Deb Hemley

Every writer hits a “dry season.” You know…when you just seem to have no writing ideas. Today, professional writer Deb Hemley (@dhemley) takes you on a trip to all the places you might find new writing ideas. You’ll be surprised to discover that you don’t have to travel far to find yourself experiencing a monsoon of new ideas.
Are you often looking for writing ideas? Do you gravitate to one writing prompt after another and still feel uninspired? Just like people sometimes look for love in all...

How do you keep your writing “vehicle” running smoothly and heading down the road to your destination? Today, professional writer Deb Hemley (@dhemley) takes a look at the process of writing from the perspective of a road trip and offers tips to keep you on track.
On a recent road trip, I whiled away many hours writing from my perspective in the passenger’s seat. One might imagine that I would have a lot to show for the amount of time I spent writing as we drove those many miles. But, to be p...

Morning after morning, while driving through Boston’s suburbs, I listened to the dire radio reports about the bed bug epidemic in New York City. Every mention of the words bed bugs had a way of transporting me momentarily to a different time and place, to the days of my youth when those two words were spoken at least once a week.
My father’s father, Benjamin Hemley, opened the doors of American Sea-Grass Company, Jobbers of Upholstering & Bedding Supplies, on Cooper Street, Brooklyn, in 1909 ...

Everyday more and more businesses around the world are creating presences on Facebook.
Some companies opt to bring users directly to the page wall or other tabs (e.g. info, photos, RSS/blog, discussions and links) and use product images or company logos instead of more elaborate landing pages.
Regardless of where a user lands when they first arrive, something needs to capture their attention.
As we’ll see in the examples of pages from the 50 Top Facebook Pages of Brand’s Worldwide represented...

Does your business have a Facebook marketing plan?
Do you need inspiration for Facebook updates that excite your fans?
Do you treat each and every update as an opportunity for engagement?
In this article we’ll take a look at 26 brands, an A-Z guide, that use Facebook status updates that combine visual content and brand messages to create buzz, excitement and interaction.
#1: Audi USA
When Drive (a TV network that celebrates the culture of cars and is geared toward car enthusiasts) highlighted...

As is most often the case with the Internet, many of the trends and products people are talking about today weren’t part of our collective lexicon two and three years ago. And some, weren’t even discussed as recent as the first quarter of 2010!
As we head into the New Year, we were curious about what we can all expect to see in Web Design in 2011, and asked some of the leading Web Designers and Web Design Writers in the field for their predictions.
After you’ve had a chance to read their illu...

Once, he told me about an upcoming exhibit of Ansel Adam’s photographs. “If you’ve never seen them in person,” he said, “ you should come. It’ll be fun.”
A few days later, we took the early morning greyhound to Manhattan. “You don’t need color to capture the essence of the natural world,” he said, referring to Adam’s photographs. “You know his pictures of Half Dome?” he asked. “Magic, pure magic.” He chewed on the remains of his fingernails, already beaten-up and stained with dried oil paint ...

I recently graduated from the LiveStrong program at the West Suburban YMCA. And when I say, graduated, I mean that both literally and figuratively.
The program ran for 12-weeks with two 75-90 minute sessions per week and included cardiovascular conditioning, strength training, balance, and flexibility exercises.
I have to confess that at times during the first few weeks I’d peek at my watch, and wonder, how much longer? I dreaded the sound of another repetition, “10-9-8-7… breathe. Are you br...