The badly needed kitchen renovation of my New York City apartment continues. On day three I opened up the walls and pulled the copper tubing for the water supply line to the new fridge. I got a call saying the delivery of the new cabinets, counters, refrigerator and a sink from Ikea will be coming Tuesday afternoon. The new stove, microwave range hood, and a dishwasher from Sears are scheduled for delivery on Friday.

Here’s a little video update of the progress today:

The electrician confirmed he’ll be arriving tomorrow to start work. The debris removal folks came today and took the old stove and all the debris from the demo.

Bummer, the ceiling fixture died today. It’s fluorescent, and I think the ballast went bad. I’ll ask the electrician.

Here’s a video taken at the end  of the day:

We’re still on schedule and on budget. If the electrician doesn’t need to redo the wiring back to the main panel, we’ll be golden!

The Go-To Guy!

Technorati Tags: DIY home renovation, ikea kitchen, kitchen renovation

The badly needed kitchen renovation of my New York City apartment continues. On day two I continued tearing out the old cabinets and appliances in preparation for replacing them with cabinets, counters, refrigerator and a sink from Ikea along with a new stove, microwave range hood, and a dishwasher from Sears.

Here’s a little video update of the progress today:

The electrician coming in to replace the fuse panel and completely rewire the kitchen space on Tuesday and Wednesday, so I want to get as much stuff out of the way to give him clear access to the walls.

Monday afternoon the debris removal people are coming as well. I broke down the old cabinets so that they would take up as little space as possible – the debris removal is charged by the load size, so this will help keep the budget down. I want them to take the stove too, but only if it doesn’t add to the cost. (Sears will take it for free when the new appliances come, but I’d have to wait until Friday.)

This wave of the project is focused on the basics and the electrical work, but I’m already looking forward to dressing things up with a tile backsplash, a new floor, and some under-cabinet task lighting once the main project is done.

The Go-To Guy!

Technorati Tags: DIY home renovation, ikea kitchen, kitchen renovation

My New York City apartment is getting a badly needed kitchen renovation. I’ll be tearing out the old cabinets and appliances and replacing them with cabinets, counters, refrigerator and a sink from Ikea along with a new stove, microwave range hood, and a dishwasher from Sears. We also have an electrician coming in to replace the fuse panel and completely rewire the kitchen space.

This wave of the project is focused on the basics and the electrical work. Later I want to dress things up with a tile backsplash, a new floor, and some under-cabinet task lighting.

This is the before shot of the kitchen. The new fridge is already there, but the rest is heading to the dumpster. I’ve got to box up and clear out all of the contents of the shelves and cupboards.

I spent a few hours boxing up and moving all of the contents of the kitchen into the girls’ room where I’ll leave it until the kitchen is finished. As small as the kitchen is and with as few cupboards as we have, I was a bit surprised at how much we had crammed in there.

Once the contents of the room were safely stored away, I took the doors off of the cabinets and took the wall cabinet and vent hood down.

Here is my progress for the day.

So far I’m on schedule for my expectations on this project. I’ll have all of the demolition work completed tomorrow and be ready to open up the walls a bit to get ready for the electrician. I also want to see if I can pull a water line across the room to connect up the ice maker on the fridge.

Now it’s time for a little rest.

The Go-To Guy!

Technorati Tags: DIY home renovation, ikea kitchen, kitchen renovation

The roach killing tactics that worked best for me…

When you first see the roaches, your instincts say, “kill, kill, kill!!!” But, the best and least toxic solution comes about after the initial panic ebbs and you can think about the situation a bit more clearly. After I calmed down and stopped spraying RAID everywhere, I did a bunch of research and devised a plan of attack. My goals were to limit the amount of poisons used, make quick improvement in the living conditions in my home, and implement a long-term roach management solution that uses natural, non-toxic materials to keep roaches out of our home for good!

To achieve these goals, here is what needs to be done:

1 – Locate where the roaches are entering your home and cut off their access

2 – Cut off their food supply with a thorough de-greasing and cleaning

3 – Use baits, traps, and other products to kill the roaches back inside the walls as well as remaining roaches already inside the living spaces

4 – Create barriers to roaches coming inside in the future and repel roaches from entering closets and cabinets

I tried so many different tactics and products that it is hard to say if any one is ultimately responsible for ending the infestation. But, I know that I saw dramatic results after thoroughly caulking and sealing every crack and crevice in my kitchen and bath (I had also been using baits, poisons, and traps for several weeks, so they contributed as well – just not as dramatically.)

On the same day I caulked and sealed, I also aggressively cleaned the kitchen with a de-greaser. The amount of cooking grease that coats the cabinets, walls, and vent hoods in a kitchen is remarkable. Scrubbing with ordinary cleaners isn’t enough, you have to pull out the heavy guns. Don’t forget to clean out the oven, under the stove top, the back and sides of your stove and the walls and cabinets surrounding the stove. If you have a self-cleaning oven, run it through a cleaning cycle according to the manufacturer’s instructions. The high heat will kill off any eggs or live bugs inside the stove (but you still need to de-grease everything afterward.)

Glue traps were effective in both capturing the roaches that were running around the house and also in helping to identify how and where they were entering the rooms. These clues made it easier to find the spots requiring further treatment.

To keep the bugs out in the long-term, I used several tactics. I placed cedar products in the closets, cabinets and drawers. The natural oils in the wood repel roaches. I’m planning to line all of the closets in cedar eventually, but placed blocks of cedar on hangers there for the time being.

Moth balls are also a good deterrent to keep the roaches out, but they are toxic and smell pretty bad. Your application options are limited. One folk remedy is to drop a couple behind the stove every few months to ward of roaches.

My most aggressive long term tactic was to drill holes in the wall cavities around the kitchen (the source of our worst infestation) and blow a combination of Diatomaceous Earth and Boric Acid into the walls. Both of these products work to kill the roaches through mechanical means rather than poison. Neither product loses potency over time and the roaches cannot become immune to it the way they can with many poisons. In my view, the walls are now a highway of roach death which will stop future roaches before the ever manage to get inside. Small amounts of both products were dusted under the stove and refrigerator.

The Diatomaceous Earth is non-toxic and has a very mild ‘earthy’ odor. This is good with a baby around the house (Boric Acid is toxic, but not nearly as bad as the poisons in most roach sprays.) I also added a few cans of a mint oil based bug spray into our cupboard to handle future sitings. Unlike poison based sprays, I’m not scared to use this around the kitchen. It works a little slower than poison sprays, but smells better and won’t hurt you if a little overspray gets on your dinner plate.

I never had to resort to bug bombing. I think I could have handled the situation effectively if I had used nothing more than the Diatomaceous Earth, mint oil bug spray, glue traps, silicon caulk, expanding foam, and boric acid coupled with a thorough cleaning and degreasing of the entire kitchen.

The roach sightings have dropped dramatically in the past couple days and I’m looking forward to many roach-free days in the near future.

The Go-To Guy!

P.S. Do you have any tips or techniques for effectively killing roaches and treating an infestation? Leave a comment and let us all know!
[nms:cockroach,3,1]

Technorati Tags: boric acid, diatomaceous earth, how to kill cockroaches, killing roaches

If you have set out to build your own bookbinding machine to create perfect bound paperback books, it is wise to seek out some examples of machines used in the binding industry. That is easier said than done, but I have located a few places that sell such machines and even found a video demonstrating one such bookbinding machine in action.

As you watch the video I found, take special note of the critical aspects of the process.

The first thing to watch is how the book pages and cover are postioned and held in place. The bar that clamps everything together is not located all the way at the edge of the spine. It is actually about 1/8th of an inch from the edge. There is also a second metal bar behind the spine that sticks out slightly from the back of the clamp.

The next thing to notice is obvious, the book flips upside down to expose the spine for gluing. This machine roughs up the spine and then applies a layer of hot glue to the edge of the pages.

Finally, when the book is flipped back around, a metal bar about 1/8th of an inch thick clamps up against the side of the book spine to pinch it against the bar in the back. The book is held in place for a moment to allow the glue to cool and then released.

This machine costs approximately $7500 USD. I’ve actually seen this machine and others from the Fastbind product line available on eBay for slightly over $1000 USD with shipping.

It is possible to create books with less expensive materials and equipment (the easy bookbinding method shows this well), but this is a good example of a method that can be adapted for your own bookbinding machine. I’ve seen people with metalworking skills showing off similar machines. I use a more simple clamp and cold glue method myself.

If you know of other good video examples of bookbinding machines that are within the reach of everyday folks, let me know by posting a comment below.

The Go-To Guy!

Podcasting and the steps needed to set up a podcast came up in a recent conversation.

I’ve been working with a friend/client on the promotion of a book he wrote. Recently I was advising him to start a weekly podcast that incorporates portions of his book and then directs people to his website (were he sells the book, of course!)

He has already posted MP3 audio excerpts from the book (www.AllenPaulWeaverIII.com) and wanted to know what the difference is between these recordings and a podcast. I thought the answer would be a good addition to this site.

So, What is The Difference Between an MP3 and a Podcast?

Short answer, not much!

The audio file in a podcast is just a plain old MP3 – nothing fancy. But, the content of the audio file will be different.

The content of the file will probably have an opening segment to the show, maybe some commercial breaks, and a closing segment – like a radio show.

The resulting MP3 file is loaded onto your server, like any other file.

What distinguishes a Podcast from other MP3 files is the way in which it is promoted and distributed.

Podcasts use the RSS technology built into blogging software to create a ‘feed’ for people to subscribe to. This feed gets promoted at places like Apple’s iTunes store, iPodder.com, Odeo.com, and other places dedicated to tracking and promoting podcasts.

When a subscriber adds the RSS link to your podcast into a program like iTunes, the software will automatically download your podcast MP3s when a new one is posted and synchronize it with the subscribers iPod or media player.

There is one special distinction between a regular RSS feed and the RSS feed required for a podcast. The podcast feed must include enclosure tags around the link to the MP3 file. These tags tell the feed reader that a link to media is present.

Some blog software adds enclosure tags automatically and some does not. WordPress handles it automatically. For those blogs that don’t do this automatically, take the feed from the podcast category and use feedburner.com to ‘burn’ a new feed. Feedburner will add the enclosure tags and then you can submit their feed link to the podcast directories. (Bonus – Feedburner will also give you lots of great statistical traffic data about your feed subscribers, so you might want to go this route anyway!)

Here is a sample method for distributing a podcast using WordPress:

1. Record and Upload your audio files
2. Create a new Category on your blog for the podcast
3. Post a new entry into this category that has a link to the audio file
4. Submit the RSS feed from your category page to the podcast directories (run it through Feedburner.com if you want the added stats)
5. Brag to all your friends about your cool new podcast
6. Record and Upload More Episodes

To create a link to the RSS feed on a specific page on a WordPress blog, you just need to copy the address of the page from your browser and add “/rss” to the end. Here is a non-podcast example of a feed from my website as an illustration:

http://www.andrewseltz.com/category/bookbinding/rss

The hardest part of the whole process is coming up with great content for your podcast. The tech isn’t as complex as it may appear at first glance.

Did I leave something out or give an answer as confusing as the question? Just add a comment to this thread and I’ll do my best to clarify.

I haven’t set Allen’s podcast up yet, so I may discover a few new issues along the way. If I do, I’ll update this post.

The Go-To Guy!

For any first time non-fiction book author there are two enormous hurdles to overcome in order to succeed in publishing their book. You must face the blank page and get started and then you must get through the first draft.

These hurdles are not as high as they first appear and with the two strategies you are about to learn, they will shrink even further.

Staring down the blank page is like deciding to go on a cross country trip. Say you are in New York and decide to go to California. If you you just hop in the car and start driving west, every turn will be difficult because you really don’t know enough about where you are going to make a good choice. The wise traveler pulls out a map first and picks a few major stopping points on the trip. Then the specific roads to take to each point are selected. Once the trip is planned out, the driving begins.

The Road Map to a First Draft of Your Book

Most first time non-fiction authors don’t start out by looking at the map. There is a map for creating non-fiction books. The book map includes major way stops and the roads in between. When the writer consults the map, it becomes much easier to plan the journey. So, what is this map?

The map is other successful books. Spend a little time at the bookstore looking at similar books to the one you want to create and it becomes easy to see that there is a basic structure to all of them. Author and product creation consultant Fred Gleeck calls it the 24/4/2 system.

Books in the non-fiction world can be roughly broken down to 24 main topics (the chapters), 4 sub-topics inside each topic, and 2 paragraphs of actual content for each sub-topic. Organize your information around this road map and write the content and you will have a text that will work out to be approximately 120-150 pages in paperback format. This is a respectable length for a non-fiction book.

Creating the outline of these points is the “planning your trip” portion of the writing journey. The topics and sub-topics outline where you want to go. Writing the paragraphs for those sub-topics is the actual trip to your first draft.

So, step one is to create your 24/4/2 outline for your book.

Choosing the Fastest Way To Write

Once you know where you are going, it is time to choose the fastest vehicle to get you there. For me, dictation is the key to speed.

Rather than sitting down with a pen and paper, or at your computer keyboard, have a friend sit down with you and interview you based on your 24/4/2 outline. Your friend will ask you to explain each sub-topic and your responses will be the paragraphs in the first draft. Momentum is vital, so don’t stop to look up information or verify facts. Leave what I call a breadcrumb note for yourself and move on. A breadcrumb can be as simple as saying, “find statistics to back this up.”

After everything is recorded, hire a typist to transcribe your recording. That transcript is your very rough – but completed – first draft.

Now it is time to go through the text, cleaning up your breadcrumbs and smoothing out the language. After this first pass, you will be ready to share the first draft with some reviewers and get feedback for your second draft.

Finishing Your Book

There is still a lot of work to be done to move from the first draft to a completed book. But completing this draft is a major milestone and creates a momentum for the project that greatly increases the likelihood that your book will get finished.

Many first time writers start plowing into the writing without a plan and get lost in the content. Frustration builds until they abandon the project. But, when you have a first draft to show, the project becomes ‘real’ to you and other people can react to what you have created.

Plan your trip by consulting the road map and then get yourself a fast car!

The Go-To Guy!

P.S. Have you written a book in this way? Do you have an even better method? Don’t let me have the last word, leave a comment and share your story!

Associate Content approved my recent articles today and made me offers. That is the fastest turnaround I have had with them so far. Up until now it has always taken me at least a week to get offers for anything (but I was also submitting more articles. They might deal with them in batches and the ‘bulk’ submissions are slowing them down???)

The speed of approval was the good news. The actual offers weren’t that great. My article titled “Speed Write Your NonFiction Book Using Dictation” got a whopping $5.10 offer and my article titled “How to Fly Without Getting Sick” got a truly underwhelming $4.61 – and that one was an exclusive submission.  Since it ended up taking me about and hour to write and submit each, I’m way off my target goal of earning $20/hour.

On the slightly brighter side, I’m $9.71 closer to my new monitor. That is better than last week, but I’ve got a lot more writing to do!

Since I didn’t see much benefit to submitting an exclusive article, I think I will submit most as non-exclusives so I can use them again and squeeze some more money out of them (but that money will not be counted toward the new monitor purchase.) The writing article will be going up on this blog immediately – I might get some Adsense income from that one.

So here is the running tally:

2 Articles Sold – $9.71
Balance Required to Buy Monitor – $590.29 – $790.29
Remaining Number of Articles to be Written at Current Average Price ($4.85/each) – 122-163

Looks like I have a ways to go. I had better find some more profitable subjects if I want to get this done before my 14 week old daughter graduates college.

Back to the article mines,

The Go-To Guy! 

In my last post on this project I mentioned that I had cranked out 11 article outlines on a cross-country airplane flight and just needed to flesh them out before uploading them to Associated Content to sell.

My hope was that I could spend a few hours one afternoon or evening to crank out the finished articles and submit them, but life hasn’t quite worked out like that. Living with a 15 week old daughter in a studio apartment is challenging and the ups and downs of her day have a huge impact on the time and energy I have to work on this project.

Starting today, I’m trying to get the process moving again by writing one article on my subway ride to work. From the time I sit down on the train to when I arrive at my stop, there is about 20 minutes for me to work. This is just about right for the time I allotted for drafting each article.

Today I wrote an article titled “Speed Write Your Non-Fiction Book Using Dictation.” The total article length was just under 700 words. I typed it up over lunch and submitted it to Associated Content.

One of the drawbacks to working this way is that I hand write each article and then go back and type the hand written text before submitting it. I’m not a very fast typist, so this added another 20 minutes to the process. Including about 10 minutes to log in and upload the article, I have spent about an hour creating and submitting this article. That is going to reduce my overall hourly rate for writing – but I’m getting closer to my monitor and taking advantage of time that is usually not profitable to get the work done.

I also decided to submit this article as a non-exclusive article. The subject matter is relevant to a couple of projects I am working on, so I want to have the freedom to re-use the text (although I will probably rework it before using it anywhere else.) I will submit future articles as exclusives to see if the payments offered are better. If the difference is small, I’ll just keep doing non-exclusives to keep my options open.

If you would like to see the types of content I have been paid to write, visit my user profile at Associated Content.

Who knows, if I can get a seat on the subway going home tonight, I might knock out another article!

**UPDATE**

I wrote 1 1/2 articles on the train ride home. I typed up and submitted “How To Fly Without Getting Sick” as an exclusive submission. It took about the same amount of time as the earlier article to complete and submit. That’s 2 down and 8 1/2 articles to go in this first batch.

The Go-To Guy!

It is time for an update on my writing challenge.

This past weekend I traveled cross country for a conference (New York to Los Angeles.) I decided to devote a portion of my westbound flight to writing articles for this challenge.

I planned to write on subjects I was familiar with which would limit the amount of research required. I also chose topics that would not require quoting lots of facts and figures. The topics were writing and home improvement.

There was one home improvement topic I needed to do a little research on, so I had about 25 pages of printouts from a quick Google search on Thursday night. I relied on personal experience for the rest of the articles. When I got started writing, I fell into an interesting pattern.

As I started to write, I found myself outlining the articles with just enough detail to capture the idea and provide an outline of the complete article. Because I wasn’t laboring over details, I got on a roll and moved through the articles quickly.

In less than 2 hours, I outlined 11 separate articles – 9 on my original topics and 2 that just popped into my mind when I got in the groove. (That works out to 11 minutes per article.)

This process reminded me of when I worked on an automotive assembly line building cars (this is just one of the many interesting jobs I’ve held!) When you break a project down into the primary steps of production, and then complete one step for multiple products at the same time, you move much faster than if you complete every step for one product before starting the next product. You get into a rhythm and you stop thinking about the process and just do the work.

The outlines still need to be expanded into full articles, but I think that can be done quickly since they are already clearly outlined – I’m just expanding the thoughts into complete statements.

I should have the first batch ready to submit for payment within a few days.

The Go-To Guy!