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	<title>uwMike &#187; Writing</title>
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	<link>http://uwmike.com</link>
	<description>Hacker, Engineer, Dancer, Gentleman</description>
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		<title>The Switch</title>
		<link>http://uwmike.com/articles/2007/04/29/switch/</link>
		<comments>http://uwmike.com/articles/2007/04/29/switch/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 29 Apr 2007 05:05:08 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Mike Purvis</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Soapbox]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Writing]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://uwmike.com/articles/2007/04/29/switch/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[For the past four months, I've been traveling about and haven't had much of the necessary time nor the inclination to write. In lieu of that, I had been aggressively updating my [Facebook photo albums](http://www.facebook.com/p/Mike_Purvis/122603642). Being back at school for the summer will reinstate blogging as among my primary procrastination measures, so expect more content in the coming weeks, including a much-needed update to [WP-Cats](http://uwmike.com/wordpress/wp-cats/). 

In the past I've always enjoyed the changes from school to work and vice-versa. The variety offered by Waterloo's co-op program is a wonderful blessing: Working is money and free time and independence. School is community and friendships.

This time does feel different, though, and I'm not the only one feeling it.

I'm trying to be excited to go back to school, but I'm really just *not*. New York is a beautiful city; I'd come to love it there. Meanwhile, my connection to Waterloo this term was little more than a tuition bill and an [increasingly broken and mismanaged](http://dearwaterloo.com/) professional development program. Here, I was in a job where I could leverage my existing skills, learn far more than I have in any academic term, and yet still make a meaningful, appreciated contribution.

I do know that I will one day be back in New York—I love too many things about it to not return. This leaving is temporary; whether back in months or years, for a few days, or for a decade, I cannot say. But I do mean to return. Leaving now is not a permanent farewell, only a temporary parting.]]></description>
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		<title>Some Words About Dashes</title>
		<link>http://uwmike.com/articles/2007/01/20/dashes/</link>
		<comments>http://uwmike.com/articles/2007/01/20/dashes/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sat, 20 Jan 2007 23:30:05 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Mike Purvis</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Writing]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://uwmike.com/articles/2007/01/20/dashes/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Since [Wordie](http://wordie.org/) showed up, I've been using it to collect together [words I like](http://wordie.org/people/mikepurvis). I find that vocabulary is not something I can recall on demand—I think of the words in situations that demand them, and then afterwards hit up Wordie to log them for later perusal.

Punctuation use, for me, is similar. It's more instinctive than thoughtful, which is a bit odd, consider my nature generally. But unfortunately, it seems that for many, the use of commas, apostrophes, and even basic spelling is neither instinctive *nor* thoughtful. Recently, I lashed out at someone on IM for using the letters *u* and *r* in place of the words they sound like. "The only situation," I typed furiously, "in which it is acceptable to abuse letters of the Latin alphabet in this manner through written correspondence with me, is if you are *cute*, *female*, and *single*."

The thing about poorly-punctuated emails and IM chats, though, is that the vast majority of people are at least aware that it's informal. It's like people doing the grind---it's fine at night clubs, not so much at a formal occasion. <sup>1</sup>

So yeah. Despite this general *awareness of incompetency*, dashes are an area of punctuation that a lot of folks remain permanently in the dark about. I thought it might be helpful to put up a quick summary of the four main kinds you need to know about...]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://uwmike.com/articles/2007/01/20/dashes/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>2</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>On Making Drafts</title>
		<link>http://uwmike.com/articles/2006/08/30/drafts/</link>
		<comments>http://uwmike.com/articles/2006/08/30/drafts/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 30 Aug 2006 05:10:04 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Mike Purvis</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Reflection]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Writing]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://uwmike.com/articles/2006/08/30/drafts/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[I surprised myself in senior year when I signed up to take Writer's Craft. I'd never liked the writing process; my so-called poetry was a disaster of fictitious emotion, my stories seemed to launch grandiose plots that went nowhere, I regarded essay composition as the sort of suspicious art mastered by those whom I felt sure would vault themselves directly from business school to corporate management.

But I did take Writer's Craft, and I enjoyed it; when inspired, and not under duress, I *could* enjoy writing. I've always been good at explaining things to people: teaching and tutoring are incredibly rewarding activities.

So in some ways it's perfectly understandable that I'd have spent the two intervening years writing on a website and writing a book. And in others, it's very strange.]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
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		<item>
		<title>An Indirect Slashdotting</title>
		<link>http://uwmike.com/articles/2006/08/28/an-indirect-slashdotting/</link>
		<comments>http://uwmike.com/articles/2006/08/28/an-indirect-slashdotting/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 28 Aug 2006 18:01:24 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Mike Purvis</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Asides]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Writing]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://uwmike.com/articles/2006/08/28/an-indirect-slashdotting/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[A review of my book has [just made Slashdot](http://books.slashdot.org/books/06/08/28/1333228.shtml). [Michael J. Ross](http://www.ross.ws/index.html) gives us an 8/10 and an overwhelmingly positive run-down, concluding thus:

> Overall, Beginning Google Maps Applications with PHP and Ajax is an excellent introduction to extending the power of Google Maps on the Web, and provides enough detail to both help and entice readers to build their own Google Maps mashups. ]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://uwmike.com/articles/2006/08/28/an-indirect-slashdotting/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Words Of The Week</title>
		<link>http://uwmike.com/articles/2006/08/23/words-of-the-week/</link>
		<comments>http://uwmike.com/articles/2006/08/23/words-of-the-week/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 24 Aug 2006 02:51:22 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Mike Purvis</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Writing]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://uwmike.com/articles/2006/08/23/words-of-the-week/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[It's often easy to draw a word's meaning from context, but in the age of Wikipedia, Urban Dictionary, and Google Define, there's little excuse for not know a word's precise definition. Here are a handful that I've clarified recently, courtesy of my browser history.]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Beginning Google Maps Sample Chapter</title>
		<link>http://uwmike.com/articles/2006/08/22/maps-chapter/</link>
		<comments>http://uwmike.com/articles/2006/08/22/maps-chapter/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 22 Aug 2006 12:27:40 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Mike Purvis</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Asides]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Writing]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://uwmike.com/articles/2006/08/22/maps-chapter/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[We've just posted up the [fourth chapter of Beginning Google Maps Applications](http://googlemapsbook.com/sample/Beginning_Google_Maps_Applications_CH4_Sample.pdf), which is about the art of geocoding.]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://uwmike.com/articles/2006/08/22/maps-chapter/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>In The Flesh</title>
		<link>http://uwmike.com/articles/2006/08/10/google-maps-book/</link>
		<comments>http://uwmike.com/articles/2006/08/10/google-maps-book/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 10 Aug 2006 04:19:10 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Mike Purvis</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Asides]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Writing]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://uwmike.com/articles/2006/08/10/google-maps-book/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[My book has arrived, and I have a few pictures of it.]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://uwmike.com/articles/2006/08/10/google-maps-book/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>11</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>First-Person Narrative</title>
		<link>http://uwmike.com/articles/2005/04/05/first-person-narrative/</link>
		<comments>http://uwmike.com/articles/2005/04/05/first-person-narrative/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 05 Apr 2005 03:23:00 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Mike Purvis</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Writing]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://dev.uwmike.com/articles/2005/04/05/first-person-narrative</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[There are some books from my childhood that never seem to leave the radar. If my little brother&#8217;s got them out of the library while I&#8217;m home, I&#8217;ll check out from the conversation and curl up with an old friend.
One such book is [Henry Reed, Inc.](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0140341447/104-5390610-5571933), by Keith Robertson. (and indeed, all five in the [...]]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://uwmike.com/articles/2005/04/05/first-person-narrative/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>A Zombie High-School Story</title>
		<link>http://uwmike.com/articles/2005/03/06/a-zombie-highschool-story/</link>
		<comments>http://uwmike.com/articles/2005/03/06/a-zombie-highschool-story/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 06 Mar 2005 22:24:00 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Mike Purvis</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Writing]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://dev.uwmike.com/articles/2005/03/06/a-zombie-highschool-story</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[A eighteen-year-old in Kentucky has been jailed for writing a story about a [high-school over-run by zombies](http://www.lex18.com/global/story.asp?s=2989614&#38;ClientType=Printable). Says he,
It&#8217;s a fake story. I made it up. I&#8217;ve been working on one of my short stories, (and) the short story they found was about zombies. Yes, it did say a high school. It was about a [...]]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
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