H'lo

I thought I'd do a quick hello and update you on stuff.
Well, I dropped my online writing group. I'd like to get back to it at some point, but right now it was acting as more of an anxiety inducer than anything useful. I just have too much to do. I can see the usefulness when I'm not quite so rushed, but right now I"m on a tight (self imposed-ish) deadline, and the online writing group was just getting in the way.
Unfortunately, while I did have some extra time, and less stress, I still didn't have as much motivation and energy as I needed. not much I can do about the energy, besides coffee. Even the motivation is going to be hard to increase, but I can encourage it but getting rid of some of the things I'd rather do. If I had an office without internet, that would be excellent. But I can't afford an office and an apartment (not that I've found one of those yet) so I've been looking for places with 2 bedrooms, one of which I'll use as JUST a creative office, no  video games, movies, web surfing. it will be for writing (and occasional drawing or playing music possibly) and nothing else.
But that plan has been on hold while I look for a place that meet's my wants, my price, and allows dogs. I have found several that meet two of those, but none that met all 3. Well three actually. but one of those I let pass because I thought I found two better options. in the mean time, the better options stopped returning my calls for a week, and when he did both the other places he had were no longer available. CURSES!
Anyway, so I've been without an office, and I'm easily distracted by my A.D.D.  like dyslexia (apparently it's one of the symptoms of dyslexia) which tends to lead to watching tv, playing video games, surfing the web, etc.
Then this occurred to me today while listening to the podcast Writing Excuses: I could go to the library! It's likely to be quiet, people aren't likely to bother me. If I need the internet it's right there, but I'm not likely to be so comfortable I'll start watching a movie, or playing a game. and I'm also not likely to fall asleep there (as I often do unintentionally at home). I probably wont get there everyday of the week, but if I can get there for a couple hours, 3 or 4 days a week, that will help alot!

Alright, I've got some things to do if I'm going to get there today (which I may not, I've already ran, and am falling asleep, but I'll try.) Have a great day!
XD

Unknown setting

So Sunday my writing group did an exercise for writing setting. I tend to struggle with writing setting. When I read, I tend to let much of setting details float by. I think setting is often times used pointlessly, or simplistically. It's purpose is often times to do little else but to paint a literal image in the reader's mind. But I tend to base the images off of personality or atmosphere, and memories much more than I do off descriptions. When the description serves more than one purpose, It sticks with me better. for example, when I read about Jim Butcher's character Waldo Butter's jet black hair, I remember it, but I don't visualize him that way. I visualize him as having dirty blonde hair. But when Patrick Rothfuss talks about his character with red hair, bright red, red as flame.  I remember, the image is powerful, it's brought up many times, and it is woven into the story. it's important. Now, Butters is a side character, and there can't always be importance to hair. Yet character description is demanded by the readers..... Long story short, because I often times ignore descriptions when I read, I tend to forget about descriptions, or forget the details of descriptions when i write. So practicing this was especially needed by me.

In the prompt, each of us was given a popsicle stick with a name of a setting, steam punk, ancient Japan, post apocalyptic, Egyptian, USA in the 1920s, etc. I wont give mine away, but I knew very little about it. We were also supposed to describe it as a tour guide, but by the time i'd wiki'd my subject, I'd forgotten that detail.

In entering the section of the city I call home, I always finds myself with
mixed emotions. The world isn't what it was expected, the last great war
had ended, it was supposed to end all wars. In those sections of the city
soldiers danced in celebration of the end of wars. In my city, there was a
new war, a younger war.
There was progress too. 3 sky scrapers fought for dominance of the sky,
two twins and a younger brother. It's one of my favorite sights. depending
on the angle, the towers looked both complete and in progress. construction
Workers toiled to finish, and desk jockeys rode elevators to offices.
And then there was our leadership. "I am not a crook" played on every screen
was echoed in mocking by small children. No things weren't perfect. The
ideology of uninhibited love of the previous decade had faded, and was fading.

I think that came out pretty decent actually. Can you guess my setting? 1970's America.
anyway, gonna try to work up the motivation to write some novel now.

Shutgun. Head. Sweet relief.

Dramatized reen-countment(made up word):


Another day at rayovac, working the ol' grindstone. AAA batteries in packs of eight are taken from a conveyor belt, and placed in display trays, ten per trey, cardboard seperators are placed on 3 trays of batteries before those trays are packed into cardboard boxes.  The seperators don't actually do anything, but walmart and Rayovac like to pretend they keep they keep the cards from bending. 250 of those boxes are stacked on a pallet and wrapped up to be shipped out. a normal day, with one caviot. A nerd believes he's found a common soul. I was not the nerd.... somehow.


I'm going to shorten the nerds names for comedy (and two irony's one for you and one for me.)


Fat: Oh, so wanna be an author, huh?


Me: *I shrug* yeah, I -


Fat: Oh that's cool. Yeah I like to think of myself as a writer too. A writer and a reader.


Me: Oh yeah? what do you like to read?


Fat: Oh all sorts of stuff. Harry potter, star wars, twilight. I like good quality stuff.


Me:....................... yeah, a lot of people like those books. I read harry potter.


Fat: Oh, not just the books. I love the fanfic. Fanfic in general is just awesome. I don't know why they don't publish some of that stuff.


Me: *Trying really hard not to slap myself in the forehead* I've never been a big fan fiction reader.


Fat: Well, sure you said you're a writer. so what do you like to write about? you ever do cross-overs


Me: Cross overs?


Fat: Sure, like harry potter vs. the darkside. Prof. Lupin and the half blood vampire. Cross-overs. Actually I wrote that last one. Lupin falls in love with Bella's daughter. Well not love, just immutable attraction. I think it's my favorite of all my writing.


Me: Yeah I don't really write fanfic.


Fat: What? Why not?


(By the way, next two blocks of dialogue are as closed to word for word as I can remember)


Me:..... Well...... (if you write fanfic look away)..... it's not real writing. You can't publish it either.


Fat:..... Sure, you can. There's lots of websites outthere that let you post fanfic.


Me: sure... but that's not the kind of published I'm going for.


Fat: So, then what do you write about?


Me: well, lots of stuff. Mostly speculative fiction (scifi/fantasy/horror/etc). I wrote a book about a carpenter that learns to use magic, finds out the history behind his runaway father, and saves a city from an evil-


Fat: so... was he like Harry potter's friend or something? was he a weasley? Don't call the evil thing Voldamort, he's dead. Try... moldavort! and you're welcome for that.


*Shotgun. Head. Sweet relief. (by the by, if I had a blog where I only complained about things, this would be my sign off. No you can't use it, I may not be done with it.)

aaaaaand Break.

     So I've spent a few hours writing. not sure when I started. Tenish? anyway, I got a couple thousand fresh words cracked out. It's about what I'm expecting from myself. if I'm in the zone I can write 500+ thousand words every 15 minutes. But that is usually spaced out with times of "hmm what happens next" and "how can I phrase this". Writing that quickly generally puts more words on paper, but I often hate what I'm writing in those times. looking back at them, they usually aren't too bad, but I'm less confident in them as I go.
     I also revised a section of the story that I realized wasn't following cannon, that took some time. But it wasn't as aweful as I was expecting. actually, I was really set to write. If I can write this much every day, and maybe 5k extra on weekends, I should be set come september. Today this goal feels very attainable. I'm getting tired, so I don't know that I'll be able to write more today, but I think I'm okay with that.
   
     The website is coming along too. I'm not likely to have it completed by the July, but we'll see. I'm going to try to get some more out of the way right now.  So far, I have the main page pretty much finished. I haven't uploaded it yet, so no checking! I've got 3 goals for it this afternoon. I'm going to try to get a template set up that I can post my web book (Seven Kingdoms) and a mirror of this blog on. That shouldn't take long, as I know about what I want. With that done I can quickly mirror what blogs I've written (since the start of the year anyway). If I have time and energy, I MIGHT also do a quick revision and post of the first section of the novel. I'll probably make it a teaser though, since I don't have enough written yet to really start posting. But I might be able to get word out, get people interested. I also want to make a "Sorry this page hasn't been created yet, this is a beta version of the site. please check again later! XD" page.

      Alright, I'm going to go attempt to do this. But one final note. I've found that listening to music helps me, so long as I can't sing along, and it's high energy. So I've been listening (for several hours) to this japanese music, it's odd, but I like it, and it meets the requirements. Thanks pandora! I will take my check now (God that joke is tired)

Duces!
XD

I hate Melan....

Alright, I'm getting tired and I'm running out of steam. but I felt like I needed to blog.

Today I had no incentive to write. I felt whiny and crabby and tired when I tried to start. I could almost hear myself complain "But I don't WANT to do that right now." The thing was I didn't want to do anything. I didn't want to watch tv, read, write, eat, swim, sleep, stay awake. I had no interest in any kind of activity or choice. It was a very melancholic/lethargic mood, and it's something I struggle with at times.
I like to entertain myself with the thought that Sherlock Holmes suffered from similar fits, and were usually preceded at proceeded by fits of periods of genius and accomplishment. They were likely brought on by the drug use, but w/e.

I don't know that genius ever comes before or behind these bouts of lethargy, in some kind of cathartic balance; but I do know that making myself be more than mindlessly active while I feel that way sucks.

However. that doesn't mean there isn't a nice pay off if I manage to subvert my subdued feeling. But today, I forced myself to write. I pushed myself to put out 2k words, and for the first 1.5k I was checking my word count every couple hundred words. It was arduous, but  finally I was just 400 words away, so I decided to do a 15 minute word spring, to finish up. 15 minutes later I was just shy of 500 words, and it wasn't long after that that I had surpassed my goal of 2k words by over 500 words.

The writing isn't perfect, and I messed up the cannon a little bit, but I surpassed my goal for the day. and more importantly, I over came that whiny voice that wasn't willing to be satisfied with any course of action.

So yay me! I have realized something through this though. If I was very lucky, and motivated, I could reach my every goal by this fall. I could create a website, write a book, finish a book, and revise both books, while writing a third book that I'd be posting to my website. It's possible I could achieve all these things by the time I go to worldcon in the fall. But it's possible that september will find me with no upkept website, no routinely updated book or blog found on the website. and two unfinished, unrevised books.

So what can I cut out? The website shows a level of seriousness, that I'm hesitant drop. But at this stage in my career, there's not much I can post on there beyond the blog and free book. So I can't really cut either of those things if I plan to keep the website. I'm changing my publishing of the web book to a weekly post of 5k words, in an attempt to give me a better chance to remain consistant.

But it wont be enough. I had to decide which novel to get manuscript ready by the fall. One of them, has 60k words written already. The other has around 6k But WtL, has two drawbacks, despite being further along. One, I am very undecided about many aspects of it, and I'm struggling with what to rewrite. and two, it's the first book in a series. New authors are much more likely to sell a stand alone book than a series. It's also my first novel, and therefore not likely to sell. Perhaps I could finish, revise, and make it manuscript ready by the fall, but I'm not even confident I could do that.

While, I'm not thrilled at the idea of dropping WtL for the next several months, distance might provide a new perspective. I also have the new novel (tentatively named Brendon's darkness) outlined in many ways. the specifics are still coming to me, as I'm largely a discovery writer. but I know the story line. I have the plot summery worked out. it shouldn't take me long to bring it to a full length novel. The goal is to have it written by august, and revised by September. and made manuscript ready by the end of the first or second week in September.

Even this goal feels slightly daunting today, especially considering I'd like to have eight posts totaling 40k words written and posted in my 7kingdoms, web novel.

Deep breathes everyone. I can do this. I will do this. That said, this blog may take a bit of a hit in that time. I'll post at least once a week, but I can't guarantee it will be more than that. Once the fall hits, I'll start working up to daily posts again.  Although, november will likely see a decline for nanowrimo, but we'll worry about that when we get there.

For now, wish me luck. And take care.
XD

Big fat liar

      One of the things I have had a difficult time with in the past, is accepting that what a character said was a lie. I think authors don't tend to do that much in dialogue. When two characters are talking about something, they tend to answer truthfully and fully, unless they are a villainous character up to no good.  But it seems as though general lies, told out of embarrassment, or impatience, or gloating, don't tend to be told very often.
    I was just writing a scene in which a character was explaining how he would found it cowardly to send a man to the gallows, rather than face him in single combat. While the character believes that, he neglected to say that a part of him relishes in killing scumbags. I was on the verge of sharing that information out of reflex, when I realized I didn't have to. and I would never have to. the character could lie.
     I think sometimes we only recognize lies in stories if they are told by traitors, or if the narrator or pov character reveals their deceit. But I think authors probably often allow characters to tell half truths, without the revelation; small lies that you really would only pick up on by rereading, or knowing the true personality of that character.

Alright, well that was short. but that's okay. Maybe a joke. One I heard a while back.
Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says, "Does this taste funny to you?"
XD

Uphill battles, and averting "Meta"

When I last posted, I said I wanted to start blogging daily. I'm sure it'll take a while before that truly becomes a habit, but ya gotta start somewhere. and since I tend to have a lot of false starts before I actually start, I gotta start my false-starts somewhere too.

A couple weeks ago I started running in the employee fitness center at Rayovac (where I'm employed), I'm a couch potato in general, and I'm very out of shape, so I go back and forth between running and quick walking, pushing myself to run longer and faster every visit. When I'm on the treadmill I have often listened to music or audiobooks, and I'll focus on these things when I'm doing the running portion especially. Today I forgot my headphones. I had gone out to my car to swap my boots for running shoes, when the realization struck me that I had no means of distracting myself from the slowly ticking seconds. One other time I'd ran without them, and every step was miserable. I was too aware of my running, of my exhaustion. I was overly aware that I had just finished working a draining eight hour shift spent entirely on my feet. I nearly just called it a day and went home. Instead, I set my jaw, and ran anyway. There will always be things to distract us from our goals. Loosing weight, getting in shape, these things will never be easy (hence the failure of every easy diet and simple weight-loss pill/drink/earmuffs), so when a new difficulty comes along, we can't let ourselves get frustrated. Part of us thinks "I'm already fighting an uphill battle, it's not fair that I have to face _____ too!" (for me that blank would have be filled with "focus"). Instead, we have to remember that we chose to fight an uphill battle, rather than accept the alternative. the missing headphones of problems, changes nothing.
Two things relate this to writing, first off, Becoming an author is another uphill battle, and I'm bound to run into some problems I didn't expect, or I hoped to avoid. When they surface, I'll have to remember, that I was prepared to face them in order to obtain my goal.
Secondly, while running in silence, I was able to distract myself with a new book I'm working on, and I feel like I came up with some neat advances, including character backgrounds, and world possibilities  that could be explored in a sequel, without ruining the stand alone nature of the initial book. so Yay!

I was going to share a "daily to do list" I wrote up this morning, but I feel like I've occupied a sufficient amount of both our days with this post already. A hint tho, this blog was on the to do list (whoa, Meta! j/k) xD