Reset your spending with a poverty week

18 Jun 2014 1 Comment

by Holly Ocasio Rizzo in Uncategorized Tags: , , ,

Remember when you had no money – I mean long ago, before you ever had muchPennies money? If you were like me, you avoided frills and squeezed maximum value out of every dollar.

When your spending goes off-kilter, revisit that time. Give yourself the gift of a poverty week to slow down and reset your priorities – though not necessarily your financial priorities.

I’ve used poverty weeks to improve my diet; when I was young and just starting out on my own, I chose fruit and vegetables instead of Ben & Jerry’s. A poverty week also served as a retreat for focusing on creativity and redirection. Once I set aside a poverty week just to home in on cleaning out the garage and fixing up the house.

On the financial side, poverty weeks have helped me to break shopping binges; you can’t order online if you pretend your credit cards don’t exist, and by the end of the week, you’ve moved on to other fun—like being creative or cleaning More

Does an f-bomb make the man?

17 Jun 2014 Leave a comment

by Holly Ocasio Rizzo in Uncategorized Tags: , , ,

Los Angeles didn’t quite know what to make of its mayor, Eric Garcetti, holding a

© Piotr Marcinski

© Piotr Marcinski

beer bottle and dropping the f-bomb into a microphone during a rally that was broadcast live to celebrate the Kings’ winning the Stanley Cup.

“They say there are two rules in politics,” the mayor said. “Never, ever be pictured with a drink in your hand and never swear. But this is a big [effing] day.”

Where’d he learn that word – at a Rangers game?

The morning news speculated that Garcetti said it, in part, to offset criticism that he’s too reserved for LA. He’s a Columbia man and a Rhodes Scholar in a town known for beauty, not brains. The unexpected f-bomb, speculators said, made him look more like an average Joe, all right, and average Joes – as we know because Hollywood tells us so – are manly men.

I disagree. That Garcetti used the word only points up its increasing impotence. The f-bomb has become so common in regular conversation that it More

Rev up your verbs for power

16 Jun 2014 Leave a comment

by Holly Ocasio Rizzo in Uncategorized Tags: , ,

Verbs drive powerful writing. Not adjectives, not adverbs, not description – verbs.Verbs 3

But not just any ol’ verbs. Banish “to be” and “to have” in all their forms. They’re sleepy and lifeless. That’s why, in grade school, they were called “helping” verbs; they don’t do stuff on their own.

Instead, choose verbs encompassing some type of action, even if it’s breathing. See the difference. Feel the power. Now practice it!

Here are a couple of practice sessions to try. They’re great to do when you’re procrastinating over writing. More

Reaching for the ‘new normal’

15 Jun 2014 Leave a comment

by Holly Ocasio Rizzo in Uncategorized Tags: , , ,

Dad clip art

webweaver.nu/clipart/fathers-day

The putty knife pings against the siding, peeling off morsels of old paint. It’s a summery sound that reminds me of my dad. This is how he prepped the house for a new coat. I smile. Even if paint doesn’t stick quite as well to a weather-battered cabin as it does to a suburban house, I think: Dad is here, working through my hands.

Dad is missing his 14th Father’s Day. But he’s not missing. He still guides his first-born: Do it the right way now and you won’t have to redo it the right way later. Don’t rush. Stop to drink ice water. Take a nap with the cat.

This is “the new normal.” It’s how we settle after someone we love dies. It never will be normal, though, only new. As Father’s Day approaches, I avoid the ads for tools and men’s clothing, stay out of department stores, won’t even look More

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