Christmas is Coming Up Quick

This week was mostly spent socializing and working on my Christmas gifts. Monday was the normal everyone-invades get-together. CelestialTyrant crashed at our place until Wednesday, and so Tuesday was spent socializing with him and working on Hubby’s gift while he was at work. Wednesday was more work on Hubby’s gift, and then we all hit up the mall to do some Christmas shopping.

Never bring three men to a Michael’s craft store if they’re ANYTHING like my friends! They were like kids the whole time. :D

Thursday was spent working on the rest of the Christmas gifts since Hubby was home the whole time. Friday was a long work day for both of us, and then there was more Christmas gift making. Saturday was the same as Friday. This evening I forewent sleeping while Hubby was at work so I could FINALLY get back to his gift. I honestly don’t know if it will be done in time.

Then, when I wasn’t crocheting I was looking up crochet patterns…. I have about 70 queued up for me to do!

However, poor Omnibladestrike has been so patient with me that I made sure to read his story while I was at work. I finally finished and sent him my edits this week – roughly a month after he posted the chapter on DeviantArt. You guys should check it out. Yes, there are some rough patches that I pointed out to him, but his revision is so much better than his past attempts. I think he’s finally finding his voice and rhythm with his writing. The biggest issue I still have is that the main character Mekonraiba doesn’t seem to have a consistent voice. I don’t know if he has Mekon’s voice in his head. It takes some time to build that though. That is, unless you’re Delaroux or DarkAngel1326, and then you have the characters yelling in your head.

Speaking of which, I wonder how her story is coming along… now that she’s going to have a bit more free time I wonder if she’ll start backup on Of Blood and Honor…

Anyway, back to me.

Yes, I didn’t continue with my story. I didn’t even continue with the music video I’m working on with ChibiSunnie. At this point I think I won’t be getting anywhere near either of those projects until next month or even February; depending on how a major issue in my life pans out.

However, I did get a lovely letter from my uncle the other day.

When Hubby and I went to the extended family Thanksgiving gathering last month my uncle came up to me to ask about my writing progress. He had been following my NaNo-themed Facebook status updates and was genuinely curious on both my story and my writing in general. We talked about both my NaNo story and my Hey Arnold fanfictions. He seemed greatly excited for me and expressed interest in reading my works.

He then proudly proclaimed that he was a published author. A running LinkedIn group he is a member of wanted to write a collaborative book about the hobby. Since my uncle had already written some articles for Helium.com, he rewrote the articles as a coherent chapter about motivation and submitted it to the group. They loved his work and included the chapter in the completed book. You can purchase the book as both a paperback and an ebook viaAmazon.com.

How does this all relate to that letter I received this week? Well, when I got home from the Thanksgiving vacation I made sure to send him an email that had links to my Fanfiction profile and my NaNo story specifically. I then told him that I’d love to read his chapter as well. It’s quite exciting to have a published author in the family.

My uncle did one better. He sent me a copy of the book along with the aforementioned letter. He hadn’t read my Hey Arnold stories, but he did read my NaNo story and had the following to say about it:

 UNCLE: “Well, I finally got to read your story and it is good – very good! I hope you get a chance to finish it sometime soon. I’m looking forward to the completed story….The writing is very fluid, detailed, and kept my interest. And I don’t consider myself a fantasy, sci-fi, or comic book guy. I really see very few flaws in this ‘rough draft,’ so I would say you have a very promising future in writing. Good luck with this story and the other projects you were working on.”

Thank you so much for the encouragement, Uncle! It may be a while before I get back to Connor and Natalie, but I will continue their story.

Actually, I was thinking of putting “The Race For Destiny” on hold until I finish fully realizing Amara’s world and then place Connor and Natalie there. It will make the story a little less “Fable” and a little more “D&D” which is sort of a neutral zone when it comes to “fanfic” versus “original fantasy”. We’ll see how the story develops over the years.

Chibi also sent me a review/beta-edit of my story thus far. Unfortunately, I took NaNo’s “Don’t edit, just write” a little too much to heart. Apparently there was a huge block of text that I completely duplicated in one of the later chapters and I didn’t even notice. I don’t even know how I managed to do that! So I actually wrote 300 words less than I thought I did! Dang it!

She also pointed out a few other things that I’ll have to go back and tweak once I actually have the time to go back and edit. I do want to comment on a re-occurring statement that Chibi made. Paraphrasing it was “I had to chuckle at the cheesiness of…” I know! I know! There are some super cheesy moments in this story, but most of those cheesy names/moments are actually the scenes/names I completely swiped from the game Fable. “Chamber of Fate” is the actual name of the room where the hero graduates from the Heroes Guild as well as the room where the final boss battle takes place. Some of the cheesiness of Connor’s reaction to the Chamber of Fate relates heavily on the fact that it’s supposed to be a central location of major events in his life. Further in to the story that would be better explained, but if the reader is chuckling prior to these reveals perhaps I need to re-work how Connor acts… :P

Well, unless that Mayan Apocalypse turns out to be true, I’ll catch everyone next week! :D

Originally, I was plowing through Lycopolis fast enough that I thought I'd be able to do a full review of the book in this week's post. However, I got stopped by a couple of wonderful emails this week. DarkAngel1326 is back to writing! YAY!

She sent me her latest chapter of Keep Love In Your Heart, as well as a prologue to a new story she's working on. She's struggling with deciding on what to do with the new story. She knows how she wants it to grow, but isn't sure it will be able to do so as a fanfic. Yet she's still not confident enough with her writing to give up the "playing in someone else's sandbox" crutch. Can't say I blame her; I have the same struggles. Anyway, I'm trying to encourage her to just take the leap and make this new story an original. We'll see how that goes.

So if you read DA's stuff - and all of you should, it's awesome! - please give her some encouragement!
**SIDE NOTE: DA's b'day is this week! Whoot! I wish I knew what to do for her birthday. I mean, the girl got me three amazing gifts.... Must. Think. Of. Something!**

Speaking of encouragement, Omnibladestrike also sent me something this week! If you're having difficulties remembering him, well, he's my IRL buddy who's writing an original fantasy tale. It's been a bit of a struggle, and he's restarted the story about seven times now. But I'm sure Ali Luke can reassure him that most great novels are like that. She even commented SOMEWHERE that Lycopolis is a far cry from the original draft.

Anyway, he sent me his new prologue. It kept me a while to get to it - crazy week, plus beta reading, plus what I'm going to talk about next - but I have to say I'm quite impressed by what he has. Yes, there's still some polishing that needs to be done, but in comparison to past drafts, this one feels like it's by a completely different author. I'm amazed at how much he has grown during his "Gah! I can't write!" self-discovery hiatus.

So let's also throw out some mad props to Omni! You go, dude! And trust me, we WILL get your story to a point where you'll be proud to show it off!

Aside from getting back in to Beta reading, I've also spent the week watching Hubby play Persona 4. I'm not really one for turn-based games - which is why I'm not a big fan of Final Fantasy or Pokemon - and the first 4hrs or so of the game just draaaaaaaaaaag on.... but after THAT the game is really interesting to me. Also, I completely love the soundtrack! I'm actually listening to one of the songs on loop while writing this post.

I find myself compelled by the story, shocked by the insane amount of "OMG, WHAT!?" moments, and now I'm excitedly waiting for Hubby to finish the game so we can track down the anime of it.

And speaking of shows....
I was visiting CelestralTyrant this week. When Hubby and I were finally on our way out the door - at 1:30am - I noticed a book on CT's end table:

GAH! WHAT!?

I squealed like the little fangirl that I am, snatched the book from the table, and had the following conversation:

Me: OMG, OMG, OMG! Is this legit a book version of the old cartoon series!?

CT: Um, I guess. I dunno. I've had that book forever.

Me: Isn't it amazing!? I totally heart this series!

CT: Oh, uh, it actually bored me every time I tried to read it.

Me: Are you kidding me!?

CT: Yeah... so if you want you can take the book. Like, seriously. Just take it. Merry Christmas.

OMG! CT, you are AWESOME!!!! So, naturally I tracked down the old TV series on YouTube. Sadly, the only posting I could find has the episodes split up in to three 7min segments - so THAT'S kinda annoying. But at least I can still watch it! *squee*

DreamWorks! You need to get this series out on DVD! NOW! ShoutFactory, if you get the rights to put this show on DVD after doing the same with Hey Arnold and Reboot.... well.... I might as well just sign my paychecks directly over to them from now on! XD

Granted, the likelihood of the series being put on DVD anytime soon is slim-to-none considering most people don't even remember the show. Even I only remember it every once in a while - but when I do I go INSANE with it! As I tend to do with most of my fandoms....

So, this actually all circles back to my writing. No, I'm not working on an Invasion America fanfic. However, I fear the same results the series - and book - got.

Much like DarkAngel1326, I fear my writing isn't good enough. I see how renowned all these other fanfiction writers are in the fandom. Whenever someone asks, "Who's a good writer?" or "What stories should I read?" I see the same ones come up over and over... and my name is never even thought of. There's at least one DeviantArt group dedicated to fanart of a fanfiction. My work isn't nearly as good as that. I mean, I get ChibiSunnie's awesome fanart, but... well...

Hubby reassures me that I'm too harsh on myself; that I have at least five super-devoted fans. And I love each and every one of them for that! However, if you're a show and you have an insane cult following, but the mainstream doesn't even know of you, you still get cancelled. Am I destined to be Invasion America? Or Invader Zim? Or Firefly? Am I destined to have a handful of really loyal fans, but still fade in to obscurity?

I dunno. Maybe I'm just being too harsh on myself. Maybe I should really be grateful I have even that handful of fans - and that they are so devoted to my work. Maybe I should stop thinking about becoming "famous" and just focus on telling stories. Go back to the "I don't care if anyone reads this, I'm writing this for me" attitude I had when I started "WTMTB".

Self discovery is hard, man! :P Maybe I'll have things better sorted out next week. At the very least I hope to have a link to DA's birthday gift.

Yup, It's Procrastination Time Again

So this week went by so fast I nearly forgot today was Sunday - and thus forgotten the blog update.

It's been a crazy week for RPGing and not so crazy for writing. So sorry about that. And sorry that it looks like my earlier prediction of having the chapter up this month isn't going to happen.

I still have my wedding thank you notes to write and my Operation Ruthless video to edit.

This Week's Procrastination List:

• Finished the cover picture for my main Facebook account's timeline. Thankfully my Lyco Rogue account doesn't have Timeline yet, so I still have some time to figure out what I want to do for that.... Maybe something as simple as a promo for this blog....

Anyway, here's the picture. 

Isn't Toothless adorable!? It was a pain in the butt to pixelize him, but he's adorable, no?

Also, the drawing was based on this one by Hirukio

And by "based" I of course mean "blatant rip-off".

• Hubby and I finished watching all five seasons of The Guild. Which sparked two things in me:
1. I want to make my own web series based on the chaos revolving around me and my friends! Buuuuuut, I don't want a "blatant rip-off" of The Guild.... so.... yeah
2. I AM SUPER DUPER MADLY IN TO MMOs AGAIN!!!!!!
Which means I'm once again addicted to a free "baby" MMO called Fiesta Online! Hubby and I got in to the game right around July 4, 2006 or 2007. We played a little more frequently than "casual gamers" but we weren't quite obsessed with the game either... For one reason or another, we stopped playing the beginning of 2009. BUT NOW WE'RE BACK! Whoot! If you have an account - or would like to start one - on the Teva server, just leave a comment below and I'll track you down and we can party together! YAYZ!
• Wednesday and Thursday - rare occasions where Hubby and I have the whole day together - we finally attacked the Back Room - where we've been storing everything we didn't trust in the garage - and slowly worked on turning it in to The Library! It's nearly done! SOOOOO MANY BOOOOOOOKS! Now, to figure out where to put the "non-book" stuff that was back there - like VHS tapes, the inflatable mattress for sleepovers, and a bunch of throw-pillows that we can't put on our couch since it's a rocker/recliner loveseat and the pillows just get in the way...
• Friday we once again played D&D!
• Sis-in-Law turned THIRTY!!!!! The big 3-0. Which means I have roughly 2 years to plan a party for Hubby.... *sigh*
• Work has been KILLER with all the nice weather lately! Stupid working at a grocery store....
• After work-craziness, I wind down with either some Fiesta or another game I recently started re-playing: Leisure Suit Larry. Because I am a perverted woman who likes to play super-cheesy dating sims where the lead is a complete loser but still thinks himself a Ladies Man. Ya know, I'm actually surprised The Big Bang Theory never made an online dating sim starring Howard Wolowitz. Now that he's married off I guess we'll never get one... La Sigh.
• Sporadically throughout the week I HAVE been working on Thank Yous! We JUST got the wedding thank you from my sister-in-law and her wedding was the August before ours, so we have about a month-and-a-half to keep on par with her....

In writing news, I finally got back in to beta-reading. CartoonLover16 sent me a rough draft of his second chapter. He's still working on it on his end, and I'm slowly reading it on mine. With everything else going on this week the only time I have to read his story is during my half-hour lunch breaks. It's a slow process, but I'm about 1/2 way through his chapter. YAY!

Speaking of YAY and Writing.... I got an AMAZING surprise this Monday!

Any repeat readers, as well as those I beta-read for, can tell you that I pretty much SWEAR by the knowledge of Ali Luke at Aliventures.com. Well, last weekend - after talking to Mekonraiba at D&D - I went on a reading spree over at Aliventures.com. I was trying to find anything and everything I could to revive his writing spirit. While there, I made multiple comments on archived posts. 

Now, normally Ali is AMAZINGLY NINJA QUICK when it comes to responding to comments - and I try to do the same here - but she didn't respond all weekend. I didn't really think too much of it. She's busy with her novel's online book tour, the posts were in the archives, and it was Mother's Day weekend.

Then Monday comes around and I find the following email:

"First, thanks so much for the comments.... Also, would you like a free copy of my novel Lycopolis? I think it'd be your kinda thing. I'm looking to get a few more reviews on Amazon, but there'd be no obligation whatsoever to review it unless you felt like it....And if you're happy for me to sign it, lemme know what name you want it signed to (if that makes sense) :)
Cheers,
Ali"

OMG, OMG, OMG, OMG, OMG, OMG!!!!
A free, autographed copy of a novel written by a woman I consider my mentor!? I'm not sure if it's because of the frequency that I comment on her blog, or the fact that I'm constantly telling her that I use her posts to help those I beta-read for, or if it's because I openly admit to being as much of a RPG nerd as she is, or if it's simply because she knows me as LYCO rogue... but whatever her reasoning, I am beyond excited!

So, be warned, people... there may be less of my own writing, and perhaps a review here once I get my hands on Lycopolis. If you are interested, Ali has a link for you to download the first five chapters for free.

Also, don't forget to check out the blog itself!

OH! And by NO MEANS am I trying to exploit Ali's kindness by telling you guys about it, so please, PLEASE don't try to con her out of free copies of her book!

I mean, I trust you guys, but I felt the need to stress the above point.

Anyway, that is all for me this week. Now to get ready for another killer day at work... friggen nice weather...

Script Frenzy Fail Diary

Those who have read my blog posts from last April know what I like to do while participating in Script Frenzy: document the day-to-day of the event. So I took a ten minute time-out each day to quickly write a blip about my journey. Join me on my trip towards failing Script Frenzy... *sigh*

APRIL 1ST - A Sunday, therefore it was spent sleeping. I attempted to finish Character Creation for the D&D game I talked about; that way I would be all set for the next game session. However, every time I went to read the books for research I passed out.

APRIL 2ND - Hubby and my 6month anniversary! It was also Monday which means Cyhyr and her boyfriend were visiting for game night. With massive cleaning still needing to be done on top of everything... yeah.... no writing done again. FUDGE!

APRIL 3RD - Failing continued when it came to Script Frenzy. I opened Celtx and saved the file. Does that count? However, I DID spend about two hours working on my latest chapter. Granted, it was mostly spent editing and re-writing portions I already wrote and sent to ChibiSunnie for beta-ing, but it was still SOMETHING!

APRIL 4TH - Woke up to find the latest newsletter from Aliventures. Since it's a newsletter and not a blog post I can't link it. This then resulted in my Setting Goals blog post in order to relay all of it over.

APRIL 5TH - I wrote about five pages of script before getting stuck. I HATE exposition!!! Switched over to my fanfic and hit the 11,000 word mark! Super, crazy-long chapter. It's about 19 pages long. Not done yet, but I'm getting closer. At least I'm accomplishing SOMETHING, even if it isn't my script. Chibi reminded me that I wasn't much farther last year, and so I'm not quite at the Point of Panicking yet....

APRIL 6TH - Cleaning commenced for Easter weekend, plus I still needed to take care of the in-laws' kitties while Hubby's parents are still on vacation. At about 2pm, Hubby and I got kidnapped to the local college by his BFF. I ended up running in to Makonraiba. Since I couldn't work on my own stuff anyway, agreed to beta the new opening to his story. Better than before. Finished off the day with the first actual D&D session with everyone. Just wish a troll that was in the college common room we were all in would have stopped his elitist BS about how "his" way to play D&D was infinitely better than our way... I'm normally not violent, but I was about to show him my own "Ol' Betsy and The Five Avengers". Anyway, no writing was done.

APRIL 7TH - Yeeeeeeaaaaaaah... was lazy and watched X-Men: Evolution with my hubby all day... Day 2 of absolutely no writing.

APRIL 8TH - EASTER! :D Started off the day with some VeggieTales movies. Then over to take care of the kitties while making dinner at the in-laws' house. Then trucked everything up to my sister-in-law's house. After a few hours up there, we came back down to the in-laws' house to again take care of the kitties and clean up after using Mom-in-law's kitchen. Went home and passed out. Spending the holiday away from home means a third day of no writing. I'm such a slacker!

APRIL 9TH - First day on the job! The meat/cheese slicers didn't remove my fingers, so it's a start. Also, it's easier for me to actually, oh, I don't know... write? Easter holiday weekend is over, and Hubby literally smacked my butt in order to get me back to work. I had about two hours before Cyhyr got out of class and came over for the weekly get-together. Her boyfriend was already here when I got off of work.

APRIL 10TH - Hubby and I went in to work at the same time, but I worked an hour less than him. Therefore I spent an hour in my car working on my story in the backseat. Once I got home I didn't accomplish much more since Hubby's obsessive X-Men: Evolution watching suckered me in as well.

APRIL 11TH - FINALLY finished the chapter and sent it to Chibi. It was on time too! Granted, I originally wanted to have the chapter published by Easter, but I still made the week goal I established in my last post. So there is nothing left to stop me from getting back on track with Script Frenzy... except for work having me stay an extra two hours to cover a call-in.... when I've only worked there for three days!!!! Good thing I'm a quick study! @_@

APRIL 12TH - Got edits back from Chibi, but I had some follow-up questions, so the chapter wasn't completely ready for posting. I then used the 1/2 hour between when I got off of work and when Hubby did in order to work on... gasp... MY SCRIPT! I also finally started talking in the Script Frenzy forum since the region leader was commenting that no one posted anything there since April started. Only managed to get a few more paragraphs done - not even a full page - before my script writing halted. Hubby's BFF is going through a romantic crisis and so we spent the rest of the day trying to cheer him up. At least it was for a good cause...

APRIL 13TH - My day off! Cool! I was all set to use it to really punch through with the script writing. Hubby would be at work for 5 hours, so I'd be completely uninterrupted. Then I got a call from the landlord. We're renting the house on the month-by-month basis. It's a super sucky way to do it, but we couldn't afford the extra $100 a month for the landlord to write us a lease... HATE our landlord. Makes no sense, you'd think with a lease it would be CHEAPER, but whatever. Anyway, while we're renting the house he also has the house on sale. The deal is he gives us 24hr notice of a showing, we have to be out of the house during the showing, and if the house is sold we have two months to find a new place to live before we're evicted. Goody, right? Anyway, the landlord called to inform me that there'd be a showing 9am Saturday and again 11am Sunday. So my day off to write turned in to a day off to clean - something that's been neglected with all the writing and random visitors.

APRIL 14TH - Virtually no writing done yet again. Not only did I have to work, but I also wasn't feeling well, so I spent the day watching TV with the hubby. His BFF again stopped by. He seems to be getting better with each visit, and it was fun talking about X-Men for about an hour. Still need to write about 45 pages... awesome! :P

APRIL 15TH - Well, originally wanted my chapter up by now at the latest, but I DID say it would be up by "Tax Day".... and technically that's April 17th.... So that's two more days to work on edits from Chibi, figure out how to rework the epilogue, and get this thing posted. Since I was waiting for edits from Chibi, I used my "Well, I'm up dropping Hubby off anyway, might as well write" hours to FINALLY work on my script. Only wrote 9 more pages, so the page count is 13 instead of the 50 it's SUPPOSED to be, but at least I didn't give up completely on this project.

APRIL 16TH - Work, people over, quick last-minute edits to the chapter, and sleep. Not a very productive day for writing. Plus side... In-laws came home so at least writing-time won't be taken up by take-care-of-kitties-time....

APRIL 17TH - IT'S UP! IT'S UP! MY FRIGGEN CHAPTER IS FINALLY UP! Also, I got out of work before Hubby again, so I was able to punch out another page or two of the script before he got off of work. But the main thing was that I got my stupid, forever-long, chapter up! Whoot! Now to find time to do my Author's Notes blog post..... But first, more of the script.

APRIL 18TH - Super bad day at work. Craziness, working with employees I haven't previously met, working 5 out of my 6 hour shift before getting a break... oh yeah, and a dehydration-induced migraine. Got home, crashed for about 2 hours, spent the rest of the day drugged up on pain killers and curled up on the couch trying to get my head to stop self-destructing. Went to bed at like 10pm! Plus side.... I have a nice review for my chapter already. :D

APRIL 19TH - Day off. Desperately needed to use the free time to clean and write! According to Script Frenzy's webpage I can still make the 100page count by the April 30th deadline if I write 8 pages a day! Let's see what I can do. My major problem is that I picked this plot because it was based on a game Hubby and our friends were playing - so I figured I'd get re-inspired each week. Of course, we switched gears and played OTHER games during the Monday Visits - or Hubby's BFF steals everyone to his lake house.... So no cheating, I have to do this plot completely on my own. :P I did manage five pages, but I'm stuck with all the combat I need for the script.... :P

APRIL 20TH - Work and house guests, as per usual. I am completely and utterly stalled with this script. I am just not inspired. With 10 days left I'm struggling between forcing myself to at least ATTEMPT to write - I mean, I DID put everyone on hold for Script Frenzy - or to just wave the white flag. I'm only up to 20 pages. Hubby suggests that I just stop, but I signed up for this, could I really be a quitter? I'm not even 1/2 way to were I was last year and I was supposed to have LESS distractions this year. In fact, if it weren't for my lack of willpower to walk away from my husband watching the TV for like 7hrs straight I WOULD have been about on par. I'm actually super upset about this. I had it all planned out. I had it all strategized better than last year. So why can't I write?

APRIL 21ST - I got about three pages done throughout the day. Pathetic really, but I'm forcing through. I haven't even gotten to the main plot of the story, it just doesn't want to be written. I feel drained whenever I attempt - it's like forcing a fatty to run a mile every day. Still not sure if I should just quit with only a 1/5 of the story written, but I'm still pressing on. I did attempt a real effort this time. Hubby had some friends over right after I was done with work. I attempted to be a good hostess at first, but they started talking about Magic: The Gathering and they might as well speak Klingon. So I sat in the living room for like five hours while they talked and played Magic. Every time I attempted to write I couldn't think over how loud they were. *sigh* I was too tired to do my normal 2am writing session while Hubby is at work. Maybe while he's sleeping throughout the day.

APRIL 22ND - I set up a playlist to try to keep me pumped. I stayed in my bedroom - AWAY from the TV. Hubby's asleep downstairs, so I had no sounds distracting me. And I'm spent the day fighting the urge to just play Mario 64. *sigh* Why does this script suck so much!? With the distraction of The Lorax fanart to celebrate Earth Day, I was only able to crank out another four pages. Plus the new Blogger format sucks. I want to go back to the other way. It didn't feel as sterilized and it felt more user-friendly... I can't stand websites changing their layout when the old ones work perfectly fine. Pwah.

APRIL 23RD - My day off was spent LITERALLY playing out the main battle sequence that really catapults the plotline. I broke out Hubby's Heroscape, built the "set", placed the "actors" in their positions, and then played out the battle the way it would happen if it were just a normal game of Heroscape. I then documented the fight and managed a nine-page battle sequence. Epicly long for the beginning of a movie, but I'm just going for page counts at this point in the game. Got up to about page 40. Goody, I'm making REAL headway now.... :P
Plus, can  you believe it kept me FOUR FRIGGEN HOURS to set up and play the battle sequence? I think the most annoying part was that I wanted a casualty of war, but the character I created to be that casualty just WOULD NOT DIE! I even started him off with 1/2 the health as my other characters, but every time I tried to kill him off he ended up surviving! The main characters, on the other hand, would have each died like 4 times if I didn't "fudge the rolls"... in other words, when the character would have died in game I just added more injuries to their script counterparts. *sigh* Nathan, you will forever be my epic NPC that WOULD NOT DIE! :P

APRIL 24TH - My first 8+ hour day of work since I quit Subway almost exactly 7 months ago. I was supposed to get a break, a lunch, and a second break. But it kept so long to get to my first break that by the time I got back from lunch I only had about an hour left of work. In other words, my legs got REALLY tired. Plus I had to be up and at work at 7am - another thing I'm not used to anymore. So even MORE tired. And I FINALLY got my hands on a copy of Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World.... only for my Hubby's one friend to call and interrupt the movie... and then his mother stopped by and interrupted again.... and then a different friend called and interrupted a third time. The damn movie kept almost 3hrs to watch! :P I attempted to write, but my mind was so burnt out I couldn't think of ANYTHING. Why am I failing Script Frenzy so hard core!?

APRIL 25TH - Cleaned like a boss in the morning, nearly killed myself by scrubbing with too much bleach, and then - when I was sufficiently tired out - I went to work. It. Felt. Like. The. LOOOOOOONGEST. Day. Even Hubby said I felt like I was away FOREVER. It was only a four hour day.... Anyway, Hubby had a buddy over by the time I got home. I cleaned some more, and then Hubby's BFF came over and the four of us watched TV shows and played Super Smash Bros. Brawl. I have five days to go. 60 pages. Mom's coming to visit for her birthday this weekend. I should just give up. *sigh* I won't wave the white flag, but I'm not actively participating anymore. Not like I really participated at ALL this year. Shouldn't have even bothered signing up. Such a waste. I should have just continued with my beta reading and waited until next year. I didn't think I'd have many distractions, but I didn't take into consideration the power of snuggling up to my hubby while watching endless hours of TV.... *sigh again*.... I super duper really need to find a quiet place next year.....

APRIL 26TH - Super Duper Cleaning Day part 2. I scrubbed EVERYTHING down... the counters, the floors, the bathrooms, the refrigerator, the dishes... I was a cleaning BEAST in my attempt to get ready for Mom's visit. In my cleaning furry I did manage to pull something in both my back and shoulder.... so the evening after picking up Hubby was spent watching movies and icing everything down....

APRIL 27TH - MOM'S BIRTHDAY!!!! While she was driving up to visit I was at work. I actually worked long enough to get a lunch this time, so I brought my netbook along. I did manage to work on the script a touch more, but I got interrupted by the HR rep who was practically begging people to sign up for her wellness program through the store. *sigh* I got maybe two more pages before I had to stop. I continued work, went home, Mom showed up almost right after - I wasn't even out of my work clothes yet - and we spent the evening with Hubby's BFF playing games and introducing my mom to the wonders of Netflix. We must have started and stopped about five different TV shows, we'd get about ten minutes in and she'd go "Oh, does it have *INSERT SHOW NAME HERE*?" Oh mom.... Happy *2nd birthday. :D

APRIL 28TH - Another long day of hanging with my mommy. We hung out at the house chatting for a little while, then we went to go eat, and then we took her to Hubby's BFF's house; which is up a mountain and on a lake. My mom LOVED the view. I didn't think we'd ever get her to leave his backyard. There was an awkward moment when Hubby told his BFF that we were kidnapping him, he replied that first he was going to shanghigh someone on to the lake in his canoe, and then Hubby flipped the canoe - on purpose, of course - when pushing it off the shore... causing the BFF to be drenched head to toe in his regular clothes, almost losing his keys in to the lake, and without any clean clothes to change in to. He later thanked my husband for allowing him to "go commando" since the only pants he had left were his swim trunks.... why wasn't he wearing those originally!? Anyway, Mom stopped repremending for the horseplay and we headed back to our place. More movies and games before BFF's roommate picked him up and Mom headed out to her hotel room. Then it was a few brief hours of sleep before Hubby needed to go in to his overnight shift at work.

APRIL 29TH - Well I pretty much waved the white flag on the whole script thing. Mario 64 was calling my name - too bad I couldn't really play because the cartridge is slightly goofed up and you can't read anything... Either way, I miss playing video games, it feels so long since I've done so.... Instead of my normal 8hr writing spree while Hubby was at work, I ended up spending about 4hrs reading a loooooooong message from my beloved Chibi and responding to her in an equally long manner. She did cheer me up a little by reminding me that just because I didn't hit 100 pages and got the "Won Script Frenzy" badge or whatever, that doesn't mean I "failed" either. I set out to do something that no one else I know set out to do. Granted, Cyhyr's boyfriend wanted to do it this year as well, but he opted out because he knew he didn't have the time to make the commitment. I did have the time and I wasted it, but at least I made an effort. That's something, right? And I DID manage to accomplish at least one writing goal this month: POSTING THAT DARN FANFIC CHAPTER!!! Speaking of which, I think I might have to do a blog post about 50 Shades of Grey....

APRIL 30TH - Fought with my bank, social services, my other bank, and the electric company. All before work. At work I got my break two hours in to my six hour shift. Which is beyond stupid, and resulted in mild dehydration that cramped up both legs. My legs are swore, I'm laid up on the couch, my back is killing me, I'm tired, and there is really no chance of me even THINKING about the script. So there you have it. I officially ended Script Frenzy with a lousy 40 pages. Super lame. 

And thus the month is past, and so is Script Frenzy. I got back in to the rhythm of daily chores during the weekend my mom was here, so I'm hoping to keep that up. I also STILL have to do the wedding thank you letters - because I'm THAT much of a loser. But all-in-all  hope for the next fanfic chapter at least structured before June.

So here I am, back from the hiatus and ready for more writing! Yes, I'm bummed about my poor turn-out with Script Frenzy. However, I now know that I need to be stronger and not only take an internet hiatus, but let Hubby and his friends know that I can't have visitors over April. I also think I'm gonna try a graphic novel script next year, but I could also convert my story in to a movie script if I'm done with the story by then.

Anyway, moving on to my Author's Notes post. Hopefully that will be my return to Sunday Blog Updates.

Helpful Writing Hints and Script Frenzy Prepping

Well, this was the week of laziness again! I FINALLY finished up Mekonraiba's story edits. It was a touch rough-going, with all the grammatical errors and all, and so it was a constant start and stop process. I do think he has a very nice - although perhaps a touch cliche - story brewing in his head, he just needs to know how to better express it on paper.

A person by the name of CartoonLover16 had posted on DeviantArt this week. Seems he's writing a Helga-centric fanfiction with a lot of focus on Helga's interaction with her family. He asked for any advice from the "die-hard fans" to make sure a "casual" fan such as himself didn't miss anything in canon. I then sent him a dissertation about my biggest Hey Arnold! fanfiction pet peeve - Helga's parents portrayed as physically abusive monsters that couldn't care less about their daughter. This is far from true if you pay attention to the show. I didn't mean for my response to him to be so long-winded but... well... check back on last week's post and.... yeah.... On the bright side, he seemed to find it helpful, and a couple people commented that they agreed with my agitation over the falsely pigeon-holing Bob and Miriam as "flat, Disney-like, evil villains". Another bright side is that I might write an essay on the subject and post it on DA, but it's unlikely that I'll do so in the near future.

Downside? CL16 now wants me to help beta for him as well. So I used his story to further procrastinate the writing of my own.

As for the writing of my own story. I had every intension of working on it Thursday. I even opened the document - an accomplishment in and of itself - and read back through the first half of the chapter I already had written. I did some tweaks and some edits to polish it up a touch. And then promptly stopped to go play Doodle God...

I am mildly comforted about my procrastination after reading an article I also sent to the self-doubting DarkAngel1326 as well as my fledgling Mekonraiba. Just in case you are also a writer, I'll leave this riiiiiiiight here....

Eight Secrets Which Writers Won't Tell You by Ali Luke. Part of her blog Aliventures. She also has another one of her blog posts linked in this one. I also found it reassuring.

Why Fiction is So Hard to Write

Oh heck! Just go ahead and read everything she has on her blog. I know I'm now following her. It is all inspirational and reassuring and has helpful tips. So if you're a writer I strongly suggest checking out Aliventures.

There HAS been a side task that I've been working on - plot conception wise. Those who have been following me - or at least my FanFiction writing - might recall my month-long hiatus throughout April last year. It was so I could participate in National Novel Writing Month's sister-event: Script Frenzy.

A review on last year's premier attempt at Script Frenzy:

I greatly enjoy the fanfiction writer Rachel Cabbit - from whom I got this writing-update blog idea - and read on her blog that she was participating in NaNoWriMo. After seeing a few more people on FF and Facebook comment about participating, I looked in to maybe doing the same. While on the NaNoWriMo's website I discovered that there was a sister program that occurs every April. Instead of attempting to write a 50,000 word novel between November 1st and November 30th, Script Frenzy's goal is a 100 page script between April 1st and April 30th. The real draw for me was that while NaNoWriMo tries to encourage writers to go solo, Script Frenzy was alright with collaborations. I had written easily two-dozen scripts in college as well as scripts while working at a production company for three years. At the time, I was actually more comfortable writing script than I was writing prose. Also, the next NaNoWriMo would be the month after my wedding - and we all know how crazy that month turned out. Writing a script, with a partner, long before my wedding and move all seemed like winning arguments, and so I signed up. Not knowing what to script, I decided on writing a fan-version of what I believed The Jungle Movie would have been like if Nickelodeon had greenlighted the second Hey Arnold! movie. Based on hints the show's creator Craig Barlett "leaked" over the years, I set forth to ask the fandom what they thought, as well as if anyone wanted to help collab with me. That's how I met my darling ChibiSunnie! The movie was epic, and overwhelming. We got past the half-way point in our page count, even if we only barely got in to the second act of the movie. Finished with 63 out of the 100 pages, and not even half-way through the plotline. Boy, do I need to go back and edit that thing! I kept meaning to last year, but never had the time to work on it further.

Well, it's that time of year again. At first I wasn't going to participate again this year, simply because I haven't done much work on my fanfic since LAST Frenzy. But then Cyhyr's boyfriend told me he wanted to try Script Frenzy for the first time this year. I wanted to be sort of moral-support for him by also working on a script right along side him. We could then talk about how far we have gotten, if we were ahead or behind on our page counts, whether or not we ran in to a wall with the plot, etc. Cyhyr herself might even participate. Since I would actually have a writing group this year I just couldn't resist. Again, I signed up.

Now the issue was figuring out before April 1st what it was I wanted to script. I worked on TJM last year, and so I couldn't really work on that again this year - as much as I'd like to. I've been obsessively watching the English dubbing of an anime called Ouran High School Host Club lately. I loved the show when I watched it in Japanese a few years back, and I'm remembering how great the show is now that I'm re-watching it in my native tongue. I briefly considered writing a movie continuation of the series, since where it concludes leaves quite a few loose ends. I soon dropped the idea since I haven't read the manga the series is based off of, and so I don't know if there is a more satisfying finish to the written version of the series. Then the leading idea was to take the Hey Arnold! A Midsummer Night's Dream crossover plot bunny, and write it as a play instead of prose. However, I really wanted to write something original this year - as much as I love fanfiction.

While I muddled over what to spend next month writing about, my hubby dug out his old Heroscape game. As much fun as it was to play the game as it was intended, being the Dungeons&Dragons-obsessed group that we are we try to convert EVERY game in to a form of LARP or D&D. So, Hubby wrote up loose rules and we're beta-running a campaign he created using a merger of D&D and Heroscape play mechanics. It's quite enjoyable!

Well, one morning it hit me! I could TOTALLY script out the Heroscape campaign. Hubby came up with a very loose introductory story to explain why the characters are where they are and doing what they're doing. He never really mentioned what could happen or what the end-goal is, so I could easily create one. There is also a subtle feel of a manga Hubby and I have been reading lately - Psyren - and so I could pull in elements from that manga. The recent ads for the movie adaptation of the book The Hunger Games has me looking at elements from that, the Japanese story Battle Royale it supposedly "ripped off", as well as re-reading Steven King's story The Long Walk - which both stories could have easily been inspired from.

So now I have a basic idea of what I'd like to do for the script, but I'm still a little iffy on what the actual DRIVE of the story is. Thankfully, my beta reading this week has helped me there too. As I said above, Mekonraiba does have an interesting story concept, and so some elements from his story may creep in to the script as well. Thankfully, he doesn't seem to mind at all. Yay! I might be all set for Script Frenzy. Now, to actually WRITE MY FANFICTION before I use Script Frenzy to procrastinate further.

Before I leave, I want to comment on a weird happening that I noticed this week. My Update Day is Sunday. Granted, a few times I've been late and I've updated on Monday or Tuesday. And there was that one time I posted on Friday to comment on my Valentine's Day story. However, for the most part I try to keep my update days on Sunday.

And yet, on Tuesday at 2pm my time and again at 9pm, and then one last time at 1am Friday, I had eight hits on my blog. It's so weird that my blog was hit up eight times on multiple occasions, on non-update days! XD Who are these people!? They are awesome-sauce and I wish to glomp them!

OK... NOW I'm off to write.

P.S. - I forgot to mention I have a new link on my side bar. Actually, it's replacing the deceased "Arnold Forums" link - since there IS a forum attached. The new Operation Ruthless website opened this Friday! It is a site dedicated to educating the Hey Arnold! fans of The Jungle Movie as well as informing everyone how they can help convince Nickelodeon to revive the project. It is just such a cool place to hang out and we're all like one big happy family! YAY! So check it out! Even if you don't want to help revive TJM it's still cool to see what we do and talk about the show we all love!

Well, technically I have TWO new links since I also added Aliventures... Seriously, check it out if you write AT ALL!

OK, for realsies... I'm leaving now!

Beta Reading and Drabble Woes

WOAH! 800+ page views!? That means I've had 100 hits in about 20 days! I'm averaging 5 page views a day! Whoot! Well, technically it's more like 17 hits every time I post an update... but that's still AVERAGING 5 hits a day! I feel all warm and fuzzy like moldy toast! ^_^ OK, moving on to the actual post....

So I've continued with my Beta-Reading tasks and boy has that gotten crazy!
Monday I spent like four hours talking with DarkAngel1326 about her next chapter of Keep Love in Your Heart. She's been in a slump lately. Partially because the next chapter is really depressing, and even someone whose penname includes DARK in the title can have a hard time writing super depressing stuff - especially when she fears it will alienate the fans. She's also in a slump partially because she refuses to believe she's a good writer. Not only do I constantly tell her she is, but also one of our Hey Arnold! friends AJSky7 posted in her Author's Notes that DarkAngel inspired her.

AJSKY7: "One of [DarkAngel1326's] stories, Fast Cars Can Only Take You So Far, is one of my favorites and it made me confident enough to write in this style....[DarkAngel1326] you are an amazing poet and a writer, and I feel a personal connection to your work, so don't doubt yourself either!"

Bah, regardless of us constantly telling her how good she is, DarkAngel still refuses to believe us. I blame 1) All the people in her past who told her she wasn't good, and 2) Her brother who is supposedly a better writer with even less confidence than she has. If HE would just believe he was a good writer than maybe she could as well... PWAH!

So anyway, please, PLEASE check out DarkAngel's stuff and let her know how you truly feel about her work! In the meantime, she's at least getting back in to writing by doing daily writing prompts on her DeviantArt account. She even borrowed one of my plot bunnies in order to write a drabble. She recently re-assured me that she's getting ready to get to writing her next chapter, but our darling Brokenrose24 gave her yet another plot bunny about Suzie and Oskar Kokoshka separating, bettering themselves alone, and then re-meeting in the future. Who knows which story she'll go with. If you have a preference, let DarkAngel know!

I've also started up beta reading for Devious.Editor. Started the same way it did with Delaroux - I made a contructive criticizm on her story and she asked me to beta future chapters. I'm not sure why I keep agreeing - aside from loving the idea of getting to know the next chapter before anyone else! Beta Reading is a lot of work, but it's fun. Plus you have the old adage of "Those who can't do, teach." I guess I'm just up to the "teach" part of writing. LOL. Anyway, I feel guilty that my epic Valentine's Day story made me push back my edits for Devious for a week! Poor thing, waiting for me! Sorry, Devious' readers! She's slacking on posting because I'm lazy!!! On the plus side, we've gotten a dialogue started and I think she might really have something super-good for the next chapter!

By far the toughest Beta Reading I took on is for a mutual friend of my husband and mine. I can't even recall how far back it was, but some time between 2005 and 2007 I was introduced to a webcomic my husband's friend drew. Although the comic itself wasn't terribly entertaining, the thing that really hooked me was that the friend designed his characters off of his friends. So my husband had a character designed off of him, and even I got a character eventually. Anyway, the comic eventually got its own forum set up, and on this forum, Mekonraiba posted a sampling of a story he had been working on. Poor thing... my husband and I ended up MSTing every sentence the guy wrote! To this day we joke about one of Mekon's phrases: Thrashing the Flowers. As we play Legend of Zelda my husband jokes about thrashing the flowers as he has Link cut the blossoms growing throughout Hyrule and Skyloft.

Well, it's been years since then, and Mekon feels he has improved with his writing, but would feel more confident with a Beta to back him. I just couldn't say no to his friggen puppy-dog eyes! I went back through his old fanfiction to re-acquaint myself to his writing style. Boy was it a rough go when reading that old stuff, but I have to admit, the stuff he wrote in 2009 wasn't all that bad. Sure, it still needed polishing, but that just means I have something to do as a beta, right? :D I have faith that he really has grown to a point where he could be just as good as the girls! I just need to ban him from using the words 'And', 'Nodded', and 'Seemingly'.... Sure, he got in to a bit of a Writer's Funk when I critiqued him, but who wouldn't? He seems to have his writing-mojo back and is ready to work. We'll see how this goes, and I'll be sure to link you to his latest stuff once that gets going.

This brings me to my other bit of news. Since Mekon wants to focus mostly on his original story, we would have to work through Fanfiction's sister site FictionPress. This means now that I have a FP account I can start working on original works as well as my Hey Arnold! fanfiction. I might post some stuff about my Dungeons&Dragons character - although I guess technically that could still be fanfiction, who knows. Perhaps I'll convince Delaroux to set up a FP account for all of her Flite11 adventures... Either way, I might go back to my D&D character, tweak things a touch here and there, and post something on DeviantArt as a trial. We shall see; we shall see.

Kind of stemming off of all the beta-reading, there has been something that's been kinda nagging at me lately. My husband's one groomsman's girlfriend Cyhyr has become like my only female friend in my new home. Love her dearly. She glomps me, so she's awesome in my book. ^_^ However, I commented on Monday about my astonishment with people who can write drabbles. These are, basically, stories that are between one hundred and one thousand words - something like that. Point is, they're tiny. We all know how long-winded I am. I'd be surprised if I could write a blog post with less than one thousand words! This is why I have trouble with Twitter.

Because of this, I'm just amazed at the people, such as my FanFiction idol Rachel Cabbit, who can not only write in drabbles, but also tell such compelling stories with so few words. The people that can say so much with so little.

Well, Cyhyr - who is a bit of a hardass when it comes to things she studies, and she happens to be a fellow writer - sternly said that all writers should aspire to the point where they can write a drabble. Publishers want shorter stories with more punch in them.

I know she didn't mean it as such, but it felt like a punch in the gut. I honestly don't know if I can write concise enough to write a drabble. Therefore, I don't know if I could ever truly be professionally published.

I'm too damn long winded and I don't know how to condense! Am I doomed from the start? When I was little I used to be succinct in my stories, but then I was always bombarded with questions when I was done. Clearly I didn't include enough details. Slowly I added more details to my stories so people wouldn't have questions when I was done. Somewhere along the line I past that "happy medium" and now I get too detailed. My mom and even my husband tell me that when I verbally tell stories I just go on forever! Something that should be a two minute conversation turns in to an hour-long one.

In fact, I can feel me doing the same thing with the above paragraph, and yet I'm gonna leave it here as a mini-diary for you to read.

I don't know. This "every author should strive to write short, concise stories" thing is really bugging me. I mean, Delaroux and a fellow FB friend even teased me about it. "And now time for essay writing with [LycoRogue]".... Granted, they both said they loved how detailed I get, but still. Them joking about my FB comments being "essay-like" sends me back to high school when people would comment on long-winded emails and other such letters as "being [LycoRogue] like"... GAAAAH! WHY IS THIS BUGGING ME SO HARD CORE!? *sigh* Pwah....

And my husband is kind of passive-aggressively complaining about the massive time I spend both writing and beta-reading: "You should give THAT up for Lent! LOL"

PWWWWAAAAAAHHHHH!!!!!!

I guess I really DO need to work on that stuff and how time-consuming it is - especially my overly-detailed stories. I mean, check out this blog post? And ChibiSunnie got a long-winded response to her review of For Whom The Bells Toll. *scratches head* I dunno... I'm off to fold laundry and do dishes and other such housework while I figure it out.