Speaking of early 2000s, I've been on a bit of a writing streak lately. I'm coming up with random little story shorts, mostly inspired by music, just like I used to in high school. It's fun being back, but I'll talk more about those little drabbles later. First, we have to of course talk about "Peeping Tomcat."
I'm past my half-way point one way or another - if I stay at 14 chapters or expand out to 15 - as of this Friday. This was probably the second or third chapter I thought of as I expanded my original writing practice short out into what is now "Peeping Tomcat." Even though it was one of my oldest written chapters, I was editing this baby right up until I went to bed on Thursday.
Mainly because I needed to add a new element to the chapter, and in doing so I ended up switching up the chapter title. I never really was a fan of the working title "Soup" anyway. It just didn't seem to fit in with the other titles I came up with thus far.
Another snaffu? I whoopsied with my story's saved files again. Because I'm awesome.
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- Write at home and save to laptop
- Save copy to the external and flash drives
- Go to work, and transfer flash drive file to netbook; overwriting the file already there
- Continue to write at work and save to netbook
- Save copy to flash drive; overwriting the file already there
- Go home, and transfer flash drive file to laptop; overwriting the file already there
- Rinse and repeat.
Then Wednesday happened.
I had been writing at work for about 20min before I realized I just opened up the flash drive file instead of my normal routine of dumping the file onto the netbook hard drive first. So I figured "easy fix" and just Saved As to the netbook. Normally, when you "save as" you then work on that new file: either the name changes or the file destination does, depending on what the "save as" difference is.
So, since I selected the netbook's old version of the PT file, and THOUGHT I clicked "save as" and yes to overwriting the existing file, I was under the assumption everything else I did that day was on the netbook hard drive file.
Then at the end of the work day I saved the hour-plus worth of work I had done throughout the day, and closed my netbook. Only to realize "you idiot! You forgot to save the new file back onto the flash drive." So I promptly started my netbook back up to finish my routine.
A moment too late, I realized the "date modified" for the new file was 5/9.... not 5/16 like it should have been. The file I was apparently working on throughout the rest of the work day was still off the flash dive; I never switched to the netbook hard drive version. Unfortunately, I had already told the netbook version to overwrite the file on the flash drive.
Meaning I just saved an old version of PT over the freshly saved new version I had been working on all day....
I'm good at this.
Downside? This was one of those rare instances where I think I did a better job with my first go at writing the scene than I did on my "I only remember the best bits" rewrite from scratch. I couldn't remember the exact wording of my first go, but I remembered it being better than what I ended up with.
I then spent most of my Thursday off trying to edit, edit, and edit some more to try to get everything back to the way I had it before my oopsie. I think I got close. Regardless, I think I did well enough that my readers have been enjoying the latest chapter. What do you think?
The chapter has been weird with its reception. On the one hand, it hasn't felt as popular as the others since I haven't been getting as many notifications about faves/kudos, reviews, and follows/bookmarks as I normally do past that first day. On the flipside, this chapter seems to be provoking the most comments... and all within the first twenty-four hours:
So, the numbers for the first 24hrs seems pretty on par with previous weeks, but that spike of five reviews! That's the most I've received outside the initial nine on the first chapter. The only other chapters that received more than one new review within 24-hrs of posting were "Normal" at four reviews, and "Mimicker" at three.FFN: 642 views, 3 faves, 3 followers, and 4 reviews!
AO3: 131 views, 3 kudos, and 1 review
DA: Only 11 views
Total Results: 784 views, 6 faves, 3 followers, and 5 reviews
Reviews from the first 24hrs:
1. Kitty's got quite the crush. I can't stop watching him watching her! Agh! lol (AO3 comment about chapter 6)
2. The green activist looks like an akuma-victim-to-be. It's good Chat Noir was friendly and signed his petition.
3. Hopefully he's starting to get a clue. Excellent chapter as always! (One of my repeat reviewers)
4. Of course he would be slow at it. I really enjoyed this and look forward to more. (Another Cassy1994 review)
5. Also, another lengthy review from Jowy's Pixie. See below
The real kicker here though is that this was a "no new Miraculous episodes" week. Normally those are my "slow" weeks. So, having five reviews, even if one was for an earlier chapter, is pretty neat.
And speaking of "pretty neat" reviews, this is Jowy's:
Jowy's Pixie: Ah yes, Adrien sure is dense sometimes when it comes to his feelings for Marinette. However, it was indeed nice to see in this chapter that he's starting to recognize that what he is feeling for Marinette may be slightly more than friendship. It must be so confusing for him though. To be in love with both Ladybug and Marinette while not knowing that they are the same person. I'm already twitching anxiously at the thought of the chaos this could possibly cause for his already confused emotional state.
I felt so sorry for Adrien the whole time I was reading this chapter. You managed to capture his emotional turmoil perfectly and I was totally invested in his thoughts and feelings. Adrien was so in character this entire chapter. Marinette was also so adorable making him some of her great-uncle's soup and trying to give it to him. Just a shame Adrien wasn't there to receive it and also the fact that Gabriel obviously still would not have let them in. Because I think that could have led to some lovely, cute exchanges between the pair. Ah well, Gabriel will be Gabriel. Why do I have a feeling that the environmentalist guy will become an akuma victim? I dunno, just a feeling, but I could end up being wrong.
Once again, another amazing chapter. I was so excited when I saw the update. This story is very quickly becoming one of my favourites at the moment. I'm really enjoying reading it. Keep up the fantastic work and I look forward to more. Good luck!
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Anyway, the weekend continued, and spilled over until you have today. While the stats didn't increase all that much with regards to faves, follows, or reviews, my views did jump up quite a bit.
Yeah.... My first Tumblr promotion for my chapter updates - last week's "Chapter 7: Confusion" - ended up with 16 notes. All of them were likes, including one like by ChibiSunnie. This past week, though? Just that one like - by someone who doesn't follow me, so... cool? - and Cy's reblog of it to try to help me promote. Chibi hasn't really been on Tumblr this past week, so I'm sure she'll like and/or reblog once she's back on. Until then? I'm stuck at two notes. Bummer. The ironic thing was that I was sure I'd have a better turnout after all the other writing I did this week.FFN: 988 views, 4 faves, 6 followers, and the aforementioned 4 reviews
AO3: 220 views, 4 kudos, and that 1 review
DA: Still only 16 views. No faves this week thus far.
Total Results: 1224 views, 8 faves, 6 followers, and 5 reviews
Tumblr Notes: 1 like, and Cyhyr reblogging it....
Oh, you forgot that, didn't you? Yup, I did start this post off by commenting on all the writing I worked on this week. It wasn't all for "Peeping Tomcat" though.
Yes, a big portion of it was, which helped with this eighth chapter, and I'll circle back to that, but I've also done some drabbles. I spent so much time letting my mind wander to hopefully come up with the next akuma attack for my story that said mind wandered into a couple of new plot bunny ideas.
You already know the first one. I shared it last week.
As of this posting, it has 11 likes, and 2 reblogs. One of those reblogs was by one of the people who liked it, and they added "Oh my god! So good!" to their reblogging. Cyhyr also chimed in with "Yaaaas continue." So, that's at least 13 people who have read it since I posted it on the 14th....
Then, three days later on the 17th, I woke up with another little short in my head. I have no clue where it came from. I literally woke up with it already pretty fully brewed.
It is a cute little Lukanette story. In other words, a story using the romantic paring of Marinette and a potential new love interest as of episode 12: Luka. Just to keep in mind: Luka, and episode 12, premiered with the USA Netflix release on March 30th. Same day I premiered "Peeping Tomcat."
Which means the fandom has known of Luka - and have either loved him, hated him, or became indifferent to his presence - for roughly 8 weeks. In that same time we have only gotten up to the 15th episode, but Luka returned for a brief cameo in the most recent one. Point being that in two months and only four episodes - including his own - Luka has become a very popular, albeit also polarizing, character. All of this may play a factor in how this story was received.
Namely, the most popular original post on my Tumblr.
As of this posting, it is up to 35 likes, and 3 reblogs, two of which were people who already liked it. Meaning at least 36 people have read it. On top of that, 29 of the likes and all 3 reblogs occurred roughly within the first 48hrs that it was up.
To kind of keep up with this pattern of one new drabble every three days - completely unintentionally, by the way - I posted yet another drabble on Sunday. I guess that means I need another new drabble by tomorrow to keep this up...
Anyway, this was a longer drabble, clocking in at 4 pages/2000 words. A lot longer than I originally thought it would be.
For a few days I had been listening to the song "Play Me Like a Violin" by Stephan. I'm pretty sure I've shared it before, but here it is again.
It all clicked then. What if Emilie was that "stranger in a white dress" sung about in "Play Me Like a Violin"? Granted, I wasn't comfortable with having Gabriel taking ecstasy and having a random fling with the first person who made him feel good, but that doesn't mean they still couldn't have a semi-random hook-up.
The whole thing ended up fairly PG in the end, but I still enjoyed what I came up with. I also have more of the story brewing in the back of my mind, much like I did with "Fused Akuma."
So far, it has had 12 likes since it went up just before 3:30pm Sunday. One of those people also reblogged it with the tags:
#OOOOOOO I LOVED IT!! #SUCH CUTIESS
"Stranger in a White Dress" was also reblogged by a second person who made me chuckle with their tags:
I mean, I WAS going to have her call him, but now I'm intrigued.... what if she doesn't? Or, rather, what state is she in when she does? Plot bunnies abound!#CUTE AF #GABRIEL AGRESTE #EMILIE AGRESTE
#MRS AGRESTE #AHHH #I LOVE IT SO #THOUGH I DON'T KNOW IF SHE'LL CALL ?? #THAT'S WHAT GIRLS DO U KNOW
Another fun thing about this week in Tumblr-world was that I got my first "ask."
Basically, for those who don't know, there's a way for you to put a link on your Tumblr that encourages people to send you messages via your Tumblr email, which is different than direct messages/chats. While fans of your blog can use this feature to inform you of something, correct something you've posted, critique or even troll you, or simply send you some gushy love, for the most part, it's simply kept as "asks" because fans tend to ask you questions, hoping you'll answer them.
If you do, they can be either answered privately - just between you and the asker - or, more frequently, it is publicly answered. Public answers are posted on your Tumblr page like any other blog post. This helps the blogger answer questions for more fans who may have either asked the same question, or wanted to.
Anyway, my ask? It came shortly after I posted "Kisses": Do you have an ao3 account or a wattpad? I read one of your fics and I'd like to read some more.
So, of COURSE I publicly replied that I do have and AO3, and shared links to it, my FFN and DA accounts, and even promoted my original works a little by linking to my FictionPress account.
.....
And then about an hour later I realized that I was an idiot and should have used that opportunity to promote PT again... so I reblogged the ask with the link to that.
So I've been having more and more people stop by my Tumblr. I've expanded my audience. Granted, not by much; less than 100 people, but still, it's expanding. I've also had love for my stories, compliments about it, and I tried to use that momentum to promote PT more.
And yet the traffic to my story doesn't seem to showcase any of that... bummer. Hopefully with more "every third day" drabble posts along with my weekly updates to PT, I'll get more traffic flowing my way.
Ironically, this week I HAVE been getting a lot of notifications for new likes and follows.... for my "Hey, Arnold!" stories....
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I had it mostly figured out so I could hint at it in chapter 8, but apparently I'm not subtle with my hints. Then again, fans of the show know by now "any random character that isn't part of the core cast that shows up is obviously getting akumatized, otherwise why bother introducing them?" So I guess I kept true to form in that case....
Michel Poirier is an environmentalist university student in his early 20s, and he becomes Terravenger. Trust me, that was the best name I came up with. I think it's about par with the other ones within the series... His goal is to revert Paris to an untamed jungle... well, forest, technically, because of the temperate environment, but "untamed jungle" has a better ring to it. I've also got a rough page-long synopsis of what happens thanks to the Snowflake Outline method created by Randy Ingermanson.
I still have some tweaks to do, namely the Lucky Charm. As of right now I have chopsticks that she uses to block the seed shooters mounted on the back of Terravenger's hands, but it seems a bit too simplistic. Sure, chopsticks aren't straight forward, but the second she sees the seed shooters she just needs to throw and use her luck to clog the shooters. I also need to better figure out CN's distractions. So I'm hoping my writing mojo spills over into this week.
At least I have a lot to talk about at group tonight. Which reminds me! After a small writers-block- induced hiatus, Omnibladestrike is back to writing again. I'm proud that the month away from the keyboard didn't deter him. Sometimes we just need time away for our brain to recharge and refind inspiration. Sometimes, like with Omni, we need to switch gears on what we're writing, at least for the time being.
Goodness! I still have so much more to talk about, including the update to my reading challenge, but this post is epically long; more so than usual. So I'm going to call it a week. Maybe I'll have time to talk about the reading challenge next week.
Finally, a shout out to my father's would-be 60th birthday this weekend. Love ya, Daddy!
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