Carolyn's Blog

Tuesday, January 31, 2006

Now I remember!

Two milliseconds after I clicked Publish Post, I remembered I wanted to mention what is becoming one of my favorite blogs to read. Miss Snark's blog. If you're a writer, check it out. I was noticing that 41 people subscribe to her feed via bloglines but 49 have her bookmarked on del.icio.us. I just went and checked Technorati and Technorati found 2,682 posts that contain "Miss Snark". 20 posts just today. Now, there's a certain number of those that aren't the REAL Miss Snark. But it's interesting.

That's all I think. Except then I looked up me and I very nearly got sucked in to stupid web tricks. OK, that was a stupid web trick, but I wasn't stupid enough to click on any reviews.

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Writing, Interrupted

Been working on Dark Elf. Came up with an idea today that may well be over the edge. I don't care, of course, but it might be. We'll see if it sticks. Getting some good work done.

I'm still pretty happy with Instiki. It's cool. But, there is an issue. As the story complexifies, names change and drop off, and there doesn't seem to be any way to easily change the structure created by the original document name choices. This may be a show stopper. I don't want it to be. I want this to work for me. Maybe I'll get this on the wish list.

What else? School has started again. I'm going to do another directed writing and drop the lit class. Soccer is in haitus which is nice for a bit. Seems like there was something else, but I can't remember what. The laundry, I guess.

My son and I are getting a chihuahua this weekend. I know what you're thinking. I can't help it. Those little dogs are sneaky cute.

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Monday, January 30, 2006

coming awake

Have I mentioned how much I hate driving? Well, I do. Worked on Dark Elf today. Got some good work done. I'm really in the idea/scene/refine stage. I found some great research books on the Renaissance. Will be reading through those. Also went to the bookstore and bought:

• Inkspell, by Cornelia Funke -- Inkheart was a fabulous book. My son loved it. Adults will get a LOT from this book. Inkspell is the sequel. Can't wait to read it! To be honest, if you write paranormal, I recommend you read all of Funke's books. Her stories have really original twists.


• Ptolemy's Gate, by Jonathan Stroud -- the 3rd in the Bartimaeus Trilolgy. My son adored the first two. Me, too. Funny and interesting. Highly recommended. This was a sneak into the child's room to snatch and read while he was sleeping book.


• Gilead, by Marilynne Robinson -- Have heard great things about this book. Will report back.


• A Million Little Pieces, by James Frey -- I want the right to say I'm outraged, too.

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Sunday, January 29, 2006

Deja Vu

Back from soccer tournament in Sacramento. Tired. Am coming down with whatever my son had. Ick. Got basically no work done. I hate driving. Hate it hate it hate it. Will try to get something done later tonight after the child is in bed.

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Saturday, January 28, 2006

Awake but not for long?

In Sacramento CA for soccer tournament. I will rant later on the other blog about the directions. Yikes. I'm tired and I'm going to bed now. Tried to write a bit. Worked on Dark Elf. Not much done.

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Thursday, January 26, 2006

Gotta dash, dontchya know

A guilty moment here. My son is in the shower and will be done dancing and singing in about 10 minutes. (Hope he remembers there's soap and shampoo in there and that he's supposed to use it...) Not enough time to start any writing, no more interesting emails (that's carolyn AT carolynjewel.com ) so I'm blogging. Dark Elf is going well. I now have to rewrite most of chapter 1 and all of chapter 2, but that's OK. I've been working on the synopsis and trying desperately to leave out the crap that doesn't matter. Things are complexifying nicely. So, really, I'm pretty happy. This weekend is soccer, it'll be an overnight, 2 games on Saturday, 1 game on Sunday... So, here's hoping I can get some work done and that it doesn't rain.

Uhm. That's pretty much it.

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Wednesday, January 25, 2006

Hump Day breakthrough

The house is in complete disorder. The utility room is the last room to be done. Today, they're putting in the cabinets and counter. They're also putting in the shelf hutch thingees in the kitchen area. It's awesome. (Don't worry, I'm getting to the breakthrough). Meanwhile the painter is also here finishing up painting some of the other rooms and giving advice unrelated to painting. It's chaos. The child is unable to watch TV and yet he has not, in fact, perished from the lack.

So, at the gym today, I was notebooking away on Dark Elf, which has been going very well, and sort of mourning the lack of gym-elf, when I had a really brilliant idea. I was pedaling away and the idea came and I mulled it over a bit, hit level 8 on the dotted hills and then in the dip when I had my breath back and realized it would totally work, I said Oh, my God, that's perfect!. I think some people heard me, but so what, I guess. The only thing that would have improved the gym experience would have been the actual elf with the strategically placed broadsword.

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Sayings and Phrases - meanings and origins

This is a totally cool website! There's a free prhase a week email, too. Neat. www.phrases.org.uk/mean...

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Monday, January 23, 2006

The Monday -- What's the opposite of Blue?

So, today, I got a lot of writing done. Not only did I work on Dark Elf chapter One (and feel pretty Ok about it, considering it's early days) but I made good progress on sketching out the next few scenes to come. Yay!

In other good news, I solved the issue with instiki images. It was brutal and ugly and I only found the answer by accident, but I did and now I have these cool pages where I can have images of my characters.

Mostly, I'm very happy that my day off was so productive, writing-wise.

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Rant Alert!

There's a thread going on over on one of the RWA lists about whether to query an agent or an editor. Yes, I understand how capricious the publishing world can seem. But here's a few things that are [bad word removed] irritating me about the posts. One published author wrote and said, basically, that an agent is worth it, for all the reasons that writers know. The response from someone was that this particular writer has such a strong voice that she probably found it easy to get an agent. WTF??? Because of that, this person thought she should forget about querying agents and go straight for editors. Think about what that's really saying: There's nothing special, unique or compelling about my story or the way I write.

Get a clue. The bar is high. Really, really high. If you don't feel you have a voice, then go work on developing one. Don't waste postage querying editors and agents about your nothing special story. Don't go crying about how editors and agents are big fat meanies for wanting to take on writers who have done the hard work of developing their writing into something special. If your MS has been rejected a bazillion times, stop sending it out and instead spend some quality time figuring out where you've fallen below that very high bar.

OK, look, it's a cold cruel world out there. It's OK to vent on a list, it's theraputic and all that. But the best cure for rejection is hard work on the story and your writing. Rant over.

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Sunday, January 22, 2006

Champion, I tell, you champion!

As in time wasting (aka engaging in avoidance behavior)

Today I have done this much writing:

0

What I did do:

Went to work for a bit. The thing about my job is that if you need to do something that involves bouncing or otherwise making a production server unavailable, this must be done during off hours. Oh, well. I finished the tarot card puzzle with son and did, um, stuff. Oh right. Took him to the movies to see Hoodwinked. (note: pretty cute movie, actually), Attemped to read a book I must read (not much success there.) Did Tarot card/puzzle reading with my son. Result: it's unclear if he'll be a trillionare by the time he's 31. I consoled him by saying that his question was probably too specific and besides his youth is probably the reason for the lack of a clear answer. Did a reading for me, too. Since I was prohibited from my stock request for world peace, I asked about writing. Success looks good for me, so yay there! Watched the Wal-Mart movie. Can you say depressing (pronounced Corporate-Greed)? Whoa. However, there was some fairly strong visual and audio rhetoric and some unsupported arguments which annoyed me. The thing is, I kept thinking, oh, yeah! That was in the paper. Uhm, what else?

I read Miss Snark's blog multiple times. I'm addicted. Checked email, responded to email. Deleted massive amounts of it. Joined the Adrian Paul fan club. I may need to go on digest on that one. Edited to add: Mr. Paul: even though you are a hottie, and I'm now thinking maybe you look at lot like my Dark Elf (not to be confused with the gym elf) your website needs some major help. Hint: begin with organization. Test: go to your homepage and pretend that you are a brand new fan who just saw you in something. How would that person know where to find your fan club info? Answer - she wouldn't except by accident.)

OK, I lied

No not about Adrian Paul. He is a hottie and his website does need work. I did do some writing work. Today I decided that one of the characters in Dark Elf will die, leaving my heroine high and dry and all alone. I was going to work on it, but I couldn't quite get my head around the how etc. Which is why I kept checking to see what else Miss Snark had to say. I will work on it tonight.

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Saturday, January 21, 2006

Sniff

I just finished reading a book my 10 year old son kept telling me to read.. (He's been reading it at school.) Walk Two Moons by Sharon Creech. It's a Newberry Award winner, by the way. So at last I read the book, and I bawled like a big baby at the end. No fooling. I had to go take off my contact lenses because crying always messes them up.

Carolyn's patented Wow for this book. Amazing. I knew, I absolutely knew at the beginning what had happened and then I thought, no, I guess not and I let myself be convinced and then, well, as I said, I cried.

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Friday, January 20, 2006

Zzzzzzz again

So, there I was working on the chapter outline for Dark Elf and I fell asleep. I guess I was tired. So, I'm going to bed. No soccer this weekend. I have to go to work on Sunday for a bit, but I have Monday off (no school for the child).

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Thursday, January 19, 2006

Knock Knock Knocking on Chapter One's Door

Ok. So today was a weird and pissy day. boomm at work again. Argh! and that's all I'll say over here in this blog.

Today I scrapped just about every thing I wrote yesterday in the new Dark Elf chapter 1. At my son's soccer practice, I hunched over the laptop and tried a bazillion times to get a good start. No go. Until, suddenly, I said to myself, Carolyn, darling (the word wasn't actually darling, but pretend it was) what you really want to do is write the scene where the heroine gets interrupted in the middle of stuff by a group of men that includes the hero, so why don't you just do that? So I did, and it seems to have worked. The next thing I know, my son is trying to get into the car and I'm taking up the whole back seat and besides, the car is locked.

In other news, I got the new version of WordPerfect which for some reason is called X3. I guess it's a better name than something dorky like a year that's been done and gone for quite some time. Now, besides stuff that makes word processing easier, I am dying for a UI that is gorgeous. The UI is pretty much the same old same old, with some BIG exceptions that I'm really liking. So, we shall see. I'm happy with that.

Some other stuff, but I can't talk about it yet.

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Wednesday, January 18, 2006

It all goes to show you....

Today I heard from my agent's associate on the proposals she'd forwarded to her because the associate of her sells a lot of sci/fi fantasy etc. So, my agent liked Possession, but was not so crazy about Shift. This agent did not like Possession, but really liked Shift. They both liked Dark Elf. Which goes to show that tastes matter even when you're past the trying to published stage. However, the best thing is that I got great feedback on all the things she looked at. Her comments on Dark Elf were particularly helpful. So now I've gotten two sets of feedback from people whose job it is to read for salability. Invaluable. I'm still a bit at sea regarding where to concentrate my writing hours, though. Which of the three do I polish first?

Off to work on... something.

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Tuesday, January 17, 2006

Writing along

Worked on elf chapters today. Things were going well for a bit there, then all of a sudden, it was all narrative boring crap in order to explain my heroine. Oops. I need another tack. Much as I like this particular scene, it may be better to start with a different pov character so that he can offer up what he knows about the heroine. Either that, or have a lot more talking going on.

I'm tired. Going to bed. Have I mentioned how much I hate Tuesdays masquarding as Mondays?

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brianstorms weblog: Lessig is Wrong

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Monday, January 16, 2006

update to daze

I started chapters for Dark Elf. I think I have it. It's enough to get going, I guess. I like it sort of, but it doesn't have the feel I want yet. I have a page and a half, but I started the beginning several times. So, not much to report there, except I started.

In geek news, I have solved one instiki issue only to come across another, which is how to get them synchronized between desktop and laptop. It's not as straightforward as you'd think. However, I'm still liking it. It's great to be able to, say, take a look at my cast of characters page and then click a link to see (or add) details on a character. Dark Elf is a good test, since I'm basically at zero with that.

In other news, alas, the weekend is over. I really enjoyed my long weekend even though it wasn't as productive for writing as it ought to have been. And, now's the long stretch to the next day off.

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work-a-daze

Today my RITA entries came. I got some interesting books, including some I would never have read on my own, so I'm really looking forward to that. I got several genres which is neat. The deadline is March 7, but since school starts Jan-30, I'm going to try to have them done before then.

It's a holiday for me today. My son has a soccer scrimmage in a bit, so I'll shortly be sitting in the back of the car, typing away. I think I might start on chapters for Dark Elf. My fiction prof at SSU, Sherrill Jaffe, uses the phrase finding a way in to describe the way in which a writer gives the a reader a way into the fictional world. It applies as well to deciding how and where to start the story. And with Dark Elf, that's what I need. Invariably, I start far too soon. I'm thinking I'll just pick something that seems like it's from what I see as the middle of the story, and that should be about the right place to start. We'll see where that gets me.

I'll report back on that.

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Sunday, January 15, 2006

Progress continues as does nuerosis

Worked on the Rake today. Cleaned up most of one of the chapters. I'm feeling panicky about this even though at the moment there is no reason for panic except of the typical neurotic sort. I have no deadline or anything. But at the moment, the issue is that I want the rest of the book to match up to those first 3 chapters. The other issue is that I am feeling plotting challenged. Why? It's a long convoluted explanation. My synopses, when submitted when the book isn't written yet, have little resemblance to the finished product. That's because I really have to know my characters and that means I have to write them. And they change during the course of a book. And so I had to explain this to my agent who felt that the historical project description was plotless. Well, yes. It was. It's just an itty bitty idea. Hardly a paragraph. It's her job to sell books that have plots and all so of course she zeroed in on that. Sigh. Reminder: She liked the idea for Dark Elf (which was several pages, chapterless but with bits of plot thrown in that probably won't be in the book should it get written.)

But the whole thing has left me feeling convinced I can't plot. But I can. When I'm writing the damn book. I think. Now, I'm working on fixing up the Rake, something I'm typcially very good at, and now I keep thinking, "This is probably the wrong thing to have happen because, of course, as the whole world knows, I can't plot." Argh!!

Someone suggested I should be writing proposals for the project descriptions, and of course that is right. But I'm afraid if I leave the Rake too long it will be stale. Sigh.

Lastly, Instiki is still working. I wrote a little command file that invokes the correct path etc and that seems to have done the trick. It's cool. So far, I can say I'm pretty happy with it. But I need a full development cycle to really see if I'm right about the richness of the wiki as opposed to word processing.

Edited to add: I forgot to mention that on Friday, I saw the elf. He was in the middle of a conversation about some work he's doing at the gym (I think) so I couldn't do much but think, wow, he is just a really really handsome elf. I was on my way out, all sweaty and icky (I go to the gym after work, pick up my son and then go home to shower). Great. I probably looked like Godzilla on a bad hair day.

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Saturday, January 14, 2006

Romance, she wrote

Yes, this is a writer's diary. And I have been working on The Rake and finally, finally that pesky chapter is working. Just wanted to report that news.

In other news, I was able to solve my issue with Instiki. Better instructions would have prevented the problem. So, now I feel like I can get going with the test drive. My feeling is generally postive at this point.

Back to The Rake (am beginning to hate the title....

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Geek Toys for the Web

I've always wanted to have polls on my website but I've never had time to roll my own. But I've found a site (dpolls.com) that will do free ones and let you show them on your website. Mostly it's cool and it's free. It was easy to set up and easy to include on the relevant page. There are some limitations. You can only have seven items in your poll, so I ended up creating two. Fortunately, the subject matter lent itself to the division. Also, and this seems dumb to me, you can have seven items, but the poll can't display all seven in the poll area, you have to scroll to see all the choices. Very bad interface design. Choices below the fold (as it were) are going to be at a disadvantage.

Check it out: Best Human and Non Human Hunks. One poll for the humans, another for the non-humans. Go vote and let me know if you have any problems.

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Thursday, January 12, 2006

Reviews and writing

Today I got a really nice email about A Darker Crimson. She said many nice things and then expressed some outrage over my Amazon reviews... Now, for the past month or more, I have been very very good and not looked at Amazon reviews at all. Not even once. This email made me fall off the wagon. So, I'm pretty much immune, kind of sort of for a writer. One review said "Well done!" and said a bunch of nice stuff and then gave me two stars. WTF? And then there were some that sounded more like personal attacks. Wow. Guess I struck a nerve! What's the opposite of fans? anti-fans? Nega-fans? Despisers, I guess. Or maybe, raving lunatics? The reason I'm not totally crushed is that in the last couple or three weeks, I've had several nice emails about the book. Still, I should not have looked.

Worked on the Rake today. I struggled with the chapter notion I thought was coolest, plus I kept falling asleep because I haven't yet actually gone to bed early, let alone on time, and then, right when my son's soccer practice was ending, I found the way in, as it were. So hopefully I'll have time to work on it tonight. Except I should just go straight to bed.

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006

oh, you know, just stuff...

So, I am sending my agent a replacement proposal, one of hers is misplaced. This means I had to buy new toner. Beautiful, lovely pages printed. So, the old toner says it's 77% full and it prints like crap. So, maybe I still love my printer, but hate the toner? It's expensive so that makes sense. Anyway, boomm at work. I made up that acronym. Can you guess what it stands for? Never mind, you'd be BORED trying to guess. (hint, hint).

The good news is that soon proposals will be in editor land. Come to think of it, that's the bad news, too. Fellow-neurotic writers are one with me on this one. What else? I notebooked The Rake at the gym and when I was done and stretching out, feeling like I'd gotten nothing accomplished at all (and by the way, no elf. The elf confessed to me that he goes to the 24 hour place across town. Should I switch gyms?) and my mind was off wandering, just like that, two really good ideas. I wrote most of the first one at soccer practice. I'll finish the rough tomorrow, and get started on the other idea asap.

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Tuesday, January 10, 2006

Back at it

I'm feeling a bit scattered. I'm tired. Still catching up on sleep. I dunno, I'm feeling kind of blah right now. I wasted most of my evening doing anything but writing. How on earth did I go from having just one book to think about and write to four? Plus these short things, which, honestly, are really good and unusual but there's no place to sell them. I need direction and structure and I don't know what to commit to next. This mood will pass but right now it's a bitch.

A couple of rants, very short because I'm tired: I miss Liz Maverick's blog. Why isn't she blogging? Actually, that's my only rant.

Got another really nice email about A Darker Crimson today.

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Monday, January 09, 2006

OK, the silliness is over

I had fun taking the Regency Heroine quiz, but now I'm all business. I finished A George RR Martin's A Feast For Crows day before yesterday. It was a rough ending becuase I didn't realized the back had a bunch of glossaries and an excerpt so when I finished what was, in reality, the last page (which was on the left side) I just moved to the next page on the right, and tried to make sense of the seemingly insane chapter title that began "Meanwhile..." Oh, no! It's like taking the last bite of chocolate while believing there is more left. Alas.

Yesterday I read Khaled Hosseini's Kite Runner. Was it any good? I started it yesterday and was up until 1:15am to finish. I cried. More than once. For different reasons. And, it passed the acid test: I gave it to my sister to read. If you haven't read this book yet, go read it. Just do.

I worked on the short today and basically started over and now I'm not sure I don't need to start over again. I'm kind of tired (see prev. para) and may not be thinking as clearly as I ought to. But, it's fun, plus a good warm up to get the writing muscles going before diving into.... what? I'm not fully committed. I need to know what my agent thinks of the stack-O-paper I sent her. I got a really nice email today about The Rake chapter One I have posted. From her email to some editor's checkbook...

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C'est moi!

Oh dear, you are Bookish, aren't you? You are a highly intelligent and witty bluestocking, whose beauty is hidden behind spectacles. Your dress sense is eccentric and a little unfashionable, and you consider yourself plain. You have very little use for men, who find your knowledge of Shakespeare, interest in politics and forthright speech formidable. You are undoubtedly well-off. The only reason for your presence in a novel of this kind (which, I might add, you would not dream of reading, although you have occasionally enjoyed the works of Miss Austen), is your mother, who is absolutely determined that you will make a good marriage. Rather than defying her directly, you are quietly subversive, dancing with anyone who asks you, but making no attempt to hide your intellectual interests.


The only person who can get past your facade is the man who is witty enough to spar with you, and be amused at your blatant attempts to scare your suitors away. While you will, no doubt, subject him to a gruelling cross-examination to find out whether his respect for your intelligence is real or mere flattery, you may be sure that he is your match, and that you, he AND your mother will all live happily ever after.

The Regency Romance Quiz: What kind of Romance Heroine are you?

brought to you by Quizilla

Hmm. I think that dress makes me look fat.

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Sunday, January 08, 2006

working despite cookie disaster

I got this cool idea for a short, which I have started tonight. I'm working on stopping the moment I feel like I'm waiting for things to get interesting and just not going where it was going. So far so good. I only have a page, so it's too early to say much. But I like the idea and lately, these notions have practically written themselves over 3 to 5 days, so we'll see.

I forgot that tomorrow the contractor is coming to demo the utility room so we spent the morning emptying it out and finding places for all the junk, which, I am happy to report, included the trash. Then I started reading Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini and it's really, really good. I already started crying once and I'm only halfway through. And, no, not because it's sad. This is a bona fine wow book. Complex and rich and wonderfully written.

Then I had do some errands and it turned out someone substituted my sweet 10 year boy with a moody nerve-snapping fiend. It was not a fun trip so I didn't do all the errands I should have. A bit later, with me still annoyed, he reminded me I'd promised we'd make cookies. Well, that was true, so we made two batches that were supposed to come out green and blue so that we could do pinwheel cookies, only they both came out green. Ah. Yes. Egg yolks are yellow. Fresh egg yolks are incredibly yellow and blue + yellow = green. Sigh. The recipe for pinwheel cookies said to melt chocolate etc but we were not prepared for chocolate melting as the whole point was not plain and chocolate but blue and green and besides, someone who shall remain nameless but whose first name might start with C had only recently finished off the last of the chocolate suitable for melting. The inspiration of the moment was to empty the last of the fat-free cocoa into the should-have-been-blue batch and that seemed to be OK since the end result was two batches of different colors.

The batter needed to chill but I guess we didn't wait long enough, because, well, suffice it to say, the rolled up dough did not, at the moment of crisis, maintain the required stiffness and sort of lay there on the cutting board looking obscenely limp. Upon slicing, there were few recognizable pinwheels and they weren't circles, they were triangular or other disturbing shapes, so we ended up shaping and smushing them. But the problem went far deeper than shape. Consider the color combo. Green and brown. They're puke cookies. They came out of the oven round enough, but they don't really look very appealing. And the patterns are these sort of Rorschach test blobs and swirls and honestly, it's all rather disturbing and unsettling.

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Saturday, January 07, 2006

now i'll have nightmares

Oh, golly. Just watched Dawn of the Dead. They just don't make scary movies like they used to. I'm sure I won't sleep tonight. When I wasn't being scared witless or saying oh, yuck! I was wondering just what it is about the story that makes it so compelling. Some are obvious - the underdog theme, people faced with insurmountable odds displaying a certain level of ingeniuity...

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A few degrees short of a circle

If miles were degrees, today I have driven just a few degrees short of a circle. Oh, my. I hate driving. hateit-hateit-hateit-hateit-hateit-hateit-hateit-hateit-hateit. The kids played great soccer on a field of mud. So, I have not done any writing today. Thought about it a lot during the drive, though.

Sidenote: There's a strange and sad phenomenon when you're a single parent and it has to do with how couples treat you. As in, you're there, but they often appear to wish you weren't. Oh, well.

I'm going to watch Dawn of the Dead tonight, then read. Tomorrow, I write.

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Friday, January 06, 2006

Have soccer ball will travel

Tomorrow my son has two soccer games in a city that is 2 hours and 15 mintues from here. Ugh. We have to get up very early -- for a weekend. So, I guess I won't be getting much writing done tomorrow.

I'm ready to start pounding away on my writing. I guess I didn't realize just how stressed I've been for the last year what with having A Darker Crimson to write and all that baggage, and school and that darn reading class and oral exam and then agent stuff and then new new proposals and finding out what it's like to have an agent who is considered a big deal. Stressfull. It's been nice to just read a lot. And a lot of the stuff I like to read.

Sooooo, now it's January, and I need to have a book done by June. 30th. And then another by December. Thank goodness there's no shortage of projects to chose from.

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Bad Author Websites

Over the last few months, for whatever reason, I've seen a lot of authors put up new websites or redesigned ones. With one or two exceptions they've all been horrible. For gosh sake, you authors out there! Your writing website is your professional face to readers and the industry. Do you bank at "Bank of Someone I Know"? Is your savings account under your mattress? Unless you have been a web developer by profession, do NOT do your own website unless you do your homework first and read (and understand) reputable books on web design and usability. Please. Do that much. Later tonight I will post an article about what you need to know before you pay someone good money to give you a website that does not meet minimum professional standards. I'm tired of seeing authors get ripped off -- out of ignorance, and by well meaning people who simply don't know any better.

In writing news - holy cow! My agent is now part of what's being referred to as a Super Agency. She emailed the news today because word leaked out. I recognize her new fellow agent names and I'm impressed, but I was already impressed with her. I know this is good. Honest, I swear. OK, no more, off to draft my article.

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Thursday, January 05, 2006

No geek stuff here

I decided to make a new post of pure writing stuff so that people who come to my blog don't wonder if they got the wrong blog or maybe Carolyn is babbling worse than ever. Any way! Today I got to the gym only to realize, to my great horror, that I had failed to bring along A Feast for Crows. So, I notebooked instead. I decided to flesh out my next historical and actually, I think I made some darn good progress in the notion. I don't have any names yet, but I know the opening scene and the opening situation and that's good. And I think I may know what happens at the end of that scene, which is not something I expected, but then, these things never are.

In neurotic writer news, my agent said she would take a look at my stack-O-paper before it goes off to editor land and I haven't heard anything back. Insert disaster scenarios here. Now I'm afraid to read anything I sent her because what if I discover it's horrible?

The printer news is mixed at best. The printer repair guy came (driving a Mercedes! Obviously, I am in the wrong profession.) He replaced the fuser but it didn't fix the problem and since fusers are $4-500 dollars it would be cheaper to buy a new printer than pay for the repair visit AND replace the fuser. So I told him to put the old one back. He checked and cleaned a bunch of other parts and no go. He says this means it's the toner cartridge. Every single toner I've ever bought for this machine? I can't even print 1000 pages... That's really disappointing. On the other hand, I watched him pull out the fuser and I bet now I could replace it myself, if I could find a fuser. Except, as was demonstrated, that was not the problem. So, now I have to buy new toner to see if it goes away.

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Another Grand Experiment

OK, home from soccer (I read A Feast for Crows). The local wiki is my next big writing experiment. I decided that since I already have a wiki on my website, I would create my examples there. If you're curious, Take a look.

See, the thing is, a wiki lets you edit and create content very quickly, but because it's web based, you can hypertext. I am aware that word processors allow hypertext -- sort of. But, frankly, it's a freaking mess. Move or rename a file and you're hosed. Just awful. So I gave up on that long long ago. But've I've always wanted that drill down ability you can have with the web. I thought about creating a website to do the same thing, but a web site was just way too much work. It's really not quite the same. But a wiki! So close, maybe this is it.

The Pros

1. Hypertext. I can have a list of all my characters with specific and expanded information about a single character just a click away. And I can return easily to where I started and navigate around quite fluidly, this is just not possible with word processing files.
2. I don't need an internet connection for this.
3. No hitting the limit on the number of files that can be open.
4. More dimensions for world building. I can add pictures, graphics or whatever.
5. It's geekish cool.

The Cons

1. Well, it might turn out to be more trouble than it's worth.
2. It's not in the same physical directory structure as my other writing files, so it will have to be backed up separated. Right now, I just zip up whole directories.

Some details

I'm using Instiki which runs on Ruby on Rails. That means you install Rails first, then instiki. It's not quite as simple as the Instiki page implies, but it's pretty close. I already had Ruby installed, so that was easy. I'd already worked out the kinks in the installation instructions. Sidebar! Geeks cannot write documentation to save their lives. All the really important stuff gets left out because they assume a certain degree of knowledge. But I admit Instiki was about the easiest new technology I've ever taken for a test drive.

And I will be test driving it. I will report back.

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I'm a Geek -- and Proud of it!

I love wiki technology and have been lusting after having one to run locally without the hassle, danger and general irritation of using IIS server. There is now a wiki that essentially runs locally and today I have it working on my laptop and my desktop. I have to jet off to get the son to soccer practice so I'll post some pics later and try to describe it. But I foresee this as VASTLY improving my development process for story and world building not to mention keeping track. I can save the word processor for exactly that -- word processeing.

So, it's another grand experiment, the 2nd this year! (The first was Amazon Connect, which reminds me I need to check and see if they've taken it live and if so, see what it does for me before I go generally blabbing to other writers...)

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Wednesday, January 04, 2006

ramping up

For good or ill, my agent has the packet of material. I am at home right now waiting for the printer repair guy to arrive and fix my printer. I'm reading A Feast for Crows. Writing-wise, I have to decide what to start up with again and carry through to finish. Probably The Rake. I'm most nervous about the holes in the story due to the last round of necessary cuts of dreck. But there's also the important fixes for Possession, which need a massive infusion of character from my heroine. So, which? Anyway. I hate waiting and right now I don't know if I can stand to do nothing. Something -- anything -- is better. Right?

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Monday, January 02, 2006

Photo Op!

Still no writing done, but that's been the point of the last few days. I got to thinking and realized that what with school and writing on deadline and surprise -send me everythings, from the agent, I have not had an actual break in over a year. So, on to posting photos. You may thank me for not showing you the tree OR the fence that fell down.


OK, so this is the border collie and why in an emergency like todays we don't herd sheep. She does. This is her intense mode. She's intense about 2 things in life: balls and herding. She looks like this because I have my foot on her ball. This seeming cruelty is necessary so that I can get the ball without her deciding she'd rather take it back without my throwing it, which she wants just as desperately as she wants me to throw the ball for her. I didn't say it made sense. Maybe it does to a herding dog. This picture was taken before I threw the ball and she ran through mud to get it. Shortly after that she was a mud-colored dog.


And, here's a picture of where I live. Just one of the views that makes this OK sometimes. There are no sheep in the field since we had to move them out because the lower neighbor is unclear on the need for real fences in the country.



And Last, just because this picture came out pretty.

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Rain rain go away...

This morning as I drove out for my espresso fix the radio said No. Cal was getting a break in the rain. It was pouring as I listened and the main road was flooding... Came home only to realize well over 25 feet of the neighbors rickety wooden wall/fence had come down.We have very young lambs and their idea of fun is to scoot through small holes. We have the sheep separated, ram (his name is Jet, after Jet Li) plus mothers-to-be and mothers and their lambs and the sheep too old or too young to have babies. So, there we were in the pouring, driving rain, moving the sheep out of that field and into another and then making repairs on our side so we could move the mother ewes back into the lower field once that portion of the fence was repaired (using the word "repaired" advisedly). Ick. Handling wire in the cold rain is no fun.

Then we discovered the tarp over the pen for the new ewes and lambs was about to bust from the water collecting on top of it. More makeshift repairs involving bailing out the tarp and sticking struts underneath. Then we noticed a very large branch above the pen was actually broken and hanging in the crook of another branch. Out with the chainsaw... On our way back to the house to dry off, we noticed a tree that looked funny and discussed having the tree-guy come out later and take it down. That, however, is no longer necessary as the tree has fallen into the other neighor's field and is currently only marginally held up by his sturdier fence.

In other news, my son and I made green cookies. The all-weather soccer field is under water and his practice has been canceled. I started A Feast for Crows last night and now I think I will get back to it. I'm starting to feel antsy from not writing.

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Sunday, January 01, 2006

Brand Spanking New!

Didn't do a lick of writing today. Didn't read much either. Played a cool card game with my son. Three Dragon Ante, which is a Dungeons and Dragons thing, and it's the most fun I've had in a while. (Draw what conclusions you will from that remark and you're probably right). We also worked on a new puzzle. I had a wonderful email today from someone who said really great things about A Darker Crimson. There have been a few recently, which does my soul good. Emails like that mean a lot. In other news, I watched TV for the first time in, gosh, years. Mythbusters. Interesting show - all 10 minutes of it wedged in between the commercials. I worked on the puzzle during the commercials and just walked over when it seemed like it was one. I had no idea there were so many commercials on TV. Horrible, really. What a waste. Why does anyone bother?

It's raining a lot here. Flood warnings all over and the back roads, which are mostly what is available to us where we live, are sort of iffy. We live on a slope so flooding isn't an issue here. But when I went to get coffee yesterday, the place was full of Ranchers and Farmers because Highway 101 was closed. They looked kind of lost. A couple of times the wind blew so hard today, I was sure some of the trees would come down. Year before last they did and we had to chainsaw our way out. We're OK where we are but many other parts of the County are not. If you build on a floodplain, your house will eventually have water in it.

However, the really best thing today is that I spent almost all day thinking it was Monday and that I had to go back to work tomorrow and I don't! YIPEE!!!

Last night I started the Art of Hacking, which is pretty interesting, but brain busting. That will not be a quick read. A Feast For Crows is by the bed and I'm not tired...

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