Case of the Mondays

What I think about when I get to work:
1. Damn I have a lot of homework to do.
2. Damn I have a lot of house work to do.
3. When am I going to have time to work on my novel?

What I think about when I get home:
1. Don't want to do homework.
2. Don't want to do house work.
3. When am I going to have time to work on my novel?

What I think about when I'm doing my homework:
1. I should really do some house work. This place is a mess.
2. When am I going to have time to work on my novel?

What I'm thinking about when I'm doing house work:
1. This is way better than doing homework.
3. When am I going to have time to work on my novel?

What I think about when I'm actually writing my novel:
1. I should really be doing my homework.
2. I should really be doing the house work.
3. I should be working right now, but eff it, it's almost the end of the day.


Brought to you by A.D.D. Because only having one thing to think about is clearly too boring!

I was RESTING MY EYES

Brief tangent before we even start: I have issues with starting blog posts, social network status updates, and paragraphs in general with the word "So." I almost did that here. Almost. I caught myself just in time. Improving my writing one repetitive word death at a time.



Teh Sass has issues keeping up with her writing. News at 11.

I've decided that I'm going to try blogging again once a week. I think I can handle that, even when school starts again in a few days. It won't be the TLDR once a day posts of yore but it's better than writing a couple of posts once a year right around NaNoWriMo time. (Sadly, that was one of the reasons I came back now -- I remembered it was almost time to get obsessive about NaNo. Blog? What blog? Oh YEAH. That one! Aww, look at all these kyoot widdle posts from like THREE YEARS AGO. Holy crap.)

I miss my blogging sessions. They were great exercises in creative flow. I miss the process of composing my [many] thoughts into a random bit of silly, finding just the right picture to punctuate my statement, and leaving random bits of youtube for myself to remind me of what was interesting to me at the time. Plus, doing the blog thing is kind of a warm up to doing the novel thing. I haven't written something worth squat outside of NaNoWrimo in YEARS. What the eff happened to me? Gah!

I will get back into writing on a regular basis. Oh yes, I will.

In other news, I've returned to the social networking scene and revived my Twitter account as well as joined Google+. Not gonna lie, Google+ is the best thing on the internet since captioned cat pictures. I'm slowly trying to coerce friends and family to join me there. Something I was pleasantly surprised to see was all the photographers that popped out of the woodwork in Google+. Photographers and Nerds. Artsy peeps and the tech-savvy. My kind of crowd! Part of me actually hopes it stays that way. Please, Google, please don't allow business pages on Google+, or if you do, do it like you did with the games and make them completely ignorable!

Seriously, love me some Google+.

Another thing I usually do that probably annoys you as much as it does me: start my ending paragraph with "Anyway." Not gonna do it. There! See me not doing it? VICTORY IS MINE.

See you guys next week. Gotta get back to the grind!





~~Sass~~

Almost! Almost!

Tomorrow is the Harry Potter madness! So excited!



(Also, sorry for not posting for two weeks. I didn't realize it had been that long between posts. Bad Sass. Bad.)

I'm rolling right along with NaNo. Right around day eleven or so I had a change of heart with my story and took a three day break. It was a good break, because I came out of it and decided that no, I was not going to write this story from the perspective of the snakeshifter. No, I was going to write it through the perspective of one of the very human coworkers of the snake shifter. And not just any human coworker. No! I was going to write this thing through the perspective of the office gossip chick.

Let me tell you, things got interesting.

I did get three days behind in my writing, though, and I'm still working to get caught up from that. Last night I was "only" 4800 words behind. I'm going to try to get back on track by the end of this weekend, and then I'll tackle the holiday when it gets here.

Thanksgiving typically kills my word count. If I'm not ahead of my word count by that Wednesday, I'm generally doomed to miss my 50k goal. We're traveling back to KC again this year (MO side, kthx) to see family and of course we have to hit all three Thanksgiving dinners. But I will make 50k this year. I will. Why?

I want my discount on the Windows Scrivener!

So yeah. Cheer me on. I'm totally making it this year.

To keep in the spirit of Harry Potter-ness, here it is. The Harry Potter cast tries their best at American accents. Enjoy!

'American Talk' With Josh Horowitz And The 'Harry Potter' Cast



~Sass~

Cold Hearted Snake

Snakeshifters. Yes, there, I said it. I have snakeshifters in my NaNo this year. The awesomeness that is reptilian were-form has me trying to think up all kinds of great battle scenes for later in the story. Although, typical to NaNo, I haven't quite figured out who my bad guys are yet. I've simply referred to them as... THEM. In capital letters. It's my flag to go back and change the reference once I know their identities. I can't tell you how jerky it is to read through a paragraph and see "THEM"... "THEY"... "THEM"... "THEIR," but oh well. It's all part of the fun.



I am a little behind, though. As my husband put it, our 7 month old "thinks sleep is for the weak," and by that I mean as of last weekend he's been waking up crying multiple times a night. I don't know if he's teething again or what. Since it's super dry here we started running a humidifier in his room. That helps some but he's still waking up way more than he should, and it's making my brain short circuit. Hard to stay up late and meet that word goal when I suddenly cease to function after about 7:30.

I'm most of the way through season 2 of Weeds, though. That show is freaking hilarious.

We have a new plan to tackle our lagging word counts tomorrow. Multiple birthday parties and game nights shall not interfere with snakey NaNo goodness!

Hi, How's It Going?

Wow. It's almost been a year since my last blog post. It's like I've been busy or something.

< ~~ (Totally his fault.)

I've decided that I took way too long of a break from writing and I need to get my ass back in gear. I miss it. It misses me. But you'll have to excuse the first few posts because woah I'm rusty and this isn't as easy as it used to be. Stuff no longer flies from my fingertips like... like...

Well, see, there you go. I can't even do a simple simile anymore! Aaahhh!

I'm not going easy on myself, though. Jumping right back into NaNo again this year to make sure I can hit the ground running with some of the ideas I have fighting for life in the accumulated mommy slush that is my brain. After taking a two year break (!) from my wolf story I went back and read it and got excited all over again. Need to spruce up the ending, work on some consistency issues, and get that puppy submitted. That's it. I'm doing it this year. (ooo, look, I accidentally made a pun!)

In the mean time, to keep you all entertained, witness the frightening glory that is Germany's Got Talent:





~Sass~

The Game Plan

Okay, so I'm lagging a little bit on NaNo. Lagging is better than a complete stop, however, so I've come up with a game plan to keep myself in his race.

Right now I stand here:



Technically, I was supposed to be here by the end of last night:



That's about 4200 words behind. But, that's okay. I've been behind for all but the first day of this NaNo and I haven't stopped yet. So what is my plan? There are a few things to consider.

1 - We're leaving for KC on Wednesday, and we're driving. From Denver to KC is about a 9 hour drive if we speed a little more than is necessary and don't stop much. It might be 10 hours if we decide we're not in that much of a hurry, or if there are too many Kansas State Troopers hanging around. Since I'll be in the passenger seat of our comfy rental car (because we are so not taking OUR car on that long of a trip) I'll have some time to pound out a few thousand words. If I don't get carsick.

2 - I'm pretty much not going to write from Thursday to Saturday. This is because I have a very large family and multiple Thanksgivings to attend, plus my mom's 50th bday party on Saturday, and some additional baby shower registering on Black Friday (*shudder*)... not to mention the fact that there are a lot of people waiting to see the pregnant lady. I still haven't posted or sent anyone baby bump pics so they're kind of antsy. Due to the insane amounts of food I'll be eating that baby bump will probably expand to make me look like I'm 7 or 8 months along instead of 6. Anyway, not a lot of writing from Thursday to Saturday.

3 - This leaves me with only Sunday (and if all else fails, Monday after work) to do any catch up from Thanksgiving week. That blows. Why? Because Sunday is November 29thth, the next to the last day of NaNoWriMo. The site will be slow from everyone validating their word count -- which is why Monday after work is completely out of the question. If I wait until the last minute to update my word count I may not register as crossing the finish line within the deadline even if I DO actually do it. This means I want to have my NaNo completely done by Sunday the 29th or I only want to have 1-2k left to go.

So, with all of that in mind, I have to be damn productive from now until next Tuesday.

I figure if I can make myself pump out a good 3k words a day from now through Tuesday, that will leave me with a word count of approximately 46,400. Like this:



(I like pictures, can you tell??)

That means all I would have to do is write 3,600 words between Wednesday through Sunday. My hope is that I can write those 3600 words in the car on Wednesday and have some breathing room for Thanksgiving, but this is uber slacker we're talking about here. I'll probably get 2k in the car and have to find time to write the last 1600 somewhere in there. This is assuming, of course, that I actually make my 3k a day word goal from now until then. But I shall banish such pessimistic thoughts.

I CAN DO THIS.

And if I can't... well, hey, I've got more words written this month than I've done combined in the last two years. That's huge. I've found out that even when I'm brain fried and baby tired (which is like every day after 6pm) I'm still able to force 1k words into a word processor a night. If I choose, I can make that a daily ritual. And I will choose to do that. Oh yes, I will. I miss writing. It's time to insert it back into my busy life.

Root for me, people. I'm on the path to victory!


~Sass~

NaNo: Day 1. Success!

Here it goes, then. Almost a year of writing damn near nothing and I started NaNo at a pretty good pace. Just a little over 1k words in the morning followed by a grand total of 1964 words by the end of the day.

I DID IT. I STARTED WRITING AGAIN!

No school makes a lot of difference. I don't feel pressured to hurry up and write so I can do my homework or vice versa. There's no guilty conscience screaming in my ear about stuff I'm supposed to be doing other than writing ridiculous prose. (Well, almost no guilty conscience. I was supposed to finish cleaning the computer room today and that sort of didn't happen. Shhhhh.)

Also, I'm a slacker of epic proportions. I totally didn't tell you guys.



We're expecting a little bundle of testosterone!!! (OMG, I'm 21 weeks on Monday! I'm past the halfway point!!! Mah belleh, it gets bigger...)

Gonna sign off early tonight so I can go to sleep (*snort*) and get up early to pound out a few hundred words in the morning before work.

And if you haven't started the NaNo craziness... THERE'S STILL TIME. Go! Go on! Sign up already. Start writing.

Or post your word count. Is anyone up for a word war sometime this week? Just let me know. Imma be there to kick your butt.


~Sass~

Y Hallo Thar

Erm. I sort of fell off the face of the planet for a while.

*cue fidgety embarrassed-ness*

I took a break from everything writing related, and apparently I needed it. I haven't blogged, twittered, forum-trolled, or even emailed people unless absolutely necessary. What I have done is take a lot of vacation, get a lot of house stuff done, and watch a lot of TV.

And oh yeah, I got pregnant.

^_^

Teh Sass will pop sometime mid-March. In the mean time I'm starting up night classes again for the fall semester. I'll get 3 classes done by the time November rolls around and be finished for the semester, which I hope will leave me enough time to crank out something for NaNo. I succeeded for 2007, bombed 2008, and intend to fly past the finish line for 2009. I'm not even going to pretend that I'll have the energy to do that, but the actual time I can at least finesse out of my schedule. I'm a writer, damn it. I'm supposed to be writing.

There it is then. I'm not going to say Teh Sass is back in the bloggosphere, but I'm not going to say she's gone again, either.

*cue dramatic fade-out*



Your Moment of Zen:




~Sass~

Ready... Set...

Roadblock.

Okay, so I have a few months off of school and I'm supposed to have more time to write, right? Well not really. But I'm going to MAKE time, GDI, even if I have to pull an hour of sleep from my tired self. There is a weency problem, though.

What do I write about?

I'm supposed to be the one that answers that question. I know this. But I don't know what I'd want to write about that will hold my interest for 80-100k words, and I don't currently have any characters that are trying to beat their way outta my head. I spent three years with werewolves on the brain so I'd rather not repeat that, however it seems any time I think about writing my brain goes straight to my Kate story. I've decided it means I'm not done with it. It needs more love. I'm not ready to put more emotional effort into it, though. It's exhausting being in Kate's head and I'm frustrated with that story beyond belief. I need something fresh to work with.

So, werewolves are out. I'm not doing vampires because the market is saturated right now and even I'm getting a little tired of them (half the time I can't even take them seriously anymore. Thanks a lot, Meyer). I don't want to do demons as they don't hold my interest beyond an occasional read. Other shifters I'm sort of lumping in with werewolves. So in one fell swoop there goes the majority of the urban fantasy genre, and what's left for me to work with? Magic users. Meh. Guardians. Meh. (Although I have to say my Nasaru story from NaNo 07 was friggin' hilarious.)

Let's skip the creature feathers. Features. WTF with the Freudian slip? Been playing WoW for too long (I'm a Balance druid, which in form looks like an owlbear that can go pew pew. Go go laser turkey!). I do also have old stories with feathered hotnesses, but like I said, shifters are out for me right now, and anyway some other really awesome author I know is coming out with her first two books that involve feathery hotness, and I don't want to hitch a ride on her bandwagon just yet.

ANYWAY. Enough with the sidetracks. So if I'm skipping the thought of creature features for now, I suppose I better just find a character personality that suits me and write about him/her to see what hits the page. Don't think I've written anything in a dude's point of view yet so maybe I'll try that. Of course he'd have to be a complete asshole because goody-two-shoes aren't that fun to write about (to me)(unless they suddenly become bad guys which is kind of cliche).

A dude, then. I'll work with that. Let me roll that one around for the day and see if I can come up with an appropriately asshole-ish name.


~Sass~

Stuff I'd Like To Do

So here's what I'd like to try this year. These are NOT new year's resolutions. Why? Because if I make them new year's resolutions, they won't get done. I did, however, include some non-optional stuff on this list just to kind of throw it out there and make myself accountable to the intarwebz at large. We'll see if it works.



For 2009 I want to:

Make healthier eating choices. Note that this does not translate into "Diet"... while I love organizing things and figuring out schedules, planning meals, etc, I tend not to follow them once I've worked them out. Me and schedules, we don't keep up with each other. Also, if I eat a completely unhealthy meal or six I can't beat myself up for breaking my "Diet" and therefore can't feel defeated and give up on it. Instead I can simply shrug it off and do better on the next meals. (Yes, I actually do have to play these mind games with myself. It works though... with the exception of Christmas I did really well on this "plan" the last two months or so.)

Plan / outline / brainstorm at least one complete novel. I originally set this as my three month plan (to start in December and be complete by beginning of March) but seeing as December fell under that holy-shit-busy category I didn't get it started. I don't want to give up on it though, so I'm going to shift that goal up a bit and shoot for Feb / Mar / Apr as my plan time. Which will be followed by...

Write said planned novel in three months. Combined with the previous plan this means have a completed draft zero in about six months. For some of you this seems easy, however I'm a lazy ass that moves at about turtle speed when it comes to writing, so for me this is pretty ambitious. I'm really gonna try not to beat myself up if I don't make this goal. I mean, if it takes me seven months then it takes me seven months. I don't meet the goal but hey I finished it, right?

Be active at least three days out of the week. Notice I didn't say "go to the gym" or "do a few sessions of Tae Bo." I decided not to be specific after having spent an entire week painting our house and moving major pieces of furniture around (in prep for and after the carpet install). It feels like I spent too long at the gym, and my back muscles are now tight enough that my lower back and hips are screaming at me to stretch something. This, I think, counts as being "active" since it was at least an hour of movement / lifting / whatever each day. For future weeks I'll try to find something else to do such as go for a walk or try my hand at one of the classes our gym offers (yoga, pilates, etc). It'll be easier when summer comes -- we love to hike on the weekends.

Stick to the budget. We've made one... now we need to follow it. We've also made an agreement that come hell or high water we want to put aside $20 a week for savings (to later have for either play money or emergencies if current savings somehow runs out). Doing it in small increments like that means it doesn't seem so overwhelming, and if hubby and I each do it, that means we can save $40 a week, or roughly $160 a month, which translates into about $960 by the time he gets laid off (hubby was given like 9 months notice that his last day would be July 1, 2009. Hooray company buyouts and reorgs.)

Find a second renter. We didn't want to do this, especially with a newly finished basement that we want to use as an entertainment room (hello home theatre and/or game night room!). However, do to the looming layoff and some extra bills that need to be paid down or paid off by then, we have to say goodbye to our extra room and stick another renter in it. Hubby is going back to school and can't hold a full time job during that time period (nursing school) so we need the extra income. Not even "want." We need it. Sigh.

Finish one of two bathrooms. Because having two crappy 1980s bathrooms with the hubby and 1-3 renters is just not going to cut it. The downstairs bathroom hasn't been updated since the house was built in 1978 and the upstairs one has carpet (with the original brown and orange 1978 laminate under it) and unpainted walls (because one of the very first things we did was rip off all the wallpaper and slap some mud on there. Yes really, there was carpet and wallpaper in the upstairs bathroom. WTF).

Take a two week vacation. Technically, I get three weeks a year plus 10 holiday days, a floating holiday, and 5 sick days. Also, since we were bought out by Staples, all of our accumulated sick/holiday time will be converted to vacation days as of July 1 because Staples doesn't allow year-to-year rollover. Use it or lose it by Dec 31. Since I've never before taken a consecutive two week vacation, I want to do it this year.

Read 30 books. This seems pretty easy on the outset -- I mean, I'm a bookworm. I read a book a night if given the chance. But then I take into account the fact that last year I only read like 10-15 books (not counting school related ones) and suddenly that 30 books looks a little more challenging (especially when I remember that we're now on a choke-hold budget).

So yeah. That's what I want to do this year. I'm sure I'll think of more things I want to do but for now I'll stick with that. I'll start putting a little counter at the end of my posts once I start the writing stuff to let you all know where I'm at with this whole goal thing.

And, real quicklike, here's the stuff I want (or have) to do this month:
-- Beta Project, first five pages x3 entries (due by Jan 24)
-- crit Kelly Medding's book 2
-- crit DA's Lethal Lies
-- get to level 80 (no, I'm not there yet)
-- clean up my work file down to 20 days past due
-- purge one box of basement junk a week


What are you guys up to this year? This month? Is anyone else as busy as I am?


~Sass~

Jo Leigh and Book Suggestions

So, as I twittered earlier, I've apparently been living under a rock. I just discovered this and there's only 2 days left on the auctions...



Some of these are really ossim. If I had the money, I might actually bid on the Smart Bitches auction, because you know those books are some good reading. As it is I'm trying to see if there's one that falls under "affordable." One I clicked on at random was up over $300, and lowest I saw so far was $52 (though I didn't look at many of them. I skimmed).

Gives me the warm fuzzies to see so many writers (and agents and editors) sticking up for each other. That's the type of community I strive to join in all my endeavors. (Hey, snarky bitches have a heart too, you know. I do actually care sometimes!)




Oh, also... I need suggestions. I have 4 nieces (soon to be 6 coz of my step-bro is engaged and his lady friend has 2 more daughters) and I don't know what in the hell to get them that they'd enjoy. Bookwise, I mean. (Remember, I'm buying books for everyone this year!)

Does anyone have suggestions for these ages?

niece 1 (sister of 2) – 10 yo
niece 2 (sister of 1) - 8 yo
niece 3 – 4 yo
niece 4 – 1 yo
future sister of 1+2 – 10 yo
future sister of 1+2 – 3 yo


~Sass~

I did it!

I finally got that stupid final scene re-written! Eeeeee!!!!!

(For those of you keeping track, it's taken me way longer than it should to revise this novel. So long, in fact, that I'm putting off my homework to indulge in a gigantic creative streak just so I can have a shot at getting it done before Thanksgiving... 'coz I want to play WotLK, damn it.)

So now, on the novel to do list:

-- finish re-writing denouement, thus officially finishing draft 2 *squee!*
-- run through draft to check for consistency in changes
-- consult trusty beta readers (I heart you guys!)
-- possibly participate in The Beta Project
-- take Beta opinions into consideration and make corrections where necessary
-- write the damned synopsis and query thingy already
-- start accumulating rejections


So yeah. This stuff, I shall do it. Onward!



~Sass~

Twilight: Final Review

Okay, I've had a day to calm down from yesterday's "amigahd!" moment.

And all I can think about is Twilight. The first thing I did this morning when I got to work was run over to Stephenie Meyer's website trying to find an inkling of what she did to sell this book, what her pitch was, so that I could maybe get a better understanding of what she intended when writing the book. (Which I didn't find, and I may try to email her about, because I am that curious. I want to know how she sold this thing.)

Instead, I head to the movie section. Proceeded to spend the next 20 minutes reading info and watching clips.

Despite wanting to punch the main characters in the face, despite feeling robbed of my uber climactic vampire fight there at the end, despite feeling somewhat cheated in my reading experience for various reasons including the lack of vampire fighting, I want to read more. I want to read the other three books. And I don't know why.

I mean, she obviously did something to grab me and suck me into the story as a reader. I think I'm so pissed because my writer side and my reader side are duking it out. My writer side tells me "look, she was inconsistent with Bella's character. She displayed a lot of TSTL syndrome and yet had brief flashes of true intelligence. She fluxuated between depressed and happy so much that she left the bipolar readers in total awe (the behavior of which was unrealistic). Bella's dad was not a chief of police no matter how many times Meyer mentioned it -- he was not a cop personality. Edward is downright creepy (he reminds me a lot of my very controlling and mentally abusive ex boyfriend, which is admittedly most of my problem with this book) and acts like he's eternally 15 years old with an unhealthy puppy love obsession despite being a very much in control 100 year old vampire before meeting Bella. There were too-convenient setups and plot twists everywhere. She sucked at scene transitions. The conflict of the story was internal and lead the readers around in virtual circles for 400 pages before finding external conflict that escalated so fast it stole my breath. Literally, I think the plot was 'they fall in love and shit happens.' (Okay, maybe there was something in there about Bella finding a purpose or something, but it wasn't a main focus.) Then she let the readers down by having Bella pass out DURING the climactic scene, which, while realistic, is a horrible way to tell a story. Oh, and they sparkle. SPARKLE. What the hell? Vampires do not sparkle!"

And then the reader part comes back and says "but it was damned interesting, wasn't it? Like a reality TV show. Why do people watch those? They know it's silly, they know it's contrived, they know the cast is always going to be so outrageously over the top because people become idiots when money is at stake and they're on TV... but it's so friggin' entertaining. And you were entertained, weren't you?"

To which I grit my teeth and mumble, "yes, damn it. I was. But you repeat that to anyone and so help me I will make you pay."

I still maintain that this is very much a Romeo and Juliet story. For those of you that might make a positive association with that play, let me tell you how *I* view it. It's my personal opinion that Shakespeare was making a statement about young love. He was telling us that yes, even in his time, teenagers could be raging idiots. In the span of three days these two teenagers fall for each other so hard that they can't stand the thought of bein apart and through some seriously effed up events end up committing suicide "for love." (A viewpoint which I didn't take until I was several years out of high school... because in high school, I thought it was the most romantic thing ever.)

This is basically how I view Twilight, and it's also the reason I want to punch Edward and Bella in the face -- because they freely admit to knowing their infatuation isn't healthy and they both agree the other would be better off without them. And yet, they don't care. They're like fuck it, let's enjoy our time together. Admirable. Enfuriating. Soap Opera drama at its best, and it sucked me in. I should feel ashamed of myself. But it isn't going to stop me from reading the other three books, is it?

No, no it's not. Damn it.

Then I go on to read about where Meyer got the idea and got Twilight published and stuff. Typical busy-mom writer story about how she wrote in her free time, someone encouraged her to publish the thing, and she did. That was the typical part. Here's the not so typical part: from the time she sat down to start the book and got it published, it was six months start to finish. SIX MONTHS. A few years later and she's a worldwide best seller with a huge movie deal.

I think I hate her now. Jealousy is clawing its way out of my cold little heart. Is my skin turning green? Do I have steam coming out of my ears? How did this become such a huge phenomenon in such a short time? I have bookshelves full of better material.

But it isn't the same material, is it? Meyer hit the nail on the head -- I don't know if she meant to, but she took a love story and a vampire story and made it mesh together in a very unique way. And what sells these days? Stories that stray from the norm. She strays really far from the norm in just about everything in that book. And it got her attention. She stands out. That is why these things are so popular.

I mean, look. Everyone talks about her book. There's reviews everywhere (hello, I just made how many review posts on it? Yeah, ELEVEN, including this one). Smart Bitches did four: one specifically about edward, one that reviewed the book and gave it a D-, one that showed a spoof trailer (which is so full of ossim and amazing it's ridiculous), and one that was trying to figure out the deal with the movie posters. There are hypothetical letters from Edward Cullen to Sarah Palin (coz the Cullens moved from Alaska to Washington), two comic strips (here and here) from headtrip comics, at least one major discussion thread on AbsoluteWrite by published and hopeful authors (which is just one set of forums I troll... and there is probably a lot more to be found, I'm sure) some of which is positive and some of which is fraught with WTFery, and even an MSN Movies article that does another spoof about Twilight: The Lost Script. There's anectdotal evidence everywhere of people loving the secondary characters, of showing up to Midnight Release parties. People that hated the book are spreading the word as fast as they can... which makes others want to read it despite the negative opinions (because we as people like to experience things for ourselves, especially if it's as fucked up as everyone says it is).

So yeah. I can hate this thing all I want, I can talk about burning it and punching people in the face, I can rant all day long about how much of an unhealthy relationship Meyer writes about and how no teenager should ever read the books lest they try to validate their own craptastic and possibly abusive relationships, I can rant for pages upon pages about just creepy Edward and I-need-to-validate-my-life-through-someone-else Bella, never mind any other issues, but at the end of the day...

I still want to read it. I have to. I have to know what happens, and how badly it all goes to hell. What the hell is wrong with me?

/sigh

Basically: I don't get it. And now, if you'll excuse me, I need to go cleanse my brain with some actual work.

Quote of the Day:

(Romeo and Juliette)
Romeo: Is love a tender thing? It is too rough, too rude, too boisterous, and it pricks like thorn.
Mercutio: If love be rough with you, be rough with love. Prick love for pricking and you beat love down.


~Sass~

Oh My

Remember when I showed you my first 51 word "phase" for the start of my NaNo novel? And I was like yeah, I can so turn this into 500 or 1000 words?

Yeah. It turned into 2200.

This is good in that I now know the phase thing works, but now it makes me think about it harder, because apparently I am very good at stretching word count. (What a surprise, right?) Means I need to map out the rest of my phases with a quickness. (No, I did not have them all planned and ready to go. Come on, you know me, I don't plan. lol)

The minimum word count needed per day is 1667 to make it to 50k by November 30th. My personal goal is 2k a day. I mean, it's only 333 words more, not that hard. Very much obtainable if I remember last year's experience correctly.

Only thing is, I wrote 1630 words on Saturday, and 743 on Sunday. I was supposed to have 3400 words to work with this morning and I only have 2373. Good 1k short of the minimum, and I had planned to write 4k by now. Not a very spectacular start.

Buuuuuut... I do like the story, and I'll continue on with it to see if I can get a decent chunk written this month. No one says you HAVE to get 50k. 40 or 45k would still be a nice accomplishment. It would be more than I've written the rest of this year, anyway. (Pretty sad, I know.)

So how is your NaNo going? Are you doing better than I am? Someone want to have a word war with me this week to keep me motivated?

Quote of the Day:

(Rocky Horror Picture Show)
Janet: What have you done to Brad?
Frank: Nothing. Why, do you think I should?


~Sass~

I Can Has Mystery?

This is it, then. I've decided to write a mystery for NaNoWriMo.



The closest I've ever come to a mystery is playing around with a whodunnit sort of thing with a murder in the first half of my first book. Lots of experience with mystery, let me tell you. So what did I do to educate myself? Ran over and asked the good peeps of AbsoluteWrite, that's what!

Got some pretty good info, too. Clair Dickenson brought Thundering Clichés to my attention (which is hilarious), and Ruv Draba posted a pretty good summary of what constitutes a Mystery novel as upposed to other genres. Both are excellent reading.

Then, on a general NaNo tangent, I came across a free book by Lazette Gifford. It's called... NaNo For The New And The Insane.

I love that book. Love. It.

Why?

Because of pages 38-48.

Here, I shall quote part of it for you (because it is, after all, free, and I have given credit where it's due!):

A few years ago I started a new type of outlining I've called the Phase System. It helped me write Kat among the Pigeons -- 102,610 words -- in ten days. Because of the amount of detail in the phase-outline, I wrote 10,000 words a day without ever having to pause or fret over does this work or what comes next problems.

The phase-outline for that particular novel ran over 10,000 words. I can see many of you wincing. An outline that long? Isn't that a waste of time and energy? It depends on what you get out of it in the end. Every one of those 10,000 gained me about eleven words in the novel's first draft. The two weeks I spent writing out the phase outline cut the time I wrote the novel from about fifty-five days (at an average of two thousand words a day -- about where I write under normal circumstances) to eleven days. Even adding the fourteen days it took to write the outline, that's still forty days less than it would have taken me normally.

[[[snipped]]]

Okay, so what exactly is this method?

Phases are written out as key phrases that will bring the action into focus. A phase can be clues to dialogue, if that's what the section's focus is centered around, or it might be a little bit of description, or a set of actions... anything that will make the story move another few hundred words.

Usually a 'phase' will only run from twenty to fifty words in the outline. For instance, this is an example from Gathering (Book 7 of the Dark Staff series -- and this is first draft with only a little touch up).

Phase Outline section:

1. Tristan in the room aboard the ship, resting, thinking about going home, feeling the world changing. It feels like traveling between realities, without any of the work. (28 words)

These few words translated to this:

Going somewhere else...

Tristan rested on the soft bed, feeling out the ship around him and the power beyond it. The metal shell moved through the same space where he and Abby had traveled so often before. Each time they had slipped from one reality to another, leaving friends behind.

Their quest had come at such a cost to them that sometimes he wondered if the Goddess really understood the needs of flesh and blood, whether human or elf. He wondered what she expected, in the end. Did she understand what she asked of her son, and what he paid that she could never give back?

Or could she? They were going... home this time.

He pushed that thought away as quickly as it came.

He could feel the magic brushing against the craft, whispering through the walls and calling to him with a seductive offer of power that he knew, from experience, he could not wholly control. Dangerous power, a dangerous passage... he had never fully understood this place that stood between realities.

The one thing he did know, however, was that this was far less work. He could rest this time, he and Abby both, before they...

He shivered a little.

Tristan?

Abby, somewhere else on the ship, had felt his worry surge up through the crowns. I'm all right. (222 words)

[[[snipped]]]

I look at what I think the novel's length should be and try to work within those parameters. For instance, a young adult mystery might only run 60,000 words. If I have 300 phases written out, then I only need 200 words per phase.

On the other hand, if I'm writing a space opera, I know that I'll likely need the final word count to be at least 125,000 words. If I've only written out 300 phases, that would mean about 417 words per phase. In a case like that, I would likely go back through the phase outline and start looking for areas to expand. If I can add another 100 phases, then I only need 312 or so words per phase. If I can get the number of phases up to 500, then I only need 250 words per phase. This can be a real help during NaNo, where you can look at writing short pieces and making headway on the story. Obviously for NaNo most of you will want to reach 50,000 words. Here is how this might break out for you:

• 60 Phases in the outline -- 834 words per phase -- 2 phase sections per day
• 120 Phases in the outline -- 417 words per phase -- 4 phase sections per day
• 150 Phases in the outline -- 334 words per phase -- 5 phase sections per day
• 300 Phases in the outline -- 167 words per phase -- 10 phase sections per day


Phases rarely ever come out at the exact word count assigned to them. If you assign a lower word count than you expect to do, you're more likely to go over what you need, and that's good from a morale point of view. It will help you move on to the next phase. I've had 200 word phases go to over 1000 words, and I've had some come in at less than 100 words. Don't make your story line fit to the phase word count, though it if is short you might consider adding some details.

When you write out a phase in the outline, get key words and actions into the line. Then let your mind flow to where the character/story would go next. Write it out. If it doesn't work, erase it and try again. Drop in descriptions and clues to dialogue.

[[[snipped]]]

You might -- as I have from time to time -- find that some phases need to be cut, or others need to be added in. Do it. Don't worry about it. What looks clear-cut during the outlining phases sometimes shows a few holes later. Adding and subtracting is fine in limitation. Just don't rewrite the entire outline.

During NaNo I divide the phases up by days to give myself a set number to do. I list everything out in a Microsoft Excel worksheet. Ten phases of 200 words each is 2000 words. A story can move forward very quickly that way.

Oh my God. You can write a novel ahead of time and not cheat! This is an outline for those who don't like outlining... after all, you're still alowing your creative juices to flow, and going back to rewrite 20 words into 200 words is sort of like revising anyway, so there's room to play. It somehow seems more freeing than a traditional sort of outline.

With that in mind, I've got my first little "phase" ready to go (which is kind of long, but you know, I'm working on it):

-- Nikki Swank sits at her desk. David Jones makes his entrance. Nikki puts down her 40oz and makes a smoke ring with her cigar. What do you want? I need your help locating an object. What are you paying me? Lots. We have a deal. Can I get your number? No.

51 Words. I can easily turn that into 500, or even 1000. This is such an easy method, and I can make major mistakes here without having to go back and fix 20k worth of story. I'd maybe have to go back and fix 10 little "phases." This is so full of win I can't hardly stand it.

Now, wait, hold on. I can see some of you trying to slice the air with that eyebrow of yours. Nikki Swank? David "Davey" Jones? Oh yes. These are my characters. I haven't told you about them, have I? [insert wicked grin here]

Nikki Swank is a pr0n name. I'm going to admit that up front for all to see. It was the name I got when I entered my real name into a pr0n name generator, and I liked it so well that I figured, what the hell, I'm going to use it in my NaNo. Davey Jones I just figured was a ridiculously appropriate name match to Nikki Swank. The Pirate and the Prostitute kind of thing. It makes me giggle every time I think about it. I think I might even give him a pirate tattoo and a ruggedly dark appearance.

What? Don't look at me like that. It's awesome and you know it.

So anyway, with some mystery tropes in mind from the earlier list I linked you, I decided that she must 1) have an office, 2) smoke cigars, 3) have a stash of bourbon or whiskey or some such other drink in her desk, 4) have a hot, possibly shirtless man (thanks DA for the suggestion, lol) walk into her office to ask for help, 5) have an entire area of her house dedicated to collections of rare and expensive cigars and alcohol, 6) play jazz music in her office to attract affluent clients, and 7) have a six shooter that somehow never runs out of bullets.

She's also about 30 years old, lives in modern times with a cell phone et al, couldn't tell you anything about the cigars or alcohol she collects (she does it because it helps her image), isn't at all familiar with jazz...

And she dies.

Now, hold on, don't have a hissy fit. I did not just give away the ending.

But I'm not going to tell you what I mean, either. Muahahaha! (You're free to guess, though, and I'd actually like to see you try!)

Anyway, I gotta cut this short. I am still at work, after all. I just wanted to share because, like I said, it makes me giggle.

Quote of the Day:

(Pirates of the Caribbean)
Barbossa: You're supposed to be dead!
Jack Sparrow: Am I not?


~Sass~

On Goals and Planning

I was browsing through my list of umpteen blogs this morning when I came across C.E. Murphey's post about persuing dreams. There was a particularly lolsome statement in there I felt was worth repeating:

In the comments on Mr. Rucka’s LJ, though, somebody was talking about a friend or a sister or somebody who wanted to be (paraphrased wildly because I haven’t re-read it) a high-level New York executive, and who was just out of college and who couldn’t get the job she wanted and felt her family was stepping on her dreams by telling her to aim lower.

This, I feel, is possibly a basic problem with people pursuing their dreams: *lots* of people think they’re going to start at the top, and in fact refuse to consider starting anywhere else.

Does this sound familiar? Because I know a LOT of people that think this way. Pyramid schemers in particular. *koff*Quixstar/Amway*koff* (Yes, we do, unfortunately, know an entire family that got sucked into it. More on this later.)

C.E.'s statement there reminded me of a particular South Park episode.

Oh yes. The Underpants Gnomes.



[In the gnome's cave]
Gnome 1: This is where all our work is done.
Kyle: So what are you gonna do with all these underpants you steal?
Gnome 1: Collecting underpants is just phase one. Phase one: collect underpants.
Kyle: So what's phase two?
[Silence]
Gnome 1: Hey, what's phase two?!
Gnome 2: Phase one: we collect underpants.
Gnome 1: Ya, ya, ya. But what about phase two?
[Silence]
Gnome 2: Well, phase three is profit. Get it?
Stan: I don't get it.
Gnome 2: (Goes over to a chart on the wall) You see, Phase one: collect underpants, phase two-
[Silence]
Gnome 2: Phase three: profit.
Cartman: Oh I get it.
Stan: No you don't.
Kyle: Do you guys know anything about corporations?
Gnome 2: You bet we do.
Gnome 1: Us gnomes are geniuses at corporations.


Because this amuses me -

Quixtar/Amway business plan:

Step 1: Recruit lots of people.
Step 2: ???
Step 3: Profit!

Get it?!


Planning is important. You have to crawl before you can walk. You have to walk before you can run. (Unless you are speshul and skip straight to running, but then you lose out on necessary hand-eye coordination training. Consequences!)

C.E. talked about her plan to become a published writer. She set her goals, she worked towards those goals. She didn't expect to pull a JK Rowling and suddenly earn millions after being published (but boy that would be nice!). She set the bar at a realistic height, reached for it, and guess what? It worked.

Our friends the Quixtar minions are constantly told to write down their goals so that they keep the end in sight. This is fine, but they are specifically told to aim too high. They are told there is no limit on their dreams, and that's nice, but then they fill our friends' heads with the idea that in only a few short years they could own things like a mansion and a yacht. From Step 1: Recruit to Step 3: Profit should only take a few years and there is no end to the money they could make, etc, just as long as they keep recruiting "for the business."

Riiiiiiight.

And then they wonder why it took their mother 8 years to turn a profit on this sort of system. (My awe is two-fold here... one, that they stuck with it that long, and two, that they actually made a profit, even if it was like $100 a month.)

Do I have a plan? Of course. I'm still at Step 1: Write the damn novel. But I have a plan. I perhaps need to put a time limit on the plan to get my ass in gear... but at least I didn't expect to write a book and earn millions. (Quite the opposite, akshully. I fully expected to be a "starving artist" for a while during the whole hone-my-skills thing, but then again, that's why I still have a day job.)


So, what's your plan? Have you set realistic goals for yourselves? Are you working towards them? Or have you had a meeting with the Underpants Gnomes lately?

Quote of the Day:

(South Park)
Mr. Slave: Oh, Jesus Christ.


~Sass~

NaNoWriMo

And so it begins. The pre-event frenzy has hit the internet and writers everywhere are preparing for a month of craziness. Insanity, thy name is NaNoWriMo! Forums are up, swag is on sale, and the plot bunnies have started breeding.

It doesn't actually start until November 1, but many of us get overly-excited thinking about what to write, including me. The rules state that you don't need to plan anything ahead of time. It's encouraged, in fact. But for those of you that like to plan you are allowed to sketch some things in advance as long as you don't actually write any prose.

So, how do we get this ball rolling? You need a character, right? But you can't think of a name. How sad for you. Isn't it great that so many web gurus have set up some name generators just for this purpose?

Seventh Sanctum was built with writers in mind, and they have a full page of name generators that include things like Evil Names, Tavern Names, and Elf Names. Want something more traditional? Try here or here. Maybe you want a Pirate name or a pr0n name or a Mafia name. The list goes on and on... do a google search. You'll get a few million results (and I only wish I was kidding).

So, now you have a name... but you need more than just a name to bring a character to life. Seventh Sanctum once again contains many fun generators for writers. There are random generators for Characters, Quick Story Ideas, a What-if-inator, Villainous Plots, and much more. But what if you're in the middle of your story and you feel there needs to be some sort of plot twist to throw your readers off track? What happens if you start to lose interest in your story? You might want to consider a plot twist generator. Need some advice for your characters? Try this. And be sure to give some love to your Evil Overlord! He needs to be interesting too, you know.

After all of that you can do one of two things: organize, or wing it. I like to wing it, but those of you who prefer a little organization can rest at ease knowing there are plenty of free ideas and programs for you to use. If you like progressively detailed linear outlines try the snowflake method, though it's a paper and pen sort of thing instead of a computer program. If you'd rather have a program, try Spacejock's yWriter. Excellent way to organize and lets you get pretty detailed. Can't stand to be that structured? Try a mind-mapping program instead -- Free Mind. Want to write by the seat of your pants? Sit back and do nothing until November 1! It's that easy!

Also, don't forget to go pick up the official NaNo book, No Plot No Problem. I very highly recommend this book. Each section talks about the different stages of NaNo, and you aren't supposed to read it until you get to that stage (for instance, don't read the part about week 3 during week 1). Excellent book. I'll have to dig it out of a box and have it ready to go for November.

Anyway, I have school work and office work to do, so I gotta go, but I hope some of those links were useful to you (or at least gave you a good laugh!) Ta-ta for now, dah'lings.

Quote of the Day:

“A professional writer is an amateur who didn't quit.” -- Richard Bach


~Sass~

New Ideas

Whilst sitting here at my computer, at work, neither doing work I get paid for nor the homework I'm supposed to have completed for tonight's class, I started thinking about why it is my creative process has mostly stopped for the year. Literally, a year. I haven't written more than 15k words on anything new. Why?

Passion. Or lack of.

Not passion as in hot, sweaty, omg-love-me passion, but passion like an intense desire to get an idea down in writing. That all consuming feeling of I must write this story. Revisions notwithstanding, I was writing my soul into the Kate novel, because I actually had something to say and felt strong enough about it that it needed to be shared with others. Self discovery and inner strength within the younger generation I felt were issues worthy of addressing.

Though now that I addressed it, I currently can't think of anything else to write.

Oh sure, I imagine some funny or oh shit moments as they relate to a particular scene, but the passion isn't there to flesh out the whole story. I'm missing that reason to write. I mean, I guess not everything has to have a point to it, but I work better when it's there. There is nothing wrong with writing merely to entertain it's just that I can't do it right now. I'm not into it.

Let me use one of my story ideas as an example. I thought up a terrific character (okay, I think she's terrific) for a story I thought I would have pursued by now -- a woman with albinism, able to see raw magic despite the legally blind state of her natural eyesight. She comes across a locket that is the equivalent of a magical nuclear bomb. I even thought up a boyfriend for her -- a Haitian Vodoun, one that isn't intense and spooky but treats his practice as something natural. A hobby, even. I stuck them in the middle of modern downtown Denver for hilarity's sake. (Everyone thinks the boyfriend is Hispanic by way of Mexico, and he is constantly explaining the difference to ignorant locals.)

But while the original idea appealed to me, it just didn't have that spark to keep it going. I look back on the few blurbs I have written with fondness, but there is no passion to flesh out that story.

Then there was last year's NaNoWriMo project. Funny idea -- a woman gets a one day temp assignment to babysit for a prestigious company and finds out the children are anything but normal. I wrote that one to about 50k words and set it aside when NaNo was done, but I haven't gone back to revise it. It's funny, but it's also unfinished, and it had an entirely different purpose than my usual writing. I threw stuff into the word processor as fast as I could just to see what I could come up with. An exercise in creativity. It was fun, but I don't feel a particular urge to go back and finish it or do the revisions. There wasn't really a point to that story either other than the fact that it was entertaining.

Blah. I feel like a writing elitist now. "But what's the point of the story?" So not the attitude I want to have.

I guess I'll contemplate the state of my creative self while thinking up some things for NaNo. Maybe the month of carpal tunnel syndrome will snap me out of my funk. I've got my fingers crossed...

Quote of the Day:

"And by the way, everything in life is writable about if you have the outgoing guts to do it, and the imagination to improvise. The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt."
-- Sylvia Plath


~Sass~

Forgot

There was something totally friggin awesome I was going to blog about yesterday...

And then I got distracted. I know, right? What a surprise. It was a good topic, too. At least, I think it was. I'm reasonably sure it would have been entertaining.



Anyway, I need to give a shout out to my gaming buddy who (whom?) I know as Raven, otherwise known as yesitstom in various places across teh intarwebz. He made his first blog post yesterday, I'm so proud! *sniff* Though, in a major FAIL moment I didn't post the comment I had intended to post... it should have said "FIRST!" Instead I got all helpful and shit. (You'll understand when you read it.)

Also, I did a little too much browsing yesterday and found more blogs by authors I like and authors-I-have-yet-to-read-but-really-want-to-go-find-in-the-bookstore-like-right-now. Some I added to my LiveJournal friends list, but most ended up on the side there. See? Aren't they pretty? *points to the blog lists*

Ooooohhh, and I got an idea the other day for revisions.

My idea, let me shares it.

Okay I'll give you a quick rundown here. Kate, mah werewuff chica, is about to have teh proverbial shit hit the proverbial fan. She has a pretty big confrontation with two rival werewolves, in which some people get hurt and die etc, etc, etc. Well, one of these wolves is killed "off screen," so to speak, by my Alpha Male, while the other is a joint kill by Kate and said Alpha Male.

I think I want to change that.

One, I think I want that second kill to be hers and hers alone. She needs it. (Okay, she doesn't need the mental trauma of having killed someone, even if it is a werewolf, but it's something she should probably do on her own to reinforce her independence and generally to leave a satisfying ending to that chapter of her life.) Two, I don't think I want to leave the first kill off screen. I think I'm going to switch it around... Alpha Male will not get that kill, Kate will, and in doing so she will spend a little more quality time with him and possibly add an entire juicy chapter to my WIP (because it *badly* needs it... I'm 3k down from original word count, and original word count was only 77k, which, for those of you in the know, is borderline on the low end of expectations for fantasy novels).

So, basically, I want to give Kate a little more chance to kick some ass and add a few thousand words while I'm at it. Sound good? Yes, I thought so too.

And I shared it with you guys so I wouldn't forget it. Heh.

Quote of the day:

(Arrested Development)
Tobias Fünke: Okay, Lindsay, are you forgetting that I was a professional twice over - an analyst and a therapist. The world's first analrapist.

lawls

Caught Vicki Pettersson's post from yesterday. Awesomely embarrassing and totally hilarious. It's okay Vicki, we've all had moments like that (though admittedly we all haven't run down the street after the guy yelling in Swenglish! hee!).

Also just wanted to pop in and let you all know that I'm back on track after a 2 week break. I hit my revisions yesterday like the fist of an angry God, and chapter 12 is now polished and pretty! Woo! /excited

In other news, Disney's marketing team produced a major FAIL moment in a truly horrifying-yet-funny underwear debacle. Tsk tsk. Either Disney is hiring clueless employees or they (gasp!) may have a few perverts on their payroll.

Quote of the day:

"It's true that we don't know what we've got until we lose it, but it's also true that we don't know what we've been missing until it arrives."


~Sass~