Home of Phones Homophones

Home of Phone Pic

My dog wags it tail when I tell this tale.

No man can know more about fish than you.

My dear, you love fishing more than hunting deer.

You’re the master of your trade.

So you enter a contest, but not to sew.

It’s for fishing, of course, and begins at four.

You don’t know what to do because it’s only two.

It’s not enough time to stay in an inn.

Right then you get the idea to write.

You list in red ink every book you’ve ever read.

Soon the time has passed. It’s half past three.

You reached the blue sea just before the horn blew.

With spirits high, you say, “Hi.”

You agree to play fair. Let’s see how you fare.

If you break the rules, you’ll find that you’re fined.

They count to ten and bang on the tin.

It’s time to see if you can find a big fish in the sea.

You set sail with a boat that you bought at a sale.

Where you go you wear your very best gear.

You use an ant for bait that you got from your aunt.

Your main advantage is your lucky horse’s mane,

Hare’s foot, and magic mermaid hair.

We shall pray for your prey.

The poor fish would rather be stung by a bee.

You caught your fish while napping in a cot.

Even though I’m here, I don’t believe what I hear.

However, I did see it with my eye.

Then you pick it up with your feet. What a feat!

Go this way to the scale. It’s time to weigh the fish.

They’re measuring their prizes over there.

Now we wait to discover the weight.

When will we find out if you win?

Your son is watching anxiously in the sun.

His stomach is in a knot, but yours is not.

You’re the one who has won the prize.

They write your name with a pen on a pin.

They mail it to you by a postman who is male.

You’re our hero of the hour.

Let’s cook the poor fish and pour water on your pores.

Fry the fish in flour. Decorate it with a flower.

It’s time to spice it up by adding some thyme.

When you add a beet, the flavor can’t be beat.

Everyone knows the smell delights your nose.

We wipe our bare feet on your bear rug.

We meet at the table to eat the meat.

The maid has the table nicely made.

Just after we ate the clock struck eight.

Thanks for stopping by. It’s time to say, “Bye.”

 

Copyright (c) 2013 Chris McMullen

Should any educator wish to use the above edition of this poem, “Home of Phone Homophones,” for non-commercial, instructional purposes, it may be used freely for this purpose.

You Might Be a Stat Junkie If…

Stats Pic

How often do you check your stats?

You might be a stat junkie if…

  • You bought a cell phone mainly to check your stats away from home.
  • You check a different device when nothing has changed just in case that might be the problem.
  • You can’t resist the temptation to check your stats during a movie. Especially, a good movie.
  • You actually spend more time during the day checking your stats than doing anything else.
  • Your spouse calls from the room, “Honey, are you checking your stats again?” And your spouse is right.
  • You checked your stats when you saw this post. Hey, they might have changed.
  • You experience withdrawal symptoms when the internet is down, when your cell phone doesn’t work, when the site needs maintenance, when the phone line is out, or when you otherwise can’t check your stats for few minutes.
  • You’re a member of Stat Checking Anonymous. Or, if having heard the name of this organization, you feel the need to join it, until you realize that it’s fictitious. Even worse, you feel like founding such a program because it should exist.
  • You hardly get any writing done because you spend so much time checking your stats.
  • You check your stats every time even the smallest thing doesn’t go your way, hoping the stats will make you happier.
  • You get out a calculator to see how many sales you’ve averaged per day, or to figure out how many more you need to get back on track.
  • You wish that you could receive an email every time a sale is made.
  • Your stats control your mood.
  • Your muse doesn’t come around anymore because you’re too busy checking your stats.
  • You’ve ever checked your stats twice in a row (or more) because you forgot what the number was as soon as you logged out.
  • You’ve ever cried because your stats disappointed you.
  • You’ve ever walked into a wall, tripped, or otherwise mis-stepped because you were checking your stats while walking.
  • You’ve ever bought your own product just to see the stats change. Then repeatedly became upset that haven’t changed yet.
  • You can’t go to sleep until you finally get that one last sale. And when it doesn’t come for many hours, you start begging for it. Out loud.

Related Posts:

1. I got this idea from Victoria Grefer’s recent post: http://crimsonleague.com/2013/09/15/bloggers-why-you-shouldnt-be-a-stat-junkie/

2. If you missed my previous clockwatcher post, you might enjoy this: https://chrismcmullen.wordpress.com/2013/06/29/authors-are-you-clockwatchers/

Chris McMullen, author of A Detailed Guide to Self-Publishing with Amazon and Other Online Booksellers, Vol. 1 (formatting/publishing) and Vol. 2 (packaging/marketing)

Did You See These Funny Reviews Featured on Amazon?

Did you notice the new advertisement for funny reviews at Amazon? On the homepage, there is an ad that says, “You Guys Are Really Funny.” It’s not an external ad; it links to an Amazon page. The page features 10 different products (only the last one is a book). Each has 3 funny customer reviews.

If you haven’t seen these funny reviews, you should check them out:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html?docId=1001250201

They are pretty hilarious.

Why did Amazon do this?

  • Perhaps to share something funny and put customers in a good mood.
  • Maybe to help try to improve the perception of customer reviews.
  • Possibly to encourage customers to write product reviews – showing that you can be creative and have fun with it.
  • It could be to generate more reviews of products other than books, since 9 out of 10 of the products featured weren’t books.
  • There might not be just one reason. Or it could just be the first point and we shouldn’t overanalyze this.

Regardless of the motive, this advertisement for funny reviews could have any of these effects. None of which would be a bad thing, really.

In the spirit of these reviews, maybe the real reason is to get more guys to buy products on Amazon, hoping the products will help them with the subject of women. 🙂

Chris McMullen, author of A Detailed Guide to Self-Publishing with Amazon and Other Online Booksellers, Vol. 1 (formatting/publishing) and Vol. 2 (packaging/marketing)

Once Upon a Time

Cliches

Once upon a time, it was a dark and stormy night.

A tall, dark, and handsome knight was bored out of his mind.

Far, far away, a damsel was in distress.

The knight woke up and smelled the coffee.

The time had come to cut to the chase.

So he put the pedal to the metal.

He went the whole nine yards.

Then he went the extra mile.

He was careful not to burn any bridges along the way.

But he did break a leg.

It was nothing to sneeze at.

He took two cookies and saw the doctor in the morning.

Then he felt snug as a bug in a rug.

He turned nutty as a fruitcake and barked like a dog.

Unfortunately, he was barking up the wrong tree.

Fortunately, he had an ace up his sleeve.

Until he lost his shirt.

So he followed his nose.

He arrived just in the nick of time.

Better late than never.

The damsel was over a barrel.

A tiger was playing mouse with her.

The knight took the tiger by the tail.

Since he had a bone to pick with that tiger.

It was like playing with fire.

He cleaned the tiger’s clock.

Then he rubbed salt in the tiger’s wounds.

The tiger went stiff as a board and then bit the dust.

Next he buried the hatchet.

And the tiger was up a creek without a paddle.

When the knight and damsel met, it was love at first sight.

It was so romantic.

Because it takes two to tango and three’s a crowd.

They were like two peas in a pod.

He was dressed to the nines and she had money to burn.

So they tied the knot.

They even put the icing on the cake.

And they lived happily ever after.

They were on cloud nine.

Until they kicked the bucket.

Life goes on.

All’s well that ends well.

That’s a wrap.

The end.

Lost! One Hour — Please Return! $$ Reward!

Missing: One Hour

Description: 60 minutes, 3600 seconds, 1/24 day, looks a little shorter while having fun and a little longer when bored

Last seen: 2 a.m. Sunday morning, March 10, 2013

If seen, please contact the owner.

$$ REWARD $$

TV Golf Tactics

So you’re closely monitoring the scorecard of your favorite golfer online hole-by-hole while you wait for golf to come on t.v. You’re very anxious because he’s in the top 10.

When it finally comes on t.v., it doesn’t. Nope, there’s a basketball or football game going on instead. Golf will finally come on when the other sport finishes.

But that’s okay because there is only 2 minutes left. Except for the fact that the last 2 minutes of basketball or football takes more like 15 minutes.

They even call a time-out if they’re down by 50 points with 1 minute to go! What’s the point of that time-out? To prolong your misery? If it’s a close game, then I would understand.

But then if it’s so close that it ends with a tie, it goes on for another 15 minutes, which of course means a half hour.

Eventually, golf actually comes on. When it does, what’s the first thing they do? Come on, guess. I’ll even give you a few reasonable choices:

(A) Show highlights of Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson

(B) Discuss the weather and how it will impact the course.

(C) Immediately begin by showing the golf.

(D) Do something totally unrelated.

Yep, you guessed it, (D) is the correct answer: The first thing they do is take a sports break to tell you what wonderful things are going on in the world of basketball, football, or hockey.

Wait a minute! Didn’t I just turn on the golf? Is this the wrong channel?

Attention, golf announcers: We turned on the golf to watch golf (as difficult as this may be to believe). If we wanted to know who won a basketball, football, or hockey game, here’s a thought: Maybe we have already watched it!

I can’t remember the last time I was watching basketball, football, or hockey and they took a 10-minute break to tell me what was going on in golf earlier that day.

So when golf finally begins, the player you were watching – who was doing really well when you were following the scorecard online – has since made a few double bogeys and is now totally out of the competition.

Now that the golf is finally on, you don’t even want to watch it.

But I guess this works, otherwise why would they do it?

Maybe if I included 20 pages about baseketball in the beginning of my books (which have absolutely nothing to do with basketball), I will start selling more books. 🙂

With this in mind, I may as well include information about one of my books after my name, even though that book has absolutely nothing to do with golf (nor any other sport). What better way to symbolize the irony, huh?

Chris McMullen, author of A Detailed Guide to Self-Publishing with Amazon and Other Online Booksellers

(P“u‘n,c;t.u?a!t-i–o”n)

Go go go go, slow, v-e-r-y s-l-o-w, slow, fastfastfast; break away, slow, pause, stop. Go go go (aside) go go go – tangent – go go go stop.

State. Exclaim! SHOUT! whisper. Question? “Quote, ‘Quote within unquote,’ unquote,” end.

justletthewordsflow