Today's Word: Wires
The crisscross of metal cables held up the stage. Salvaged from old power poles, the thick cables were black and wet with the sweat dripping on them.
Class update
Everything went very well. Read five pages from chapter one. Felt very much like a book signing event, with yours truly at the podium. Very positive comments with good feedback. Got an offer from the instructor that she'd help me with my synopsis for contest. I need to clear up a few logical gremlins, too. But all in all, a sigh of relief from the man with too much caffeine in his blood.
I have this dread feeling in the pit of my soul that I might have to break down and get Microsoft Word. I hate it. Too damn bulky and counterintuitive, but I'm getting killed in format issues when e-mail my non-Word files from home and put them into my office's Word so I can print them out. Perhaps I should print them out at home and save the trouble, but I'm so addicted to preening my stuff up until a couple hours before class. If I had a laptop that magically generated paper, I'd be printing out assignments in class, as my patient instructor waits on.
Tuesday night did offer a clever assignment to help with a breakthrough I've been needing. Simply put, how do you (or I, in this case) present the backstory of the fall of civilization without pouring on the pages, deadening the reader with what authors call "the information dump." I'm thinking about having it in pieces, sprinkled throughout the novel. Wrote a bit of it with Rayelle last night in an exercise. My exercise buddy, fyi, wrote about the proper use of a light anti-tank weapon, and did it without making it sound Clancyesque. Gallows humor in dialogue works wonders.
Wednesday, February 09, 2005
Tuesday, February 08, 2005
Dude...I mean, dude
Geoff Huish, 26, was so convinced England would win Saturday's match he told fellow drinkers at a social club, "If Wales win I'll cut my balls off," the paper said.
Friends at the club in Caerphilly, south Wales, thought he was joking.
But after the game Huish went home, severed his testicles with a knife, and walked 200 metres back to the bar with the testicles to show the shocked drinkers what he had done.
Huish was taken to hospital where he remained in a seriously ill condition, the paper said. Police told the paper he had a history of mental problems.
Wales's 11-9 victory over England at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff was their first home win in 12 years.
Mental problems? Well, yeah, obviously.
Geoff Huish, 26, was so convinced England would win Saturday's match he told fellow drinkers at a social club, "If Wales win I'll cut my balls off," the paper said.
Friends at the club in Caerphilly, south Wales, thought he was joking.
But after the game Huish went home, severed his testicles with a knife, and walked 200 metres back to the bar with the testicles to show the shocked drinkers what he had done.
Huish was taken to hospital where he remained in a seriously ill condition, the paper said. Police told the paper he had a history of mental problems.
Wales's 11-9 victory over England at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff was their first home win in 12 years.
Mental problems? Well, yeah, obviously.
Today's Word: String
Small fragments of words. Lining the journal. Blasts of thoughts. And the author. Too afraid. To. Put them together. He felt. Satisfied to write. Them down. But left them to die without. Nurturing.
First chapter undergoing a washing and waxing. My darling and loving wife tells me I'm obsessing. I know she's right, that there's a point on the assembly line when you tighten the bolts just a little too much. Or, for my foodie readers, you cook the thing until all the nutrients are out of it. It's supposed to be a beta draft anyway. It gets a lot done, but my instincts tells me it could be a little too overheated. Rayelle comes off like a bullet-proof ninja in the proceedings instead of the street rat I'm hoping for.
But I don't think it sucks. That's a relief. It'll be the first time in a few weeks that I'm not dreading going into class. Reading the syllabus, the next few weeks look light, which means more time for me to write (the novel) and revise (for contest). I gave my wife my copy of "Battlefront" for Xbox to hide at her work for time being. I need to prune the distractions from now until the contest conference in July. If I get half the book done by then, I'd be okay. Three-quarters with the ending written would be better.
Oh, and this is for Mrs. P. I don't get a lot of inspiration for gaming, although "Battlefront" (my precious) did give me some ideas for a graphic novel I'd kill to do. Usually, I game to just game. I consider my Xbox and Gamecube as my play areas and my laptop my work area. I've been a gamer since I was about 7, and the advent of the Atari 2600. I read a lot of insider gossip on video games, and I'm very selective about what I play. It also doesn't hurt that I live in Seattle: Cradle to Nintendo of America and home of Microsoft. I go through fits and spurts of loving and hating the industry, usually coming down on a modified Sturgeon's Law that 90 percent of video games are the same old crap in a market dominated by sequels and cross-market licensing. I'm floating into LoveLand now, curious about the upcoming video gamegasm trade show, E3. Next year is going to be the roll out of the next generation of consoles, and I'm interested if there's going to be real innovation (Nintendo's Revolution) or if it's just going to be prettier candy (Xbox 2, PS3).
I like gaming more than television. Sometimes I wish the industry would grow up and take more risks. Would like to see more mature titles that don't revolve around gore or nudity. Less sequels, more innovative concepts. That said, I'll always stop and pick up a Star Wars title or the latest in the Legend of Zelda series.
My hypocrisy always gets me in the end. At least my wife (casual gamer, at best) likes to watch me murder pixels.
Small fragments of words. Lining the journal. Blasts of thoughts. And the author. Too afraid. To. Put them together. He felt. Satisfied to write. Them down. But left them to die without. Nurturing.
First chapter undergoing a washing and waxing. My darling and loving wife tells me I'm obsessing. I know she's right, that there's a point on the assembly line when you tighten the bolts just a little too much. Or, for my foodie readers, you cook the thing until all the nutrients are out of it. It's supposed to be a beta draft anyway. It gets a lot done, but my instincts tells me it could be a little too overheated. Rayelle comes off like a bullet-proof ninja in the proceedings instead of the street rat I'm hoping for.
But I don't think it sucks. That's a relief. It'll be the first time in a few weeks that I'm not dreading going into class. Reading the syllabus, the next few weeks look light, which means more time for me to write (the novel) and revise (for contest). I gave my wife my copy of "Battlefront" for Xbox to hide at her work for time being. I need to prune the distractions from now until the contest conference in July. If I get half the book done by then, I'd be okay. Three-quarters with the ending written would be better.
Oh, and this is for Mrs. P. I don't get a lot of inspiration for gaming, although "Battlefront" (my precious) did give me some ideas for a graphic novel I'd kill to do. Usually, I game to just game. I consider my Xbox and Gamecube as my play areas and my laptop my work area. I've been a gamer since I was about 7, and the advent of the Atari 2600. I read a lot of insider gossip on video games, and I'm very selective about what I play. It also doesn't hurt that I live in Seattle: Cradle to Nintendo of America and home of Microsoft. I go through fits and spurts of loving and hating the industry, usually coming down on a modified Sturgeon's Law that 90 percent of video games are the same old crap in a market dominated by sequels and cross-market licensing. I'm floating into LoveLand now, curious about the upcoming video gamegasm trade show, E3. Next year is going to be the roll out of the next generation of consoles, and I'm interested if there's going to be real innovation (Nintendo's Revolution) or if it's just going to be prettier candy (Xbox 2, PS3).
I like gaming more than television. Sometimes I wish the industry would grow up and take more risks. Would like to see more mature titles that don't revolve around gore or nudity. Less sequels, more innovative concepts. That said, I'll always stop and pick up a Star Wars title or the latest in the Legend of Zelda series.
My hypocrisy always gets me in the end. At least my wife (casual gamer, at best) likes to watch me murder pixels.
Monday, February 07, 2005
The first 82 words
Rayelle tumbled out of the tenement doorway, sending the dented metal fire door around on its hinges and banging against the crumbling brick edifice. Streaks of blood trailed from her counterfeit Chinese combat boots, leaving red scuffs as she crunched on broken bones and discarded Wok Around the Block containers. A blast of chunky air infected with post-war carbon filaments made her cough in a key of a minor spasm. The Seattle night sky glowed orange from the fires in the north.
Rayelle tumbled out of the tenement doorway, sending the dented metal fire door around on its hinges and banging against the crumbling brick edifice. Streaks of blood trailed from her counterfeit Chinese combat boots, leaving red scuffs as she crunched on broken bones and discarded Wok Around the Block containers. A blast of chunky air infected with post-war carbon filaments made her cough in a key of a minor spasm. The Seattle night sky glowed orange from the fires in the north.
Today's Word: Clip
The fragment of old celluloid film was on the floor, black and curling in self defense. A fragment of her vision left vacant and to die of loneliness from the final cut. He picked it up, studied the frames, and he saw he was in it.
I'm never going to finish the damn chapter on time. I'm in that queasy space of impending failure. I have an optional assignment that I'm going to miss because I'm so drawn in on making the first chapter sing. I thought I was close, but I'm caught in heavy fog. The coastline is not in sight. We are running low on food. Landmarks are hazy and malleable in the night. The stars have forsaken us.
In more serious news, I want to extend heartfelt condolences to Mrs. P (link on the right). She lost her sister. Being an only child, I can't imagine losing a sibling. I can only envision it as a parallel death of yourself. Someone of your own blood, cut with some of the similar physical features, dies and makes you understand your own death is inevitable. But in the practical sense, I have no idea of what it's like to have someone that close gone. You're trained to understand parents and grandparents vanishing into that great beyond before you, but a brother or sister (like a spouse) is next to you, running along side on that linear of time's arrow. Having a vacancy next to you...I wish I had more to say than I'm sorry.
The fragment of old celluloid film was on the floor, black and curling in self defense. A fragment of her vision left vacant and to die of loneliness from the final cut. He picked it up, studied the frames, and he saw he was in it.
I'm never going to finish the damn chapter on time. I'm in that queasy space of impending failure. I have an optional assignment that I'm going to miss because I'm so drawn in on making the first chapter sing. I thought I was close, but I'm caught in heavy fog. The coastline is not in sight. We are running low on food. Landmarks are hazy and malleable in the night. The stars have forsaken us.
In more serious news, I want to extend heartfelt condolences to Mrs. P (link on the right). She lost her sister. Being an only child, I can't imagine losing a sibling. I can only envision it as a parallel death of yourself. Someone of your own blood, cut with some of the similar physical features, dies and makes you understand your own death is inevitable. But in the practical sense, I have no idea of what it's like to have someone that close gone. You're trained to understand parents and grandparents vanishing into that great beyond before you, but a brother or sister (like a spouse) is next to you, running along side on that linear of time's arrow. Having a vacancy next to you...I wish I had more to say than I'm sorry.
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