Chatting With My Zan

Heeeeeeey, guess what?

It's raining again....

Haruhi Suzumiya from
The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya
created by Nagaru Tanigawa 

I think we had a grand total of four hours of sunshine this whole week. I was outside washing down my porch furniture during some of it... and then promptly got pummeled by rain out of nowhere. It was sunny. There was a distant thunderclap. Rain came splashing at me. The worst part is that I have a covered porch, and I was pressed up against the outer wall of my apartment. Under normal circumstances, I could enjoy the energy being outside in a sun-shower gives me, but the winds were so bad I was STILL getting drenched. Worst yet was that I had my laptop outside with me so I could watch YouTube videos while I was cleaning, so I had to quickly scoop that up and sprint inside before it got too wet.

Yaaaay.... Raaaaain....

My one coworker says her yard might as well be a swamp or a moat at this point, and, frankly, I believe her. It's getting quite pathetic out there...

It's getting quite pathetic in here as well...

Yet another week where I didn't really do much of anything. Not a single word was added to "One and the Same," nor have I worked on yet ANOTHER side project.

Well... almost....

Friday I was quite surprised to see someone's name in my Facebook messenger list. Someone who either hasn't been on FB in a while, or at least hasn't been on the same time I have been in MONTHS.

This guy:

The Wonder Twins, as designed by Hanna-Barbera

Yup, I was able to chat with my Wonder Twin Ronoxym, and he reminded me that, just like Jayna, I truly do need my Zan in my life. It's great to just sit and chat with him. We were actually on messenger together for HOURS on Friday, which was FANTASTIC after months of radio silence.

Stupid adulting...


It was just great to be goofy with him, and to vent to him, let him vent to me, catch up on what's going on in each of our lives, and just go on and on and on about both "Game of Thrones" and "Avengers: Endgame."

Among all of that chatting, three things happened.

One: We jointly came up with a really cool fanfic concept for the MCU, which nagged at me the rest of the day, so I ended up writing up the rough concept outline on Tumblr. It has a major Endgame spoiler built into the concept, so be warned if you wish to check it out.

For those who want to know, but don't feel like reading the whole thing:

The long and short of the story is that Senior Citizen Steve Rogers, going by an alias now, befriends Young Phil Coulson in the 70s or 80s. Steve has aged and changed enough that Phil doesn't know he's talking to THE Captain America, and so this is a way for Steve to fix at least one regret in life: never giving Coulson a chance to befriend his hero. The two become close, with Steve and Peggy becoming surrogate grandparents to Phil, and it is actually Steve himself who inadvertently made Phil such a Cap fanboy. On top of that, it was Peggy who encouraged Phil to join SHIELD in the first place. Steve knew it would lead to Coulson's death, but he couldn't chance preventing Coulson from joining, and potentially never giving the Avengers a reason to unite to defend NYC in the first place. There's a lot more within the skeleton outline I came up with, but that was the meat and potatoes of it....

Anyway, I will most likely not take the time to actually write the thing more than I just did, so if anyone out there is inspired, you're welcome to the concept, just please send me a link once you're done, and a credit for the plot bunny would be nice. Not sure who would see it though, since the Tumblr post hasn't really had much love. The only one who seemed to have seen it was my buddy Skarabrae-stone, but still, the idea is out of my head, and the Plot Bunny has joined its brethren on my Plunny farm. That's enough for now.

Which brings me to the second thing that happened.

Two: I once again lamented my unintentional abduction of his Willow/Devon short story - meant to be only about 5 pages long, at most - which resulted in it being about TWENTY-EIGHT pages long, and sitting in WIP-limbo for almost exactly 4 years.... I admitted I went a bit overboard with the concept. I then expressed my hope that the editing skills and overall story crafting skills I honed slightly since I started work on “Peeping Tomcat” would be enough for me to re-focus "Please, Let Me Explain". This whole editing project is next up on my list once OatS is done.

As I discussed my need to go back and edit PLME so we could get back to writing and finishing it, I also acknowledged that I desperately needed to whittle PLME back down from the monstrosity I created.

To which Ron replied with: "No you don't. It'll be long as hell, and beautiful as all get out."

Hacker Girl Facebook sticker
by Birdman, Inc.

Ron, you are a beautiful human being!

Those two, simple sentences killed a nagging paranoia that had been in my head for the past 4 years: I took over Ron's story, bloated it way past his initial concept, and now it's so overwhelming he can't/won't work on it, which means I'm responsible for killing his muse/inspiration for this story, and he probably never wants to collab with me ever again because I just bulldoze over my fellow-creator.
Now, not to say any of that is NOT true, to some degree, but the fact that he seems to genuinely enjoy the way the story has gone is a MAJOR weight off my heart. He hasn't continued working on the story because he genuinely has been too busy to think about it, not because he's mad at me or because I killed his muse or what-have-you.

This revelation led me to my third thing.

Three: My overall desire to work on writing projects again jumpstarted.

I opened up PLME again on Saturday, and just sorta skimmed through it. It wasn't as painful a read as I thought it would be, so yay us. Our writing wasn't cringingly bad 4yrs ago! Whoo! It DOES need polishing though, and I more-or-less know how to do that, so it is evident that I DID improve on my skills over the past handful of years, so that's also encouraging. Yay yet again!

I didn't actually start on editing anything, or take notes - aside from mental ones - on where to tighten or adjust, but that initial "let's take a look at this thing for the first time in years" happened, and that's kind of a big step.

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by Birdman, Inc.

I actually had a DRIVE to do something this week. It didn't really amount to much, but it did start up the gears again. I was motivated to read through PLME so I could get re-acquainted with the story. I wanted to bring up the Devon and Trish fight scene as well so I could finish that rework too. As well as maybe FINALLY come up with a title for the dang project!

I wanted to work on "Glitches" a bit more too, and even thought through some more world-build as I flipped through writing advice and resources on Tumblr.

OH! That reminds me! Random side note: I have a writing-focused blog on Tumblr now. The blog you are currently reading will always be where I talk about how my week went in the world of writing, as well as my over-all writing process and writing progress. It will be where I talk about my struggles of a writer, the joys of the faves and reviews, and promote my latest writing projects. The Rogue's Scribe will always be my main "writing blog." However, I have nearly 1650 Tumblr posts just chilling in my drafts folder to eventually sift through and reblog. At least half of those posts are writing related, but always felt weird to put on my main blog for whatever reason, even though it's a hodge-podge mess anyway. Probably because I was afraid I wouldn't be able to re-find the writing related posts when I need them again.

Anyway, for MONTHS now I wanted to do up a writing-centric Tumblr, and the thing that kept stalling this goal was... you know it... say it with me now...

I couldn't come up with a title for the blog. Which also meant I couldn't think of a handle for it. But I'll get back to this in a moment. For now, let's stay focused on the inspiration sprung from my convo with Ron.

So, still dealing with Happening Number Three: drive to edit. I wanted to work on PLME again. I wanted to rework the fight scene between Devon and Trish. Both stories wanted me to work on Glitches as a whole again. Part of me even wanted to work on world-building Gyateara a bit more. I just had this desire to Create on Saturday.

Sadly, it ended up not really amounting to anything, as I already mentioned, but it was the first time I had the DRIVE to even attempt anything writing-related pretty much all month - this blog not withstanding.

Sunday, that drive was still there, thankfully. So I cracked open my netbook at work for the first time this month, with every intention of writing another scene for OatS. I got a bit side-tracked though. Mainly because I wasn't sure whose chapter the scene should be yet again. I'm STILL having issues with figuring out the final chapter, and writing it in third person to test the waters isn't helping, so I wasn't sure if I should bother with the same tactic with this new scene I've been brainstorming for a little while now.

So I did the only other logical thing: I worked on yet ANOTHER outline for the story. This time I'm breaking down the overall plot into potential chapters, and then designating them to a narrator: Marinette or Adrien. I'm trying really hard to bounce back and forth between them: odd-numbered chapters are narrated by Marinette, and even chapters are Adrien's. With this concept I should be able to see whose turn it's supposed to be when I get to the scene I'm thinking of, as well as see if I need to actually shift things around a little so the chapter can actually be narrated by the other character. It helps me also see their respective character arcs this way.

I didn't get terribly TOO far with the outline before my computer died on me, and I was busy all day yesterday, so I couldn't get back into the outline, but it was still progress.

Teeny, tiny, barely anything, progress, but it's still more than I've done all month, and a step in the right direction. I got my foot through the proverbial door, and that initial push to write shouldn't be so hard anymore.

Plus, between the massive highs and lows of the latest Game of Thrones season, and the literally debatable plot-holes in "Avengers: Endgame," I've been talking about writing in general with a LOT of people lately: Ska, Ron, and Hubby, to name just a few. Talking about what we loved and what we hated with each episode or movie really brings up the questions of "what makes a good story? What is good storytelling? Are character arcs we're watching fulfilling, and why or why not? Is it a great subversion of writing in general if those character arcs don't feel complete? Was plot sacrificed for character growth? Was it the other way around?" There are TONS of storytelling and writing questions these stories present, and the (mostly civil) discord it's causing is FANTASTIC.

Love the episodes, hate them, thought Endgame was the perfect close, or believe the Russo Brothers need to re-learn how to write a solid script; regardless of where you are on the spectrum of feelings with regards to these bits of media, the overall discussion that comes out is awesome. And, frankly, Endgame left a LOT open - on purpose or no - for fantheories and fanfics to develop. Which means awesome content for me to devour.

If nothing else, these fandoms are erupting with their own creatives: fanart, fancomics, fanfiction, and/or fantheories. And these creatives are being used to either correct perceived wrongs in the canon presented in these conclusions to epic tales, or they are expanding upon concepts presented, or they're theorizing on how the canon could make sense.

People are being overly critical with the stories they're consuming, which is a bit terrifying as a writer, but at the same time it is invigorating to see so much discussion about storytelling surrounding me. It helps me see the pitfalls other storytellers are tripping into, so it's easier for me to avoid them in my own works.

Also, I'm in those discussions as well. I'm also being analytical and going into stories with a critical eye. I have my own criticisms for Endgame and Game of Thrones, as well as a few of the anime series that Hubby and I are watching, and even some of the fanfiction I've read this past week.

I won't go into details here as to what pulled me out of the fanfics, because I don't wish to shine a bad light on otherwise beautiful stories. It did help me understand what pulls me out of stories, though, and so I hope it will therefore help me avoid the same pitfalls in my own writing.

Which, I guess, brings me back to that writing tumblr... or... wriblr I believe they're called? Or something like that???

Along with studying the writing trip-ups of other stories, I've also been going through the writing advice I've had saved in my Tumblr drafts section. Mostly so I could finally empty out the drafts by reblogging them to my writing-centric Tumblr.

As I mentioned above, I've wanted to do this for MONTHS - at least since November - but stalled out by not coming up with a good title and/or handle for the new blog. I couldn't use LycoRogue, since that was attached to my main blog: Inside the Tree Trunk

You know, I don't recall if I ever explained the name of the blog. Basically, it's a nod to a D&D campaign Hubby briefly ran. My character Pamela Sheppard - going by the stage name Arianna Snow - had unintentionally charmed a nymph, who instantly became smitten with Arianna. The nymph was also a high priestess for her goddess, and since Arianna wasn't really of a faith at the time, she just sort of shrugged and told the nymph "Yeah, I'll follow your goddess, I guess." The weird pseudo-courtship the two had led the goddess to favor Arianna, and gift her with a magical tree. It grew next to the sacred pool the nymph watched over, and if Arianna knocked on the tree trunk it would open up into an endless trove for anything Arianna wished to hide within it.

So, since my main Tumblr blog is also an endless trove for anything I find value in and wish to save, I figured "Meh, this is my own magical tree trunk." Thus the name...

AAAAAAANYWAY, as I was saying, I couldn't use LycoRogue as my handle. I knew I wanted to somehow include my latest writing mantra - just get the shit on paper; dare to be bad - within the writing blog. I tried naming the blog itself Get The Shit On Paper or Dare to be Bad, but I couldn't use either phrase as my handle; they were already used. Not thinking of alternative names that I enjoyed, I gave up for months.

However, I guess also thanks to my convo with Ron, I finally went "Ya know what? Let's try one last attempt at that handle." This time I changed tenses slightly: Getting Shit On Paper. It's a bit crude, but I also kind of loved it, so that became my handle for my writing blog on Tumblr.

The blog name itself needs some work, but it gets the point across for right now: The Writer's Random Resource Guide, managed by @gettingshitonpaper.

There isn't much up quite yet. I need to find the time to go through all of those drafts - of which, again, there are over 1600! - and start setting up a queue of them. Still, there's SOMETHING up on it right now, so feel free to hit it up if you're on Tumblr and would like a generic resource blog.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to ride this wave while it's active, and work on some of my writing.

Catch ya next week!

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by Birdman, Inc.

A Christmas Gift For You Guys!

First thing's first. I know that Hanukkah is over by now, but life got crazy, which means I missed wishing my Jewish readers a happy one when I skipped last week's post. So, if you celebrate the Festival of Lights, I wish you a belated happy holiday, and hope your Hanukkah was a blessed one.

Now, to explain why I missed last week. Yes, this will be my generic "life is mad crazy, especially working at a grocery store near the holidays." However, it's more than that. The true reason for missing last week's post was because I was too busy writing a short story!

Yeah!

As I mentioned in my last post, Hubby and I have finally gotten around to watching Game of Thrones. We watched the first two seasons thus far, and it has really inspired us. Hubby created his D&D campaign, and we actually had a few sessions last week.

If I remember correctly, our first session was a couple weekends back - either Saturday or Sunday; can't remember which. We had a tournament with all of our characters. As the princess, I only participated in the archery opening games and then watched the others, which consisted of an obstacle course, jousting, a boar hunt, and melee combat.

Well, my in-character little brother - the heir apparent - ended up killing a cousin of Quarthix's character - Brack - during the melee portion. Whoops.

So Brack's family hosted another tournament in honor of their family member dying nobly in the last one. We did that session the next day. Once again my character Airis only participated in the archery portion before sitting out another obstacle course and wrestling portion. No one died this time. YAY!

Then we did our first individual sessions with our characters. Quarthix's fiance's character traveled home with her younger brother and another companion, only to be attacked by a griffon. She and bro lived, but the other companion and two of their horses were griffon-food.

Hubby's character and two companions - cousin's I think - were attacked by an owlbear. I know Hubby's character got out alright, but I can't recall if either of his companions died.... I WANT to say they all escaped with their lives?

Brack and his younger brother were talked in to going to an illegal dog-fighting ring after all the tournament guests left to travel home. Brack, his younger brother, a friend of Brack's younger brother, and said friend's kid brother all went with this guy Malcolm - another friend of Brack's brother's friend - to the games. They bet a few times, but after a couple rounds the underdog managed to kill the favored "dog" - they were actually wolves. The crowd turned ugly and started a riot, killing the victor in the fight. Malcolm and the man in charge of the fights lead Brack and his group in to the back room, where the wolves were kept when they weren't fighting. While they waited out the rioting crowd, the group played some dice, but Brack's younger brother ended up getting caught cheating. Malcolm - who was the wolves' trainer - released them on to Brack's group, and the man in charge of the fights turned out to be a werewolf. Whoopsie.

Brack and his younger brother were the only survivors. RIP little, possibly 8-yr-old Billy. You at least poked a wolf's eye out... or something.

Then we had my character Airis and her younger brother. The road back to their castle has a toll-road. Obviously the royalty can afford the toll, but the guards told their driver that the road was closed down because of a rockslide or fallen tree or something to that effect. Unfortunately, this meant my group was forced down the unsafe, bandit-ridden road. The carriage was attacked by a group of about eight bandits. All six of our guards, our driver, and both of our horses were killed. My younger brother nearly died after getting his eye shot out by an arrow.

Ladies and Gentlemen, presenting the Cyclops King.

Injured herself, my character was too flustered to know what to do with her unconscious brother that was too heavy for such a dainty woman to carry. If at least ONE horse were available... *sigh*

So she left him bandaged and with water and food as she walked to the guard station on the other side of the toll-road. The guards there told her that the road hadn't been closed down for over a month; obviously the "guards" on the other side were bandits meant to lead her in to the trap. Fantastic.

We haven't played through it yet, but I'm informed that by the time the guards brought Airis back to the arrow-filled carriage to retrieve her brother he is missing. While she was hoofing it to the guard station another group of bandits kidnapped the future king. Boy, am I batting a thousand.

Can't wait to see what else these characters are going to get in trouble with....

Well, the point of bringing all THAT up is the fact that it again sparked my interest to world-build Gyateara. If nothing else, so that I can run my own D&D campaigns there eventually.

So, while at work between the 10th and 17th I was thinking of a specific group of people that live on Gyateara, and their faith. The inspiration was basically the Dothraki tribe from Game of Thrones. They are nomadic, barbarian, war-like people. They don't value money at all, but they have no qualms with ransacking a village in order to get food, water, and even slaves and women if they need any of the above. The main thing they value is their horses; believed to be part of their very souls once they pick a horse. I'm obviously not a fan of the raping and pillaging they do when they conquer someone, but that aside, I'm fascinated with the Dothraki. I really wanted Gyateara to have people like them. So I came up with the Sandikir people.

I really, REALLY wanted to introduce you guys to them after mentally working so hard on them all week. Unfortunately, I didn't get around to writing their story prior to last Wednesday due to playing the D&D sessions; plus Christmas preparations.

When last Wednesday rolled around I decided I still wanted to give you folks SOMETHING to show for all of my brainstorming. Especially since I haven't produced anything of note for over a month. I didn't want to tell you all yet again that I had a story building in my mind, but I didn't have anything for you fine folks to read.

I was determined to have the story written out first, and then write out the blog with the link to the story included. Issue was that the story took on a life of it's own - plus I was paused for about an hour or two - off and on - because of researching I was doing. See, one of the key components of the story is a race of Dire Wolves. I didn't want them quite as large as the Dire Wolves you find in D&D, but I did want them to be larger than an average gray wolf.

Originally, I was just going to randomly throw in a size that seemed about the height I wanted them to be. However, I realized how key these creatures are in the story, the culture of the people I'm writing about, and the world of Gyateara as a whole. So I wanted to get them right. I researched wolf sizes and broke down the proportions of the wolf's body so I could better build the right anatomy for Gyateara's Dire Wolves.

I also kept coming up with parts of the Sandikir culture that desperately needed their own terms - Sandikir terms. There was no way that I was going to be able to come up with a full new language, but I HAD to come up with these new words. I used one of the generators I gushed about last time. Thankfully, Fantasy Name Generators did have a language generator. Unfortunately, it still kept me a WHILE to figure out all the terms. I ended up with a list of about 13 new words!

Although, I am proud to state that I came up with Sandikir, Rikmahja, Rikvu, Mahmurja, Konsirph, Likjun, Plinva, and Miknar all on my own! That's over half of my Sandikir terms! I also came up with the names of the three pups by myself, too. YAY!

Now, the story started out as yet another chapter in my The Divine Legends anthology. I was going to simply write the divine "origin story" the people believed in. I had so much of their culture figured out, though. It felt weird to know it and not have it documented somewhere. Granted, I won't be so heavy-handed with "this is how they live and what they believe" in an actual story or D&D campaign. Still, I wanted to make sure to get the culture down on paper - figuratively speaking - while it was fresh. This resulted in me creating a new anthology that talks more about the cultures of Gyateara: The People of Gyateara

Well, the story kept growing and growing until it ended up just shy of 2600 words. I really should expect this by now, I mean... seriously... when have I ever written anything that was short!? I also tried something new. I wrote the story with the narrator talking directly to you as if the narrator were a sort of "tour guide" for the people you - the reader - stumbled upon. Not entirely sure if it works, but you can let me know what you think of it.

"The Land of the Sandikir"

On DeviantArt          On FictionPress

Anyway, with the story FINALLY done, I went to publish it and then work on the blog. Problem being that it was now about 3pm, and I needed to pick up my husband. I had to wait until I brought Hubby home from work before I could publish the tale up on DeviantArt and FictionPress. Once that was done I STILL couldn't get to the blog post.

I had laundry and dishes and other such chores to get done. I was exhausted when everything was complete. I finally gave up and figured I'd post a day late. Then the true chaos of The Last Week Before Christmas kicked in. I had gifts that needed to be finished. My home wasn't completely clean yet - still isn't. I never got around to putting up any decorations aside from our advent calendar and the Christmas tree with no ornaments on it. To this day, I still have most of our presents that I need to wrap.

Totally failing this Christmas thing this year....

But at least I have this one gift for you guys. The story that stopped me from posting last week. Hopefully that and this long post is a good enough gift to thank you all for being such faithful readers.

Love you all, and have a merry Christmas!

A Song of GoT and Generators

Oh! Is it "Pretend I was writing" day already!?

As I forewarned, I wasn't going to be able to get much writing in before the end of the year. However, same deal as it has been for over a month now: brain has been brewing.

Thanks to a friend of ours, Hubby and I were able to finally watch the first season of Game of Thrones just before Thanksgiving. We loved it so much we quickly used Hubby's one birthday gift to purchase season 2. We plowed through the whole thing yesterday.

It wasn't as gore-filled as I expected, but it was as bloody, as foul-mouthed, and had way more nudity than anticipated. That aside, it really is an addicting story. You don't really know who to root for. There's backstabbing, allies actually secret foes the whole time, sweethearts becoming complete jerks, murderous villains becoming the heroes, hatred birthing love, and if all else fails, once you've chosen whom you wish to root for, they get killed off.

I know, I know, if I enjoy it so much, I should actually read the books. However,

1. My reading list is already far too long.
2. The book could ruin the series for me, but it's unlikely that the series could ruin the books aside from giving me images instead of letting my mind form them based solely on the words.
• Actually, I think with such a large cast of characters it would be a LOT easier for me to picture the actors in my head instead of trying to start from scratch with a mental image and get all sorts of confused as to who is who.
3. The man takes FOREVER to write! I don't wish to be like everyone else and wait a decade for the next book. I'm content only in waiting until we can buy the next season. I'll then wait until George R. R. Martin is either done or dead before I'll start actually reading the Song of Ice and Fire saga.

Aside from praising it, my point in even bringing up GoT is this: Martin took YEARS researching and world building. He has then spent nearly two decades in the world of A Song of Ice and Fire - almost 25 years if you count that he started writing the first book in '91. It may be confusing and hard for even him to keep track, but it is an intricate world as well thought out as Middle Earth or Narnia. Maybe even more so considering he has something like 250 characters to keep track of...

As much as I enjoy the series, I find myself entranced by the land. I never skip the phenomenal opening sequence; loving that it changes to showcase where the characters are going to be based in that episode's tale. I study the maps included in the season box sets; trying to memorize the layout of his two-continent world.

It drives me to get lost more in my own world, but more on that in a moment.

The show inspires my husband as well. Shows usually do; the really good ones anyway. He loves them so much he wants to be able to play in them. And play we usually do.

After watching X-Men: Evolution and a few other X-Men based cartoons, Hubby created the X-Future Play by Post forum roleplay game.

Now, he's working on a D&D adaptation of Game of Thrones. In truth, he's working diligently in making his own world and seven ruling families. He toiled away - doing little else - for about three days straight. He drew maps, named reigning cities and families. He came up with their family tree, sigils, and phrases/words-of-honor. He doesn't have seven like GoT does, but he does have a family for each of the six stats in D&D: Strength, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma. Each family has a bonus in one particular stat, dependent on the environment of that house. For instance, one family is the protector of the realm's largest university. Anyone in that family gets a familial stat bonus to Intelligence. Another rules over farmers and receives a bonus to their Strength. So on; so forth.

THREE DAYS my husband did this! Granted, it isn't as detailed as most fictional fantasy worlds, or the one I'm trying to build. Still, that's an impressive feat for someone who's unsure of his own storytelling abilities.

So, I now have yet another character to play with: Airis Castilien. She is the eldest daughter of the king and queen; heir apparent for about two years before her younger brother came along.

In the past my characters have been cold. They have been snarky. Most were sarcastic and witty. Some were bleeding hearts. All were generally "good" characters.

I'm switching it up with Airis.

Keeping true to GoT, I'm treating the eldest of royal birth as a bratty young woman with entitlement issues. Namely, the fact that she's the eldest child and yet her little brother gets to rule over her simply because she's a woman.

It is well known between her and her parents that she is now little more than their best bargaining chip. If their reign begins to wobble, she'll be married off as a peace offering. She is being groomed specifically for that purpose: the land's greatest and most coveted commodity, and possible bargaining chip to keep the Castiliens as the rulers of the realm. Airis has accepted that she'll never marry for love, but she sees her marriage as more of an investment than an olive branch. Her goal is to sway her parents in to allowing her to marry the perfect patsy. A man who has enough power that it would be deemed a good match by her parents; a man with enough pull that he could topple the kingdom if he wished; a man fooled easily enough that Airis could take rule from him.

She'll be sweet, proper, may even display herself as the damsel in distress in order to manipulate protection. She'll also be cunning as she craves power. She'll listen to every little whisper and follow every subtle plot. She will be patient, but she'll also be ruthless.

Most of all, if she doesn't get killed, she'll be tons of fun!

But let's backtrack to my world building. In order to help Hubby quickly build his own world, he searched for some fantasy name generators. He found a few that he could work with, but one in particular is now our new favorite.

It has a generator for nearly everything, including things like plant or food names, character descriptions, or even PLANET descriptions. You can practically write a short story using only this guy's generators.

I found it only mildly interesting at first as Hubby had me search for my character's name - I chose Airis because it's pronounced like heiress, and I couldn't resist. However, as he showed me all the other generators on the site - and I took a mini self-guided tour later - I realizes how fantastic this can be for breaking down my writer's block.

Here, check it out for yourself! I'm totally putting it on my Handy Links tab that I've neglected this year. This generator is a must-have for any stumped writer. That, or ones like me who are just really bad at naming things. Although, after names like Middle-Earth and Westeros, is Gyateara really that bad?

Anyway, not writing a fantasy? Writing a horror, historical, mystery, sci-fi, or futuristic tale? He's got generators for that too!

Just go ahead and check out the link: Fantasy Name Generators

I'm a kid in a candy store right now, and so I'm not really advancing anywhere in my world building at this point. I'm having too much fun seeing what the generators come up with. The closest I have is a spreadsheet of deity names and titles. I take the ones I like and just keep going. Eventually - perhaps in the next week or so - I'll narrow it down and start working on my pantheon again, but it's the first time I've really thought about it in months. I call that a victory.

Now, to try to help Ronoxym rekindle. Poor guy confessed that the only tales he has in his head right now are about Devon. I told him he can still write them out as non-canon tales or to tuck away for my comic reboot of X-Future. Not sure if he's alright with those options though. Maybe I can get him to co-write with me again, at least to get his creative juices reflowing.

We'll see what I can do.