For those of us who have a mission of posting at least two articles a day it is just terrifying when you approach the desk to find you have no access to the net! So here are some tips to use your down time productively.

1. Don’t stop writing. Some time in the next few seconds, minutes or hours, you will be back on line. Write, write, write and save your writing for future publication. This is a time when you can be really productive. You don’t have the distraction of checking what is happening in Twitter or Facebook. You can’t look at the latest posts and make comments. You have found a positive period of potential production! Forget the distractions and start writing.
2. Catalog your photos. You know that ‘My Pictures’ folder on your computer that has all that crap in it? Holidays with the kids, last Christmas at Aunty Helen’s, graduation from 10 years ago…….Well somewhere in that mess there are some really good travel pics, flower pics, beach scenes, visits to monuments and attractions, candid people pics. Make a new folder called ‘Publication Pics’ and copy all the publishable pics to one folder. As soon as you are online again you can upload them and start making some cash.
3. Interview your friends and family. Ask them what they search for online. What advice would they find helpful, what research are they doing, what do they want to know about. Strange as it may seem these people are your audience and they know what they want. They are a small sample of the general population. Recruit them to find out from their friends, neighbours and other family members and report back to you.
4. Go for a stroll. And while you are out pick up today’s newspaper – in fact pick up a few newspapers and a couple of recent magazines. In these you will find what is happening beyond the world of the internet and in your local community. Lots of stimulation material that will get your creative juices flowing.
5. Check out current events. If there is something happening in the community that day just grab your camera and a notebook and get on out there. Take pics, ask questions, meet people and chat to them. tell them what you do. Ask if they would like a bit of free publicity for their event.
6. Speak to charities & community groups. Generous people work in these organisations. They won’t give you money but they will give you time – that is their nature. Ask them what they do. Ask how they promote their activities. Offer to write something for them – good news stories about volunteers, people who have been helped, their projects. They will love you because they don’t have the time or the resources to get their news out to the world.
7. Go on a guided tour. Day trips and guided walks are great. The tour guides will give you information and with your trusty camera you can take pics along the way. Take lots of pics – only about 10% of them will be worth publishing (if you are lucky). Talk to other people on the trip and tell them what you do. You would be surprised what information they will give you and leads you can follow up for another story.
8. Go see a movie. Take your trusty pad a pencil with you. Watch out for the good ‘lines’. You know the ones that get the whole theatre laughing or crying. Write them down and keep a catalog of funny lines on your computer. They are useful to stimulate a story, to use in your text or to provide a great headline.
9. Do some people watching. You don’t have to go far for this. Just somewhere where there are other people! Sit and take notes of anything interesting, funny or weird. Think about what you could write about. There is material on every street corner. So grab a coffee, put on your sunnies (so they can’t see you looking at them!) and get out there and enjoy the rest of humanity enjoying their day.
10. Turn your computer off from time to time. All of the above tips will only work if you are not in front of the computer. So go on – I dare you. Take a day off from the small screen and the keyboard and go looking at the world. You will be surprised what it will give to you that you can turn into cash.