Blog Archives
Look Down, Look Down, Upon Your Fellow Man!
I was writing this afternoon while listening to Les Misérables on Youtube, and damned if the last hour or so of the musical completely tear me away from the writing. Okay, it’s possible that I was also having a tough time with the writing and was more willing to be distracted than usual, but still… Damn that’s a good show.
Looking forward to the movie, but honestly the all-star cast is going to have a tough time living up to the standards set by the London cast I saw. Javert especially stuck out to me, he was on Darth Vader’s level of scary. Good luck matching that, Russell Crowe!
Anyway, I noticed something about Javert’s last song. Spoilers ahoy from here on out! Read the rest of this entry
Remember that Post-A-Day thing?
Incidentally, I did the math and if I can write two posts per day I can still make my goal of 366 by the end of the year with a dozen to spare.
So that’s something. I’m way behind on my NaNoWriMo project, and I have far too many other things to do right now, but it’s good to know that this one is still within reach.
Now I just need to drop my standards enough to pull this stuff off while still getting everything done…
False Dichotomy
A false dichotomy is a fallacious argument that suggests there are only two possibilities when in fact there are more. I’m stretching this quite a bit here, but the spirit of the thing feels right.
In the wake of the election, you’re probably sick of politics. I know I am. But this is the time when we can actually change things, now that we have some breathing room before the mid-terms start another two fucking years of campaigning. Now is when we can make real changes.
In the United States, there were six candidates for President this election, but only two ever had a chance. Two of them I can’t even name off the top of my head. Read the rest of this entry
Injury Update
It’s been two weeks now since I fell down the stairs. For the most part I’m doing well, I can move with only a slight limp and at this point there’s only any pain if I do something stupid like try to put weight on that toe.
Did you know that when you walk a sizable part of your body weight is supported by your big toe? I didn’t realize that until I couldn’t do it anymore.
Fatigue is now a bigger problem than pain. Today I went shopping, and it was exhausting. I took the cane, even though I’m not using it inside the house anymore. I figured there would probably be a difference between walking around the house, where I can sit down at any moment, and walking around a store where I’m on my feet constantly. I’m very, very glad I did that.
It took more than two hours and I now have a bruise on the palm of my hand from leaning on that stick.
This actually sounds worse than it is. The injury itself is healing quickly, and when I accidentally put some weight on it there weren’t wailing alarms in my head like before, though it still hurt. At this point I’m having much more trouble from secondary aches and pains due to walking funny for the last two weeks.
And I just realized that I’m procrastinating from the NaNoWriMo book by stretching this post out. I’m procrastinating from writing, by writing.
Still losing every battle, but somehow winning the war.
One More Day
California votes tomorrow. Don’t forget! If anyone asks for your ID, you probably don’t need to show them unless you registered by mail after 2003, and maybe not even then. We aren’t a vital state in the big dirty fight, but don’t let that stop you. Get out and exercise your voice, and then let’s spend next few years trying to build a better system, because this two-party shit has got to go.
My opinion of the big dirty fight is best summed up by this.
Uh, Amazon?
Last week I dropped my phone in the supermarket and it popped apart and the battery went skittering across the floor. Everything seems to be okay with it, but it scared me. This phone is literally the most valuable thing I own, both in price and general usefulness, and it would have been devastating to lose it because it slipped out of my shirt pocket when I bent over to pick up a bag of dog food.
So tonight I decided I’d spend some of my writer’s block time shopping for a protective cover for it. I went to Amazon to do this because I’m poor and a little cheap, and also an Amazon Prime member, so I wanted to find a cheap one with free two-day shipping.
I told Amazon to show me only Prime eligible items, to NOT show me “add-on” items, and to sort the list from lowest price to highest.
Now take a look at this screen-shot. Read the rest of this entry
Writing frustrations
I have not done well in NaNoWriMo this weekend. Seems like every time I start to really get moving something, or more often someone, interrupts me and by the time I can sit down again I’ve lost the thread.
I did come to a conclusion on the schizo tech question, I’ve decided that if I want it a certain way and can come up with even the slightest, paper-thin justification for it, that’s the way to go. That way it should be almost entirely the way I want things, but I have rules to guide me when I’m not sure how it should be. Plus rules like that give you nice surprises sometimes.
This post is little more than feeling like I’m doing something worthwhile while stuck on my novel. The awful part is that I was moving along well, and had a good, solid idea of where the scene was going to go before I got interrupted, and now I’m clueless. I don’t even know why the characters said what they said, now.
After November, my next writing project needs to be learning to write an outline.
NaNoWriMo update, and Chapter 1
So here we are, near the end of Day Two of NaNoWriMo. I’ve been setting my word count goals at 2,000 words per day, on the theory that this gives me some leeway for when I inevitably screw up.
Right now my word count is just over 5,000. I’m feeling pretty good about that, and taking the rest of the night off to watch classic (or at least old) horror movies with popcorn & beer. I’m going to post the first chapter of my incredibly rough draft here for your reading… er…. for your reading.
I haven’t really found my tone for this book yet. And that’s okay, NaNoWriMo is about quantity, not quality. So far it’s looking like a sort of fanfic crossover between Discworld and the Dresden Files. I’ve had a lot of fun dreaming up the world these characters live in. This chapter is going to be under the same Creative Commons license all my blog posts are, which means you can share it as long as you take no money, give me credit, and link back here.
This is a real adventure for me. I never learned to write a proper outline, you see, so while I have a few ideas for how things might turn out, I’m really making this up as I go. With only a few exceptions I honestly don’t know what’s foreshadowing and what’s a red herring or just flavor filler.
I don’t know how long I can keep going before I paint myself into a corner, but I have a few ideas for escaping if I get stuck, including radically changing the genre of the book if things get desperate.
Without further ado, here’s the first chapter of my as-yet-unnamed novel. (The footnote might be a little awkward, sorry about that.)
Read the rest of this entry
The Nef Project
Here’s a Kickstarter project I want to promote called the Nef Project. Nefratiri Martinez was expected to die before her fifth birthday. In August 2013 she’ll celebrate her 30th.
Her family kinda thinks this is a big deal and they’re crowdfunding a documentary about her life. Partly to inform and educate people, but mostly as a birthday present to celebrate her living six times longer than anyone expected.
I’ve known this family personally for 20 years now, and it wasn’t terribly uncommon to hear that Nef was in the hospital again. There were times when I expected to hear that she’d died, but she’s hung in there. She’s one of the happiest people I’ve ever met.
(I’ll forgive her for laughing every time I walked into the room during my highschool years. In fairness, I was a gangly teenager then and probably did look pretty funny.)
Go take a look at the project, and if it looks interesting to you toss something in! Don’t think of it as a donation, think of it as pre-ordering slightly overpriced collector’s items!
Technology, high and low
I’ve been working on my NaNoWriMo project. Writing is hard, so I’m taking a break to ponder what TVTropes calls schizo tech.
I always liked that trope myself, but then I’ve been known to write blog posts by candlelight. I’m including a lot of it in my fledgling novel, in poor neighborhoods it wouldn’t be uncommon to see someone using their smartphone as a light to find the candles, because they don’t have electricity at home and go out to charge up their phone periodically. These people have Twitter but no automobiles. Their military tactics include jamming radio signals so your enemy can’t coordinate a catapult strike. They have detailed computer models of wind patterns so sailing ships can plot more efficient courses for vital shipping.
I’m having a lot of fun dreaming up the world.
Anyway, although I haven’t run into it yet, eventually I’m going to have to face the decision between what I’d like something to be like, and what it makes sense for it to be like. I’m wasting a l0t of thought worrying about where I should draw the line between justifying the odd little quirks of the setting, or just declaring it to be so because I’m the author. I’m sure that at some point I’ll have to do the second, but I’m going to try to stick to the first as much as I can.
Well, I can’t spend all night goofing off here, I have a book to write! I’m really terrible at coming up with names, so if you have any ideas for names of characters, gizmos, geography, or anything else you think I should use, put them in the comments! If you think having characters use “Twitter” over the “internet” on their “smartphones” with “wifi” is just too prosaic for my fantastical setting, tell me what I should call them instead!
Happy Halloween!
I love Halloween. I love the autumn, and I love spooky stuff, and I love dressing up, so this is pretty much my favorite holiday.
I’m going to a dinner party tonight, so this should help contribute to the meal!
Should be delicious!
(The video released by the talented singer behind this arrangement is here, with a download link if you want an mp3. I used this one instead so my blog wouldn’t be filled with spoilers to Pan’s Labyrinth.) Read the rest of this entry
Novels of November
November is coming up, and that means National Novel Writing Month. Well, I’m thinking about it.
The thing is, pounding thoughts and ideas into words is such a long, difficult process for me that I’m pretty sure writing 2,000 words per day would amount to a full time job at least. Some of you may recall that in the first few months of this blog I was unable to make a quota of 1,000 words per week,
But then what would I really have to lose? I mean, at worst I just don’t make it. So far every little goal I’ve set in this blog has failed, even though the primary goal of improving my ability to write seems to be succeeding. What’s one more tiny failure?
Well, nothing, really. But I’m getting sick of tiny failures. I’ve had an awful lot of them this year, and they add up to more than their sum.
On the other hand, it’s not like I have a lot of self-respect to lose in this department. And I have too much time on my hands, I haven’t been busy enough to get anything done.
So I’m thinking about it. I’ll have to make up my mind tomorrow, or it’ll be made for me. But I want to sleep on it.
A Touch of Magic
For the most part, Tumblr is just another thing that automatically posts links to my blog. I don’t really get Tumblr, I guess. But this morning during my usual blog-reading I followed a link to Trish Causey’s Tumblr and fell down a rabbit hole of beautiful pictures.
Some of those pictures have naked people, and some are explicitly sexual. Now you’re been warned and can’t blame me if you click on that link and get fired or have to answer awkward questions or break into a thousand tiny porcelain pieces from the shock of seeing an erect penis or something.
Somewhere, as I delved deep into that archive of neat pics, I saw things that made me think of magic.
An Old Memory
The sound was indistinct and seemed far away, the best interpretation she could think of was many children singing. She walked through the nursery, smiling down at the sleeping infant in the crib, and opened the window a crack.
The chilly October breeze made her shiver a little, but she couldn’t make out any new details about the sound. A flash of movement in the corner of her eye caught her attention but by the time she looked it was gone. She found herself staring at the gibbous moon, with an impression that she’d seen something fly in front of its face.
A Most Peculiar Epic
I’ve mentioned webcomics before, which run the gamut from high art to crap. The other day I rediscovered one of the best. Not just one of the best webcomics, but one of the best stories I’ve ever read.
Created by the astonishingly talented Ursula Vernon, Digger tells the story of a lost wombat, Digger-of-Unnecessarily-Convoluted-Tunnels, and the strange people she meets and adventures they have. It’s set in a fascinating world with several rich cultures, and contains such interesting things as Pratchett-style footnotes, vampire squash, disturbingly cute trolls, and more! Read the rest of this entry
Aircraft Carriers of the World
Spotted on this Mother Jones tumblr post is this fascinating graphic of all the world’s aircraft carriers, to scale.
Graphic originated here.
There is some dispute on the definition of “aircraft carrier” used here, if you think a ship that can only handle vertical-take-off-and-landing craft such as helicopters and Harriers doesn’t count, then at least eleven of these ships, including the entire the right-hand column, are excluded and the U.S. only has the eleven biggest carriers out of the world’s twenty-one or so.
It’s one of those striking perspective things. Every time I see some comparison between the military of the United States and the entire rest of the world it amazes me. I wonder how accurate this is.
Falling and running.
I fell down the stairs last night. I’ve been falling down stairs my whole life, and I’m pretty good at it by now, so the only actual injury was the toes of my left foot. I wasn’t able to get them pointed up so I could stop myself against the wall at the bottom with the sole of my foot, and jammed the toes straight into the wall with my whole body weight sliding behind them.
If you’re curious, that really hurts a lot. Read the rest of this entry
The Adventures of Leo Tarvi 