writer's block and blah-ness
omg it's so hot in here, whyyy *cries*
*ahem* alright, done whining now maybeBeen a while since I last updated, but really, I haven't been up to very much or, at least, nothing that seemed either a) worth posting or b) other ppl would be interested in :P (not that that's stopped me before, but... eh, been feeling lazy lately too, so... ^^;) Am ( Read more... )
*ahem* alright, done whining now maybeBeen a while since I last updated, but really, I haven't been up to very much or, at least, nothing that seemed either a) worth posting or b) other ppl would be interested in :P (not that that's stopped me before, but... eh, been feeling lazy lately too, so... ^^;) Am ( Read more... )
gah, i ignore Word's 'suggestions' all the time-- i dunno who decided what's 'right' or 'wrong' when they designed that, but it's on crack. Not only do I not agree with them, but they don't even recognize some words since they're not spelled in the 'u.s.' way (i guess our way is considered as the British spelling? i'm not sure, but my ACTUAL DICTIONARY tells me i'm right, so i trust it ;P). I've actually started using a program called Pages, which is the mac word processor and, thankfully, does not bug me too much like Word does. I think things like spelling and punctuation become intuitive after a while, especially for ppl who like to read/read a lot, tho i admit i probably don't use the semi-colon as often as i should/properly XD I do use a lot of commas, tho *points to icon* possibly to the point of abusing them, tho i'm not sure, lol. I don't really like short sentences either, but I find that sometimes they do work.
writing all those essays in university where I tried to add as many words in as possible to meet the word count doesn't help.
lol! yeah, same here XD and then doing the same thing with Nano made it worse, i think XD speaking of which, wow, 91K words is awesome o.o i don't think i've ever written anything that long! (that's actually closer to 'real' novel length, as opposed to Nano's 50K goal, which is more like a novella, so even if it's not finished, that's really good!)
Mm, I can totally understand the 'what-if' thing-- even tho i've had certain parts of stories in my head for years (literally), i always wonder if it might not be better to do something else instead, but since i've 'replayed' them so often in my head, it's like they've already been written. Not that I couldn't go back and change it even if it was already written, but... yeah ^^; There's nothing wrong with going back and re-writing/revising stuff, tho-- Melissa has a story she's been working on since high school, and she keeps going back and changing it cause she has new/better ideas for it (it's pretty long, too). Maybe this is why outlining is apparently a good idea (tho i really haven't outlined anything since school >.>), it forces us to make decisions about what happens. Not that that's easy, of course, and i'm not saying you have to do it that way or anything, but... yeah. I understand ^^;
Okay, 1) of course your thoughts are important! Everyone's are! and 2) that is a horrible thing for anyone, especially a teacher to say, wtf o.o She sounds terrible... and i know it's hard, but you shouldn't take her comments to heart, especially if she wasn't even a good teacher. Not to mention that writing articles/reports are very different from writing stories (personally, i was never fond of those kind of assignments, or even essays... they were too, i dunno, 'cold'? *shrug* not much room for creativity)
I read it! Sometimes I go through periods where i'm not on lj much or miss a few entries if i'm away or something, but i always try to read all my friends' entries (and if i don't comment on lj, it's usually the times when you also post to fb and i just comment there if i see it there first). I don't always get comments on every entry either, but i don't think it's a really big deal-- sometimes ppl just don't have anything to say about what i wrote, i guess (ex: fandoms no one knows much about, lol) but that's okay. I know we all used to be a bit more active around here, and I do miss that, but that doesn't mean that no one's reading :)
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I tried writing outlines and stuff when I was trying to do a fantasy story. I got all kinds of world planning done and what was going to happen and everything... the problem was I never got around to actually writing the story since I never finished all the planning. I applaud Melissa for continuing a story for so long. The one I started the first time I was at Abbott totally sucked and needed to be redone so that's why I was doing all the world planning, etc. but I never got around to writing it. I think I like my characters being more living, changing entities that dictate their story to me, even though it changes. I mean some things just needed to be changed, like originally two characters were supposed to end up together but when one of them became my favorite the story changed and other love interests took shape and now I can't imagine those two "finishing" with each other. ^^; though in my current version of things they do end up with a kid together and no matter what I change I don't want to get rid of the cute, little kid. One of those characters did undergo a drastic personality change though; they've become a lot more self-centered than they were when they were just a side character to someone else's story.
>.>; Yeah, that teacher was evil. She was one of my computer teachers in ILT... the one for the class where everyone asked me for help because I was on the last chapter of the HTML book when the teacher was still on chapter one with the rest of the class. Seriously, how do you teach something you know nothing about? I corrected her on some stuff but she didn't believe me. I actually got Tracy to come into my class once since she was in PDHT and tell the teacher she was wrong. She believed Tracy after not believing me. -_- I think I just hated the teacher and the assignment and didn't work hard enough on it. I did it the night before it was due and should have proof-read it more carefully. I can't even remember what it was about. I've always much preferred writing fiction over non-fiction stuff. It's much more fun.
Okay, I posted an update. I'll try to post once a week or something. I just haven't been on LJ much lately. I tend to go on lunch break at work when I'm bored and don't have much else I can do. I try to read back but usually only go so far. I also tend to skip certain people's entries. Some people write a lot, multiple times daily. Someone else has all her Tweets posting to her LJ so I skip that... mostly I read my rl friends stuff and a couple of online friends. I don't always comment but I try to occasionally.
Sorry for the long comments. ^^; I don't usually talk about writing much. Tracy isn't much of a writer so I don't usually have anyone to talk to about it.
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Ah, yes, that's it. That's what I was trying to say XD I could just use the US spelling, but it just looks weird to me ^^; Like, I know both versions are right, but *shrug* I guess I'm just stubborn, sticking to the Canadian spelling, lol.
I think I like my characters being more living, changing entities that dictate their story to me, even though it changes.
Once again, very well put. I like it ^^ There's definitely nothing wrong with writing that way, tho i think it's also really good that you did all that planning-- even if character stuff changes, world-building's really important and (for me, anyway) hard XD And even if you make changes to that, too, you can still play around with what you have. Oh, and I'm all for keeping cute little kids ;) (and just cause they have one together doesn't mean they have to end up together, so it still works! if anything, that gives you even more to play with ^^)
Oh, wow. Okay, if she ppl were asking you for help over her, then you definitely knew what you were doing. This woman sounds like she was on crack, seriously o.O If she didn't even know that she was teaching wrong, then I highly doubt she knew anything about writing...
Cool, I will go and read it next ^^
Ah, don't apologize! I don't mind long comments, it's always nice to have a discussion ^^ And I really like talking about writing, so I tend to get a bit carried away, lol.
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lol, yeah in the story they have a kid but don't stay together...but then they sorta fight over the poor kid. Not gonna go into the details but eventually the better parent wins, but not after some heartache on the part of that parent and the kid. None of that is on 'paper' yet... just in my head. Maybe one day. An alternate version is on paper...sorta... it's kinda complicated to explain. ^^; It's not them but it sorta based on them. I kinda of make it complicated when I have characters writing stories...^^;
Well that teacher couldn't teach, that was for sure. Not sure how she got hired. I'm assuming no one else wanted to teach the computer class and that's why she was doing it. She was the worst teacher I had in ILT.
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