And Thus "Local Writers' Group" Is A Thing

Sorry, folks. I legitimately forgot that I didn't write an actual blog update on Sunday. So, how about I kick my butt in gear, huh?

Well, last week both nothing and a lot happened. Simply put, pretty much all of my writing advancement occurred on just one day.

Last week most of my downtime was used cleaning the apartment yet again. I sprinkled in more beta-reading for ChibiSunnie throughout the week; mostly during work breaks. I FINALLY finished reading but ONE of her stories this past Saturday and sent her the notes first thing Sunday morning after dropping Hubby off at work.

Even after roughly a nine-month wait, she was insanely grateful for the edit. The woman is mad patient. Then again, she's one of my readers, so I guess she has to be...

I did stuff in X-Future. Nothing really major to talk about, but there was slow progress with my characters there. I'm really starting to hear Crystal's snarky, insanely blunt voice in my head. So there's that. Either way, it meant non-zero day, even if it was a pathetically small amount of writing.

Then again, No More Zero Days focuses on advancing towards your end goal every day. Not only is just a little bit of writing daily a way to get non-zero days, but actually developing something more. The fact that a character whose voice has escaped me this past year is finally in my head... That's kinda big, right?

I sure and heck hope so because I hit my first zero-day this past Friday.

I was so determined to get this local writing group idea off the ground that I pushed and prodded - although, arguably there wasn't really much need of either - until we determined that this past Friday would be our inaugural meeting.

This is why I did so much cleaning this week. Dear LORD did I need to clean so we had some space to work. I was all geared up. I had the day off. I spent the whole time racing around the place organizing and mentally coming up with talking points for the group.

Then poor Ronoxym had car troubles, which meant neither he nor Cyhyr would be able to make it to the meeting. That just left Omnibladestrike, but his work day left him exhausted. We debated having our first meeting over Skype, but decided to just postpone.

Sadly, I was so fixated on the idea of having the writing group meeting and having THAT be my "something to do with writing" that I never got around to actually do any writing. Thus I went to bed with this realization and going "shoot. Zero day...."

It all worked out though. I got home from work on Saturday to discover that Ron could borrow a car for he and Cyhyr to show up, and Omni was free. It wasn't until that evening, but we managed to get our first ever Writers' Block meeting.

We focused mostly on Omni and his story. Partially because Cyhyr wasn't at a point where she felt she was really struggling - except for one component that we were able to tackle fairly easily - and Ron kept being ADHD by hopping on to Tumblr and talking to Hubby. We also focused on Omni because he seemed the most in need of the help of the group; both in actual writing advice for his story, and in encouragement to get back to writing in the first place.

I sure hope we helped. He seemed a bit bummed and unsure of himself even after our meeting, but I think this might be really good for him. Here's hoping.

We ended the meeting by having each person come up with a goal they wish to accomplish by this week's Friday Skype meeting. Yup, we're doing a monthly in-person meeting, and then the other three weeks we'll be Skyping in order to check in on everyone's weekly goal progress. I'm excited to see how this goes.

Anyway, Cyhyr is trying to create a character whose sole purpose is NOT to be killed off. Apparently she's gotten so bad with character deaths in her story that Ron started calling her "Georgette R.R.Martin". Omni is attempting the Non-Zero Days method that's been really kicking my butt in to gear. Ron is just attempting to make progress on ONE of his active Works In Progress before starting up yet another one.

I swear, Chibi and I need to show Ron how we build a Plot Bunny farm, because his are all running rampant... He started at least one new story during our meeting on Saturday! Cyhyr literally had to take his notebook away to stop him! That's when he wandered over to talk to Hubby instead...

So, here's hoping Ron is keeping up with his project, and also hoping that means he'll advance either the story he posted on his blog nearly a month ago, or he'll finally continue on with the Willow/Devon story he also hasn't updated in a month. Knowing my luck, he worked more on a story I haven't read yet... Oh well, as long as he learns that he needs to COMPLETE stories, not just start them.

Nearly every writer can tell you that STARTING stories is the easy part, it's COMPLETING THEM that's hard.

Yes, yes, all you What Is Truly Meant To Be fans, I feel your death glares and hear your mutters of "EXACTLY!"

So, now we are up to me. I have been doing a lot of Non-Zero days lately, but it's all "little bit here and a little bit there". I write on the forum. I research. I plot out. I have writing meetings. I beta read. I even started up a dossier of my characters.

It has their basics: name, height, age, weight, eye/hair color, etc. It also has very detailed physical descriptions, complete with exact locations of scarring and the like. The descriptions even include the character's normal wardrobe. The dossier pages are completed with mini-backstories and personality overviews. All of these components are important in knowing how the character looks, right down to how they hold themselves. I'm going to then give the dossier to a friend who is an art student. That way the next time she wants to just doodle she can flip to a character and draw. No pressure for her, just a handy way for her to break through creative blocks and a sly way for me to get "free commissions" of my characters.

I'm off track here... what I was getting at was that I was advancing my writing in just enough of a way for me to claim "Non-Zero day" but not to the point of actually completing any form of prose. So, that is my goal for this week: Write out some prose.

I already did that yesterday. I spent a great deal of time working on a few solo-sessions on the forum. I might turn the one in to yet another in-canon snippet. However, I do have another prose that I've been plotting out in my head. One that won't show up on FanFiction because it's actually original work.

HUH!?

Yeah! ORIGINAL WORK!

One of the things I've been working on since last week is coming up with the Creation Story of Gyateara. The trick here is to write out what actually happened and then determine how much of that "fact" is stated in the tale that humans know. Do they know the truth? Do they only have the key parts correct? Are they completely wrong about how their world was created? The gods are very much real in their world; they have relics and avatars to prove the existence of the gods. So does that mean the Creation Story is more than simple allegory for them?

Be it the "Actual Story" or a more simplistic "What Humans Know", I'll have the Creation Story done - at least a first draft of it - by this Friday's meeting. THAT is my true goal for the week. If I accomplish my goal I should have something new for you folks to read come this Sunday.

Well, maybe next Wednesday... I'm having a harder and harder time completing my Sunday blog posts when I have to work on Sunday. Wednesdays I'm up first thing in the morning to bring Hubby to work and then I have tons of hours to kill before having to pick him up again. I also seem to be in my highest writing energy first thing in the morning or late at night.

We'll see how many more Sunday posts get bumped to Wednesday. If it becomes a trend more then the exception I'll just change my update days....

Either way, stay tuned.

Super Quick Update

Things happened. It is late. I am sleepy. I am again working close on Sundays. The likelihood of a blog post prior to Tuesday is sadly slim.

Good news:
Accomplished first ever Writers' Group (Apparently we're calling ourselves "Writer's Block"?). More details later. Just know that we all have vowed on "Non-Zero Days" and I have the added goal of actually finishing at least ONE work of prose before the week is out....

Until I have time to write more, lovelies. ^_^

The Week of Win

Alright, this has been a friggen awesome week!

This past Wednesday I posted an update that explained the first two reasons why this was an amazing week:
1- Monday my best friend since childhood gave birth to her first born; a son.
2- Tuesday was a GORGEOUS day after a super crappy and frigid winter. Plus, my sister got to enjoy the beautiful weather while shopping on her birthday. Her 25th birthday. My kid sister is 25!

Both Monday and Tuesday were awesome for writing reasons too, but I wanted to wait until today to let you guys know this. Group it all together and whatnot.

So, Monday I saw celestialTyrant at the grocery store I work in, and asked him if he wanted to hang out when I got out at about noon. I hadn't seen him in what felt like forever, and so I was excited to find out that he was going to swing by after Hubby got off of work that afternoon.

The downside was that he ended up more-or-less just playing Magic: The Gathering with Hubby, Omnibladestrike, and another one of their friends. As a non-player I was sort of self-isolated at my desktop. It turned out for the better though. Granted, I didn't really socialize with the three guests I had in my house, but I did spend the evening chatting with Ronoxym and Cyhyr via IMs.

We talked about generic writing, and I playfully harassed Ron for not updating either of the stories I'm collabing with him on: the Willow/Devon and now Nys/Willow stories. I also sent the Nys/Willow story to Cyhyr at this point.

Well, neither have gotten back to me about the story, and so I posted the Nys/Willow snippet this morning. Fair warning, the whole tale is a spoiler revealing how the two girls could talk in the first place. If you still want to read my original version you can here:

"It Is So On!"

On DeviantArt          On FanFiction

Okay, back to Monday. Well, while I was teasing Ron about him not working on any writing, he interrupted by asking me what I thought about his blog.

His WHAT!? I knew he had a Tumblr, and I just assumed he meant his blog there. But no... he has one right here on Blogger! He started it up a little over two weeks ago! HOW DID I MISS THIS!? Apparently even Cyhyr didn't have the link to the blog until about a week ago....

Anyway... now I can do this when talking about him:
Ronoxym

Now - fair warning - he has a Mature Content notification for his blog. The posts he currently has up aren't really all that bad, and so I'm guessing he only has that warning in order to cover his butt in case future posts get out of hand.

Ron didn't get around to updating the blog this past week, which saddens me a little. At the same time, I had to pick on him for starting up a blog instead of updating our stories. Oh well, I can kill time by doing research.

Yeah. Research. Cyhyr has this large folder in GoogleDocs that has lots of writing How-To's and research material. She offered to share it with me while we were talking on Monday. How could I say no!? So, reading those can add to my Non-Zero days.

THANKS, CYHYR!


Well, back to Ron's blog and my Non-Zero week.

His first post was just a generic "Hey, I have a blog now and this is why." The second post was a drabble. Yup, he posted a narrative. He had meant to anyway, but what he ended up with was apparently completely different than the tale he was originally going to post.

I loved the concept. I teased him as I was reading through it that it felt like a fanfic of three different source materials. The first sentence described the protagonist, and I INSTANTLY thought he was talking about Edward Elric from Fullmetal Alchemist. Considering when he first described Devon on the forum he had a lot of the same characteristics as another Fullmetal Alchemist character - Roy Mustang - without realizing that he did so, I wouldn't have put it past him to create a lead heavily influenced by some fandom source material without picking up on it. That's besides the point. A few sentences down the protagonist is described more as having curly black hair and a desperate need to get to a ship; he'd be safe if he could just get to the ship. Now my mind shifted over to the Heroes of Olympus character Leo Valdez.

Then came the feral teens. The rest of the story I was wondering if it was supposed to be some sort of Lord of the Flies type of society. I was intrigued, but I was also thrown for a loop. Turns out I was right about it being a fanfic, but I would have never guessed the ACTUAL source material. I was a bit flabbergasted when I got to the reveal at the end of the story.

Yes, the writing is a bit rough here and there because he clearly didn't bother to proofread before posting, but I swear to you that the story is worth it. It doesn't even take all that long to read. So do it! Go to Ron's blog and read his drabble. Then demand for more.

Help me get this guy in to a writing kick by having multiple people beg for him to update.

*Waves to Ronoxym*

Well, this finally brings us to Tuesday.

I got to work bright and early at 7am. I almost instantly started thinking about Ron's drabble. I was intrigued. It gripped hard on to me, and my mind raced with possibilities, as well as how I could do something similar with another fandom.

A Writer's High was sparked within me. All I wanted was to race home - literally, I had THAT much energy - and start writing.... ANYTHING. Of COURSE this was my full day shift. I was stuck at work for eight hours when all I wanted was to write! Figures....

I was this ball of energy the whole shift. I would bounce while standing still. I talked faster than usual. I nearly sprinted across the floor whenever I need to get across the department. I had this urge to just do suicide runs up and down my work area. I felt like I was about to burst.

If this is what it's like to have ADHD, I have no clue how anyone handles it. I'm usually such a focused and still person. I felt like I was going to explode and just become this entity of pure energy floating around in the ether. Craziness!

The fact that it was a gorgeous day outside - one where I wanted to spend every minute in the sun - didn't help matters.

I was able to do something I haven't in a while thanks to that energy: Beta read Omnibladestrike's chapter that he sent me back in the summer!!! Geez! Sadly, I had unknowingly lost the ACTUAL chapter that he wanted me to beta read, and so I accidentally re-edited the previous chapter. Whoops.

Well, he resent me the second chapter of his story - yeah, he actually moved on to the second chapter! Go him! - and I beta read that within 24hrs. He got the proper chapter edited and sent back to him on Wednesday.

So, quick detour back to Tuesday.

I was set to write when I got home. I started up the blog post I updated on Wednesday. I wrote some on the forum. I worked on the Ripley/Lia as well as Trish snippets I've been struggling with lately.

Then I got in to a mildly-heated discussion with CelestialTyrant. Personal things I won't air out here, but I think in the end I helped him figure some stuff out. So sacrificing my writing energy to help him out was well worth it. I also chatted with Cyhyr a little, and she was in an equally odd mood: she was excited about wedding planning!

Now, Cyhyr obviously loves Ronoxym. No doubt there. But she's more of the "I want to be married" type than the "I want a wedding" type. Fantastic for in the long run - the girl always has her priorities straight - but kind of crappy when she has to plan the wedding with no desire to.

Anyway, I used my left-over Writing High to ride her Wedding High, and we just girl-talked for a while. Again, I didn't get as much writing done as I would have thought that morning, but I had fantastic talks with two good friends. Fair trade.

Wednesday I managed to finally finish up that blog post that kept getting delayed: first by work cutting my Sunday posting hours short, and then by talking to Ron, Cy, and CT over the next two days. I didn't just write that post though. I also started this one. Got a decent chunk of it done too before I had to pick up Hubby from work.

I might have gotten farther, but I felt so guilty about making poor Omni wait for so long for me to edit his chapter - and then ending up editing the wrong one - that I started out the day bright and early and reading his work. After I sent him my edits I quickly told ChibiSunnie to send me her stories again. Just like Omni, I had neglected to read the three Hey Arnold stories that she had sent me while participating in a writing challenge.

Sadly, the rest of the week was a bit tight in regards to free time. It was still awesome with things such as Hubby making me awesome meals, and getting to smother my niece in kisses and hugs. It wasn't as awesome with regards to writing, though. So, I haven't sent Chibi anything yet, but I've been whittling away at one of her stories whenever I have a moment. Beta reading for her has helped me avoid Zero-Days on Thursday, Friday, and yesterday. In fact, the only writing-related thing I did yesterday was beta read more of her one story.

In fact, aside from beta reading, the only other writing I did throughout the rest of the week was:

• Periodically work on this blog post; concluding today.
• Updating on the forum, and getting further in to Crystal's head; finally starting to hear her.
• Coming up with that project I teased about in my Wednesday update.

So, what is this project? Well, nothing is finalized yet - in fact, silly Ron hasn't even chimed in about it - but it hit me during my antsy work shift on Tuesday.

I'm going to once more complain about my pathetic eyesight, my broken netbook, and my inability to really see my desktop monitor too well. When I do things like write my snippets I tend to just let my eyes unfocus a little as I type. I'm one of those people who doesn't need to look at the keyboard - or even the screen for that matter - in order to type something. This is how I can marathon my writing, even with the vision issue. I then go back and read in shifts. I'll read for x-minutes, and then take a break. I'll come back and read more, and repeat. That's how I read posts people put up, or edit both my writing and others, or read the 100+ Facebook notifications waiting for me each day.

Not the most efficient way to write or beta read; although, even if I could properly see, it IS a good practice to stop from ruining my eyesight even more. Anyway, to help with the turnaround time of my beta reading - as well as helping me read even when not home - I've started to print out the stories and make notes there. I later type these notes up and pass them along.

I do a bit better this way. I also had a better time actually talking to people about writing when I was able to do so in real time: in person and/or IM. It really bubbled over that energy, and got me super excited to get back in to writing. It's also faster to bounce off ideas. Plus, I didn't have to wait a week or so before hearing feedback - yes, I'm looking at you Ron. Likewise, people didn't have to wait MONTHS to hear feedback from me - yup, I know you are looking at ME, Omni and Chibi.

As much as I enjoy being part of Writers’ Huddle, it is far from being in real-time. It is a great deal of reading; something I have troubles with. So I haven't been as active in the community as I would have liked. I do love the concept though. I also noticed how great it is to talk to my local fellow writers: Cyhyr, Ronoxym, and Omnibladestrike. We truly encourage each other, give each other differing views on how to take the story - views that tend to better the tale, and excite each other in to writing more. It's just such a good energy.

So, on Tuesday I sent the proposal out to those three: Create a local writing group. Why haven't we thought of this before? I suggested that we meet in person at least once a month, if not once every other week. I know with Ron's schedule the every-other-week option might be a bit rough, but if he can manage it I think keeping each other so accountable on such short periods of time will be truly beneficial to all of us.

Like I stated before, nothing is finalized. We don't have a first meeting planned. We haven't agreed on how frequently to meet. We haven't decided if we're always meeting at my place, or if we are going to rotate where we'll meet so everyone gets to host. We haven't even figured out what day of the week we want to hold these meetings. But the idea is out there, as well as the excitement to make it happen.

I'll be sure to keep everyone posted, but I'm super excited at where this is heading. If I can get this writing group off the ground and couple it with my new Non-Zero Days philosophy, I may actually FINALLY have a semblance of a writing habit.

Be on the look out for great things on the horizon!

Lent Gives Me Non-Zeros (And Other Awesome Happenings)

I want to start out by saying a huge congratulations to my best friend.

My friend since way back in elementary school gave birth to her first born on Monday. He's absolutely adorable and I can't wait to meet him in person. She and her husband did good.

I'd like to follow that up with a nod to my kid sister.

She celebrated her 25th yesterday! My best friend is a mom and my sister is a quarter-century old. When did that happen!? When did I get old enough for this!?

Well, aside from those two awesome bits of news, I have some of my own. Partially thanks to Lent, I managed to accomplish a Non-Zero week! That's right, kiddies, a full week!

Okay, so, for those who still don't know, I got the idea of the Non-Zero day from an old classmate of mine when she found the idea on Reddit and posted about it on her blog. This has been my philosophy ever since. I now live my life aiming to do SOMETHING daily - even if it's just writing a quick sentence or do five minutes of research - that will advance me towards the goal of becoming a professional writer.

It may not seem like it too much with the Non-Zero days I've done this week. None of them really push me towards writing that masterful manuscript that will be my break-out hit. However, it does get me in to a writing routine, which is something I'm desperately lacking. It gets me practicing and learning daily. It may still be another five years before I have a manuscript ready for print, but these Non-Zero days get me better prepared for that day than how I was previously living.

First up, as I mentioned, this new boost in writing is partially thanks to Lent. See, I've noticed lately that I spent pretty much all day on Facebook. I have at least twenty people on my list for getting notification, and I check those notifications as soon as I get them. I then putz around on the site while waiting for someone to do something on it. I also stay practically shackled to the desktop - since I don't have a data plan on my phone - in case someone hops on and wants to talk to me through Facebook Messenger. I crave human interaction, and so those IMs and notifications are like a drug to me.

I was truly addicted.

I noticed how unhealthy that habit is - on more than one level - and so I decided to cut down my use of Facebook. I now more-or-less stick to roughly and hour or two a day. Still a bit much, but I need at least that in order to catch up with all those notifications. Anyway, now that I'm not spending my day latched to Facebook I need to kill time; keep me occupied so I'm not tempted to open up the website in order to fill that social void. Thankfully, that's what writing is for!

So, how did that work out in to a week of Non-Zero days? Well, the first two days were kind of minimalist in that regards. I worked more on the snippet I have in the works with Nys and Willow talking to each other. Well, it's more of an argument between the two. Anyway, I got maybe half way through the story last Monday before I hit a brick wall. I just couldn't get things flowing. It's the same reason I haven't finished the Lia and Ripley snippet. I just don't really know either Nys or Ripley well enough to have them in my head. Since I'm not Cyhyr - the "Director" writer - I have difficulties just writing what I want them to say and have it still sound natural; unscripted. I need to have the characters in my head and "talking" to me so I can feel the natural flow of the conversation.

I mean, I have Ripley SORT OF in my head since I do know him at least a little bit. Hubby kept him sort of simple since Ripley hasn't really developed in his head yet. He's a laid back surfer who struggled to live on the streets for three years; causing him to become violent. He then had his anger channeled by becoming one of the security guards of the campus. He learned discipline and realized he enjoyed helping people, so much so that he's going to school to become a psychologist. He's easy for people to talk to and quite lovable. However, this tends to result in people taking him for granted as someone there to help them through their troubles; ignoring that he has troubles too. I already have a Lia/Ripley snippet up where Ripley drops the "psychologist" persona and becomes a lovesick teen. The current snippet I'm working on is kind of similar, but I can't find the trigger to get him to drop his facade. It was so much easier the first go....

And Nys? Well, Ronoxym doesn't really do much with Nys, and so I don't really know her too much. I do know that she's a lot more like his fiance Cyhyr than Ron will admit. That made things a touch easier. I just sort of pictured how Cyhyr would react in a similar situation. I basically wrote fanfic about my friend.

That being said, I did advance the snippet some more last Tuesday, and then went in to a writing sprint last Wednesday. I finished and managed to send it Ron to review. He let me know that he does have some rewrites, but he never got around to writing them.... It's been an official week now. I'm giving him until the next blog post to send me revisions. Otherwise, I'm posting it as-is in X-Future: Snippets, dropping the link in this week's update on Sunday, and then the revision/collaboration version we write will be its own thing.

I might do that anyway. It would be cool to see the differing versions. Ronoxym needs to do the same thing with the Devon/Willow story we're working on. I'm sure people would get a kick out of his solo version of the story versus the one we end up with once done. Especially since my derailing his story easily added ten pages to the tale... whoops....

Anyway, as of Monday I also sent the Nys/Willow story over to Cyhyr to betaread. Who better to let me know if Nys is in character than her inspiration?

No updates from her either.... So, no updates on the Nys/Willow or the Devon/Willow stories as of yet. Bumming me out, but once those two aren't so busy I should get something. It gave me time to work on other things while waiting. However, I'm still in that mentality that I can't really focus on any other stories until the Willow ones are done and posted. I guess it's the idea of closure. I need one story completed before I can move on. Odd, considering poor What Is Truly Meant To Be hasn't been updated in about a year... oof....

Anyway, after sending Ron the snippet on Wednesday I spent the rest of the week working on and off with yet another Trish snippet. Yup, the one I commented on last week about her getting off injured reserves. I have the whole thing played out in my head, but I also now realize that it's a bit visual heavy. Definitely would be more entertaining if I could film it. So I have the basic skeleton of all the action and everything written out, but I still need to figure out how to write it so it's entertaining in a written media.

Once I hit THAT wall I moved on to another project yet again. I wanted to have SOMETHING up for you guys this week, and so I decided that I'd convert more solo-role-play-sessions in to Snippets. This most recent one was Willow doing a private training simulation out in the woods of Mount X. Though it doesn't necessarily push the overall story forward, it will probably still end up as its own chapter in X-Future: The Second Generation Begins. However, the role play only happened three months ago, therefore it will easily be another year or so before I get to the point where the chapter will fit in the story. In the meantime, I decided to drop it in to the Snippets anthology. I'll probably remove it once it's a chapter in TSGB, but I'll cross that bridge and all that. Until that time I can try to get some reads where its at now.

I'm not entirely sure who would read it though. It is just overflowing with spoilers. And so those who are reading TSGB might not want to read it in order to avoid getting slapped with the results of a LOT of plot twists. Those that don't care about the spoilers because they're players on the forum - and therefore already know everything - already read it as the original posts. I didn't really change much when I switched it over to narrative due to how I write on the forum in the first place. Then there's the group that aren't players - meaning the story is new to them - but they also don't care about spoilers. Out of that small group I have to now weed out the ones who are offended by foul language since the story has a bunch of it.

In other words: I'm not expecting a lot of reads for this snippet.

Still, if YOU wish to read it, you can here:

"Training with a Mind of Its Own"

On DeviantArt          On FanFiction

I actually had everything all set to have this up on Saturday, and then work on this blog post on Sunday. However, I was missing talking to people online now that I had cut back my daily Facebook intake. I decided to try out using Skype as my go-to messenger over the weekend. It didn't work as well as I had hoped, and so I'm now on Trillian. I highly recommend. I've been super happy with it over the past few days.

Anyway, while I was trying out Skype on Saturday AngelBlood666 actually tracked me down. We proceeded to IM each other for the next TEN HOURS or so. It was awesome talking to him about just normal life stuff as well as touching a bit on writing. I feel like I've connected him on a new level now.

So, AB666, feel free to hit me up whenever.

The only downside was that I was pleasantly distracted from my converting of the Willow snippet. I did do some role playing on the forum and very slowly converted the snippet; it just took me too long to finish the story for me to also have time to write a blog post. Add in the craziness of Monday and Tuesday, and that explains this mid-week posting.

Well, the Non-Zero Days continue on, and I have a project in the works to help even more with this goal. I'll let you know more about that in Sunday's post.

Until then!

So Many Plot Bunnies!

Well, it figures that the last week of Writers’ Huddle's Winter Writing Challenge would be the ONE week I actually hit my goals: A weekly blog post AND at least 8hrs of writing.

Oh well, at least I got there eventually.

While it is usually advised to figure out one writing project, and then stick to just that one until it's done - otherwise you run the risk of twenty started projects, but no completed ones - I have to credit my heavy writing week to having a sort of Writer's ADD.

I have multiple writing projects in the mix that I kept jumping between. My two big ones involving Gyateara - A Race for Destiny and Amara's future tales - are mostly research and brainstorming while I world-build. The converting of X-Future in to its own world is similar. So, those are large projects I keep bouncing back to, but they don't involve actual writing yet. Therefore, I need other smaller projects that allow me to write.

Thanks to the X-Future girls I was able to do just that. I currently have five snippets in the works; at least one of which will eventually become canon. First up is a conversation between Ripley and Lia. As I was falling asleep a week ago this interaction popped in to my head; something that has been happening frequently as I pass out, but more on that in a minute.

The tale - once done - will be sort of filled with spoilers, and so I might as well throw one out now.

***SPOILER ALERT***

The tale - although not originally birthed from the song - is highly influenced by the song "Say Something" by A Great Big World feat. Christina Aguilera.
Here's the song for anyone who doesn't know it, but would like to:

Heartbreaking, right? Sorry about that.... Queen of Emotional Angst and all that...

***END OF SPOILER***

Another project I have in the works is one that will become canon. To avoid another spoiler I won't give any names, but an X-Future couple is going to "get away" for the summer break. A much needed vacation. So I was given the task to just write it all out, and then we'll post it as part of a "summer time skip" on the forums.

The third tale may also become canon as another solo-roleplay. Hearing that, I'm sure you know who it's for: Trish. Who else do I solo-play so frequently? Although, that does remind me that I have a Willow solo-play that I might convert in to a Snippet. So keep your eyes open for that.

Back to Trish. Yes, once more Trish is in my head. I haven't played her since early January and the girl is going stir-crazy in my mind. Her story is simply her FINALLY recovered from her injuries. She was just as stir-crazy on Injured Reserves as she is in my head, and so she wants to stretch and push her powers. She had a bit of a creative project while she wasn't able to move too well, and now she's going to put it to some use in the cold locker The Brotherhood has for when she wants to practice her fire control.

A fourth project actually just came up Friday night, and so I'm not sure I should really count it... As with the Lia/Ripley conversation, this interaction also happened upon me as I was falling asleep. It's like my half-awake state is perfect for channeling these characters as I witness their arguments. This time a character you guys don't really know to well: Nys. Devon stumbled upon her on the streets, rescued her - so to speak - and she became his traveling companion. Although Ronoxym will swear up and down that there is nothing between Nys and Devon, anyone who ISN'T Ron can see that there clearly is, at least on Nys' side of things.

Anyway, the fourth project I'm currently working on is Nys getting in Willow's face about Devon. It's kind of cute seeing Nys trying to be all intimidating. However, Ron hasn't really written Nys too much, and so it's a bit tough for me to know her well enough to write her. I know she can go from meek to protective, from serious to mischievous, and from easily intimidated to the one doing the intimidation. She's complex like that. She's actually a lot like Cyhyr like that; another thing Ron will deny to his grave.

So, I'm sure once I'm done with the interaction between Nys and Willow and I show it to Ron he'll have some rewrites of his own. He'll have the same "that's not how she talks/reacts" comments that I had about Willow in his interaction between her and Devon. He'll most likely derail my story as much as I derailed his. And then we'll have another collab in the works.

Speaking of which, the last project I have in the works is still that collaborative effort with Ronoxym. He added a little bit, but this week was mostly me going back through the whole thing and beta-reading/adjusting a few things. He would then respond, add them in, tweak some himself, and the back and forth would continue.

Right now I believe we're up to 14pgs and over 8100 words. So much for this being a Snippet. Companion story, here we go! Considering we're FINALLY in Devon's head I have to wait completely for Ron to continue with his story, and then just adjust Willow's reactions. I have no clue how much longer this story is going to be or where it's going to go.

The problem there is that I'm so invested in Ron's story that I can't really focus on any of the above ones I have in the works. Probably why I have so many of them. I try to work on something to keep my mind off of this story, can't focus, and try a different story instead.

RONOXYM! YOU NEED TO WRITE MORE!!!! SCREW THE FACT THAT YOU WORK 80HR WORK WEEKS AND ARE HALF ASLEEP WHEN YOU'RE DONE! I'LL FIX IT!

I've actually gotten moderately good at deciphering what he's trying to say when he mistypes in his pseudo-sleeping state.

So, yeah. I'm obsessed with finding out where Ron's story is going to go next. I try to do other things, but I can't distract my mind from that tale. The more I try to refocus my mind on something else the more I write, but no projects are done quite yet. We'll see if I do better in the upcoming week.

Now, for the final mini-challenge of the Winter Writing Challenge. We actually finished on a rewarding high note. We were supposed to treat ourselves; whatever that means.

I did something different, however. Last week was a week where I finally got back in to video/computer games, TV shows, and finishing books I've had in queue for months. I'd like to think I treated myself a LOT last week. Because of that I felt silly doing so again this week. So I considered this week's mini-challenge completed last week and I tried again to do last week's task as this week's mini-challenge.

In other words, I tried something different with my writing.

First of all, I did start up a whole bunch of projects all at once. I never do that. I write until I'm done with one story before moving on to the next. The exception being my chaptered stories; obviously, otherwise What Is Truly Meant To Be and A Race for Destiny would both be done by now...

The other thing I tried was to ignore actions while writing. I didn't write any scene description or any action blocking for the characters. I just wrote dialogue. I didn't even stop to write who was talking. It was just back and forth like listening in on a radio drama or a phone argument.

Once I was done with the dialogue I was planning on going back and filling in all the extra stuff: setting, action, reaction, who said what and how. I hadn't tried writing like that since high school. That's over 10yrs ago already, kiddies!

What tale did I give this treatment to? Ripley and Lia. I feel that in most cases writing out the "blocking" helps with the story. I better picture how the characters are interacting with each other that way. I know where they're standing/sitting in relation to each other. I know if they're throwing things or are standing with a cocked hip. I know if they're snuggling or ignoring each other. I know if they are pleading, yelling, laughing, or rolling their eyes. The way something is said is just as important as the words themselves; sometimes more important.

However, in some cases pausing long enough to write out how the characters are acting within their environment slows me down too much and the argument fizzles out. The reaction from the opposing character comes too slowly and the passion dies off. That's why I tried this tactic with Ripley and Lia.

I had tried writing the argument out the way I heard it in my head, but after three tries of the argument dying half way through I decided to try one last time where it was literally just their dialogue. Ripley came off a bit harsh, and so I have to go back and rework that, but for the most part the argument worked beautifully. Out of the above projects this is the closest to completion. I just need to go back and put in the action and setting and whatnot.

I also need to figure out how to get them in to the argument. It's almost as if they got through the argument once as I was falling asleep, aired out their grievances, and refuse to relive the fight. No matter what I try they just won't get back in to the argument. So the dialogue I have is already mid-fight. Eh, I'll figure it out.

So, for this upcoming week, keep your eyes open for the possibility of the following Snippets:
 - Willow Solo-Play of her doing a private training session on Mount X. Angst ensues....
 - Ripley and Lia having an argument about where her commitment is and whether or not she'll give up on The Institute.
 - Trish Solo-Play of her doing a private training session in the Cold Locker with her new craft piece.
 - Nys telling Willow to step off in regards to Devon. Although, this one might be severely delayed depending on the rewrites Ron has.

Writing out a full summer vacation will be a bit of a task. I'm not sure how long that will take. I'm also foreseeing the Willow/Devon story to be another few weeks before it's done. However, I'm going to try to push Ron to finish before the end of March. We'll see how that goes.

All the Zeros!!!!

Define Irony: After deciding to push harder to avoid "Zero Days"; having an entire week of them....

I'm not entirely sure what happened. I'm not entirely sure where this week went. I didn't have too many work hours this week. I did cleaning, but not as extensively as I would have liked. I played video games a bit again this week, but it was for maybe a grand total of three hours all week long. I barely watched any TV since I'm not big in to the Olympics - I know, I'm like the only person on the planet - and so all of my normal shows were reruns.

The only justification I have was that I was reading. Even so... where did the week go!?

As I was falling asleep on Friday I had a nice long mental interaction between Lia and Ripley, so yesterday morning when I was waiting to start my shift - I got my schedule screwed up and showed up a half-hour early - I wrote. Broke out the "Lia" journal for the full half-hour; writing with no trouble. The conversation is far from done, and so if I can kick this sluggish fog my head is in I'll work on that some more today.

But that and the work on this post is all the writing I've done. How did that happen!?

Ronoxym had been pulling a lot of 14-hr days this week, and so he's been drained too. Since he has yet to continue Devon's side of the collab story, I haven't even worked on that. I feel like the gang is also waiting for me to continue on the forum, but neither Lia nor I know how to respond to what's posted... and so I keep tapping my pen on the table and ponder.

The closest I've come to doing anything constructive - aside from that blip I started working on yesterday morning - was typing up another Snippet. Even so, I didn't do much writing. I had already written it as a solo-session on the forum about mid-January. I went back to re-read it to see if I could think of anything to do with Trish; since I haven't played her in about a month. I enjoyed the story enough to drop it in to the Snippets anthology with a few tweaks. Sure, editing it and messing with the formatting on both FanFiction and DeviantArt kept me about two hours, but there really wasn't any active writing involved.

Still, if you'd like to read - and haven't yet - here are the links:
"Confessions" on DeviantArt
"Confessions" on FanFiction

Oh, and anyone who read the story on DeviantArt and was wondering, yes, druidlockcooke is Ronoxym. Also, I'd like to note that in comparing the views for this anthology on both DeviantArt and FanFiction, I get a lot more views of my writing over on DeviantArt. I'm glad I decided to go ahead and start posting stories on there too, instead of just sticking solely with FanFiction.

So, I failed once more to write for 8hrs this week. It's a bit late now to change my goal for the Writers’ Huddle Winter Challenge, but I think after the challenge is over I'll just set my goal to that "Non-Zero Days" idea. Because I've noticed that while I may not hit 8hrs of WRITING per week, this past month I've been doing a lot of RESEARCHING and PLANNING that I need to get under my belt in order to move forward with some of my stories. Mostly stuff to further help convert X-Future in to an original universe, as well as world building Gyateara's universe.

Plus, every author will tell you how crucial it is to read daily. I know I've commented on this - as well as why I don't read daily - more times than you guys care, but I felt the need to do so at least once more. Maybe I can give myself some slack and count reading towards my "Non-Zero Day" as long as I do so "actively".

What do I mean by that? No, not read it aloud like I did this past month; more on that in a moment. I mean make mental notes while reading. Notice the titles of chapters, and try to mentally calculate how they were formed; something I desperately need work on giving my horrendous ability to name things. Make mental notes - or even physical ones; something a lot of writing blogs suggest - on passages I really enjoy, and then figure out why I enjoy them so much. Basically, allow myself to be swept away by the story - the way you should be with a good book; dive in head first in to the tale - but also mentally note in the back of my mind to later ANALYZE what I read.

THAT is one of the main reasons writers should also be avid readers. Seeing how others were successful in the career you want - or have already - allows you to learn and grow. As long as you take the time to reflect on what you read after the fact.

What did you like about the tale? What didn't you like? Was there a twist or an angle that you wouldn't have thought of? Did you enjoy it? How was the pacing? Or the wording? The voice of the narrator? Would you have changed any of it? If so, how? Was there a challenge the characters faced that is similar to one you can't get your characters out of? How did this author handle that challenge? Could your characters do something similar? Does that help with your writers block?

Basically, get in touch with your inner, annoying, high school/college English/Literature teacher. You don't have to think LONG about any of those questions. You don't have to write an essay. You just need to reflect to the point of growth. However - although I may be too lazy to ever actually follow through with this - a lot of professional writing advice includes literally taking notes while reading. So, go ahead and jot down that passage that you really love - or hate - or a chapter title/opening line that you got a kick out of. That way the next time you're stuck you can go to that notebook, flip through your notes, and see if anything sparks an idea.

Perhaps writing similarly to a passage you really enjoyed, parodying a line that made you crack up, or rewriting a passage or character you couldn't stand will help you break through whatever is blocking you.

So, I'm definitely going to be counting "active/reflective reading" towards my "Non-Zero Days".

Let's backtrack a bit now. First up: reading aloud. So, I mentioned previously this month that I wasn't feeling too well, and so Hubby tried to make me feel better by reading Rick Riordan's "The Mark of Athena" aloud to me. By the time I was healthy-ish again my husband was re-invested in the book - which he had already read on his own a year ago - and so I continued reading the rest of the book aloud to him. We got so in to this habit that we instantly jumped in to the most recent book in Riordan's Heroes of Olympus series: "The House of Hades".

We spent the last week reading that intense book. The downside to reading aloud snuggled up next to Hubby - perfect for emotional support during really intense scenes/chapters - is that it DID take about a week to read. Normally, a book this good I would tear through in a day or two. CelestialTyrant actually did just that; he picked up "The House of Hades" on Wednesday, didn't sleep, and had it finished Thursday.

So now Hubby, CT, Ron, Cyhyr, and I are all anxiously awaiting the last book of the series - "The Blood of Olympus" - to come out in October. OH, THE SPECULATIONS ON HOW IT WILL END!!!!

*ahem* Anyway....
Reading with Hubby really got me in to active/reflective reading for the first time EVER in regards to leisure reading. Perhaps it was because I was semi in that mindset to begin with; wanting to learn more from Riordan's work. Perhaps it was because I had someone beside me that I could instantly turn to and discuss with. Perhaps it was simply the act of reading aloud.

I was picking up on things I only noted in passing - and quickly forgot since I didn't discuss them right away with anyone - while reading Riordan's other works. Things like how awesome his chapter opening lines were. Here are some examples from "The House of Hades":

Opening line of the entire book:
During the third attack, Hazel almost ate a boulder.

More gemstone opening chapter lines:
When they reached the ledge, Annabeth was sure she'd signed their death warrants.
Leo spent the night wrestling with a forty-foot-tall Athena.
Annabeth literally stumbled over the second Titan.
Percy was relived when the demon grandmothers closed in for the kill.

And that is only about 1/2 way in to the book. So many great gems. He set up every establishing chapter with an amazing opening line like the above. For the first time I actually paid close attention to that. I'm still not sure I can create lines that awesome, but I at least have a set bar to aim for: that "wait... what!?" element.

Other things I noted were the words he used. The characters were dealing with a LOT more Greek and Roman monsters in these last two books, and so the Greek and Latin was EVERYWHERE. Man, is that hard to read aloud. And these are legit languages! I couldn't imagine reading Lord of the Rings aloud with all the Elvish, Dwarven, and other such langages. So... note to future self... if I'm going to have characters speak non-English, don't do so too frequently without some sort of pronunciation guide in the back....

Christopher Paolini did that with the books in his Inheritance Cycle. The backs of his books held a glossary of non-English words - Elvish and Dwarven mostly - as well as how to pronounce them. Riordan has a glossary as well: to define the Greek/Roman terms. He doesn't include a dictionary-like pronunciation though... So Hubby and I sort of sounded most of the words out. If we ever decide to read these books aloud to our future children we NEED to figure out how those words are properly pronounced first!

Riordan also threw in about half-dozen words that even *I* didn't recognize, and these are books typically aimed at fifth- through eighth-grade students. I made a note of that for sure. It was like he forgot for a moment who his target audience is. Ronoxym does that a lot too: elevated vocabulary.

Me? I guess it was the training from working on school newspapers for nine years, but I stick with the journalism rule of thumb: write at a fifth-grade comprehension level. In the United States, most of the population can comprehend at least up to a fifth-grade reading level. Because of this, the journalism rule of thumb is to not write more advanced than that; this way the story can be understood by just about anyone.

Sure, I may throw in some college-grade words now and again, but for the most part I stick to that rule. My language may not be as fancy as Ron's, but it's readable without a higher education or a dictionary sitting beside you.

Another thing I really sat up and took notice was the fight scenes; something I'm not very good at. I did the same thing while watching episodes of Ultimate Spider-Man on Netflix with Hubby. Know what I noticed? Injuries. Knock outs. The heroes not winning the fights all the time.

I know that it's boring to have your protagonist(s) win every battle, and easily at that. I know there needs to be struggles, challenges, and possible defeats. Yet, when I write fight scenes the majority of them are "struggles" simply because the protagonist can't quite figure out where the weak spot is.

I write fight scenes the same way I play video games; namely Legend of Zelda. I have the character(s) run around dodging attacks until a strategy to defeat the villain(s) forms. The worst my character(s) get is the worst I allow Link: getting tossed aside or minor injuries/bruises.

I don't allow things like broken ankles when walking is crucial. I don't have any character's sides slashed open with blood gushing out while in the middle of sword fighting. I never think to have a character struggling to stay awake enough to escape while slowly dying of poison. The idea of plowing down hundreds of enemies with an arrow shot through the left bicep is foreign to me. Yet all of these things happen in Riordan's books; sorry about the minor spoilers, by the way.

In Ultimate Spider-Man the supposedly indestructible Power Man had his arm broken in one episode and his leg gouged in another. Spider-Man himself had been knocked unconscious or electrified nearly every episode. They never suffer nearly as much as Percy Jackson and his crew, but they still get their butts handed to them multiple times.

I guess, even though I'm great at emotionally scarring my characters, I'm not as good at physically doing so; poor Amara not withstanding. I need to learn to let my characters get beaten up. Let them lose. I just need to figure out how to either a) get them to recover fast enough to not get killed, b) bring in back-up to protect them from getting killed without it seeming deus ex machina, or c) get the enemy to escape/not want to kill the downed character. Then there's the little-used option D: let the character die.

To be fair, few months back I did allow Trish to get really banged up in a simple training obstacle course. So I guess I'm sort of learning....
For anyone not sure what I'm talking about - but would like to - the Snippet can be found here:

"Trying Out The Obstacle Course"

On DeviantArt          On FanFiction

So, to recap this really long post: no, I didn't succeed in writing for 8hrs this week; yet again. No, I barely got any writing in aside from the two hours to write this post and another half-hour while waiting to start work yesterday. No, I didn't even succeed in this week's mini-challenge to "Do Something Different With Your Writing", considering I didn't really do ANY writing...

But I DO have this blog post up; and on a Sunday again, no less!
I did finally do something that most writers find essential for their careers: reading. And I did so ACTIVELY, too.
So, I also LEARNED this past week. I absorbed what others do differently than me in things I struggle with. Hopefully, with something to aim for I can therefore improve. I GUESS you could stretch and say that's something different with my writing...
Finally, I did some more researching and development for X-Future and Gyateara to become original tales.

All-in-all a Zero-Week that was still surprisingly productive.

Trying to Cut Back "Zero Days"

Happy Belated Valentine's Day! Especially to every single one of you, my readers, who are my Valentines! You show me so much love and patience, and I want to take this time to really thank you guys!

As far as writing goes, this was just a dead week. A week of "Zero-Days". Unless you're big on Reddit, I'm sure you're at least a little confused.

Well, my one friend from college found a Reddit comment a user named Ryan wrote to try to help out another user - Max - who was feeling way down. This comment is pretty much self-help gold. So much so, that I wouldn't be surprised if Ryan gets convinced to at least start up a blog; if not write a self-help book.

Anyway, she wrote a more succinct and slightly easier to read version for her own blog; mostly quoting Ryan with a few add-ins of her own: How to Start Loving Your Unmotivated Self.

The real key point in the whole article/comment that hit home for me was the idea of "Non-Zero Days". Days in which you put at least the slightest bit of effort to push yourself forward towards your goal; whatever it is. Obviously, for me that would be being a professional writer. Therefore, Non-Zero Days would be any day I do SOMETHING that will help me get closer to being that professional writer.

Did I write something today in order to help hone my craft? Did I work more on the research needed to world build for a possible future story idea? Did I work more on a manuscript or another chapter for the fanfictions I have going on? Did I do more work in finding a way of converting X-Future in to an original tale? Did I read any books or articles that will help me on my way to turning writing in to a career? Did I search for a new job opportunity that would either get me closer to writing professionally, or allow me enough free time to do so when I'm not working? The list goes on.

Unfortunately - and a bit ironically - after reading that article and deciding to really push for Non-Zero Days, this whole week more-or-less became one long chain of Zero Days.

I started off alright. My cold - while sticking around like a stubborn mule - is a lot better, and so I didn't spend most of my week in bed. Yay! However, there WERE two nights in which Hubby and I fell asleep at about 8:30, woke up at about midnight, stayed up another hour or so, before actually going to our bed. Odd nights.

Anyway, so I started off pretty good. I had this blog up on Monday; which meant it was a Non-Zero Day. Then the week sort of melds together. I can't remember if it were still Monday, or if it were Tuesday - but I know it was the beginning of the week - I went back and did the mind-map mini-challenge for last week's Writers' Huddle Winter Writing Challenge.

It's all about converting X-Future in to a stand-alone thing. As you can see, it's a bit jumbled. It's one of the reasons I am not a fan of mind mapping. I try to start off small and confined so I have room for more ideas, but there always seems to be more ideas than I have space to put bubbles. And then - as seen with my "Magic" section - I tend to change my mind as to how I want things to connect. The lines get crazy. Some things overlap categories too and I don't have the space to either rewrite the idea at the different categories or connect them via two lines. I just generally don't like mind-maps.

But I still did it! I caught up on last week's mini-challenge and I had been writing. I was on a roll that I could be proud of. Ronoxym even started up a Google Doc for our now collaborative story about Devon and Willow. So, I read through that, added some comments, rewrote some of the parts I did, and mentally planned out how we would publish it online for you fine folks to read once we're done. Sadly, Ron has been busy and super worked to the point of exhaustion, and so he hasn't written anything further; which halts me. So, let's hope for an easier work week for him so he can finish writing and I can keep working on this project too.

Speaking of this project, I was talking to Ron's fiance Cyhyr about the whole collab thing. I still feel so guilty that Ron's original story - which he had completely planned in his head, but ran out of steam writing it which is why he only sent me the first half - got so derailed when I did my "rewrite". I stressed that it wasn't truly a "rewrite"; that I found nothing wrong with what Ron had, it just didn't feel right to "Willow" and that's what inspired me to write my own version. And then I sort of did it again by writing my vision of how the story would continue when Ron had Devon confront Willow at her dorm room. Seems Ron had the conversation going differently, and so my continuation again threw him off. I also made Devon sound too whiny in my version. Whoops.

Anyway, so I was telling Cyhyr that I was sorry I shanghaied Ron's story, but she was actually elated that I did. Apparently not only is Ron's writing great Muse Fuel for me, but mine is the same for him. The different perspectives of the same tale really make us re-evaluate how we pictured it all going down. Since Willow is my character and Devon is his, neither of us truly knows how the other works. I THOUGHT I had a fairly good handle on Devon - being a fanfiction writer and all - but, as I mentioned before, that was proven wrong when "Devon" complained about me making him sound too whiny. So this collab thing really helps both of us out.

Both of us are now writing more frequently because as soon as one of us responds to the story the other one instantly jumps on the Writing Wagon to either rework the scene or continue on; the characters totally driving the conversation when doing so. Most occasions we credited our quick responses with something akin to the characters going "OH HELL NO! That is NOT how I sound!" or "Really? THAT'S your comeback!? Well, listen here, because I've got one HELL of a rebuttal for that!"

Ronoxym is greatly appreciative of the rewrites I do since he feels it really helps improve his original tale. I love his continuations of the story because I'm legitimately interested in where he was planning on going with it; plus, how it inspires me to write. Cyhyr loves my involvement because it actually kick's Ron's butt in to gear when it comes to writing. When he comes home he apparently starts work on Devon's half of the story, and she loves that he's getting a writing routine down. Something apparently both Ron and I have in common.

In fact, we have a LOT in common when it comes to writing. We both write more when we're inspired as opposed to setting a routine and forcing our way through the blocks until we get to the good parts. We both hear the characters in our heads and have our stories frequently derailed by them. We actually discover more about our characters by giving them free rein. We're kind of "lazy" writers; fitting the activity in when everything else is done - if we're not too exhausted at that point. There's other similarities, but that should give you the idea.

Cyhyr is sort of the opposite of the above. She does the whole "read a book AND get writing in" thing that is suggested for novelists. For me, it's either one or the other, and so reading tends to get shoved to the side so I don't feel bad about not writing for days. Cyhyr also carefully calculates every scene ahead of time to make sure it works perfectly for what needs to happen with her novel. Her characters never derail the scene. She always makes sure to schedule in writing and work other things around it. She's definitely set to become a professional writer. No Zero Days for that girl.

As I told her, she is like a director of her novel; knowing the full script, the exact blocking, and figuring out every set before starting anything. Her characters are actors to tell her story. On the flipside, Ron and I are like mediums channeling our characters. They aren't there to tell our story, we're here to tell theirs. It's messy. It's usually character-driven, as opposed to Cyhyr's plot-driven stories, and it's usually long-winded, large epics. Mostly because it takes an epic for a character-driven story to have enough happen in it to create a story arc....

Realizing this helped me understand why I'm so bad at writing drabbles, poems, and other short-format tales. Even my one-shots and "short stories" are easily 5000 words long. I focus more on the character and how they react emotionally than focusing on a plot that can be written out in 500 words.

I'm sliding off-topic here.

My point is that Ronoxym and I are so similar in our writing styles, and the fact that we seem to inspire each other to write like no one else can; not even Cyhyr or Hubby. I joked that it's because Ron is actually my writing Wonder Twin. Cyhyr and I joked about that some more before I realized that I just needed to go ahead and make Ron that as his Valentine's day card this year!

So... for Ronoxym:

May we always inspire each other, but also learn to inspire ourselves.

Also... Cyhyr wants me to poke you in to submission until you start working more on your NaNo story about angels and demons and the like... she's SUPER interested in the concept and wants to be able to read it already!!!!

Okay, so - given how long this post is getting - it may seem like a lot happened this week. A lot of Non-Zero Days with my blogging, mind-mapping, new determination thanks to an article, and mini-self-discovery while chatting with Cyhyr. Unfortunately, that was only about three days out of the week.

The rest of the week consisted of those random early evenings, tiring days at work, reading, general laziness, and dealing with the insane winter weather - I think we're up to 2.5ft of snow now? Not including the mountains of snow drifts where it's all getting dumped when shoveled/plowed?

I should give myself some slack; forgive the Past Me - as that one article stated. I did do a lot in regards to planning out stuff - both the world building of Gyateara, and removing X-Future from the Marvel universe - which is different for me.

But I didn't write a Valentine's Day story this year. That could have chewed up a lot of writing hours too. I'm just not inspired to write something. Should it be Arnold/Helga? Phoebe/Gerald? Helga/Brainy? Lia/Chayse? Nix/Annika? Connor/Natalie? A new/original tale? I have no idea...

This week's mini-challenge was to "do something new". To do something you've never done before. Ali donated blood for the first time in her life. I'm sorry to say that I didn't really try anything "new" this week. Hubby tried to find loopholes: "You've never tried to convert a fanfic in to an original before", "You've never read 'House of Hades' before", "You could try out playing League of Legends." I might be tempted to do the last one before the day is out just so I do have SOMETHING new, but the others just didn't feel right to count. The League of Legends one doesn't really feel right either since I've WATCHED him play the game tons of times... but maybe it's different to PLAY it for the first time....

This upcoming week's mini-challenge is to "try something new when writing". I'll have to figure out what I want to do with that. It's mostly an idea to help us try things we've been avoiding for whatever reason - maybe we feel we're not good at it - and broaden our horizons. Although I have done it before, I'm not very good at fight scenes, so I may try that. I could maybe try writing something that is plot-driven instead of character driven. I could try writing an informative blog post instead of a journal-like one.

I've done all of these before, but I'm not that good at them. They aren't really "new" but they are writing styles I need help with. As for something truly "new", I'll have to think about that...