Now, please don’t get me wrong. I love helping out others, especially Indie authors. After all, I wouldn’t be here today had not some lovely people taken the time to help me out.
However, I do suffer from a chronic shortage of time. This is partly because of my reluctance to say no when people ask me for help. In my defence, though, most people are not entirely accurate when they estimate how long it will take to complete a given task.
Therefore, I think we need to be honest about, say, how much time our request for a “quick read” or a “quick review” will take. After all, unless we’re Steven King, we can’t seriously expect people to read our 500-page-long book in a weekend now, can we?
After all, we can no longer afford the luxury described in The Gentleman’s Handbook of Etiquette and Guide to Polite Society (1860), which clearly advocates ignoring time constraints:
It is not considered fashionable to carry a watch. What has a fashionable man to do with time? Besides, he never goes to those obscure parts of the town where there are no public clocks, and his servant will tell him when it is time for dinner.
So, in the interest of helping out my (unfashionable) fellow authors, I have compiled this handy time reference guide, based on Marco Kaye’s Corporate Time Equivalents:
If you have a minute to spare, why not read my children’s book, Runaway Smile, for free? Unless you want to go the extra mile and review it. In which case, you’ll need no more than five minutes. Promise!
Send Sunshine said:
This is HILARIOUS! and dead on! 🙂
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Lol – thanks and welcome 🙂
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C.E.Robinson said:
Nicholas, I love this! I’m editing a script for a screenwriter, and at first she asked me for a quick read and opinion. Three weeks later, I’m heavy into the editing, even helping to develop the story. However, I’m having a ton of fun and learning the How To of script writing. Christine
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
See? The graph is pretty accurate, after all 😀
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Pamela Beckford said:
Reblogged this on Poetry by Pamela and commented:
Way too true
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Sue Coletta said:
I love this! I’m forever getting into this cycle, doing for others and then there’s no time left for my own work. It wasn’t until very recently that I started saying no. Of course, not actually using the word “no” because for some reason that word doesn’t seem to be in my vocabulary. Incidentally, according to this chart “have a minute to spare” translates to “ten minutes”, so your review time is included!
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Lol – no good deed is left unpunished! 😀
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Laine Anne Theodore said:
I love this! I especially like the ‘cool little project’ item – very funny 😀
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Aw, thanks – and welcome 🙂
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The Story Reading Ape said:
Reblogged this on Chris The Story Reading Ape's Blog and commented:
I think bloggers use the same timescale lol 😀
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flamingcrystal1 said:
It is spot on! Love the hilarious time measurement…especially the opportunity one ‘run & never look back’ and this one “Assist on” = 3 months + 1 month plotting an escape”. I was sort of bullied into helping a friend to edit his book. After spending 3 full days on editing and wielding an Afrikaans language grammar whip, correcting a truck load of errors and sending the edited version back, there was no thank you but instead “oh sorry, I’ve send you the wrong file” Grrr. I think I might need new teeth soon, as I have the urge to sank my teeth into the marble coffee table…I told him to send the ‘correct file’ to someone else to edit…
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Argh! That sucks!! 😀
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Helen Jones said:
Ha ha, excellent – and so very true! 🙂
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Sadly, many of these come from experience 😀
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tribalmysticstories said:
Very funny and true! Love it!
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Thanks and welcome! 🙂
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Erika Kind said:
You hit the nail on the head, Nicholas. Although “just a minute” is at least 30 minutes for me… lol That was really cool!!!
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Lol – yes, “just a minute” is a pretty flexible measure of time… 😀
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Erika Kind said:
😃
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Charles Yallowitz said:
Yup. That looks about right. If only we had more time in the day, but we’d probably waste it on something frivolous like sleep. 🙂
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Ugh! We wouldn’t want that now, would we? 😀
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D. Wallace Peach said:
Woke up this morning with a laugh. Thank you.
So true. To do this stuff well, it takes tons of time. Particularly difficult for non-writers to understand.
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Glad to have put a smile on your face 🙂
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amreade said:
Love it! And they’re all true!
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Sadly, yes 😀
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John W. Howell said:
I have often wondered about where the time goes. Thanks
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Happy to have helped you figure it out 😀
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Elle Knowles said:
Perfectly describes my life right now! ~Elle
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Lol – don’t worry; things will probably change in a minute or two 😉
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Julie Holmes, author said:
Reblogged this on Facets of a Muse and commented:
Humor with a touch of reality–or is it reality with a touch of humor? 🙂 Enjoy!
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vanbytheriver said:
Excellent…my favorite is the “plus one month plotting the escape”. ☺ Van
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Lol – mine is the “run and don’t look back” one
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macjam47 said:
Hilarious! I could really use a hand.
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Just a minute 😉
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macjam47 said:
😀 😀 😀
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sknicholls said:
And “In your spare time”, as if we had a second set of time.
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Lol – that’s a great one 😀
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Let's CUT the Crap! said:
Yup. That’s how it works. Primo post! 🙂
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Lol – thanks! 🙂
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Courtney M. Wendleton said:
Reblogged this on Books and More and commented:
I don’t think I measure time quite this badly…but I also have a bad concept of time in general.
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MRS N, the Author said:
LOL! I loved this! I’m like you and I have a hard time saying no to people, especially authors. Time is a like a rare diamond around here so I can totally relate to this! Great graphic too! 🙂
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
We have to start learning how to say no… 😀
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Smorgasbord - Variety is the Spice of Life. said:
Excellent Nicholas and I think there is one more that could be added.. There is no money to pay you but I will give you a credit in my best-seller.
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Smorgasbord - Variety is the Spice of Life. said:
Reblogged this on Smorgasbord – Variety is the spice of life and commented:
A little something from Nicholas Rossis to think about.. time is a very precious commodity but it is a bit elastic at times… not always in a good way.. excellent.
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Jennifer Jensen (@jenjensen2) said:
Love the gentleman’s etiquette advice! (I wish I had a servant to tell me when it’s time for dinner – mine only tell me when I need to cook it!) And spot on about a writer’s time. But hey – I read a 500 page book in a weekend! I obviously have problems with getting back to real life, too.
What I want to know is, with all the time constraints, just HOW do you manage to put blog posts up nearly every day??
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
A 500-word book in a weekend – I’m very impressed! As for me, I often joke that I live like a monk 🙂
Seriously though, I have this – this kind of interaction, comments etc – that makes it all so worthwhile. So, I make the time. Besides, it only takes a minute or two of my time 😉
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M T McGuire said:
I love that. It’s so true. I edit the parish magazine. All I do is compile it really, I’d describe it myself as a ‘quick job’ but it always takes me several hours to sort out who has sent what, which items are duplications and to download them, double checking that I haven’t missed anything out. Then it’s about 2 hours to plop them into the template.
So yeh… I have so little time that I tend not to volunteer to be anything.
Cheers
MTM
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
It’s funny how the simple things can be the worst, time-wise! 🙂
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M T McGuire said:
Absolutely and it’s the making sure I’ve got everything and sorting out which things are the same thing described in different ways from several people that does my head in!
Cheers
MTM
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Ali Isaac said:
You hit the nail right on the head, Nick! So true! 😁
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Lol – thanks! 🙂
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Widdershins said:
Yesssssss!!! 😀
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chrismcmullen said:
I see my problem now. I always have a dozen or more cool little projects underway. 🙂
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Ah, yes, that is guaranteed to do it 😀
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mgill0627 said:
Love it. This is so true!
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Lol – thanks! 🙂
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Roz Morris @Roz_Morris said:
Oh yes, this is so true. Especially the reading. I read slowly because I get trapped in sentences and the author’s mind. I wish I could work out how to read fast, but it’s just not possible for me. And I wonder how literary agents manage to work their way through manuscripts while also putting in a good amount of time negotiating, meeting people and all the other stuff.
I’m tweeting!
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Thanks for the tweet and welcome! 🙂
I suspect most agents skim through most of the time, lacking the time to really get into a book.
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D.G.Kaye said:
Bang on my friend. 🙂
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Oh, absolutely. I speak from experience 😀
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ChristineR said:
Reblogged this on Christine R and commented:
This tongue-in-cheek post from Nicholas Rossis put a smile on my dial. You can also read his delightful children’s book “Runaway Smile’ on his blog.
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cav12 said:
I can relate!! LOL 😀
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Sadly, so can I 😀
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