When you get to my door, tell them Boris sent you
(Posting by email for the first time. Fingers crossed this goes through ok! After posting note: well, it worked, but man did it make the formatting wonky...)
Well... it's been quite a busy month, thus the not posting. It started with my birthday and three days later took a nosedive when I ended up with salmonella poisoning. Took almost a full week to recover. That aside, I have been busy prepping my Discord server for National Novel Writing Month, which is next month, and getting ready for the annual Halloween party I always help my folks throw.
Regarding NaNo, I am still not sure about my story. I've decided the general idea, but have very few details. As someone who usually plans pretty thoroughly, at least settings, it's stressing me out not having anything beyond the three main characters and a starting point. I know that I want it to be a true SciFi for adults, and the title will be Ghost Hunting. The general Idea I am starting with is that at some point in the kind of near future, humanity is visited by aliens. Well, more like they show up and we offer them a room to crash indefinitely. Their arrival brings with it a nearly infinite amount of knowledge of the universe, and in exchange they want to know everything possible about Earth. A global organization called The Cooperative is formed, its ranks filled with the world's leading scientists, researchers, and experts, and is nearly as many aliens as it is humans. This exchange of knowledge ushers in a Golden Age for humanity, but it is short lived. Within a decade, the humans of The Cooperative begin dropping like flies. Humanity is quick to pin the blame on the aliens, and soon they declare all-out war. The aliens put them down with relative ease, and soon enough humanity has been decimated. There are scattered townships and nomadic groups, but humanity is a mere fraction of a percent of what it had been. The story picks up about a century after humanity's downfall, in one of the larger townships. Townsfolk have been going missing, and a human, alien/human hybrid, and a potentially sentient
android are tasked with finding out what is happening. It is their story of digging into the truth of the past, and rectifying the present, in order to protect the future.
Not the most exciting synopsis so far, but I think it will pan out decently. I wrote the prologue on the train back home from the Williamsburg trip. Wish I had some time to sit down and really work it out, though. I am a writer who prefers to go into NaNo with at least an outline, and right now I have... what I wrote above and the prologue. I'm low-key stressing. I bounced some ideas off of Draco one night, and he helped me get some good ideas.
On the subject of Draco. I feel kind of bad. Draco used to write a decent amount back in our early days of college. He always wrote horror, and I love reading his stories. They were a really great mix of creepy and terrifying. He never really did well with longer stories, but he did write these things he called "Horror Bytes", which were short, few-sentence unnerving stories. Every year I playfully try to get him to join me for NaNo, but I know he likely never will. He hasn't written in a couple years now, and doesn't seem to ever plan to again. That being said, he did decide at the beginning of this month that he wanted to write a scary mini-D&D adventure. A group of us created characters, and we had to provide their greatest fear. He wanted it to be fairly personal, too, so that it would help us get into the scary mod more. Unfortunately, we were going to have it on 10/28, but for a few reasons he had to postpone it. He said one of the biggest reasons is that he wants to impress me... :/ I mean, I get that I am his best/longest friend, and am a writer (published and all), but like... I used to enjoy his horror writing, and know I will enjoy a themed D&D session that is more roleplay focused than our usual campaign that's 90% combat. When he told me this he looked visibly tense and like it was stressing him out just to say it. I feel bad...
In other D&D news, I can't remember what the last update I gave was... Sketch officially decided to take a break from D&D... then Jerboa had to open his big mouth two weeks later and tell him off, so Sketch cut ties with all of us. I feel bad for having a burned bridge, even though it was technically a third party who burned it, but there has been a definite shift in the mood at the table since he left. The guys brought in another friend of theirs (whom I want to dub Paul Bunyan, but shall go with Lumberjack). They used to play D&D with him, but a few years back he moved too far away to keep playing. He moved back recently and they invited him to fill Sketch's old seat. The guys all have nothing but good things to say about him, but I have to say that at the table I don't see any of it. We've traded a guy who sat there doodling and doing nothing in-game for someone who actually gets up and walks away from the table for an hour or more at a time, and rushes people through their turns. He was also bossing people around, and interrupting other people to do his own thing, when his character wasn't even in the room because, oh I don't know, he wasn't at the table when we made our decisions, so his character stayed behind! I don't know. I have gotten nothing but dark-orange-almost-red flags from him since he joined us. I am trying to give him the benefit of the doubt because the others talked so highly of him, but everyone is already showing signs of irritation at his actions. I'm concerned about moving forward. Honestly, if he keeps this up, and I am very much not going to look forward to D&D anymore.
On a completely different note, my parents are throwing a Halloween party this evening/night. I will be helping host it, as usual, and have been preparing some party games. We spent the day so far getting as much ready as we could, but with it raining outside we haven't been able to get too much put up outside yet. Fingers crossed the rain stops soon. I haven't had a chance to really plan a costume yet, so when I woke up this morning I had the idea to go as a sugar glider! I hit up Walmart for some face makeup, a shirt hoodie thing that looks kind of glider-ish, and a heavy duty sharpie, then I went to Party City and bought a gray tail. I sat down this afternoon and sharpied a stripe down the hood and back of the new shirt, and later I can put on glider face make-up. It's not the most exciting, believable or fancy costume, but I think it should look fun when it's finished. Last night, I made some snacks, too! I made little witch hats out of fudge stripe cookies, kisses, and green decorative icing, and I made broomsticks out of mini reeses cups and pretzel sticks.
Anyway, I'll wrap this up. Hopefully once life settles down a bit I can go back to posting more and regularly again. Hope you all are doing awesomely!
Well... it's been quite a busy month, thus the not posting. It started with my birthday and three days later took a nosedive when I ended up with salmonella poisoning. Took almost a full week to recover. That aside, I have been busy prepping my Discord server for National Novel Writing Month, which is next month, and getting ready for the annual Halloween party I always help my folks throw.
Regarding NaNo, I am still not sure about my story. I've decided the general idea, but have very few details. As someone who usually plans pretty thoroughly, at least settings, it's stressing me out not having anything beyond the three main characters and a starting point. I know that I want it to be a true SciFi for adults, and the title will be Ghost Hunting. The general Idea I am starting with is that at some point in the kind of near future, humanity is visited by aliens. Well, more like they show up and we offer them a room to crash indefinitely. Their arrival brings with it a nearly infinite amount of knowledge of the universe, and in exchange they want to know everything possible about Earth. A global organization called The Cooperative is formed, its ranks filled with the world's leading scientists, researchers, and experts, and is nearly as many aliens as it is humans. This exchange of knowledge ushers in a Golden Age for humanity, but it is short lived. Within a decade, the humans of The Cooperative begin dropping like flies. Humanity is quick to pin the blame on the aliens, and soon they declare all-out war. The aliens put them down with relative ease, and soon enough humanity has been decimated. There are scattered townships and nomadic groups, but humanity is a mere fraction of a percent of what it had been. The story picks up about a century after humanity's downfall, in one of the larger townships. Townsfolk have been going missing, and a human, alien/human hybrid, and a potentially sentient
android are tasked with finding out what is happening. It is their story of digging into the truth of the past, and rectifying the present, in order to protect the future.
Not the most exciting synopsis so far, but I think it will pan out decently. I wrote the prologue on the train back home from the Williamsburg trip. Wish I had some time to sit down and really work it out, though. I am a writer who prefers to go into NaNo with at least an outline, and right now I have... what I wrote above and the prologue. I'm low-key stressing. I bounced some ideas off of Draco one night, and he helped me get some good ideas.
On the subject of Draco. I feel kind of bad. Draco used to write a decent amount back in our early days of college. He always wrote horror, and I love reading his stories. They were a really great mix of creepy and terrifying. He never really did well with longer stories, but he did write these things he called "Horror Bytes", which were short, few-sentence unnerving stories. Every year I playfully try to get him to join me for NaNo, but I know he likely never will. He hasn't written in a couple years now, and doesn't seem to ever plan to again. That being said, he did decide at the beginning of this month that he wanted to write a scary mini-D&D adventure. A group of us created characters, and we had to provide their greatest fear. He wanted it to be fairly personal, too, so that it would help us get into the scary mod more. Unfortunately, we were going to have it on 10/28, but for a few reasons he had to postpone it. He said one of the biggest reasons is that he wants to impress me... :/ I mean, I get that I am his best/longest friend, and am a writer (published and all), but like... I used to enjoy his horror writing, and know I will enjoy a themed D&D session that is more roleplay focused than our usual campaign that's 90% combat. When he told me this he looked visibly tense and like it was stressing him out just to say it. I feel bad...
In other D&D news, I can't remember what the last update I gave was... Sketch officially decided to take a break from D&D... then Jerboa had to open his big mouth two weeks later and tell him off, so Sketch cut ties with all of us. I feel bad for having a burned bridge, even though it was technically a third party who burned it, but there has been a definite shift in the mood at the table since he left. The guys brought in another friend of theirs (whom I want to dub Paul Bunyan, but shall go with Lumberjack). They used to play D&D with him, but a few years back he moved too far away to keep playing. He moved back recently and they invited him to fill Sketch's old seat. The guys all have nothing but good things to say about him, but I have to say that at the table I don't see any of it. We've traded a guy who sat there doodling and doing nothing in-game for someone who actually gets up and walks away from the table for an hour or more at a time, and rushes people through their turns. He was also bossing people around, and interrupting other people to do his own thing, when his character wasn't even in the room because, oh I don't know, he wasn't at the table when we made our decisions, so his character stayed behind! I don't know. I have gotten nothing but dark-orange-almost-red flags from him since he joined us. I am trying to give him the benefit of the doubt because the others talked so highly of him, but everyone is already showing signs of irritation at his actions. I'm concerned about moving forward. Honestly, if he keeps this up, and I am very much not going to look forward to D&D anymore.
On a completely different note, my parents are throwing a Halloween party this evening/night. I will be helping host it, as usual, and have been preparing some party games. We spent the day so far getting as much ready as we could, but with it raining outside we haven't been able to get too much put up outside yet. Fingers crossed the rain stops soon. I haven't had a chance to really plan a costume yet, so when I woke up this morning I had the idea to go as a sugar glider! I hit up Walmart for some face makeup, a shirt hoodie thing that looks kind of glider-ish, and a heavy duty sharpie, then I went to Party City and bought a gray tail. I sat down this afternoon and sharpied a stripe down the hood and back of the new shirt, and later I can put on glider face make-up. It's not the most exciting, believable or fancy costume, but I think it should look fun when it's finished. Last night, I made some snacks, too! I made little witch hats out of fudge stripe cookies, kisses, and green decorative icing, and I made broomsticks out of mini reeses cups and pretzel sticks.
Anyway, I'll wrap this up. Hopefully once life settles down a bit I can go back to posting more and regularly again. Hope you all are doing awesomely!