your story. It's not necessarily just about a laundry list of all the stuff you own (although if that's what you want to send, that's OK too). It's about the big picture. This is a subjective contest, to be judged by the product designers, marketing and management team at Skooba Design. So if you think you've got a story, sell it. Tell us what you've got, what you carry, how you travel, how you use your tech, why you're always 2 steps ahead of every technology development, whatever it may be. The better picture you paint, with words, images or video (more info on entry page), the better we can judge your story.

They are encouraging really great stories and not just a picture of your gear which I think is smart. You can also submit a video regaling the judges with your digital gear mastery.

Deadline for entry is Friday, November 20, 2009 at 11PM Eastern time. 

I’ve also got a reputation for being blunt in my critiques of people’s lenses. I won’t say something like “You’ve made a good effort but…” when I look at a lens and think it’s terrible without any redeeming features. I cannot bring myself to utter false praise. One reason is that it calls into question my own judgment. People reading it will assume I really think it is a good effort when it’s plainly not. The other reason is that I don’t think false praise helps the person improve.

I always try to offer advice on how to improve the page and the writing when needed. I don’t just say, “It’s rubbish.”

Now I’m an Angel, I have to be more cautious in my approach although I still won’t give false praise to a hopeless piece of work. The reason for my caution is because, as an Angel, I have the reputation of all Angels to consider.

Even when I don’t bless a lens, I sometimes write privately to the lensmaster (when they have contact enabled) to make suggestions for improvement that would make the lens eligible for a blessing or at least 4 or 5 stars.

Helping new Squids is the part of Squidoo that I have always enjoyed the most. I’ve got great pleasure from seeing some lensmasters do a reasonable to good first lens and then go on to become great lensmasters. Some of them are now Giants. It’s great to spot talent early and see that person go on to meet or even exceed your expectations.

If you want to know what I look for when I’m deciding whether to bless a lens, take a look at my Angel in Disguise.

You can read the full review of the T.O.T.E. from Urban Junket over on my lens; here's an excerpt:

Maybe I'm just feeling a little nostalgic for John Hughes this days - but I have to say that my journey with my review copy of the Urban Junket T.O.T.E. reminded me of the teen romance films of my youth.

You know the ones I mean. Those teen movies where the female protaganist is a bit of a tomboy who maybe wears glasses and she's desperately in love with the male protaganist, but he doesn't even see her! But then at the end of the film, he suddenly realizes that the perfect woman was right in front of him the whole time! Well...that's kind of how it was with me and the Urban Junket T.O.T.E.

I confess that when I first received the Urban Junket T.O.T.E., it was summer and I thought it was nice. It wasn't until the days started to get a little darker and the leaves turned that I really started to notice it - arrestingly colourful, slick and chic. How had I not seen it before? And how soon could I come up with an excuse to take it out somewhere??

The Urban Junket T.O.T.E. ("Tote" stands for "To Observe the Earth") comes in two sizes, the 15.4" and the 17", which is the one I have. Its glossy exterior is eco-friendly coated canvas made from non-toxic dyes - a definite plus in my book.

The glossy material is also water resistant - another plus in rainy Vancouver - although there is a little gap between the zipper and the edge of the bag, so you know - don't toss it in the pool or anything.

Plus, there is a great video from Tracey showing how to configure the bag in each of its three styles.  You can also skip the review and go straight to the Urban Junket T.O.T.E. over at CareerBags.com.

Mind you, I’ve been suffering health-wise, too but you don’t want to hear about that, do you?

A little while ago I had a request for a review of a squidoo lens made on 4 Star Rating so need to get that completed as soon as I can. Hey, I never said I was a quick worker!

I’ve also got one book review outstanding. I never feel entirely comfortable until I’ve caught up with my review requests. I’m unable to do anything constructive whilst I know I have those to complete.

I’ve tried to limit the amount of book review requests I receive by only, now, accepting them direct from publishers. Hopefully it will give me some free time to get on with some of the other writing work I know I’ve got to get done.

I’m a bit more organised where Squidoo is concerned. I’ve almost finished the updates on lenses that hadn’t been edited since July (I have one left.) Then I’ll be able to move on to the lenses not edited since August.

Then as we move into November I’ll be working on all those lenses not edited since October. Whilst I do those I also have to concentrate on promoting some of the lenses that do not even receive any traffic.

I’m currently creating a lens about them which will be different to My Worst Ranked Lenses.

Question: When you link to one of your lenses (i.e. a back link in a blog post) does it matter if the title is incorrect as long as the URL you’re linking to is correct?

Now I had a Baby Alive doll when I was young and I liked it until my brother dissected it to see how it worked, but I do not remember it Pooping. My son saw the commercial on TV and told me I should Blog about it. So here I am blogging about a doll that poops – go figure. I do not know about anyone else, but this disturbs me a bit. The commercial makes it sound so exciting too. The description is no better:

Baby Alive Whoopsie Doo Doll is an adorable, life-like doll that coos, giggles, eats, pees and even poops on her own, giving your child a fun-filled, true-to-life experience of what’s it’s like to be a mommy. Do you think we need to let our kids experience this at such a young age? Ok maybe it might be a way to get the kids to refrain from having babies so young – I just do not know what to think.

But wait if she goes Poop she will say “Whoopsie” – good thing she gives a warning most babies do not. I am curious to know what others think of this. I remember when that new Barbie came out a few years back with her dog that pooped and she has a scooper to clean it up with – what is going on? Are all the kids toys going to S*%T? Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Watch the video below for a good laugh. So leave me comments and tell me what your thoughts of this doll are.

I’ve also tried to read up on the many articles I’ve bookmarked over the past several months but have never managed to get back to until this point. Today, my focus will be on making sure I understand the FTC guidelines about disclosure. I think I’m in pretty good shape. I don’t really recommend specific products/brands except on rare occasion and I certainly never get free products or services for such things. I’ve had a disclosure statement on my website ever since it’s creation. For now, I need to decide if it’s ok to have that disclosure as a separate page with a link to it on my blog. My only other thought is that with several hundred articles spread across a wide variety of sites online, should I add such a statement to my author bio pages on each of those sites? I’m assuming Squidoo lenses are OK in view of the disclosure statement published by Squidoo at the bottom of each page.