Having a Gaming Moment

 Aww, yeah. This year is going swimmingly already.

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I'm not gonna bother sugarcoating it. I missed last week's blog because I was feeling lazy. Simple as that. I was distracting myself with other things and didn't really put in the effort. Sorry about that. I mean, I know just about all of you understand and will tell me "do what you need to for your mental health; don't worry about it." I still feel like I failed somehow though, but I'm gonna pre-emptively thank you all for the kind thoughts.

Now, for a little world building here. Where Hubby and I live is semi-rural. We have a local grocery store and Walmart, and a few specialty shops such as a car dealership, mechanic, one-screen movie theater, gaming store, furniture store, and crafting store. All other things, however, we more-or-less need to drive 30-45min in any given direction to get to. Hubby had saved up enough to finally get a gaming computer that he had been eying up for a while, and we both had the day off, so we made a plan to drive to the city for his computer. Now, it's less than an hour commute. Once upon a time, I used to commute roughly a half-hour to get to and from work. It really shouldn't seem that long of a drive. However, when you're in a semi-rural area, the only really sufficient way to get anywhere is by highway. And the highway landscape up here is ENDLESS MOUNTAINS AND, ironically, SAMENESS. 

See, where I grew up, the highway drove past smaller cities and bigger towns and amusement parks and STUPIDLY HUGE hospitals; there was always something new to see, and since you were driving past so much development it didn't FEEL like a long drive. When I visited family in the next state over, it was more of the same. Constant on ramps and off ramps and developments on either side of the highway. It may be a bit obnoxious when you think about it environmentally, but it also was a great way to feel like you were actually going somewhere at a pretty quick pace. Here, however, when all you have is mostly empty highway with the occasional car here and there, lined with trees and more trees and even more trees, and the same mountain range slowly rolling along each side of the highway, you just feel like you're on the same stretch of road for HOURS even though it's only been about 20min. I used to enjoy driving. Now, I just get so tired when doing so.

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Enough world building. My point is that, whenever Hubby and I leave town for any reason, we try to make as much of a day of it as possible to justify the "long" drive. So, Hubby and I created a list of things we wanted to hit up while also getting him his computer, as well as other things at Best Buy to look at while we were there.

Side note: we tried Popeye's Louisiana Kitchen for the first time that day. Started off with the classic chicken sandwiches, as well as a 6pk of the biscuits, and a 6pk of the beignets. RIP KFC. You've got nothing on Popeye's now that I've tried that! And those biscuits!?

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So, yeah. Hubby and I slept in last Tuesday, instead of my intended "get up as per usual, write up my blog post, and get ready to head out at noon". We did head out at noon, as we had intended, but with no blog post to be had. I knew exactly what I wanted to write too, but I just... didn't want to leave my bed.

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We then spent quite a few hours in the city going through our long list; we always build it up and then go to the cities once we have at least a couple hours' worth of things to do. Drove back into town, and then hit up Walmart for a couple of other things we needed to restock after our quarantine. Next was laundry and grocery shopping. It was still early enough in the evening by the time all of our errands were done; about 7 or so. I just didn't have the energy to bother with the blog at that point. 

I could have posted a late update on my next day off, Friday, but I ended up spending most of that day either cleaning up the apartment or playing video games.

Speaking of, that was kinda-sorta what I wanted to talk about last Tuesday.

So, after paying our monthly bills, Hubby and I noticed we had some spare cash. Yes, we could put it towards our savings for things like a house of our own, but it also doesn't hurt to splurge on yourself every now and again, right? Plus, the whole point of these stimulus checks in the US is to stimulate the economy if the money isn't needed for bills, right? So, Hubby focused on his gaming computer. I turned my eyes to a bunch of digital games Nintendo had in its eShop. Mostly indie games that were ported over. Yeah, Nintendo doesn't need my money, nor does Best Buy, I'm sure, but it's something new to try to help keep our morale up, and I ended up spending less than $100, so... meh.

Well, Sunday, January 17, since I get out of work at 4pm, and I hadn't updated Perfect Doesn't Need to be Perfect in a while, I had every intention of working on that story. Instead, I ended up vaguely watching the NFL playoffs while playing this game finally:

Yup. FINALLY got on the hype train of this game. FINALLY got to experience the joy of being a complete agent of chaos as I screwed around with a bunch of residents in a little (presumably?) UK hamlet. Instead of working on chapter 6 of my story - ya know, "six geese a layin'" - I, kinda ironically, spent Sunday evening running around as a goose.

I had so much fun when I got to the back gardens (back yards in US speak) section of the game. Especially because I got to make myself all pretty with a ribbon around my neck.

It's actually a red ribbon in this part of the game, but, down by the first level with the gardener,
you can find a blue ribbon and carry it to the artist's back yard to get the blue bow instead.

Look at how elegant I look! Reminds me of my childhood. My mom had our little house completely decked out in Country Goose. We had white geese with blue bows like this EVERYWHERE: the plates, the wallpaper, random decorative knickknacks, and we had a goose cookie jar.

I worked SOOOOO hard to keep that ribbon on. Whenever I would get caught, and the ribbon was ripped off, I would get it put back on before trying to finish my tasks. Probably kept me about 5x longer to finish this level because I refused to do anything without my blue ribbon on.

Only for it to be programmed into the game that I'd always loose the ribbon my first play-through as I progressed to the next level!

Not cool, game!

Don't worry, I figured out how to get the ribbon back on before I finished the game. 

Not even a week later, and I tore through the full To Do list for the game. All I have left is the "speed-run" to-do list. That's on hold though, because I have a couple other games I had tried out.

Like I said, I saw I had some spare cash, and Nintendo was having one of its many MANY sales on its digital content. So I scooped up a handful of games to try out.

While not a canonical Legend of Zelda game. I knew I had to try out Cadence of Hyrule. Much like how Hyrule Warriors is a crossover between Dynasty Warriors and Legend of Zelda, Cadence of Hyrule is a crossover between LoZ and Crypt of the NecroDancer. It is a Roguelike rhythm action game in a style probably resembling A Link to the Past the most. It also has a very original LoZ feel, but the fact that there is some linear gameplay (you have to defeat A before you can proceed to B) is why it doesn't COMPLETELY match the open gameplay of the original game.

Anyway, I wasn't sure if I'd like this game for a couple of reasons. 

1. I've heard mixed reviews, but I also know how harsh LoZ "fanboys" are. I was still afraid this would be about par with Tri Force Heroes or Four Swords/Four Swords Adventures; not a bad game, but super gimmicky, not much by way of story, and not much replay value.
2. I am not the best at rhythm games. One of the reasons I never did well when I tried out band in middle school. I just can't keep count, I guess? Or I'll get slightly off-count and stay on count with that; never truly finding the proper beat? I'm usually off-count just EEEEEEEVER so slightly in these types of games; too soon or juuuust barely too late. I can confirm this is still very much the case.
3. It's a roguelike game. I already get irritated when I can't figure out how to play through a game without dying a lot. If I can't figure out a LoZ boss after one or two deaths, I get cranky: "I've played video games pretty much my whole life, why do I still suck so hard at them!?" So giving me a game like Dark Souls or Cuphead where the play is notoriously difficult? I'd rage-quit FAST. The last time I played anything remotely close to a roguelike game was back with old-school Nintendo or arcade games where there was no save file. You did the full-run with either just your one life or with the lives you built up, or you start from scratch. Even Sega Genesis games where, aside from health and lives, nothing transferred over from one level to the next. I still remember how proud I was when I FINALLY beat the Escape from the Cave of Wonders level in Aladdin. All-in-all, I've been afraid to try out any roguelike games even with this background in these old-school systems.

Luckily, I saw Outside Xtra stream Spelunky 2 a few months back, and I saw how irritating, and yet fun(?) a roguelike game could be. I also saw how rewarding FINALLY getting to the end of a 3-or-4-level run could be, and how getting to that end point DOES advance the game so it gets a liiiiiiittle easier to do those early runs fully as you progress. Plus, if you KNOW that you're going to die a lot, and it's not necessarily because you're a "bad gamer" it could just be a poor random generated dungeon or loot drop, it doesn't make you feel so inadequate??? 

Then, over on OutsideXbox, they uploaded a video of Mike playing a demo of the game Going Under. Another roguelike game where it's a very tongue-in-cheek corporate dungeon crawler. It was sponsored content. It did its job. Hubby found the video intriguing enough, and the game was on eShop sale, so he picked it up. I watched him play a few levels and was interested as well, especially when I saw that even he would die easily if the dungeon was poorly generated - via bad loot or the store was at the start of the run when your character doesn't have money, etc.

I've also seen SO. MUCH. HYPE. for the game Hades. Plus, I used to play the developer's other game Bastion back when they had a free demo on Google Chrome, so I knew I really liked their style. This made me really REALLY want to try out this game, but it was another roguelike. I needed to see if I could even handle this gaming sub-genre.

So, with the goal to a) add another LoZ-themed game to my repertoire, b) try out Going Under myself, and c) see if I can handle roguelike games enough to warrant buying Hades, I picked up the Cadence of Hyrule demo. Yay for demos! It's actually a pretty decent size, especially since I do indeed suck at both roguelike games and rhythm games. It was irritating at first, and I was almost glad I didn't drop the dough to buy the full game, but after sleeping on my irritation and going back to the game the next day with new determination, I actually got pretty far. Haven't finished the demo yet, but I at least got to the final dungeon. PROGRESS!

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With Cadence of Hyrule, I learned that the Hades tagline of "One more time" is indeed the cry of roguelike gamers. I just got so addicted to "ooh! I got so close that time! Okay. Once more!"

I got even MORE addicted to it when I bought and played Going Under myself. Mostly because it's more rogue-lite, I think? Every dungeon dive, even if you fail miserably, advances the game a little. The NPCs will have new dialogue after every run. The skills you equip will slowly improve with each run. You may fail at getting to the dungeon boss, let alone defeating him, but you may finish an NPC's side-quest, which advances your relationship with them, and THAT could give you the edge you need to finish the dungeon.

Plus, this game is just SUUUUUCH a great social commentary on toxic capitalism, you WANT to do "one more run" just to see what new dialogue you get.

I mean....

Who hasn't lived this life?

This. This hits hard.

Preachin' to the choir, indeed.

Contract workers beware.

I'm sure everyone has experienced at least one boss like this, if not EVERY boss.

Ah, the joys of having your work be valued by your employer... Oh, wait.

Yeeeeaaaaaah, this game gets REAL real at points. That's for sure. 

So, the main world-build of this game is that you have this city that pretty much sprang up around this one company Cubicle. Cubicle is (almost?) entirely automated, and loves to back up-and-coming start-up companies (think the show Shark Tank). The problem is, you quickly find out that the start-up companies that Cubicle backs have a huge spike in success before completely tanking it; vanishing without a trace. You also realize that the dungeons you are diving through to help keep the monsters in the basement "under control" are the remains of these start-ups. And guess what, you're now an unpaid intern at yet ANOTHER start-up that Cubicle just backed: F'zzle Soda. There's shady things clearly afoot at Cublicle that you slowly piece together with the dialogue you get after each dive.

Cubicle is also clearly a thinly-vailed jab at Amazon.

Okay, maybe it's not even thinly-vailed.... Also, yes, that is a slide from the 2nd floor office down to the main floor of the building (the purple object kind of upper middle of the picture), as well as a water feature just off to the upper left of the picture. I'm assuming those are in reference to the "fun work environment" Amazon was/is known for.

VEEEERY tongue-in-cheek - I didn't even point out the failed start-ups that you dungeon crawl through - and I adore this game. It also adds to my new-found love of roguelike/rogue-lite games. So, next time I have some spare funds again, I'm scooping up Hades. (Also, a former coworker of mine has been majorly championing the game The Binding of Isaac, so that's another for my list.)

Okay, so, I've been spending the past week playing roguelike games and being a jerky goose instead of updating this blog, or working on my story? Well, I've also been absorbing some seriously emotional gaming content by way of Ori and the Blind Forest. Once again, I have Outside Xtra to blame for this. Way back in May, Ellen talked about how much she loved the Ori sequel Ori and the Will of the Wisps. Again, because of such games as Cuphead, I had seen a trend of indie games purposefully being harder games to give a sort of throwback to old-school arcade and 1st generation consoles. So, even though I loved the design of Ori and the Blind Forest, I was afraid to actually buy it. But after hearing Ellen talk about how moving the story was for Will of the Wisps I knew I had to give it a whirl. Especially when I saw the game in the Nintendo eShop. Thankfully, the original - Blind Forest - was also in the eShop, and had a demo option. YAY AGAIN FOR DEMOS. 

Seriously, game demos have convinced me to buy SOOOO many games over the past year or so. If you have a game; have a free demo or "showcase" so potential players can see if they even like the gameplay. You'll probably catch a lot more players that way, because people like me, who would rather shy away from a popular game because we're not sure we'll enjoy it enough to justify the money spent, are soooooo much more likely to go "okay, no. I'm hooked. Let's buy this thing." Why most games don't have the first level as a demo is beyond me. It's not like you'd need to do extra programming....

Anyway, as I said in that last paragraph, I was HOOKED. Right in the opening of Ori and the Blind Forest you get hit with The Feels almost on par with the opening of the Pixar movie Up. I have since bought the full game. I also could have continued where I left off in the demo - another fun feature that most demos have if they're the first level of the game - but I deleted the file and started completely fresh, just to experience that opening again. I haven't gotten further than the first level thus far, but I've also been juggling between a half-dozen games.

Because we can't forget that I'm still faithfully playing Animal Crossing: New Horizons daily, as well as slowly progressing through Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity. 

Dear lord. I haven't played video games this frequently since I was in, like, middle school or high school or something!

Sooooo, yeah. I've been bouncing between AC:NH, Age of Calamity, Cadence of Hyrule, Going Under, Untitled Goose Game, and Ori. I've also been trying to keep up with my French lessons over on Duolingo daily, and splice in some Japanese refreshers to not forget the basics I learned in 2019.

Oh, and also work... I've been working too....

I know, especially since I promised myself I'd have this Christmas-themed story done before February, that I REALLY should be focusing on that. But it's been sooooooooo long since I've really been able to just enjoy video games? Mostly because, no offense to my husband, but HE'S usually playing video games, and we only had the one TV. So if HE'S playing, I can't be. But with the Switch? I can play whenever, even if he's already on the TV playing something or watching something. We also have the 2nd TV in the bedroom now with my Switch dock, so I could go play on a TV myself if I really wanted to. I'm having SUUUUCH a gamer moment, and, sadly, it's kind of shoved the writing to the side for a minute.

This is why I don't get people who are/were bored during quarantine/lockdown or the people who work part-time jobs during retirement, not because they need the money, but because they're bored at home. I mean, if that's you, cool. Everyone is wired differently. But I just don't understand it. I have about a dozen different hobbies that I can cycle through at any given time, and each hobby can fill a day by itself. Add in normal Adulting chores, and I don't think I could ever be bored again.

I mean, I DO still get bored on occasion, but that's more a stress thing where I can't really focus on anything and find joy in what I'm doing. Once I'm out of that funk? No boredom. 

Now after AAAALLLLLL of that massive stuff said, I DID manage to update two more chapters on PDNTBP. (I know, burying the lead a bit here.)

Last Monday, a day later than intended, I did indeed post chapters 6 and 7 of my story. I had every intension last week to comment about the story and Untitled Goose Game and call it a day.

Anyway, if you want to know what chaos happens to poor Chat Noir and Ladybug with "six geese a layin'" and "seven swans a swimmin'" you can check out my latest chapters.

"Chapter 6"

On FanFiction       On ArchiveOfOurOwn       On DeviantArt       On Tumblr

"Chapter 7"

On FanFiction       On ArchiveOfOurOwn       On DeviantArt       On Tumblr

I only have a week to go before my deadline. I still need to finish editing down the MASSIVE chapter 8 for this story. I also have chapters 9 through 12 to write! I need to get my butt in gear!

So, looks like my gaming moment is on pause as I try to pick up the pace with writing again. Of course, I'm also going to make sure that "picking up the pace" in my writing doesn't lessen the quality. It's a fun balance.

We'll see how this goes. I have a random Saturday off as well, so, worse comes to worst, I guess I'm spending Saturday finishing my story. Keep a look out for those final 5 chapters! 

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A Rant About X-Future

This update is going to be hard for me. All I want to do is turn off my brain and not look at a computer screen. Yet, here I am.

I'm surprised actually. Not so much that I'm writing this blog, but that I have to struggle so hard to do so.

This past week has been just a repeat of the previous ones: Go to work, be run ragged by the lack of staffing in the start of our busiest season, come home exhausted, pissed off, and emotionally drained, veg on the couch to try to ignore the rest of the world exists, and lose track of what day it even is.

There was no motivation there for anything - aside from playing a little more Lego Marvel Superheroes. Once again I had no drive to do any writing or research. I was doing the bare minimum to avoid Zero Days. Even with my sermon about bite-size tasks turning in to full project completion, I haven't really been able to do so myself.

I was able to accomplish NOTHING during my two days off this past week. Two days off in a row. TWO. I essentially had the equivalent of a weekend off for the first time in maybe a year. I did minimal cleaning, crocheted a teeny bit, The Bard crashed Friday in to late Saturday, and we more-or-less marathoned Lego Marvel Superheroes the full 24-hrs he was over.

Sunday I actually fell asleep just about when I got home. I even napped a little before work. I was still exhausted. Go figure. However, Sunday was also the start of me kicking my butt in gear with my slacking off with writing.

About a month ago I had a strong desire to continue work on the collab project Ronoxym and I were writing about Devon and Willow. Sadly, I can't actually CONTINUE the story since I have no clue where Ron wants to go with it. Yet he hasn't touched the story since March; maybe even end of February. Anyway, I had already edited the "inside Devon's head" portion we've written, but there were still 12pages before that. So I started editing those too.

That's what gave me Non-Zero days since Sunday. I've been slowly re-reading and editing the rest of the story. It's a slow start, but it's something. It gets me in the "how to edit a second draft" mindset; which is a process I need more practice in since I rarely do second drafts of anything. At the same time it got my writing juices mildly flowing again as I try to rework sections of our story.

That's the main reason I'm so surprised at my deep, DEEP desire to ignore all things writing and needing of brain function. I was all proud of myself for getting back in to the writing swing of things. I was getting excited about working on this post.

Then Phfylburt happened.....

For those who might not recall, Phfylburt is one of my husband's friends who is a prominent player on the X-Future boards. Hubby may be the Game Master of the board - in charge of all things plot-wise - but Phfyl is one of the main Storytellers. Hubby and Phfyl routinely bounce plot ideas back and forth in order to come up with some of the most intriguing story points in the game. Phfyl is one of the people I wish to work with in rebooting X-Future as a webcomic.

Still looking for artists, by the way....

Anyway, despite last night I do still wish to work with him on a webcomic reboot, but at the same time he's the reason I don't wish to write at all.

The reasoning is super spoilerific for the X-Future story, so please just quickly scroll on down if you don't want any spoilers. I made sure to keep the spoiler part inside a blocked quote so it's easy to see what part to avoid.

***SPOILER ALERT**SPOILER ALERT**SPOILER ALERT***
*****DO NOT READ IF YOU WISH TO AVOID SPOILERS*****
**ONE LAST WARNING THAT THIS SECTION HAS SPOILERS**

Just before I was ready to go to bed Hubby noticed that someone had posted on the X-Future Facebook group for the first time since early MARCH. In fact, it was the first time ever someone besides ME posted in the group - everyone else usually just responds to my posts.

Anyway, what was said new post?
It was Phfyl stating simply: "I am a monster. Of this I am aware."
I knew INSTANTLY that he meant Lincoln. My beloved and favorite character on the board: Lincoln. My heart started racing and I sprinted to my computer. Hubby chuckled at my concern for the character and told me I didn't want to read.

However, he warned me with that little playful chuckle in his voice. He'd usually do this to spook me as a prank. Typically if he warned me I didn't want to read or watch something with that playful chuckle it meant either a) nothing bad happened at all and he just wanted to freak me out, or b) something bad did happen, but it was mostly angsty feels that weren't so bad aside from me going "I NEED TO CUDDLE THAT CHARACTER!"

Since I was told to check out Lincoln's journal first I figured the later would happen. Phfyl would be a monster because he came up with a new mental or emotional torture for his little character. I was fully expecting to read what was posted and then find SOME way to get Lia over to Lincoln to comfort him. Hell, I had been trying that for weeks now, but more on that later.

I went to the Lincoln's Journal thread and saw simply: [Page had been torn out]
I was like "WTF? Why bother posting in that thread if it's just gonna say that a page was ripped out of the book?" I then saw the post in Lincoln's bedroom and thought maybe there was context there. Perhaps the bedroom had some narrative to explain what Lincoln wrote, and why it was torn out of the journal.

Nope. Still no clue why the page was ripped out...

Instead I ended up switching gears as I got excited about possible character advancement. One part of the bedroom post seemed to suggest that Darwin - the voice inside Lincoln's head that has been heavily implied to be a separate being of some sort - was able to unexpectedly take over control of Lincoln's body for a moment.

Lincoln was all Emo-Boy once again. Darwin was trying to cheer him up, and then demanded that he get out of bed and talk to someone. Lincoln refused, but bolted upright anyway. This was where I got excited and thought that Darwin somehow figured out how to take control of Lincoln's body. I even thought that perhaps this was what Phyfyl meant. Perhaps he was a monster because Lincoln got bumped out of his own body; sorta.

You could tell by the way he talked towards Lincoln that Darwin had a brotherly sort of love towards him, but Darwin also couldn't resist tormenting and teasing him. Perhaps Phyfyl's monster comment was regarding a grand reveal in which Darwin was really some villain. It actually just happened on the boards in which a supposed best friend turned out to be a sleeper spy. We also have a villain who literally head-hops, and so Darwin "living" in Lincoln's head wouldn't be too far fetched.

Maybe now that Darwin knew how to control Lincoln's body he'd create mischief in Lincoln's place. The groundwork was already there. Lincoln got depressed again because he got in a fight with Tyler, and got the two of them and Crystal thrown in to a detention session. Darwin wouldn't have needed to do much to create more hell for Lincoln and possibly bring the X-Men down from the inside; an ongoing theme it seems.

Then the rooftop scene blindsided me.

Darwin was driving Lincoln to finally go talk to someone - especially after the whole "Did I just control you?!" part. Lincoln agreed at first, but decided to finally use his newly healed wings instead of walking throughout the school. I was again excited for him. So much potential can be had in this character and I was so happy that he could possibly be happy again after being able to fly once more.

Except Lincoln randomly turned for the worst. He motions to talk to his mom - whom he had just found a week before after a lifetime of searching for her - but abruptly declares that there's no way she could help him. He then thanks Darwin for being a friend and begins a spell. Darwin recognizes the spell but can't do anything to stop Lincoln. He calls out for help, but being a voice inside a kid's head no one can hear him. At least, not fast enough.

Lincoln completes his spell and almost instantly combusts. Yup. Phfyl KILLED Lincoln! Just offed him! Had the kid commit suicide out of nowhere! What's worse is HOW he did it. The kid is now splattered guts, a jawless skull, and wings painting the roof of the Xavier Institute. Grotesque! It was pretty much an "Eff you guys, there's no way we can bring Lincoln back."

See, in the Marvel Universe - especially with the canon character we recently brought in to the fold: Elixir - characters rarely stay dead. Hell, more often than not a character's heart will be pierced and they will actually DIE, but then Elixir will come by and heal said character. Good as new and capable of fighting another day. If we REALLY wanted to, in theory I'm sure we could have found a way to revive both William and Liam. Hell, Hubby's waiting for the opportune time to reveal that two different deceased characters are revived.

But then there's Phfyl's masterpiece. He sure as hell made sure NOTHING was gonna revive that puppy.

Alright, now for some buffer text so that people who skipped the spoiler above won't accidentally see anything as they go back to reading the blog... if they ARE still reading the blog. Anyway, the non-spoiler section is where I'll explain why this event made me not want to write this update, as well as touch back upon my earlier statement about Lia and cuddles.

**END OF SPOILERS*END OF SPOILERS*END OF SPOILERS**
*IF YOU SKIPPED THE SPOILERS YOU CAN READ AGAIN NOW*
**NO MORE SPOILERS. FEEL FREE TO READ AGAIN BELOW.**

Anyway...
So the above happened and let's just say it blindsided and dumbfounded me. Phfyl just devastated me with the mildest of warnings, and when I called him on it and asked for a reason he simply reposted what he said in the Facebook group.

I was a wreck. It completely ruined everything for me. I was finally getting back in to the forum - one of the few remaining players - and now I don't want to look at it.

I'm slowly playing through a mission as Willow, but I think I'll just have Hubby relay over what he did, and then have him post my responses so I don't have to bring the board up. I even hid the link in my favorites bar so I wouldn't be tempted.

I have no real clue what to do with Crystal - Hubby keeps reminding me that she's technically an NPC, and so I don't have to do anything with her; just respond as her - but I REALLY have no clue what to do with Crystal now. I have no idea how she's gonna react. It could go one of about ten ways!

So, I'm down Crystal. I've also been down Trish since January. I had already "lost" one of my favorite characters because Ron is still MIA.
He's never on the boards, and he has two characters keeping a third one sort of locked in a role play that he has to finish up. So even if Ron ever DID hop on the boards, Hubby would slaughter him if he role played "the past" with Trish; since the Brotherhood section hasn't been caught up with the "current" timeline it's still considered "pre-time-skip". Since - as I just mentioned - The Brotherhood hasn't been caught up - aka: nothing past "Rescue Trish Mission" posted yet - and since I can't role play with Ron's characters Devon or Nys - again, as mentioned, Hubby would slaughter him - the only way I can do anything with Trish is to do solo-plays. What was Trish doing during the two years skipped on the boards? Trick there is I'm not really sure; hence not posting as her even though I wanted to.

I temporarily lost my favorite character until the board advances far enough - which isn't gonna happen any time soon since no one goes on to role play anymore - and I can't think of what to do with another character who MIGHT be able to advance things, mainly because the people she'd most likely interact with don't really frequent the boards at all anymore. So if I tried any sort of role playing with them she'd be just as stuck as Phfylburt's one character who is waiting for Devon and/or Nys to do ANYTHING.

Then there's Lia.
My first character. She used to be my main character. She's taken a backseat to Willow - whom Hubby claims is mostly my personality which is probably why she became my new main - and to Trish. Lia's broken and emo-rific. She's really struggling emotionally right now, and that's one of the main reasons I haven't done anything with her for a month. I'm not really sure what she'd do next.

Part of me thinks she'll just want to hide in bed for a few more days, but would Ripley, Chayse, Willow, or even Lia's dad allow her to isolate herself like that? Would they be understanding that she needed space? Would Crystal's wonderful bluntness show itself by way of telling Lia to suck it up and get over it? Option two would be that Ripley was able to cheer her up enough to at least shower and leave her room. But where to? Probably to grab something to eat, but at the same time I feel like Lia might be all "I'm too depressed to eat anything" and just poke at the food regardless of her stomach's protest of the fasting. Lincoln has also been in a rough patch lately - although Lia DID miss the small stint of his wings being hindered - and I REALLY wanted to have Lia and Lincoln sort of interact more. Emo Corner Twins Unite!

I think this is why I'm most pissed off at Phfyl. I wanted Lincoln to be sort of Lia's Last Hope. She's on the breaking point right now and needs some sort of way of redeeming herself. Lincoln could have been that option for redemption. The two of them could talk and interact and maybe life would be able to get better for Lia. She'd stop being so emo and I'd have a useable character again.

Instead, what Phfyl did pretty much nails Lia's coffin. I really don't see a way for her to bounce back. There's been too much drama, turmoil, emotional dive-bombs, death, and betrayal for a 17-yr-old to handle. Too much for even Ripley to fix. Now, because of one super stupid thing that Phfyl did, I feel like I have no choice but to retire Lia.

I need away from the forum for a while. Maybe I'll think of a better resolution, but right now I'm just seeing Lia throwing up her hands, shouting "NOPE! I'M DONE HERE!", and packing to move back home to Long Island. Screw you all!

I can't even express how much last night's solo-play upset me.

It felt like it came out of nowhere. Phfyl hadn't really been on the boards for a few weeks - partially because his one character waiting on Ron to do something - and when he returns he does THAT!? It seems so cheap. Kinda lazy, actually. And there was so much story potential lost now. It's just gone! So many questions left unanswered. That pisses me off.

There was also emotional turmoil for MYSELF there. I wept. By god, I was a MESS last night. I yelled. I sobbed. Legit SOBBED. I ranted. I was PISSED! I was inconsolable as I stormed around the house. I tried to get my mind off of it by going through my FB notifications, but I couldn't focus. I tried to work more on my crocheting, but I kept losing count. Hubby tried to cheer me up with some humorous shows off of Netflix. Eventually he gave up and we did just go to bed.

Yet I continued to rant. I continued to call out how stupid of a move Phfyl made, and how pissed off I was at him for doing so. I then vented that I felt guilty about being so mad at Phfyl because I didn't want Hubby to see me so anguished and then HE'D hate Phfyl for pulling such a stupid stunt - and therefore ruining my night. I was then even ANGRIER at Phfyl for making me feel guilty about the possibility of Hubby also hating him - me for the stupid move on the board and Hubby for pissing me off so royally.

I couldn't sleep. I was just so irritated by what Phfylburt did on the board that I couldn't turn off my brain. I went from being infuriated to depressed to calculating any minute possibility that we could reverse his moronic move.

I hoped that Phfyl would at least explain to me why he did what he did.
Did he have a master plan? He and Hubby usually do. Some intense over-arcing plotline that would take this imbecilic play and make it EPIC in the long run.
Was he just bored and figured "eh, why not?" I'd still hate the decision, but I'd at least UNDERSTAND it.
Did he feel that he was taking on too much with the boards and wanted a way to cut back? Again, I'd be pissed at how he went about doing so, but I'd get it.
Hell, I was so agitated by the post that - even though I HATE this trope - I was even hoping for a "it was all just a dream" sort of scenario explanation from Phfyl.
Instead he answered my "Why'd ya do it!?" with a repost of what he said on the FB group, with the addition of a devilish grin.

That just made me more pissed.

I guess that's just the power of well-written characters. Phfyl - although an almost crucial player on the board - doesn't actually post all that much. We see his characters slowly grow, but at the same time it's quick since there aren't many posts to go off of. There aren't many interactions with his characters. They mostly hide in the background of the action and drama that mostly centers around my characters - since I tend to be on the boards most frequently and have the highest amount of active characters.

And yet this one simple post was able to emotionally strike me like nothing else has in a while. The last time I felt so many conflicting emotions was about 4yrs ago. It's personal family stuff so I won't get in to the details, but it was REAL LIFE and REAL PEOPLE that got me so flustered that I would quickly flip-flop back and forth between angered and depressed. This is only the SECOND TIME IN MY LIFE that I was this uneasy about something... and this time it was about a FICTIONAL CHARACTER IN A FICTIONAL WORLD!

So, let's pause a moment to give props to Phfylburt for writing so expertly. And then give him a Dead Arm for the same reason.

Anyway, my ranting about this can go on for another couple-dozen paragraphs, and this post is already epic. I think I'll stop here. Perhaps I'll continue in a double-post today. Either that, or save it for a post for next week. Regardless, if I do continue I swear it will be a little more soul-searching and a little less straight out ranting.

So much for "I didn't want to look at a computer for a while", huh?

Ending the Summer Challenge With A Weak Bang

Ugggh... this was not a good writing week.

It was not a good motivational week.

It was not a good week.

My work week consisted of insane hours, cranky co-workers, incompetent co-workers that made me want to punt them across the store, managers that couldn't stand still long enough for me to accomplish anything I needed to for the Wellness portion of my work week, and finally a rarity for me.
Customers that just irked me.

Normally I love customers. I love interacting with them. I love the quick brain teaser of trying to figure out how to make a mad customer happy. I love the diversity. I love the repeats that you get to know and vice versa. Even if I get a cranky customer every now and again I can shrug it off as "eh, they're just cranky" or "They probably had a bad day."
This week though.... *sigh*

Add in that tomorrow is Labor Day - that glorious ringing out of Summer in The States - and my week was insane and tiring. To be honest, I can't really recall what I did day-to-day like I normally do when I write these posts.

So when I was home I had no energy to actually think. I zoned out by either watching TV, putzing around on Facebook and DeviantArt, or playing one of two video/computer games. A few days ago I started up playing Fable on the Xbox again - only to be ticked off that I failed one of the side quests for probably the seventh time since starting up that game file. My main go-to, since I'm already at the computer, is to play the game King's Bounty: Armored Princess.

The worst part about my burn out? It just might happen again this week. As I stated, a holiday is tomorrow, and I have an equally crazy work schedule. Joy.

Anyway, enough griping about how I didn't WANT to write this week. Point is that I still did. I forced myself, but I got through it. I guess sometimes that's just what you have to do. Especially if you write for a living; you can't just give up a full work-week because you don't feel motivated.

So, in the end I guess it's good training for future weeks like this when I'm writing for a living.
*knock on wood*

It was a bothersome week for the forum recaps as well. The first recaps were easy. Aside from the second one about Nix - which was easy enough to gather; just go through the listing of his early posts and get the info needed - the first and third recaps were live role play sessions. This meant I had enough interaction and "story" to write out my recap chapter without much effort. Just read the session and write what happened. Simple.

Well, for this week it wasn't so simple. The day after the Danger Room session a whole bunch of us players just did a ton of individual roleplaying. Simple things to set up what our characters do in our day-to-day and/or how we reacted to Nix's control loss and/or the Danger Room session. So, there were a bunch of posts scattered across the multitude of boards that we have on the forum. When I say "multitude" I'm not joking at all. We have six different sections of the board: a section for character bios and the like, a section for general out of character discussion, a section for polls, a section for important Moderator/Administrator announcements, a section for roleplaying as X-Men characters, and most recently we added a section for roleplaying as Brotherhood characters. Out of just the X-Men role play section there are 136 topics. Granted, a large portion of them are closed but are available for reading; a large portion are still open for people to continue roleplaying in.
That's a LOT of boards to sort through!

So I started off my weekly task by going to Hubby's and celestialTyrant's accounts since the two of them were the most active when the game first started. Through their profiles I was able to track down their posts and when they posted them - the same tactic I used to figure out everything for Nix's control slip-up recap. From there I noticed that a LOT was going down on June 22, 2012. I then used this information to sort though the over-hundred topics to figure out which ones were created on or before the 22nd. This narrowed it all down to 22 topics. Still quite a few, but not nearly as overwhelming as 136.

From there I went through and found all the posts that were up on the 22nd specifically. This narrowed it down to just 10 topics, but it was still a LOT of posts. It was too much for me to try to organize them while still on the forum itself. So I thought a touch out of the box for that.

I copied and pasted all of the posts from the 22nd in to a word document. They were all still in their forum comment layout of member name and picture, timestamp, and comment all nestled in to table cells. Because of this the posts - roughly 130 of them - take up a little over 31 pages!

And we're back to overwhelming... just a touch.

Well, thank GOD for time stamps, because while I was going from one topic thread to the next I was able to organize all hundred-plus posts in to the order they were originally posted. It definitely helped flow everything easier, especially when certain "scenes" flow from one location to another - therefore going from one topic thread to another.

Needless to say, just tracking down everything that happened on the 22nd and organizing it was a task that lasted about two days.

I then attempted the last mini-challenge of Writers’ Huddle's Summer Writing Challenge: Spend exactly 5 minutes planning the scene/chapter/post/article before writing. Five minutes and that's it. Not a minute more or less. It was basically a challenge to see what you could accomplish in such a short period of time - much like last week's writing for 10minutes. It was a nice exercise for those who never plan ahead of time, as well as those who spend hours or even days writing out the planning before writing. Ya know, like how I write for What Is Truly Meant To Be.

Anyway, as I was re-organizing the posts according to their timestamps I of course glanced over them to get a basic idea of what was going on that day. I figured "alright, five minutes? I got this" and started to write bullet points about what happened; periodically glancing at the posts to make sure I didn't miss anything. Well, 5minutes quickly came and went, and I was maybe a fifth of the way through the posts.

The later third - or maybe even as much as half - of the posts were all two large scenes, and so I was able to make it through bullet pointing the rest of the posts in another 15minutes or so. I now know that there was just so much going on this third day of playing that I'm going to get either three or four recaps out of it - depending on how long the second recap ends up.

The first recap is basically what the full day of roleplaying was: everyday happenings and people dealing with what happened in the previous recaps.

You can find it on DeviantArt here.
It's also up on my FanFiction version of X-Future: The Second Generation Begins.

Quick aside: I actually had someone favorite this story on FanFiction this week! The X-Men stories haven't been getting much love/attention, and so to have someone fave the story was like "WOW!"

So, thanks, ItsAlexO!

Okay, back to the recaps.

The first recap ends with Lucas Kinney racing towards the Danger Room after getting an alert. The next recap will be why he got that alert in the first place, as well as why Nix is so nervous. This was tricky because when the game was first set up we didn't have a lot of the things we have/use now to help game play flow easier. For one, we didn't really know how to create hot-links in our comments. We now use this to help refer to either a crucial event that will make our current post make more sense, or as a means of directing people to the previous location we were at in our scene. It would have been VERY helpful to help me sort through everything. The other real key thing we do now is have blank posts - aside from a single blue line - separating one scene from another in the same location. The last thing - the one that would have been super helpful for the Danger Room recap - is that double-posting was defaulted to condense down in to one post if the posts were within an hour of each other.

How this works is if you post a comment and then went back to that location thirty minutes later to do another action - but no one else posted in that location in between your two posts - the two posts would condense in to one with a blue line breaking the posts apart. When it did that the timestamp on the non-original post(s) is lost.

So Hubby had a Danger Room session going on in which he had nine posts in a row. These all condensed in to one large post with lines separating them. I have no clue what time the individual posts were up aside from the original one. That in and of itself isn't that big of a deal. What makes this whole scene a pain in the butt is that while Hubby was posting in the Danger Room a whole bunch of players had their characters reacting in the Danger Room Observation Deck, therefore including their reactions in to the scene. So I had to read through both and try to figure out where the Observation comments fit in relation to all of Hubby's posts; a task that would have been easier if I had timestamps to go off of. *sigh*

Even better is that Lia wasn't one of the people watching - she was off doing her own training. CT wanted to interact with Lia - I think mostly because I was off on my own while everyone else was roleplaying in the Observation Deck - and so Nix came to talk to her. Thing is, according to the Observation Deck posts Nix was there until like the last five minutes of the session, and yet he somehow managed to miss how it ended..... The timing is tricky, so I'll probably fudge it a bit when I re-work the recap.

Anyway, depending on how long the DR session is - which will probably be very long - I may make the next portion of that extended story a third recap... Danger Room Aftermath. The scene for that went on for a bit as well, so it just might be enough for its own recap.

The final one for the day would be **Spoiler: Sorta. Not really, but whatever. Hover cursor over to see.** going on dates. So keep your eyes out for those updates. Whooo!

As for the Snippets... still no love for them; ItsAlexO didn't fave that story set. Maybe people are purposely avoiding the Snippets to avoid the spoilers???? *shrug*

Anyway, I haven't even THOUGHT about working on the next Snippet I have in the works. I'll keep you guys posted though.

At least X-Future has been at sort of a crawl/stand still for the past month. Kinney - who is Hubby's right-hand-man and fellow storyteller for the game - wanted to do a Danger Room session for some of the guys, but he then had to go on a week-long vacation to visit the in-laws before the session was done. Plus none of the guys seem to be online at the same time and so there are hours and even a day or two in between postings. This session is literally taking a month to conclude.

Problem there is that it freezes the rest of us more-or-less to make sure our characters don't get too far ahead time-wise. In other words, the rest of us will be roleplaying a day or two ahead of those guys and it's a pain to catch people up.

• So Crystal and Tyler are in roleplaying limbo until "the next day" can start up.
• I have no further advancements for Trish since her day was pretty full already and is probably on the next day at this point. Plus... she's in a cell, what can she really do? Hubby's trying to figure out what Deadpool can do to mess with her this time.
• Willow and Chayse are very slowly chugging through the day, but neither of us really know what to do with them; especially since Chayse wants to ignore the two huge elephants in the room: who Screw Driver is and the identity of the traveler from the future.
• Thanks to my taking over as Jamie "Multiple Man" Madrox and playing the "insanely over protective father" card, Lia and Ripley are advancing slowly but surely; with a bit of a cameo from Ronoxym's secondary character Oswald, Ripley's best friend.

OH! Random little fun tidbit about Trish that happened this week. Those of you who are friends with me on Facebook already know this, and originally I wasn't going to include it on such a public venue as my blog, but it was just too good not to.

As I was getting ready for bed on Wednesday I put on my red nightgown. I've been wearing a lot of blue lately and Hubby jokes that I'm just in "Willow Wear" or that I'm "Cosplaying Willow". After noting to myself that I had worn red I chuckled that I was finally in "Trish Cosplay". I quickly corrected myself that the nightgown had to be "Lia Cosplay" instead since a nightgown was way too girly for Trish - who would be more likely to wear shorts and a t-shirt to bed.

After another second of pondering I realized that she - in an extreme case - just might wear a nightgown as an act of seduction. Thing is, I MEANT to think to myself that she'd wear one to seduce PYRO. Ya know, the Brotherhood baddie who is Devon's father and the object of Trish's affection? Instead, what I accidentally thought to myself was that she might wear one to seduce DEADPOOL. The wackjob Merc With A Mouth who had been interrogating her.

I then shuddered at the thought.

That's right. MY CHARACTER Trish was so repulsed by the thought of trying to seduce Deadpool that not only did SHE shudder in my mind, but she actually got ME TO PHYSICALLY SHUDDER AS WELL! As an experiment I then purposely thought "What? Deadpool and Devon both start with D... it's close."
I then gagged.
WHAT THE ACTUAL HELL!? This is a whole new level of characters taking over....

Does this ever happen to any of my writer readers out there? Or am I just a nutjob????

Speaking of my writer readers - although I'm not so sure she reads my blog... I know Ron does... anyway - I have great writing news in the world of Cyhyr. First off, her collaborator finally finished her chapter for the fanfic they're writing, and so they were able to update after a year hiatus. Kind of makes me feel better about not updating WITMTB since February. The real reason I bring up Cyhyr, though, is because the woman has been a writing machine as of late.

Cyhyr: I wrote 25 pages in my session yesterday. How many can I write today? I'm shooting for at least 20; I've already got 9 though, and I think I can challenge for 30...
I'm at 17 pages now but I'm hungry and I don't want to leave...
Update: just finished scene 6 and I have a total of 48 pages written, so 23 today...
[I'm working on] a completely new fanfiction that slapped me across the face and said "write me" on Thursday night. So I started it a little then and now I'm almost 50 [frigging] pages into this shit.

So, let's give her a cyber round of applause for her great stamina and drive. Now... for me to find that same drive...

Alright, I just want to conclude by announcing one last thing that I accomplished this past week; last Sunday, actually.

For nearly a year now I've been thinking of branching out and starting up a more conventional blog - one that's informative instead of journalistic - but I couldn't figure out what I have enough knowledge about to write more than one post. That doesn't really matter if I write the one or two posts I know about such-and-such subject, submit it to a blog as a guest post, and repeat for the next topic, etc. However, I'm too lazy to spend hours on end tracking down a variety of blogs, and then attempt to write a guest post for each of them; although this is the best way to get started with a paid gig as a blog writer. Ali and I tried working on figuring out my specialty for a little bit at the beginning of the year, but it didn't really get far.

Well, Sunday I realized that I goof up a LOT, and in a wide array of categories. I've also figured out how to fix these goofs. So I've decided that my next blog should be a sort of "self-help catch all" in a sort of "learn from my mistakes" way.

I've reserved the url CritFailing.blogspot.com for when I start up this new blog:

Crit Failing: A Guide to Goofs and Screw-ups

Thanks to my co-worker Sergeant Strudel for the blog name idea. My other title possibility is "I Roll Ones", but I think that's already a "fail blog" on Blogger.... Eh, the name has time to change/evolve. The important part is the blog url.

Sadly, I don't have nearly the time to dedicate to running two blogs, especially when I barely manage to update this one weekly. Plus, I need to figure out how I'm going to write professional, article-style posts. On top of everything else, I need to set up a cache of articles; really focus on the mess-ups I do that may also plague others as well as advice on how to avoid/fix the problem.

It will be a bit of an undertaking and the new blog probably won't launch for another two years, but I at least have a plan! Whoot!

Now off to work on that next recap.... or to sleep.... probably sleep....

Ringing In 2013

Drawn by DeviantArtist Dracu-Teufel666

Okay, well I swear I didn’t intend to have a holiday hiatus.

Drawn by DeviantArtist Pluvias

My INTENTION was to postpone the December 23^rd post so I had time to finish last minute Christmas stuff, and then have my belated post Christmas evening; as a way to wish you all a happy holiday. Then Christmas got crazy, I got distracted by a gift Hubby gave me, and I had to get ready for a road trip home to celebrate my cousin’s wedding this past Sunday. Which is why there also wasn’t a blog post on the 30^th. Because of the bad snow storm on Saturday, I couldn’t drive down after work like intended, spend the night hanging out with the family and working on this blog post, get up early Sunday to get ready and post this entry, and then go to the ceremony at noon. INSTEAD, I got stuck in a snow bank, carefully traversed through town doing last minute errands, shoveled, went to bed early, got up at 3am to shovel some more, and then left at 4am to do a five-hour drive, arrive at my mom’s with barely enough time for me to get ready, drive to the wedding, and then by the time we got back to my mom’s I crashed.

Drawn by DeviantArtist Korewa13th

So forgive me my past two missed weeks.

Sadly, not having time to write blog posts also meant no free time to write, period. Well, okay, I lied about NO free time, but I’ll get to that in a moment.

The week before Christmas was spent franticly attempting to finish off all the crochet gifts I was making for everyone. The only thing even remotely exciting in the world of writing is that I received an email from Devious.Editor! You guys haven’t heard that name in a WHILE, have you? Well, not only did she want to reassure me that she was still alive, but she also wanted to send me her latest chapter to edit. So those of you who are fans of her story “Fugitive” there should be another chapter up soonish. Unfortunately, I haven’t gotten around to beta reading it yet. But I aim to before this Sunday’s update. We’ll see how that goes.

Drawn by DeviantArtist Pika

So now that the holidays have come and gone, I’ll be working on cleaning house – since that’s been neglected for about two months, finding a new one, and generally relaxing after all the holiday chaos. Part of that relaxing process is going to consist of continuing two new video games, which will hopefully not, but most likely distract me from any creative projects for a little while.

One is celestialTyrant’s game that he’s keeping at our house, and the other is a Christmas gift from Hubby. Sorry about this. Blame them.

The first game is an ADORABLE Wii game called Kirby’s Epic Yarn. I cannot properly describe how amazingly cute this game is without spending an entire post just on that. So instead have a Let’s Play of the opening of the game. OH! And just FYI... Chuggaconroy's commentary is VERY similar to CT's when he plays... so it's also a bit of an insight in to him. :-D

As for the gift from Hubby? Well, let’s just say that he did really well! See, for YEARS I’ve been trying to track down “Professor Layton and the Curious Village” for my DS. I read about the game back when I used to get Nintendo Power and fell in love before even playing. Problem was I didn’t have the money to buy it when it first came out. In fact, I almost NEVER buy a new game when it first comes out because of how expensive they are. So I was waiting for the game to be old enough that the price would drop. However, the game sold out before that happened, and I couldn’t find a copy since.

The Professor Layton series is up to four games now, and I refused to play any of the other ones without first playing Curious Village. Soon the second game “Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box” became just as hard to find. I guess people just loved the games so much that once they bought them they never traded them back in to the game stores. You can just guess what two DS games I got for Christmas this year.

I’ve been playing “Curious Village” pretty much non-stop since Christmas and I just MAY be at the half way point. I LOVE this game! This series already is in my top three. May have pushed Fable out of the number two spot; depending on how well done the sequels are.

So, again, sorry. I technically HAVE had time to work on this blog post, or beta read, or work on my own story. I’ve just been distracted by video games. Guess that’s what happens when you cut them out completely. Sort of like when you “finish” your diet and just back the pounds right back on because you missed all the food you cut out.

So let’s take this time to figure out this year’s resolutions. Although I didn’t stick with ALL of my resolutions last year, I did manage to use most of them as excellent guide lines, and 2012 was more-or-less a fantastic year because of it. Let’s aim for 2013 to be even better, shall we?

RESOLUTION NUMBER ONE: Improve upon writing style; be it voice, grammar, spelling, speed, consistency, schedule, professionalism, or all of the above.

Practice makes perfect and I’m hoping to have a lot more. I really improved over the last year. Even if I didn’t consistently write my fiction, I almost always hit that Sunday Update Day goal. I need to focus harder on getting updates done on time, as well as being just as consistent with my fiction updates.

I need to take what I learned from this year’s Script Frenzy, and definitely from my first year of NaNo. I'm going to participate in every free-entry writing contest I come across. Starting with a Hey Arnold Valentine's Day contest. Entries need to be in by February 8th. Any suggestions on pairing to write about?
Even when I'm not working on contest entries - ESPECIALLY when I'm not working on contest entries - I need to crack down on scheduling time for my writing instead of “finding” time for it.

Less TV. More Writing!

RESOLUTION NUMBER TWO: Become healthier!

Not a writing resolution, but still an important one. Both becoming healthier and writing consistently seem to have the same principal of goal making. As well as having support and a “buddy” to help you stay motivated. I need to lose a few more pounds, and both Hubby and I still eat like college students. I need to be more active and possibly get Hubby more involved so it is easier for me to stay on track. Hopefully, this will spill over and help me better time manage so I can also write – and have the energy to do so.
Pass me some of that Basil Pesto Hummus if you please!

RESOLUTION NUMBER THREE: Get more organized!

Another one that is seemingly unrelated to writing at first glance. My house is a sty. Completely. I miss one day of cleaning because of this, that, and the other thing. Before I know it, the pile of dishes and laundry are both overwhelming and discouraging. Lo and behold, I then just sit on the couch, moping about how gross our house looks, but don’t actually accomplish anything. Either that or I finally snap and go in to a cleaning frenzy that lasts a full day or two.

If I can stay more organized with the house I’ll find more time to write because I’m not worried about the chores I’m neglecting. I can then just focus. I can also learn how to better avoid being discouraged when the writing piles up. I’ll get in to a more consistent rhythm with everything and that new attitude will certainly spill over in to my writing life.

RESOLUTION NUMBER FOUR: Finish “What Is Truly Meant To Be: A Hey Arnold Musical”

Including the chapter that has been in the works since the summer, I have eleven left before the conclusion of the story. As long as I can get a chapter out a month – which can be possible if I follow Resolution Number One – and I don’t add any more chapters to the story I can finish up before 2014! I started the story in 2010 so I think three years to finish an 18 chapter fanfic is more than enough time! Sheesh!

RESOLUTION NUMBER FIVE: Work on World Building Gyateara
For those who don't know/remember, Gyateara is the name of the world I created for my NaNo story. It started off as sort of a parody of the world of Albion from the game Fable. However, I've also done a lot of world building for my D&D character Amara. Mostly focusing on one country though. So why not put Albion and the country I created for Amara on the same planet? I sort of touched upon this idea during my last actual post. Gyateara can be this land that most of my High Fantasy stories take place - as well as quite a few D&D campaigns. To accomplish this goal, however, I have to first build Gyateara. It will be a fun project to do throughout 2013.
Maybe I can even do this along side DarkAngel1326 since she seems to be building and even bigger and bigger playground for her story "Of Blood and Honor" - as well as possible accompanying stories.

RESOLUTION NUMBER SIX: Become a better beta reader for my writers
It's pathetic that my writers have to wait days, weeks, or even months before I get around to reading their stuff. How does that help them? Now they're in a holding pattern while their muse and writing drive slips away because I can't find an hour or two to help them out. Then their readers have to wait forever for the update because of my slacking.
ChibiSunnie is such a fantastic beta for me because she's quick! Without a word, she motivates me to work daily so I can send something to her daily since she does such a quick turn around. Her quick responses drive me to keep going. She keeps me in that writing flow. I need to become more like her.
DA constantly praises me as her beta. It's time to become the Awesome Beta she keeps claiming I am!
*Scampers off to finally beta for Devious.Editor and DA*

So there you have it. My six resolutions for 2013. Let's see how well I stick to them!

Honestly, I had so many other blog posts figured out. On Christmas I was going to go on about the presents I made, the awesome ones I got, and all of that jibberjabber I have above about Professor Layton and Kirby was going to be in that long post. Then on Monday I was going to do sort of a Year In Review to reflect on 2012. Then I was going to have this post the following day to talk about my resolutions. So I had to sort of jumble everything together in to one post. I may still do that Year In Review post for Sunday, but then again I might also talk more about the Valentine's Day contest. I guess we'll just see what I feel about writing.

In the meantime... DE and DA both have stories chilling in my mailbox. So I'm off to do some reading!

HAPPY 2013 EVERYONE!

Drawn by DeviantArtist Athyess