Last week I was at a week-long business of writing workshop, during which I was too busy to blog or write (except a couple of times) or do much of anything else besides hang out with writer-friends and try to get a decent amount of sleep. I took 60+ pages of notes—hard to say how many, exactly, because at some point I started breaking out notes into different files on different topics. My main file is 60+ pages.

My to do list is 4 pages long. Although I managed to do a few of the things on it at the workshop, like set up a proper contact page on my website and finally after two years figure out how to set up my professional email address (dayle@dayledermatis.com).

We covered everything from accounting and taxes to websites and cover design to distribution and marketing to corporations and copyright. My brain is full.

Business stuff for the most part isn’t fun for me, nor does it come easy. I don’t like negotiation, for example, or things involving numbers (like, say, taxes). But in the weeks before the workshop, I successfully negotiated two contracts (thank you, previous workshops), and the bottom line is, even though writing is an art, if I want to be a working artist, I need to put on a business hat a fair amount of the time.

That said, my hat is off to all the instructors, and I hope I don’t forget any of them… Dean Wesley Smith, Kristine Kathryn Rusch, ML Buchman, Lee Allred, Allyson Longueira, J. Daniel Sawyer, Christina York, Scott William Carter, Kim Mainord, Billy Reese, and Sheldon MacArthur.

Here’s a perspective from the other side of the workshop, with bonus! pictures of the classroom. No people are in it, though, and my table is boring so why would I point it out?

I thought I had more to say about this, but apparently not. See, e.g., my brain being full. Besides, I need to do some website design and cover rebranding…after my writing is done for the day, that is!

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