About me:


I'm female, born in 1955, and live in the U.S.

I have a degree in English and History from Duke University.

Among other things, I have been a professional editor for over 17 years, in New York City (1985–1992) and in San Francisco (1992–2001). Editing in all fields: journalism, nonfiction, textbooks, medical, legal, fact-checking, copyediting, proofreading, etc.

I started editing Wikipedia in mid 2006, and created an account in early 2007.




Invaluable resources for researchers:

BookFinder.com

AddAll.com

On those sites you can find any book, and at the very cheapest prices.


Finding stubs and making them grow

A stub is an article that provides at least a basic definition but does not go much beyond it. It may not be the perfect article yet, but each stub should have the potential to become one. See Wikipedia:Find or fix a stub for ways to locate stubs. For example, click what links here on that same page, or on Template:Stub (the stub notice).

Still not enough stubs? Then try Wikipedia:Requests for page expansion, or set the threshold for stub display in your user Preferences. That option sets a number of characters threshold value. Links to articles with fewer characters are shown in dark red. This makes it very easy to spot stubs. If the stub notice is a generic notice consider sorting the stub into a stub category.

To add this auto-updating template to your user page, use {{totd}}

To add an invitation to WP:The Wikipedia Adventure to someone's talkpage, use {{subst:Wikipedia:TWA/Invite|signature=~~~~}}

Wikipedia:The Wikipedia Library

Wikipedia:Twinkle


WP:Advanced source searching

  1. WP:MEDRS about referencing
  2. WP:MEDMOS about language usage and ordering of sections
  3. WP:MEDHOW about formatting refs



Tip of the day/July 18


Cricket (musical)

Exploring Music

Bill McGlaughlin

Saint Paul Sunday

Compositions by Bill McGlaughlin

Gianna Rolandi

Metropolitan Opera radio broadcasts

Cosmopolitan (film)

Leon Jessel

Hans Brinker

The Nasty Bits


Barnstars

edit
BARNSTARS (click to view)
  The Music Barnstar
For contributions to articles pertaining to music and the arts, I award Softlavender the "Music Barnstar" --Jh12 (talk) 00:49, 27 September 2009 (UTC)
  The Editor's Barnstar
Good work on sourcing content for Father Damien. Viriditas (talk) 03:52, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
  The Original Barnstar
For helping me improve Diane Harper, I award you this barnstar. Jinkinson (talk) 16:44, 20 September 2013 (UTC)
  The Article Rescue Barnstar
Thank you for your great work on Luke Barnett. A fine example for us all on how to fix an article up for deletion! Peter in Australia aka Shirt58 (talk) 13:43, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
  The Civility Barnstar
Thank you for your support of me during a recent situation regarding another editor. I really appreciate it, Daniellagreen (talk) (cont) 00:11, 12 July 2014 (UTC)
  The Original Barnstar
Just because I admire your continuing excellent contribution. — | Gareth Griffith-Jones |The WelshBuzzard| — 19:44, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

The Sorcerer's Apprentice
Thank you, soft professional editor with a user page full of help, for quality articles on music and theatre, such as The Sorcerer's Apprentice, Jack Lowden and the list of compositions by Bill McGlaughlin, for redirects and a firm focus on improving, - you are an awesome Wikipedian!

--Gerda Arendt (talk) 09:11, 13 January 2015 (UTC)

  The Writer's Barnstar
Thanks for the "education" on possessives on the JC Superstar page! As I am NOT a professional, it was good to learn something new. Is there a resource you could recommend on these kind of issues? Thanks again! THX1136 (talk) 15:30, 25 February 2015 (UTC)
  The Original Barnstar
This barnstar is awarded to recognize particularly fine contributions to Wikipedia, to let people know that their hard work is seen and appreciated. Hafspajen (talk) 14:46, 4 November 2015 (UTC)
  The Copyeditor's Barnstar
For contributions "above and beyond ..." on Champagne Charlie (1944 film). FWiW Bzuk (talk) 21:32, 22 November 2015 (UTC)

Precious again, your musical rescue work on Bach's cello suites
--Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:02, 23 November 2015 (UTC)

  The Defender of the Wiki Barnstar
for your diligent efforts to find resolution in the Winkelvi ANI, a thankless task performed well and in the face of much heat and antagonism. Figureofnine (talkcontribs) 14:36, 26 March 2017 (UTC)
 
 
 
Softlavender
Scenic Lavender Field
 
Editor of the Week
for the week beginning May 27, 2017
A hard-at-work 10+ year veteran with over 60,000 edits. 82 articles created. Her excellent diplomatic skills are a true example of the type of editor that is the backbone of this encyclopedia.
Recognized for
Outstanding negotiating and mediation skills
Notable work(s)
Creating and maintaining articles over a wide range of topics.
Nomination page


On 3 June 2023, Did you know was updated with a fact from the article Plas Dinas, which you recently created, substantially expanded, or brought to good article status. The fact was ... that Lord Snowdon and Princess Margaret spent much time at his family's Welsh country mansion Plas Dinas, but after his father's death the estate went to Snowdon's younger half-brother? The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/Plas Dinas. You are welcome to check how many pageviews the nominated article or articles got while on the front page (here's how, Plas Dinas), and the hook may be added to the statistics page after its run on the Main Page has completed. Finally, if you know of an interesting fact from another recently created article, then please feel free to suggest it on the Did you know talk page.

 

Tip of the day

/test


To delete old userpages: {{db-g7}}

User:Dispenser/Reflinks


Wikipedia:WikiProject Films/Style guidelines

Wikipedia:WikiProject Films


Wikipedia:Your first article

/tutorials

Stuff to look at later:

To reply, this is how it should go:

Original post "What cars do you like?"

First reply "I like Volkswagens!"
Reply #1 to first reply "I think Volkswagens are stupid.."
Reply to reply #1 to first reply "No, they're great!"
Reply #2 to first reply "Me too!"
Second reply "I like Hyundai!"
Reply #1 to second reply "I think Hyundai cars break down easy"
Reply number three "I like Honda!"
Reply number four "I like Saab"

Of course those would all use ~~~~ after them to sign