It's a Procrastination Post!
Mm-hmm. I should be doing any number of other things - the dishes, wrapping christmas presents, baking cookies - but, nope. I'd rather ramble on my LiveJournal, so *sticks tongue out like a bratty two-year-old* that's what I'm gonna do.
I think my last post here was about NaNoWriMo - which turned into NaNoWriNO. I ended up giving up. It's been over a month and I'm still kind of pissed at myself, but I just got so far behind that I was stressing so much I couldn't write. I'd make progress of a thousand words or so and realize "oh, I'm still 10k behind." So, in an effort to destress my life (which seems to be all I DO lately) I just threw in the towel. I got about 12k into one story, then switched gears and started a different one, got 3500 words in and THAT wasn't working either, so - bleh.
I haven't really done any significant writing since, either, and that needs to stop. I need to get back into it. I've put too much work into writing in the past year to stall now. But, I've been thinking about it the past couple days, and I think part of my attitude problem with my writing is that I don't feel like I've made any significant improvements in my skills - obviously just practice will garner some improvement, but I haven't put any real effort into bettering myself as a writer. Part of that is because I'm not sure what areas I really need to work on - it's a hard thing to see the faults in your own work, even when you're willing and driven to do the work to improve.
So I think my goal in the coming year is going to be to work through some of the writing books I have. A few months ago I found a used copy of one book in a series called "Write Great Fiction" - sounds lame, I know, but the techniques and exercises (at least in the first chapter I read) made a lot of sense to me. I ended up ordering two more from the series with a gift card I had, so now I have "Description & Setting", "Characters, Emotion & Viewpoint", and "Plot & Structure". So I think I'm going to work through those books and see what I can learn, what I can improve on. I may post the exercises I write here - not sure. Maybe I can turn some of them into SPN fic to keep them within my current interest/obsession. Who knows. But 2017 is going to be the year of study for me. And I'm going to try my damnedest to stick to my personal goal of writing at least 500 words every day.
Speaking of obsessions....
Eyewitness?
HOLY CRAP!
Not only did that show feed my fetish for pretty boys kissing, but the story! The characters!
With only 10 episodes, I kind of feel like it's the television equivalent of a short story - and a damn well-done one at that. There were a few loose ends/inconsistencies (like - what happened to Kamilah? And - how did Ryan know to look for the frying pan Lukas hit him with? It was in the woods, at night - how the hell did he find it with what I'm sure was a pretty decent concussion?) but overall, it was just a beautifully woven story with such vivid, dynamic characters and I just loved every minute of it!
At this point I've watched it probably 7 or 8 times - and I'm sure I'll purchase it at some point so I can always have it. (Hopefully it will be released on DVD? I really would love to add it to my collection.) At any rate - I love it. If you haven't seen it, I highly recommend it. (And hey, it's only 10 episodes, so it's not too much of a time suck, right? Right.)
Christmas is just two days away and I'm actually dreading it. Which kind of sucks, because I used to love Christmas. I didn't even put up my tree this year! I know there's still time, but - really, what's the point? It's just me, I rarely have guests (and especially not this time of year) so I'd just be putting it up for a week or two of yelling at my cat to leave the ornaments alone.
I'm dreading Christmas day - family time. It's a strange thing that the older I get, the more I come to know myself, and the more I dislike my family and the way they treat people. There's this general air of unacceptance of anything outside of the "norm" and I'm just generally more and more intolerant of it. And it's not even that I lead any sort of alternative lifestyle - thank goodness because I can't imagine how that would go over - but I constantly feel judged just because I don't do things the way they think they should be done. Just because I have no desire to follow the typical life path they are comfortable with. So, time with family will be spent treading water, giving civil but terse responses to any questions posed to me, otherwise staying quiet and probably drinking a lot of whiskey. At this point even the fact that I'm expected to be there pisses me off - what if I didn't want to celebrate christmas? I'm not christian, so the standard religious conotations of the holiday bear no import to me. I used to consider myself pagan, and the celebration of the changing of the seasons and the rebirth of the sun made sense to me - but now? I don't even find any joy in that, so what's the point in celebrating this holiday? It's a completely secular event for me which only comes with obligations that I begrudgingly fulfill. (Yeah, I kind of sound a bit like a petulant, rebellious teenager here, huh? Guess I'll just do what I do - suck it up and deal until it's over.)
Well, THAT got whiny and depressing. On to more positive things!
I've been listening to Kaleo pretty much non-stop lately. (Thank you, Jared and Jensen, for putting them on my radar!) I'm not sure what it is about the album, but it's pretty damn happy-making for me. I don't think I've even really listened to the lyrics of the songs (something I unfortunately rarely do) but the music just gets me. It's mellow without being either depressing or sappy - it's just chill and I love that. Again, I highly recommend it - if you haven't had a listen yet, give it a search on YouTube (the albumn is called A/B - there are a few artists called Kaleo - this one only has this one album.).
Alright, I suppose that's all I have to ramble on about for now. If you've made it this far - you deserve a cookie! (Everyone deserves a cookie!) I'm off to do - something. Productive. Probably. Maybe.
Pre-post edit: I just spent half an hour scrolling through twitter when I got distracted while reading through this for typos. The procrastination force is strong with me!
I think my last post here was about NaNoWriMo - which turned into NaNoWriNO. I ended up giving up. It's been over a month and I'm still kind of pissed at myself, but I just got so far behind that I was stressing so much I couldn't write. I'd make progress of a thousand words or so and realize "oh, I'm still 10k behind." So, in an effort to destress my life (which seems to be all I DO lately) I just threw in the towel. I got about 12k into one story, then switched gears and started a different one, got 3500 words in and THAT wasn't working either, so - bleh.
I haven't really done any significant writing since, either, and that needs to stop. I need to get back into it. I've put too much work into writing in the past year to stall now. But, I've been thinking about it the past couple days, and I think part of my attitude problem with my writing is that I don't feel like I've made any significant improvements in my skills - obviously just practice will garner some improvement, but I haven't put any real effort into bettering myself as a writer. Part of that is because I'm not sure what areas I really need to work on - it's a hard thing to see the faults in your own work, even when you're willing and driven to do the work to improve.
So I think my goal in the coming year is going to be to work through some of the writing books I have. A few months ago I found a used copy of one book in a series called "Write Great Fiction" - sounds lame, I know, but the techniques and exercises (at least in the first chapter I read) made a lot of sense to me. I ended up ordering two more from the series with a gift card I had, so now I have "Description & Setting", "Characters, Emotion & Viewpoint", and "Plot & Structure". So I think I'm going to work through those books and see what I can learn, what I can improve on. I may post the exercises I write here - not sure. Maybe I can turn some of them into SPN fic to keep them within my current interest/obsession. Who knows. But 2017 is going to be the year of study for me. And I'm going to try my damnedest to stick to my personal goal of writing at least 500 words every day.
Speaking of obsessions....
Eyewitness?
HOLY CRAP!
Not only did that show feed my fetish for pretty boys kissing, but the story! The characters!
With only 10 episodes, I kind of feel like it's the television equivalent of a short story - and a damn well-done one at that. There were a few loose ends/inconsistencies (like - what happened to Kamilah? And - how did Ryan know to look for the frying pan Lukas hit him with? It was in the woods, at night - how the hell did he find it with what I'm sure was a pretty decent concussion?) but overall, it was just a beautifully woven story with such vivid, dynamic characters and I just loved every minute of it!
At this point I've watched it probably 7 or 8 times - and I'm sure I'll purchase it at some point so I can always have it. (Hopefully it will be released on DVD? I really would love to add it to my collection.) At any rate - I love it. If you haven't seen it, I highly recommend it. (And hey, it's only 10 episodes, so it's not too much of a time suck, right? Right.)
Christmas is just two days away and I'm actually dreading it. Which kind of sucks, because I used to love Christmas. I didn't even put up my tree this year! I know there's still time, but - really, what's the point? It's just me, I rarely have guests (and especially not this time of year) so I'd just be putting it up for a week or two of yelling at my cat to leave the ornaments alone.
I'm dreading Christmas day - family time. It's a strange thing that the older I get, the more I come to know myself, and the more I dislike my family and the way they treat people. There's this general air of unacceptance of anything outside of the "norm" and I'm just generally more and more intolerant of it. And it's not even that I lead any sort of alternative lifestyle - thank goodness because I can't imagine how that would go over - but I constantly feel judged just because I don't do things the way they think they should be done. Just because I have no desire to follow the typical life path they are comfortable with. So, time with family will be spent treading water, giving civil but terse responses to any questions posed to me, otherwise staying quiet and probably drinking a lot of whiskey. At this point even the fact that I'm expected to be there pisses me off - what if I didn't want to celebrate christmas? I'm not christian, so the standard religious conotations of the holiday bear no import to me. I used to consider myself pagan, and the celebration of the changing of the seasons and the rebirth of the sun made sense to me - but now? I don't even find any joy in that, so what's the point in celebrating this holiday? It's a completely secular event for me which only comes with obligations that I begrudgingly fulfill. (Yeah, I kind of sound a bit like a petulant, rebellious teenager here, huh? Guess I'll just do what I do - suck it up and deal until it's over.)
Well, THAT got whiny and depressing. On to more positive things!
I've been listening to Kaleo pretty much non-stop lately. (Thank you, Jared and Jensen, for putting them on my radar!) I'm not sure what it is about the album, but it's pretty damn happy-making for me. I don't think I've even really listened to the lyrics of the songs (something I unfortunately rarely do) but the music just gets me. It's mellow without being either depressing or sappy - it's just chill and I love that. Again, I highly recommend it - if you haven't had a listen yet, give it a search on YouTube (the albumn is called A/B - there are a few artists called Kaleo - this one only has this one album.).
Alright, I suppose that's all I have to ramble on about for now. If you've made it this far - you deserve a cookie! (Everyone deserves a cookie!) I'm off to do - something. Productive. Probably. Maybe.
Pre-post edit: I just spent half an hour scrolling through twitter when I got distracted while reading through this for typos. The procrastination force is strong with me!