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madscientistjournal · 4 years

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An Interview with Madison Estes

Today, we’re chatting with Madison Estes, who will have a story in the final quarterly for MSJ!

DV: Tell us a bit about yourself! Madison Estes: I’m a horror addict who comes from a family of horror fans. My dad and I went to Las Vegas this year so we could do the Saw Escape Room, which was one of the coolest and most intense experiences of my life. Several of the rooms are duplicates of traps from the movies, and they got Tobin Bell to do narration in each room. My mother and I went to Texas Frightmare several years ago and we got to meet some of the Saw stars, plus Robert England, Sid Haag, and Sean Patrick Flannery. With two parents who are horror fans, I had a lot of horror influences growing up. I remember the crypt keeper from Tales from the Crypt used to scare me, but when I got a little older I’d watch reruns of it whenever I could, in addition to The Twilight Zone and The Outer Limits. Like most contemporary horror writers, I read a lot of Stephen King when I was growing up, starting with The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon, which is still one of my favorites. I also read On Writing sometime in the fifth grade. It helped me connect with literature in a way that I hadn’t before, and I believe it shaped me into the writer that I am today.

I live in southeast Texas and I have three dogs, two black and white Chihuahuas, a boy and a girl (Leo and Mayhem), and a Shih Tzu named Mika. When I’m not writing, I’m usually snuggling with them and reading or watching movies. In addition to my obsession with horror, I’m a huge nerd for Harry Potter, Star Wars, Marvel, DC and some of the old school anime shows like Yu Yu Hakusho.

DV: You’ve got a story coming out in February in Strange Girls: Women in Horror Anthology that sounds like it will be of interest to our readers. What can you share about your story without giving too much away?

ME: My story “Revival” is about a medical student who believes the cadaver he was assigned to dissect is coming back to life. He’s grieving the loss of his sister and suffering from nightmares and sleep deprivation, so he’s not mentally stable. He doesn’t trust his own judgement, but since he couldn’t save his sister, he’ll stop at nothing to save this girl if she really can be saved.

DV: You’re also working on a horror writing guidebook with other authors. Tell us more about this project.

ME: I’m working with five other writers on The Complete Guide to Writing Horror Vol. 1, commissioned by Dragon Moon Press. I’m in charge of five chapters, which cover topics such as horror subgenres, horror basics, the history of horror, business etiquette, and market resources. At the moment, I’m still working on subgenres. I’m designing this chapter to help writers learn how to categorize their own writing, and to give them an idea of what is out there so they can find their niche or niches within the horror genre.

In the basics chapter, I’m covering character struggles, decisions, consequences, and other related topics. One subject of special interest to me is character agency. I feel that in horror stories, character agency is often lacking. It’s tempting to write a passive, reactive character in a genre where the villain is often the star, but characters should have some control over their lives, or at least the appearance of control, even if by the end of the story you’re going to pull the rug from under the reader and reveal the characters had little to no chance at all. Think about the movies In the Mouth of Madness, Knowing, or Cabin in the Woods. The main characters in these stories are active. They fight back, but more than that, they ask questions and investigate. Even if they fail, they make efforts to take control of their lives. It makes stronger characters and a more entertaining story than a character that only runs from the maniac with the knife.

In the business etiquette chapter, I cover topics such as communication and conflict management with editors, and how to write cover letters, query letters, author bios, and more. Market resources covers topics such as networking opportunities, horror writing conventions, critique groups, where to find submission calls, and a list of active horror publishers. I haven’t started writing the history chapter yet (please don’t tell my editor!), but I plan to cover the origin of horror and the movements that have shaped the genre, such as the invention of film, video games, and the internet, as well as how certain authors like Stephen King forever changed horror.

I’ve very excited about this project. I can’t wait to share my knowledge and help aspiring horror writers. It takes me back to being in fifth grade with On Writing and the way that book filled me with excitement for writing. I hope to not only help writers elevate their craft, but to inspire that feeling within them as well.

DV: What’s the coolest thing about being an author?

ME: When I go on Amazon and read a review from someone who enjoyed my story, or when a book blogger reviews an anthology I’m in and singles out my story as one of their favorites, it gives me a warm and fuzzy feeling. It makes all the hours of writing and revising worth it.

DV: What’s on the horizon for you?

I just had a short story called “Crossroads” featured in Horror USA: California (Soteira Press) about an actor who goes through a midlife crisis when his girlfriend gets pregnant. His mental stability and fears of fatherhood are worsened by his Porsche, a haunted car that carries a terrible secret. I recently published my first paranormal romance/erotica story in The Devil’s Doorbell (HellBound Books) called “Visions of Blood”. A psychic has visions whenever he touches people or certain objects, but it comes with a side-effect of searing pain. A beautiful vampire convinces him to use his ability to help her track down the vampire who murdered her friend. Sexual tension leads to some very creative sex scenes between them despite the character’s disability.

My short story “Servant of Death” is going to appear in the last issue of Mad Scientist Journal. It’s about a child dying from cancer who is stalked by a shadow creature that he perceives to be Death. After he escapes the grim reaper’s clutches, his cancer goes away, but when he grows up, he finds out that remission came with a price.

I have a short story coming out next year in a time-themed anthology by Transmundane Press. My story is called, “The Time Loop Loophole”. It’s a horror comedy about a guy trapped in a time loop who thinks the only way to escape may be to kill his best friend. The premise sounds really dark, but the story is mostly humorous. The main character is kind of a self-described loser. At the beginning of the story, his biggest regret about being in the time loop is not being able to finish his video games or see the ending of Game of Thrones (a blessing in disguise according to most fans, not that he could know that). He’s not even that bothered by the time loop until the girl he has a crush on starts showing interest in him. Secrets come out, and everything gets complicated as he starts to wonder just what he’s willing to do to be with the girl of his dreams.

Thanks, Madison!

An Interview with Madison Estes was originally published on Mad Scientist Journal

#Interview #Madison Estes

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odindiana35-blog · 5 years

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The Hidden Treasure of Love of Rashad

If you own a minute, have a look at these fights, they are outstanding. I know a great deal of you're rooting for Rutgers' Tim Brown to produce the team. My department truly altered the game of doing outreach rather than recruitment, states Norris. These shirts appear to be the brand preferred by several of the top MMA fighters! This is supposed to be an enjoyable fight, and an opportunity to see one of the few truly legitimate prospects beyond the UFC continue to develop. Stop acting as if you're stupid,'' Evans explained. If you would like to say, I'd like to move in the division and I'd love to face Anthony Smith', fine. Evans on the opposite hand will attempt to stand up at first with Rampage, but it is going to only be a bluff to set up for a takedown or clinch in the fence. College basketball is a good place to come up with the skills necessary to be effective in the NBA. Love of Rashad - Dead or Alive? 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I hear it as well, Olivia whispered. All About Love of Rashad My writing is centered on how we can create improved habits, make superior decisions, and live much better lives. Below you'll find a detailed step-by-step guide, but I'd like to provide you with a quick overview how it works. If we do good, though it could be against our normal inclination, that's evidence of our faith. When Allah provides you this authority, it's your duty to utilize it in a just and reasonable matter. And it's all an issue of perspective. And it is a legacy that's so important to the culture. Come to MeI will provide you with peace. Ok, I Think I Understand Love of Rashad, Now Tell Me About Love of Rashad! From time to time, it will help to speak about doing it. That's the reason why I began to wrestle. He wishes to demonstrate he belongs. We must do what it requires to support them. However, they weren't shot or tortured. And I think that it's orchestrated. 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I'm not seeking to receive a call now. He explained that years back and he was very perfect. This is only one of those times. But I decided it was not the proper time for it. I've been here a few times. Love of Rashad for Dummies It's not surprising that we'd grow up and do everything that we've done. So come to MeI will provide you rest. That's not something which I would like to really speak about, honestly,'' he explained. While which may be difficult at the beginning of tragedy, it becomes easier as time continues. Perhaps you have completed some things in your past you're ashamed of. You're here and you may fix things between the both of you. Sit down and sleep in the incorrect way. I joined a gang at age 13. They cannot afford to think what's best down the street. But fighting to me is an extremely spiritual and mental thing. The man sighed as though it were a wonderful imposition. The play is all about a girl who's going up against all the men in the church that are in power. The Fundamentals of Love of Rashad Revealed Your entire body process is all inter-connected so what is excellent for a single thing will be helpful for others. It would be too simple for things to become out of control. Well the fantastic news is there are lots of treatments available some which work and some which aren't as effective. Then you have to locate a product to flip. Contains calcium and therefore promotes bone health. Let's look at every one of these players in detail. Hana, you will know in your heart as soon as the timing is appropriate for each of those. Don't trust somebody's advice if they won't also provide a bit of their own story. The Lost Secret of Love of Rashad Please add the things you want to purchase to your shopping cart to meet the requirements for one of our promotions and receive a combined invoice. When it doesn't work on your computer, or you are unable to install, comment here and we'll help you! It's also utilized as a nifty hack to escape trouble. In its rebuttal, Microsoft has made a decision to concentrate on the smugness, refusing to inject any trendy-ness in their image.

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lisakellner · 4 years

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How to promote your art

Two strategies you can implement right now.

Note: Here is a list of resources for difficult times. Includes financial resources and emergency grants.

How to promote your art.

There are many ways you can go about promoting your work. This article will discuss two that I think you will find very helpful. The key to promoting your work, is to do it. As artists we put all of our energy into the making and frankly, it can be exhausting to don the hat of a marketer “shopping our wares”. So, let’s change the perception a bit. Instead, look at the act of promotion as another creative project that will utilize your unique creative resources for the sole benefit of your art! The second key to promotion is not actually “promoting” but genuinely putting out there ideas, images and experiences that include the viewer, not force her to look )and look quickly). Create something compelling that challenges the current mode. Here are two ideas I hope you will include in your promoting activities.

1. Create your own exhibition

That’s right. Stop waiting around for someone else to swing in and exhibit your work. In a way, the current shutdown is a gift in disguise. It has leveled the playing field for galleries and exhibition spaces who are now all clamoring to get online effectively. Every week, Artsy sends out emails to galleries about how to effectively sell and exhibit online. While the galleries are figuring this out, you can be curating the most incredible solo exhibition of your own work. I recently did this myself. I have a solo exhibition scheduled for next year that may never come to fruition in physical form. So I decided, why wait. Here is what I did to present this exhibition. I created all of the following for this solo exhibition of my work.

A gallery of images

an exhibition catalog (with sign up form)

a viewing room (also with a sign up form)

a place to purchase on my own website (in addition to one of my dealers)

a statement for the exhibition.

a virtual view of the exhibition with in-situ gallery shots that is in slideshow form with accompanying video

Uploaded the exhibition to a third party online exhibition platform

Overall, I am very pleased with how it all turned out. Here is the final result: I Dream in Layers. All of this cost me $12, a lot of ingenuity and a decent amount of time. I had to learn some new techniques and make some new types of decisions, but I enjoyed the challenge. I have gotten some good feedback and already sold some work.

Note: I am not done! Getting the exhibition out there is the next step!

Now, you don’t have to do ALL of those things I listed. My advice is to create a tightly conceived exhibition of work that is cohesive and aligns with your best artist statement. Then, create a viewing room for the exhibition. Finally create a beautiful and professional catalog that fans of your work can sign up for and keep. Let’s look at how this promotes your art. The exhibition draws people to a specific idea you are highlighting by exhibiting these specific works. The viewing room gives them access to view and purchase this work. The catalog is the takeaway that keeps on giving. It enables people to enjoy your work at their leisure, really digesting your concepts, ideas and curated art. Of course, include prices! Viewing rooms are all the rage for galleries right now and some galleries are paying A LOT of money monthly to maintain a mediocre viewing room on a third party platform. It’s easy to get sucked into all the bells and whistles coming onto the market right now. Some are really good, some are incredibly expensive and some mediocre at best AND really expensive. Start simply. Start with what you have available right now.

Here are some suggestions.

Get out all of your art, paint a wall with fresh paint and start hanging and photographing.

Go to your basement or your studio and transform it into an incredible alternative exhibition space. You can always paint it over later!

Create an installation in your home as part of your exhibition.

Borrow a friend's space and hang the work there. Invite 1 -2 friends over for wine and a safe distance soft opening.

Create a popup in a small business that has had to close and offer them a free artwork or nominal amount with a thoughtful thank you note.

Think about creating an experience in a box. What symbolically represents the work you make? What if someone opened this box only to discover a beautifully presented set of curated objects? Film this endeavor.

There are endless ways you can create an exhibition of your art and present it thoughtfully and uniquely.

Once the exhibition is created come up with ways to invite people to view it. Maybe you section off your email list into select groups inviting them (physically or virtually) to view the exhibition.

Send out a postcard or small package to a few chosen people that you want to view the exhibition.

Print out your exhibition catalog and mail that to a select group of your choosing.

Make sure your efforts have endurance and longevity.

don’t worry just yet about a virtual reality app that you have to pay for monthly and shows your art on someone else’s walls. Right now focus on getting eyes to your work, to your exhibition event and to your website.

Create the energy you so want to see around your art.

2. Use your Artist Profile as a vehicle for showcasing your art to potential clients.

If you have an Artist Profile, then it’s time to start promoting it! And if you don’t, sign up here. It’s free! Here are some ways you can promote your Artist Profile:

Add the link as part of your signature on emails.

Share with your contacts.

Post it to social media

Write about the works you chose for your profile and share that.

Create an exhibition around the works on your profile page.

Send out a newsletter and ask your email contacts to visit your page

Offer the work on your page for sale on your own website.

Download your page as a PDF and send out mailings to prospective galleries and exhibition spaces.

The only way the Artist Profile will work for you is if you maximize the visibility it can achieve. What I love about the Artist Profiles is that it is limited to five succinct images. It gives viewers a quick synopsis of exactly what your work is about without viewer overload. USE this to your advantage. What ways can you come up with to take advantage of this one page that beautifully reflects the work you make?

As always, I hope that you found this to be useful. If you need help putting together an exhibition of your work or promoting your art, sign up for a One on One session. Don’t forget to join The Artist Essentials Facebook Group! Every week I post a new challenge or tip. And I welcome your feedback and interaction.

Did you enjoy reading this?

Interested in guest posting? Contact me here.

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#artist career advice #art career success #artist #art career planning #how to be a successful artist #promote your art

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almostnoisydonut · 4 years

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𝓒𝓪𝓷 𝓨𝓸𝓾 𝓢𝓾𝓬𝓬𝓮𝓮𝓭 𝓘𝓷 𝓛𝓲𝓯𝓮 𝓦𝓸𝓻𝓴𝓲𝓷𝓰 𝓘𝓷 𝓣𝓱𝓮 𝓕𝓲𝓮𝓵𝓭 𝓞𝓯 𝓐𝓻𝓽?

So you want to be an artist. Is this a realistic career choice, or are you going to live in a cockroach-infested flat for the rest of your life, fulfilling the “starving artist” stereotype? In short, it is not easy being a successful fine artist (someone who makes a living by creating original, one-off pieces of art) -- but many people do succeed in supporting themselves through a combination of hard work, perseverance, and using their artistic talents and knowledge in a variety of ways to supplement their income from the creation of original works of art. The internet has broadened the reach of art and made it possible for artists to increase their visibility to viewers and collectors all over the world, making them less dependent on museums and galleries for exposure and marketing, and being a fine artist isn’t the only career option for artists.

A career in art is not limited to being a painter of canvases which get framed and sold in a gallery. Behind every piece of art in a newspaper, magazine, book, poster, and leaflet there’s a graphic or commercial artist or illustrator -- usually a team. There are graphic artists putting the magazines together, and illustrators drawing the cartoons and graphics. There are also website designers, computer-graphic artists (computers don’t draw the graphics themselves, they’re just a tool, a modern version of a paintbrush!), and animators for film and television. There are stage set designers and builders. There are computer game designers. There are art galleries and museums. There is also teaching art and art therapy; mural painting and face painting; tattoo artist.

And think more broadly about other career options: photography, landscape design, interior design, shop-window design, framing; textile and clothing design; furniture and lighting design; architecture, landscape architecture, and engineering. These all require creative skills and, even if in your heart you long to be a fine artist, working in any of these fields will complement what you do at your easel in your 'own' time.

Financial rewards can certainly come, but they are often short-term and irregular. In the best cases, monetary rewards appear to cycle up and down over the years, but rarely stay high for an entire career. Of course people will be quick to point out that there are some artists out there who do make a living from their art, and that is certainly true, but as the earnings and payment numbers listed above indicate, for the vast majority of those artists that means hustling pretty hard for not a whole lot of cash. And even among the “one percent” artists (because they exist in the arts too), many of the most famous names in arts and entertainment have responded to the inevitable fickleness of the market for their work by starting side businesses to maintain their incomes — everything from licensing or endorsement deals to clothing and perfume lines, from moving to the producer’s side of the table to making large investments in other markets.

Working as an artist can be an unpredictable lifestyle. When the sales aren’t booming, even the most confident artists question their path. You have to learn how to harness your fears in order to find success as an artist.

Need a push? Take these words from actor Jim Carrey’s viral commencement speech: “So many of us choose our path out of fear disguised as practicality. What we really want seems impossibly out of reach, and ridiculous to expect, so we never dare to ask the universe for it.”

In the speech, Carrey discusses his father’s “safe” decision to become an accountant instead of an actor, and how he was sadly let go from this “safe” accounting job. He remarks, “You can fail at what you don’t want, so you might as well take a chance on doing what you love.”

The creative industry is competitive, but that’s symptomatic of the dedication people in it feel to their work. See it as a challenge to strive and succeed, rather than writing yourself off before you’ve even begun. It takes hard work and determination, the ability to sell yourself, and to produce the goods.

It takes a lot of determination, hard work, hard selling, and persistence to make a career as a fine artist. You need to create paintings people want to buy. Are you willing to change your style and subject matter so that people will buy more? Will you take commissions, painting to order in terms of size, color, and subject? Being a competent painter isn’t a magic wand. You also need to be able to market yourself and your work. It is possible to make a career as a fine artist, but it is tough and few artists make a living by only selling their work (at least initially). But most artists are good at multi-tasking and thinking out-of-the-box in order to come up with ways to support themselves until their painting alone can sustain them. But supplementing your painting with another complementary creative pursuit is not all bad either.

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alifeenrouteblog · 5 years

Text

Why I Haven't Been Writing Lately

First, the boring stuff. Since going full-time with my business, Tall Hair Creative, I’ve had less time. Yes, that’s a very boring reason. And it’s an even weaker excuse. But let’s just start here.

Exactly one year ago, I was one-month into my unemployment, just back from a trip to Europe, and had just received my first unemployment paycheck. That was the life. Around this time, I decided I would take as long as I needed to in order to recover from my 9-5 bullshit life. For the past four years, I had been told by bosses, but mostly coworkers, how I was not professional, I was abrasive, lacked interpersonal skills, and every time I might have hurt someone’s feelings. I had been changing for years, disguising it as professional growth. It wasn’t. I was manipulated.

My parents were understandably frustrated af when I told them I would not be diving into a job search. I didn’t want to rush into another terribly emotionally abusive job. Having done a fair amount of job searching in Cleveland, I already knew there wasn’t a lot of job opportunities. I knew there were even fewer prospects of finding an organization that I would actually like to work for and would truly accept my personality, work style, and the work I do here on this blog. Because I should also mention at this point, I had started my blog just a few months before I was given the axe; my writing on here until this point was, while still authentic and vulnerable, but pretty safe. I didn’t write about dating or sex. I definitely had not mentioned my family or past abuse. What started out as a HR consultant/executive coaching blog, quickly evolved into something much more ‘me’, unapologetically. This trajectory was happening before my unemployment, but I didn’t make the decision to fully dig into it until almost exactly a year ago.

So, to recap: May 2018, I found myself unemployed with a lot of free time, a newfound sense of peace, but also a desire to explore the demons that have been holding me back for decades. I spent my days reorganizing my apartment to something that I loved and truly worked for me, and I spent my evenings getting drunk on rose on my back patio or at the pizzeria attached to my place, furiously typing into the MacBook Air I just purchased weeks before with the entirety of my savings account. It wasn’t a savings account for purchasing a home, but more for travel and buying laptops when you get fired.

I would write for hours every night. I got into a rhythm. I started refining my writing and I felt like I was on to something. Then I started publishing my good shit. Then I started to get some really amazing feedback from readers. Mostly friends, but some strangers, either way – it was affirming. People were telling me how relatable my writing was. How they loved my openness. How my raw honesty spoke to them, made them feel less alone. And I was hooked.

I spent months doing this. Until I realized I had about 3 months left of unemployment cash coming in and I knew I had to come up with some plan to make money. This is the point when I started to conceptualize Tall Hair Creative. What I was thinking my business would look like at this point, was pretty different than what it is today. It’s gone through multiple iterations since August 2018. All of which I love. The most surprising has definitely been my selling my photography.

Another big thing I did when I lost my job was get a boudoir shoot. This was a big moment for me for a lot of reasons, which you can read about in this post. But I should mention here, that it was a turning point for me that I didn’t want to work anywhere that would disqualify me or judge me based on my sharing of these beautiful photos of myself. This photoshoot also sparked an interest in photography. Sometime in July of last year, I purchased a Canon Rebel, which if you don’t know is the cheapest DSLR camera you can get, and I started teaching myself photography. My original goal when purchasing the camera was to be able to capture pretty photos for my Instagram, in order to get more followers, and drive my traffic to my blog, which would obviously enable me to get a book deal in no time. It was all writing related. But I quickly learned that it was hard (impossible) to take photos of myself, especially if I didn’t know how to use the damn thing in the first place. In order to teach myself, I started offering free photoshoots on Instagram to anyone that would let me practice. This was one of my best decisions I ever made. I made a lot of cool friends this way and it turned out to be a great way for me to learn the art of photography. I distinctly remember texting Kate Kaput, while editing her photos and confused af, telling her that I had spent hours that day trying to learn how to edit photos, even though I needed to do other stuff, like look for a job. I followed that up with something like “That probably means I should be doing this for a living.” I was fucking right Anyway, all of that to say, I have been very surprised that my photography services were really the only thing that took off in Cleveland; and it changed the scope of my business quite a bit.

After blissful unemployment ended and my business (mainly, photography) was picking up, I stopped writing as much. Not only was it less time available, but it was less creative time and/or space in my head. I was putting all of my creativity into launching and marketing my business. To make matters ‘worse’, I was ghosted by someone I adored, and lost my interest in dating completely, which was fine, but made for less writing content. At that point, I had been really into writing about dating, and even became a top writer for Medium in the category of Love.

Suddenly, I was left with little time to write and no content to write about. And I’ve been riding that ever since. I’ve come up with a few things and I’ve reworked a few existing essays and put them up here, but as I’ve been saying for months now, I have not written anything I am especially proud of in SO LONG. Maybe six months. I’m not sure. This move didn’t help much either. It fucked up my writing and it fucked up my business. Moving to Denver, meant losing all my photography clients, i.e. the most profitable part of my business, but it also meant a total mindfuck. When I got the news from my best-friend-at-one-point/landlord, I was devastated. And when my mom said I could not move in with her, I was…I don’t even know what the word is. It’s something like almost being dead, but not quite dead, but kind of wish you were because it would be easier. Something so much deeper than depressed. I was depressed when Brian ended my lease/our friendship. But when my mom said I could not live with her, I felt my whole world end.

It wasn’t a surprise to any of my close friends that my mom said no. And they’ve all expressed, at least at one point, that they are glad I did not move in with my mom because they knew it wasn’t good for my mental health or our relationship. They’re not wrong. But that didn’t stop the life-crushing depression I experienced for two weeks after speaking with Brian and my mom. I couldn’t leave my bed. This has happened to me before, in rare instances of depression, but only for a day or two – MAX. Never have I experienced depression this bad for two weeks. I was tired all of the time. I slept a lot. Even when I wasn’t sleeping, I was in my bed. When I got up to go to the bathroom, I was exhausted by the time I was walking back into my bed. When Erin invited me to live with her, it was a god-send, and amazing, but it didn’t really end my depression. The anxiety and trauma of trying to figure out where I would live was gone. But the loss of my relationships with my best friend and my mother remained very present in every breath I took.

Moving to Denver gave me something to reach for. I now had stuff to do for something that was happening. I worked on selling 90% of my belongings. I started texting my close friends what was happening and telling them about my move to Denver, letting them know before I announced anything on social media. My dear friend, Colleen, said something that really caught my breath at the moment and stayed with me, even now. When I told her what was happening and I was moving to Denver, she said, “Aww Steph! I wish you the best and am here for you if you need anything. The mountains are beautiful and I hope they bring you what you need.” I loved that she said ‘I hope the mountains bring what you need’. I’ve always been a big believer in the healing powers of water, specifically bodies of water, and to be honest, the lack of ocean or lakes in Denver made me nervous, but Colleen got me thinking about stuff differently. I started to get excited.

I had a plan, I was getting excited, and then I went to Japan, which only made me more excited to move to Denver. It just wasn’t good for writing. I did write about my travel experiences to Japan, here and here, and an essay about dating, and the trip did give me a lot of healing and clarifying, and opportunities to write, but when I got home I had to hit the ground running when it came to the cross-country move.

I was so overwhelmed and my depression started to kick in again. In one of my greatest moments of vulnerability, I asked my greatest friend, Brittany, to help me. But not just help me like a normal person. I asked her to come over and make a to-do list with me and then run errands with me. I was so overwhelmed I couldn’t handle everything I had to do, so I just didn’t do anything. Brittany didn’t even hesitate. Actually, she was really excited. When I told her exactly how I was feeling and exactly what I needed from her, her reply: “OMG YES! Can we make lists and cross stuff of as we do them?” I had never been so grateful to have such a nerd for my greatest friend. She came over, we did shit, and we started crossing stuff off the to do list. She came over a total of 9 times, in the two weeks between coming back from Japan and leaving for Denver. Sometimes just to literally sit in my passenger’s seat and drive with me do errands. It sounds simple, but I could not have done it without her. She also did really big stuff too. She packed boxes (and somehow tapped them perfectly). She dropped things off at MULTIPLE donation centers. She did so much. I will never be able to express my gratitude to her for everything she did for me during this time. Even before the moving stuff got rolling, when I was deep in my depression, she would check on me every day.

I have loved Brittany since the day I met at her; on her first day at work at Cleveland Metropolitan School District. She was so cute and polite. I was so jaded and broken by that point. Our first interaction: we were in an All Team meeting, someone (one of our terrible bosses) used a yellow dry erase marker on the whiteboard, it obviously didn’t show up and Brittany sweetly said, not quite to herself, but not to anyone specific, “Oh, I’ve never seen a yellow dry erase marker before.” No one else was listening to her, but I heard her and I snarkly responded with “There’s a lot of things here you’ve never seen before.” And she laughed, like a lot. A laugh that was real and told me we would be friends. At the very least work friends. Almost four years later, I can safely say she is my greatest friend. I tell her this often, either directly or in writing, that I’ve never met anyone like her. She is the kindest soul I’ve ever had the pleasure of interacting with. She is patient with me. She asks questions before judging. She always focuses on the positive. She has never told me I’ve done something wrong. It’s mind boggling to me, because we are so so different, but other than my brother, I’ve never felt closer to another soul. She is truly the greatest. I truly hope everyone has a Brittany in their life. If not, please go find someone. And a side note – check out her executive coaching business because she’s an extremely gifted coach, and she also just got a super amazing prestigious job that she 100000% deserves.

Ok, so this isn’t a love letter to Brittany. Although, I have been trying to write her a letter for over a month now, so maybe this is the start I needed. But to go back to where is started, it’s been hard to write lately, so even though I started writing Brittany a letter several times, I couldn’t ever get through the first few lines. And even though I have tried writing Brian a letter, and have a lot on paper, I can’t seem to get it right. And even though, I haven’t even started the painful process of writing a letter to my mother, letting her know how I feel, because that might literally end me at this point (not using literally figuratively), it’s still on my to-do list. But to recap: I don’t have the time, I don’t have the creative space in my brain, and too much is going on – that’s why I haven’t been writing.

I shouldn’t say, I haven’t been writing. I have been. I have written a lot in notebooks. I have a lot of shit typed into my phone’s Notes app. I have thousands of words of shit right here on this laptop. Because I never truly STOP writing. I’m always writing. Every single day I write something, whether it’s on my phone, laptop, notebook. Here is where I struggle lately: Among the reasons I just listed, I have been having a hard time writing/publishing my writing because I can’t seem to write something without feeling like I’m just complaining. Everything that’s been going on and everything I am feeling lately, I feel like the victim and everyone else looks like a villain, and that comes out in my writing. Much of my writing has been about how other people have been shitty to me; but it’s also how that made me feel, the shitty things I’ve done, and about how I’ve worked through that. I don’t feel any of that with the shit I’ve been going through as of late. At least not when I write it and read it back to myself. When I read it back to myself, it sounds like I’m complaining. A LOT. And for some readers, that’s what this whole blog might sound like to them. But to me, and avid readers, it’s not. It’s about how I’ve dealt with shit, worked through or am trying to work through some shit, and most importantly how this is all a part of the greater human experience. Much to the chagrin of my parents, my writing has never been about putting other people on blast. It’s really not. I don’t write shit with the sole purpose of embarrassing people. But I do not let the fact that a story might embarrass someone I love prevent me from telling that story. That’s not reason alone. And where I’m at right now, with my life and my writing, it’s just not enough. I don’t have a point of view. I don’t have a message. I don’t have much to say other than bash the people that have hurt me, even if that literally means just recapping events from my perspective. It’s not enough. So I’ve been withholding my writing. Until today, when I saw my Instagram traffic data and realized that my profile views have gone down a lot lately (because I haven’t been posting anything new on the blog or Instagram) and I felt inspired to explain why I haven’t been posting much the last six months, especially the last three.

Yes, I want to tell you more about how I am adjusting to Denver. How my call to my dad on his birthday in march went. And how his call on my 30th birthday went. About how I feel about my mother and I’s relationship. How frustrated I get with my Instagram growth. How I annoyed I am that for every 10 followers I get, I lose 7. How jealous I am of people who get 270 likes on a post, when I rarely get past 40. How anxious I feel about my finances and next steps and what my goals are now. And how every day I have at least one moment of screaming inside my head, “WTF DID YOU GET YOURSELF INTO GIRLFRIEND!!!! YOU FUCKED UP BIG TIME!” YES, I want to tell you all of that. But I can’t figure out how to tell you all of that without sounding like I’m complaining, or gossiping, or just throwing people that have hurt me under the bus. That’s not my goal here. Ultimately, this isn’t a diary, it’s a blog. My only goal for this platform, which I’ve said for the last year, is to let you know you’re not alone. I’m glad I could share this, while maybe it’s not exactly how I pictured it, it’s what I needed, and I hope to god at least one of you needed it to.

You are loved,

Stephanie

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bobbynolanios88 · 5 years

Text

Venmo, Girl Scouts, Bitcoin: Unexpected Upsides

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Usually when we talk about unintended consequences here at PYMNTS, we are talking about something that has gone terribly wrong, or at least failed to perform as well as desired because of some unforeseen side effect. The goal might be noble – but pursuing a noble goal the wrong way can quickly have byproducts that make the cure worse than the disease.

Usually, an unforeseen consequence is a bad thing.

But not always.

From time to time, one comes along that is delightful.

For example, Karen Webster noted that attempts to rid the island of Borneo of malaria led to a series of terrible after-effects from messing with the local ecosystem by killing mosquitoes with DDT spray. That list included collapsing roofs, an explosion in the local rat population and a typhus outbreak.

But there was also at least one somewhat delightful outcome – and it turned out to be the solution to the cascading series of problems unleashed by the attempted malaria remedy. It was a solution that no one could have foreseen, summed up in two words:

Cat paratroopers.

And while there were no documented cases of skydiving felines in the payments and commerce news to our knowledge this week, there were a few almost equally delightful unexpected outcomes and bugs that turned out to be fabulous features.

Because, as it turns out, Venmo might just be able to help cure a broken heart (or make one worse), the big bitcoin price drop might have been a boon for cybersecurity, and Girl Scout cookies might just be the reason you see more healthy eating options advertised over the next few weeks.

Feeling confused about what connections there could possibly be? Don’t worry, it’s probably weirder than you think…

Living Well Is the Best Revenge (And Venmo Can Help You Prove It)

There are a lot of Venmo uses that devotees can rattle off if asked. Sending funds to friends, splitting up checks, paying rent, contributing to group gifts or spending in stores (particularly with their newly released line of cards) – over the last several years, Venmo has evolved from a simple P2P payments platform into a robust set of financial services tools for its users.

But Venmo, as it turns out, has an even more useful feature that, until now, has gone totally unadvertised: It can be used to make your ex miserable.

The magic that makes it happen is the social media part of the Venmo platform, which allows users to list a live feed of their transactions in an easily digestible, scrollable, emoji-filled form. And what one sees, noted Elle Huerta, CEO and founder of popular breakup app Mend, says it is “usually just enough information out of context to drive themselves crazy with.”

“It’s one thing to think about your ex moving on, but it’s quite another to see that they had $34 of delicious sushi last night with a name you don’t recognize,” she said. “And that’s why Venmo transactions can make your heart stop: Each one is a tiny glimpse into a world where your ex is continuing to walk the earth and live their life without you. That hurts.”

It’s an experience one Women’s Health writer had directly, when an ex-boyfriend arrived at her door a year after their split demanding that she make her Venmo feed more private, as it was causing him agony. Particularly, she noted, because everything he saw was out of context.

“He could see Venmo transactions showing how much I was enjoying my life – whether it was going out to brunch, or paying someone back via little red-wine emojis for happy hour,” she continued. “He could see that I went to a concert with my sister, as I sent a Venmo for ‘Best Coast’ with music notes, that I paid a friend for drinks the night before, and that I bought someone named Joe a breakfast sandwich (which he brought up during the aforementioned Venmo outburst). But he couldn’t see that I wasn’t dating Joe – that I was actually eating with him and 10 other people after our Saturday group run, and bought him a sandwich because he forgot his credit card.”

The writer, incidentally, did not acquiesce to her ex’s request, though the whole incident did make her reconsider how much of her spending life she wanted to make public.

Psychologists recommend that people who have been through recent break-ups treat Venmo like any other social media platform and stop following their exes on them, as digital stalking remains a terrible way to get over someone.

Bitcoin’s Price Busts, So Hackers Change Tactics

The last few months have been tough for bitcoin enthusiasts, who have watched the cryptocurrency bleed value for over a year at this point. The past week has looked a bit stronger, and some think that bitcoin’s price might get back above $4,000 within the next week. But considering that its price at this time last year was just shy of $10,000, the bigger story surrounding the world’s best-known cryptocurrency has been one about loss.

Which has been rough sledding for bitcoin investors, traders and miners, but might have ended up as a blessing in disguise for everyday internet users who were somewhat less likely to find themselves pegged by a ransomware attack over the last year.

Ransomware attacks, when launched against individuals or institutions, see cyber criminals gain access and control of a user’s computer, which they essentially hold hostage until a ransom is paid out in cryptocurrency. Sometimes, if the data being held is particularly sensitive, they will threaten to release it unless they are paid.

The good news, according to Symantec, is that ransomware attacks are down 20 percent year-on-year. The reason? The attacks are difficult and time-consuming to set up – and not worth the payouts, with bitcoin trading at increasingly low price points.

But lest anyone get too excited at their newfound security, there are two things to keep in mind. The first is that cybercriminals simply moved onto greener pastures, revenue wise, and have now adopted a new form of hacking called formjacking, which harvests credit card data directly from retail sites. They also persist in “cryptojacking,” an easy and accessible hack that allows cybercriminals to capture other people’s computers and task them with mining cryptocurrency.

So the fall of bitcoin’s price did have an unexpected upside – but only for as long as it took hackers to find a suitable replacement.

Raising a White Flag Over Q1 Cookie Sales

The season of the cookie is upon us: specifically, the Girl Scout cookie.

Though there is no official date range for the sale of cookies – that decision is left to local troop councils – the unofficial season runs between January and March each year, as millions of Girl Scouts start hustling boxes in workplaces, in front of grocery stores and walking door-to-door in suburban neighborhoods across the country.

And the 1.8 million Girl Scouts who are hitting the streets with their treats are insanely good at selling them. One anonymous San Diego scout sold more than 300 boxes of Girl Scout cookies in less than six hours. Of course, she had the good sense to set up shop outside a marijuana dispensary and pretty much let the cookies sell themselves for a few hours.

We eagerly await that girl’s future as the CEO of Amazon after Jeff Bezos retires to live on the moon full time.

“The traditional way of selling Girl Scout cookies is trying to go door to door, or utilizing friends and family networks,” marketing executive Kyle Boze told MarketWatch. “This girl used creativity to find a new market that hasn’t been tapped [as much] yet.”

And while not everyone has that level of marketing genius, Girl Scout cookies are big business in the U.S. – worth about $800 million in sales. That is more than Oreo and Chips Ahoy plus Milano, in case one is wondering. Among the 10 top-selling cookie varieties in America, five of them are Girl Scout cookies. And, again, they are generally only sold once a year for six to eight weeks.

But for those six to eight weeks, the Girl Scouts have managed to achieve near-unilateral surrender from the rest of the industry. No one wants to take on the little girls in the green sashes.

“The annual Girl Scout cookie sale is a force of nature at the national level,” said John Frank, a Mintel food analyst. “Big companies like Kraft know it’s coming, and they’ve learned to live with it. It’s like a storm and there’s nothing they can do but wait for it to pass, because there is no upside to marketing against the Girl Scouts.”

So what do big brands do, if they can’t counter-sell?

Some adhere to: “If you can’t beat them, join them.” Keebler, a rival cookie brand, is the owner and operator of Little Brownie Bakers, one of two licensed industrial bakeries that make Girl Scout Cookies.

Incidentally, Keebler also makes lookalike, taste-alike cookies under its own branding in the same factories where it makes the Girl Scout Cookies. The Keebler Grasshopper is made by the exact same people who make the Girl Scouts Thin Mint. You might think this would affect the sale of Girl Scout cookies, since you can literally buy the exact same cookie baked in the exact same place for half the price year-round.

It does not make the slightest difference. The similar cookies don’t have any effect on Girl Scout cookie sales, and the original cookies vastly outsell the identical copies.

“Girl Scout consumers love our cookies, but they purchase them because they are supporting girls,” noted Amanda Hamaker, manager of product sales for the Girl Scouts. “That’s not happening at the supermarket.”

Other large brands – Kraft, notably – just give up the cookie ground entirely during the early part of the calendar year, and instead focus on countering programs. That includes advertising more savory snacks – macaroni and cheese, particularly – and more public service-oriented ads reminding kids about the importance of healthy eating. (Because if kids aren’t eating their cookies anyway, they may as well remind parents that they really shouldn’t be eating so many cookies.)

It might not be the best reason, but they might make a valid point. But given their sales, it seems fair to assume that Girl Scout cookies likely won’t be where people will make their first big calorie cuts.

Still, it’s unexpected to see a seasonal jump in healthy food advertising in response to scouts selling cookies.

But it is one of the more pleasant unexpected surprises, of the sort more likely to make one chuckle than cringe with concern. And given that it is not normally the way things happen in payments and commerce – where things going unexpectedly awry can be the wrong kind of explosive more often than the right kind – it is always nice when the week or season coughs up a few that are more amusing that worrisome.

——————————–

Latest Insights:

Our data and analytics team has developed a number of creative methodologies and frameworks that measure and benchmark the innovation that’s reshaping the payments and commerce ecosystem. Check out the February 2019 PYMNTS Digital Fraud Tracker Report

Original Source https://ift.tt/2SXvhYC

#IFTTT #Cryptocurrency and Bitcoin

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adrianjenkins952wblr · 5 years

Text

Venmo, Girl Scouts, Bitcoin: Unexpected Upsides

1 Share

Usually, an unforeseen consequence is a bad thing.

But not always.

From time to time, one comes along that is delightful.

Cat paratroopers.

Feeling confused about what connections there could possibly be? Don’t worry, it’s probably weirder than you think…

Living Well Is the Best Revenge (And Venmo Can Help You Prove It)

But Venmo, as it turns out, has an even more useful feature that, until now, has gone totally unadvertised: It can be used to make your ex miserable.

The writer, incidentally, did not acquiesce to her ex’s request, though the whole incident did make her reconsider how much of her spending life she wanted to make public.

Bitcoin’s Price Busts, So Hackers Change Tactics

So the fall of bitcoin’s price did have an unexpected upside – but only for as long as it took hackers to find a suitable replacement.

Raising a White Flag Over Q1 Cookie Sales

The season of the cookie is upon us: specifically, the Girl Scout cookie.

We eagerly await that girl’s future as the CEO of Amazon after Jeff Bezos retires to live on the moon full time.

But for those six to eight weeks, the Girl Scouts have managed to achieve near-unilateral surrender from the rest of the industry. No one wants to take on the little girls in the green sashes.

So what do big brands do, if they can’t counter-sell?

It does not make the slightest difference. The similar cookies don’t have any effect on Girl Scout cookie sales, and the original cookies vastly outsell the identical copies.

Still, it’s unexpected to see a seasonal jump in healthy food advertising in response to scouts selling cookies.

——————————–

Latest Insights:

Original Source https://ift.tt/2SXvhYC

#IFTTT #Cryptocurrency and Bitcoin

0 notes

mccartneynathxzw83 · 5 years

Text

Venmo, Girl Scouts, Bitcoin: Unexpected Upsides

1 Share

Usually, an unforeseen consequence is a bad thing.

But not always.

From time to time, one comes along that is delightful.

Cat paratroopers.

Feeling confused about what connections there could possibly be? Don’t worry, it’s probably weirder than you think…

Living Well Is the Best Revenge (And Venmo Can Help You Prove It)

But Venmo, as it turns out, has an even more useful feature that, until now, has gone totally unadvertised: It can be used to make your ex miserable.

The writer, incidentally, did not acquiesce to her ex’s request, though the whole incident did make her reconsider how much of her spending life she wanted to make public.

Bitcoin’s Price Busts, So Hackers Change Tactics

So the fall of bitcoin’s price did have an unexpected upside – but only for as long as it took hackers to find a suitable replacement.

Raising a White Flag Over Q1 Cookie Sales

The season of the cookie is upon us: specifically, the Girl Scout cookie.

We eagerly await that girl’s future as the CEO of Amazon after Jeff Bezos retires to live on the moon full time.

But for those six to eight weeks, the Girl Scouts have managed to achieve near-unilateral surrender from the rest of the industry. No one wants to take on the little girls in the green sashes.

So what do big brands do, if they can’t counter-sell?

It does not make the slightest difference. The similar cookies don’t have any effect on Girl Scout cookie sales, and the original cookies vastly outsell the identical copies.

Still, it’s unexpected to see a seasonal jump in healthy food advertising in response to scouts selling cookies.

——————————–

Latest Insights:

Original Source https://ift.tt/2SXvhYC

0 notes

teiraymondmccoy78 · 5 years

Text

Venmo, Girl Scouts, Bitcoin: Unexpected Upsides

1 Share

Usually, an unforeseen consequence is a bad thing.

But not always.

From time to time, one comes along that is delightful.

Cat paratroopers.

Feeling confused about what connections there could possibly be? Don’t worry, it’s probably weirder than you think…

Living Well Is the Best Revenge (And Venmo Can Help You Prove It)

But Venmo, as it turns out, has an even more useful feature that, until now, has gone totally unadvertised: It can be used to make your ex miserable.

The writer, incidentally, did not acquiesce to her ex’s request, though the whole incident did make her reconsider how much of her spending life she wanted to make public.

Bitcoin’s Price Busts, So Hackers Change Tactics

So the fall of bitcoin’s price did have an unexpected upside – but only for as long as it took hackers to find a suitable replacement.

Raising a White Flag Over Q1 Cookie Sales

The season of the cookie is upon us: specifically, the Girl Scout cookie.

We eagerly await that girl’s future as the CEO of Amazon after Jeff Bezos retires to live on the moon full time.

But for those six to eight weeks, the Girl Scouts have managed to achieve near-unilateral surrender from the rest of the industry. No one wants to take on the little girls in the green sashes.

So what do big brands do, if they can’t counter-sell?

It does not make the slightest difference. The similar cookies don’t have any effect on Girl Scout cookie sales, and the original cookies vastly outsell the identical copies.

Still, it’s unexpected to see a seasonal jump in healthy food advertising in response to scouts selling cookies.

——————————–

Latest Insights:

Original Source https://ift.tt/2SXvhYC

0 notes

vanessawestwcrtr5 · 5 years

Text

Venmo, Girl Scouts, Bitcoin: Unexpected Upsides

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Usually, an unforeseen consequence is a bad thing.

But not always.

From time to time, one comes along that is delightful.

Cat paratroopers.

Feeling confused about what connections there could possibly be? Don’t worry, it’s probably weirder than you think…

Living Well Is the Best Revenge (And Venmo Can Help You Prove It)

But Venmo, as it turns out, has an even more useful feature that, until now, has gone totally unadvertised: It can be used to make your ex miserable.

The writer, incidentally, did not acquiesce to her ex’s request, though the whole incident did make her reconsider how much of her spending life she wanted to make public.

Bitcoin’s Price Busts, So Hackers Change Tactics

So the fall of bitcoin’s price did have an unexpected upside – but only for as long as it took hackers to find a suitable replacement.

Raising a White Flag Over Q1 Cookie Sales

The season of the cookie is upon us: specifically, the Girl Scout cookie.

We eagerly await that girl’s future as the CEO of Amazon after Jeff Bezos retires to live on the moon full time.

But for those six to eight weeks, the Girl Scouts have managed to achieve near-unilateral surrender from the rest of the industry. No one wants to take on the little girls in the green sashes.

So what do big brands do, if they can’t counter-sell?

It does not make the slightest difference. The similar cookies don’t have any effect on Girl Scout cookie sales, and the original cookies vastly outsell the identical copies.

Still, it’s unexpected to see a seasonal jump in healthy food advertising in response to scouts selling cookies.

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Latest Insights:

Original Source https://ift.tt/2SXvhYC

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courtneyvbrooks87 · 5 years

Text

Venmo, Girl Scouts, Bitcoin: Unexpected Upsides

1 Share

Usually, an unforeseen consequence is a bad thing.

But not always.

From time to time, one comes along that is delightful.

Cat paratroopers.

Feeling confused about what connections there could possibly be? Don’t worry, it’s probably weirder than you think…

Living Well Is the Best Revenge (And Venmo Can Help You Prove It)

But Venmo, as it turns out, has an even more useful feature that, until now, has gone totally unadvertised: It can be used to make your ex miserable.

The writer, incidentally, did not acquiesce to her ex’s request, though the whole incident did make her reconsider how much of her spending life she wanted to make public.

Bitcoin’s Price Busts, So Hackers Change Tactics

So the fall of bitcoin’s price did have an unexpected upside – but only for as long as it took hackers to find a suitable replacement.

Raising a White Flag Over Q1 Cookie Sales

The season of the cookie is upon us: specifically, the Girl Scout cookie.

We eagerly await that girl’s future as the CEO of Amazon after Jeff Bezos retires to live on the moon full time.

But for those six to eight weeks, the Girl Scouts have managed to achieve near-unilateral surrender from the rest of the industry. No one wants to take on the little girls in the green sashes.

So what do big brands do, if they can’t counter-sell?

It does not make the slightest difference. The similar cookies don’t have any effect on Girl Scout cookie sales, and the original cookies vastly outsell the identical copies.

Still, it’s unexpected to see a seasonal jump in healthy food advertising in response to scouts selling cookies.

——————————–

Latest Insights:

Original Source https://ift.tt/2SXvhYC

#IFTTT #Cryptocurrency and Bitcoin

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theconservativebrief · 6 years

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On Tuesday, the New York Times published a bombshell investigation that claims President Donald Trump — who repeatedly bragged on the campaign trail about being a “self-made” billionaire — actually inherited his wealth largely through creative, and possibly illegal, accounting done alongside his father, real estate mogul Fred Trump.

Though Trump has repeatedly boasted about using his business acumen to transform a “small loan” of $1 million from his father into billions, the Times found something quite different. When the younger Trump was just a toddler, the report says, Fred Trump began giving him part-ownership of several properties. Doing so allowed the elder Trump to funnel money directly into his son’s accounts, thus letting him sidestep the 55 percent gifts and inheritance tax. Fred Trump also gave his son at least $60.7 million in loans, many of which were interest-free and not tethered to a repayment schedule.

Some key takeaways from the report:

In 1990, Fred Trump sent a man named Howard Snyder to Donald Trump’s Atlantic City casino with a $3.35 million check, which Snyder used to buy casino chips. He left the casino without even hitting the craps table. That money was, in effect, an untaxed gift from father to son.

Beginning in 1992, Fred Trump’s real estate business began purchasing boilers, refrigerators, cleaning supplies, and other equipment from a company called All County Building Supply & Maintenance instead of a wholesaler. All County, which was owned by Donald Trump and his siblings and charged much higher rates than other suppliers, seems to have been a shell company that existed only to siphon Fred Trump’s money to his children under the guise of business transactions.

In 1995, Fred Trump began transferring ownership of his properties to his children through grantor-related annuity trusts (GRATs), a mechanism through which wealthy families can pass on property to their children without paying gift or inheritance taxes.

As the Times notes in its investigation, there’s a fine line between legal tax avoidance and illegal tax evasion. Some of Fred and Donald Trump’s actions, such as the casino debacle, are clearly illegal. Other things that sound illegal — like avoiding inheritance taxes through a network of trusts — may not be. I talked to Lee-Ford Tritt, a tax law professor at the University of Florida whom the Times consulted for its report, to help me try to make sense of it all. Our conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

Gaby Del Valle

So one thing [the Trump family] did was funnel money from Fred to Donald by giving him part-ownership of buildings. And then they set up shell companies to disguise gifts as business transactions?

Lee-Ford Tritt

The shell company that they’re talking about had two major issues. One, they could inflate the cost of capital improvement on their rent-stabilized apartments. If you put in capital improvements, they could increase those rents. So [Fred Trump] faked capital improvements. Some of that would’ve cost them, say, $20,000, and he was charging, say, $60,000. And by charging himself $60,000, marking up his own boilers and things like that, he was also reducing money out of his estate and passing it on to his children, who owned this shell company.

Gaby Del Valle

So that’s why by the time that Fred Trump died, he was worth a lot less than he was just a few years before?

Lee-Ford Tritt

All estate-planning attorneys want their very wealthy clients to die bankrupt, because they don’t want any estate and gift tax.

Gaby Del Valle

And how much of this is illegal? How do you determine what here is illegal and what isn’t?

Lee-Ford Tritt

It depends on what conclusions you take from the documents they were looking at.

A lot of this, a lot of the wealthy clients do. I think Americans don’t know what they do, and they’re shocked. I think the New York Times reporters were shocked by some of this, and I was like, “No, that’s not illegal.” Probably all uber-rich Americans do this. It’s in the statutes, the courts have approved it, they just do it.

Pushing it to an extreme, you can get into some trouble. So, for instance, when [the Trumps] were valuing their properties, there was this one property they wanted to get a charitable deduction for, and [the appraiser] valued it amazingly high, and that was good for them because they were going to give it to charity and they get to write off charitable deductions from the income tax. Then a very similar property, they transferred it [from parent to child] and they valued it very low to get out of the estate and gift tax. That would be illegal if they knowingly submitted false valuation reports to the IRS.

I think the president’s lawyer would say, “Experts handled all of this.” Well, one, that’s never an excuse for breaking the law. And two, the Trumps, this is their business. They’re not one-time players; they’re constantly involved in the valuation and understanding of the real estate market. They would understand if these were real values or not, and that would be illegal.

Gaby Del Valle

Could they say that valuation is subjective and that’s why there could be a big difference between what one appraiser says versus another?

Lee-Ford Tritt

No two properties are exactly alike, so even though the New York Times was [comparing Trump properties to similar ones in order to determine their value], there would be differences in the properties that would have the valuations. But to have that extreme of fluctuation in valuations, especially with such a short period of time with very similar properties, is rare.

Two, [the appraisal] has to be a good-faith base, and so that’s the difference. Were these [appraisals] presented [fraudulently]? Do they have the objective, the mens rea to submit false reports, or do they actually truly believe it? Would it pass the laugh test? So they might say, “No, no, no, we truly believe this.”

It’s just the circumstantial evidence that makes it suspect. Yeah, they could always have a response, but if they were submitted falsely, that’s illegal. When the New York Times talks about the grantor-retained annuity trust, I think every estate planner will tell you all wealthy planners use GRATs. And I would say yes, they do that, and they reduce [clients’] taxes, but falsifying the valuation of the property that you’re putting into that trust, that’s illegal. That’s where they pushed it too far. They supercharged it.

Gaby Del Valle

Could you briefly talk about the different legal mechanisms for tax avoidance that the uber-wealthy use?

Lee-Ford Tritt

Giving away property for charitable donations reduces your income tax liability. For estate and gift [taxes], you could do it as well.

This would take a long time to explain, all the products that estate planners use to reduce taxes. So few people are subjected to the estate tax, and then we give those people legally a lot of loopholes. We allow people to devalue their property. So, for instance, if I owned a piece of property worth $1 million, and I gave you a 40 percent interest in it, [that stake] wouldn’t be worth $400,000. I wouldn’t be taxed for a $400,000 gift, because I’m the controlling interest of the property and you weren’t there to make any decisions on it.

We would devalue that. We would say, “That $400,000 gift is worth only $200,000.” And then I could give you another $400,000, [devalue that money], and that would still be a minority interest. And eventually, I could give you everything and never pay the full price on the gift. And then GRATs are another mechanism where we play with the value of money and the interest rates. There’s lots of things that the rich will do to avoid taxes legally.

“All my friends who are estate planners are calling me up and going, ‘What’s the big deal? We do this for all our clients.’”

Gaby Del Valle

The Times piece notes that a lot of this — even if it was illegal, it’s not like it can be prosecuted now.

Lee-Ford Tritt

There’s a statute of limitations on the estate of Fred Trump, and that would have been three years. But if [Fred Trump’s children] knowingly gave false information, that could be opened. Now, if the estate doesn’t have any money — it’s been distributed — the IRS could go after the children, the beneficiaries, to get the money back.

I don’t know what the children reported on their income taxes, because I don’t know if these transfers were sales to the children or gifts. They seem to be very complicated. So the children might be liable for what they reported on their own income taxes, and that could still be opened up, although there are statutes of limitations on some of them — if they were done with fraud, [the IRS] could open it up.

Gaby Del Valle

The Trump administration is basically saying there’s nothing here. Is there any veracity to that?

Lee-Ford Tritt

I would say 80 percent of this, 85 percent of this, would be a yawn for the uber-wealthy estate planners. Like, all my friends who are estate planners are calling me up and going, “What’s the big deal? We do this for all our clients.” And once again, that’s a different story — that’s, “Should we allow this or not? Look at what the uber-wealthy are doing.”

But if [the Trumps] falsified valuations or played really aggressively with them, that’s different. If they used these shell corporations to rig the rate increases in the rent-stabilized apartments, that’s something different. There’s smoke there — there could be serious issues there. Now, the president might say, “This is my father. If there was fraud, this was him, not me.” Except the Times has done a good job of showing that he was integrally involved in all of this.

Gaby Del Valle

Are these loopholes in the tax code, or is it just the way things are? And can the government do anything about it?

Lee-Ford Tritt

It’s funny because people talk about them being loopholes, but they’re technically not. These are literally the statutes and what the courts have said are fine. GRATS are so commonly used by the uber-wealthy, and they’re so effective. They can wipe out gifts and estate taxes, hundreds of millions of dollars.

The Obama administration tried to shut them down, but it wasn’t passed by Congress. These devaluation issues I was trying to describe to you, the Obama administration tried to shut them down, saying you can only do them for legitimate business purposes, you can’t do them to avoid estate and gift taxes. Congress didn’t pass that law either.

Gaby Del Valle

One thing that I’m pretty confused about is, at least in terms of the rent-stabilized apartments, [the Trumps] boosted the value of the apartments with inflated costs [through a shell company], but then when these buildings were appraised, they were shown as being really low in value. This just doesn’t make sense.

Lee-Ford Tritt

These are all just strange valuation issues. This is the story I got from the New York Times, when I looked at it and they said, “What was your big takeaway?” I was like, “Wow, they were the masters of valuation manipulation.”

Every one of these things — every issue that the New York Times brings up, the GRATs, these rent-stabilized apartments, every property, everything, there’s a valuation issue involved in there. They’re so blatant and brazen about it. They’re using one valuation for one purpose and they’re changing it for another purpose. And so, you know, what’s so interesting is some of the [formerly rent-stabilized] apartments, they turned into condos, and then they reappraised them for a totally different value. I understand why you don’t understand it; it’s very strange.

One of those apartments, it was in the red — it was worth negative money [on paper]. They were making hundreds of thousands of dollars a month off it.

Gaby Del Valle

So it’s designed to be convoluted?

Lee-Ford Tritt

I think so. And the IRS is so strapped for time, it’s strapped for money and employees in the estate and gift tax divisions, they just can’t catch all of this stuff. And when they do, [the property owners] usually compromise and say, “Okay, I’ll pay 10 percent more,” and the IRS is happy. But really, you were scared about paying 60 percent more, so you just won.

Gaby Del Valle

Is the IRS in a better or worse position to go after this kind of thing than they were 20 years ago?

Lee-Ford Tritt

They’re in a worse position. So few people pay estate and gift taxes. A husband and wife have to have over $20 million to be subjected to the estate and gift tax.

It doesn’t bring in a lot of revenue, plus so few people do it, and there are so many ways to get around them and reduce your estate tax burden that they just don’t have the manpower. Something really has to catch [the IRS’s] attention for them to go off of something like that.

These GRATs that they were talking about, what Fred and his wife did, those GRATs are designed to create zero gift and estate taxes. They [the IRS’s estate and gift tax division] don’t really even have an incentive [to investigate], because they’re not thinking about how the valuation was rigged.

Gaby Del Valle

Bloomberg reported that New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio is going to try to go after the unpaid taxes. Can he do that?

Lee-Ford Tritt

Yes, and so could the IRS. Even though the statute of limitations has run out and [Fred Trump’s] estate is closed, if things were done fraudulently, if they purposely misled, [the IRS] could reopen [investigations] or go after the money. The problem is the estate is closed and the money has been distributed, but there are rules within the IRS that say they can go after the recipients of the money.

This isn’t a criminal action; this is just, you know, trying to get restitution.

Original Source -> Did the Trump family’s tax practices break the law? An expert explains.

via The Conservative Brief

#IFTTT #The Conservative Brief

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christinaspruill-blog · 6 years

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And The Ruts In the Roads?

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