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1st November 2022

November writing goals

November always makes me itch to write. Nanowrimo contributes of course – I’ve always wanted to write a novel; I do not have the ideas or the time or the internal will to write an entire novel. In the past, I’ve done NaBloPoMo – National Blog Posting Month – at least for the first week or so before I forgot and don’t post for a few days and give up.

I’ve done modified NaNoWriMos in the past, where I’ve made a writing goal (write every day, 100 words or more) and used their website to keep track. I’ve really liked that – there are rewards of badges when you meet goals and seeing the graph makes my happy – and plan to do something similar this month.

I have three glee fics and my gilmore girls fic to work on this month:

– Fic 1: a coffeeshop AU, where Kurt comes back to Ohio and now owns the Lima Bean and Blaine opens a coffee kiosk across the street. The prompt also called for a snarky “social media messages” between their businesses and that’s where I’ve really struggled to develop the story.

– Fic 2: Blaine feels like he is getting older and life is passing him by so he tries to get into the Guinness Book of World Records for the largest cronut (the prompt said cookie) and Kurt owns the bakery that Blaine wants to use. I’ve written a few words of nonsense and have an opening scene, but haven’t made much more progress than that.

– Fic 3: an epistolary story where Blaine is chosen to go to space and Kurt’s back at home. I’m writing this one with a friend (her idea, I just jumped on it because I love letter novels) and it’s my turn to write back (and has been since June I think). This one is just for fun, and I love that there isn’t any pressure around it.

– Fic #4: My Gilmore Girls fic, Like Never Before, that stands perpetually in its unfinished state. I managed to write a couple of paragraphs for the WIP Big Bang, but then it wasn’t selected for an art piece and my summer was super busy, so I set it aside. I do so want to finish this as it’s been 20 years since I started working on (!!! no really !!!!). 

I also want to polish up the essay that I wrote for a devotional about my spiritual journey and see if I can get it published somewhere.

What writing goals do you have?

posted in Frivolous Fandom, On writing | 0 Comments

2nd November 2008

National Something Something Month

So I signed up for Nanowrimo (National Novel Writing Month, for those not in the know, that happens every November. The goal is to write 50,000 words in that month). And I’ve written a total of (*checks*) 355 words. Yeah, I can see that this is going to go well. I did finally strike upon an idea a few days ago, and have gotten a prologue, but not much more than that. I have a feeling that this month is going to be spent doing more research and writing outlines than actual writing, but we’ll see. I’m not giving up yet!

I also signed up for NaBloPoMo as well, so you all are probably going to get very sick of me! What can I say, all of the cool kids are doing it, and I hate getting left out.

Alas, it is 4 minutes to midnight, I have to be up early to do “wound rounds” tomorrow on the spinal care unit (exactly how it sounds, folks), so I’ll have to share all of my stories at another time. Luckily I’ll have 28 more days to do so this month!

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7th October 2008

sing while you work. Or procrastinate as the case may be.

(The song was a random iTunes choice. Apt as always).

The list of things I need to do before Thursday at 3:

1. Wash clothes. I think I have 3 more batches to go.
2. Sweep and mop bathroom
3. Dishes. Lots of dishes
4. Arrange and organize all of the papers that I dragged into the living room to organize and arrange, oh 4 days ago
5. Clean my office/den. I can see carpet now!
6. Change sheets.
7. Wash sheets.
8. Buy bed.
9. Sweep and mop kitchen.
10. Replace chair/table sliders
11. Grocery shop.
12. Clean out my fridge so that the pregnant can actually hang out in my kitchen.
13. Look up other activities for weekend.
14. More and more autopsies.

So why exactly am I wasting time writing it all down rather than doing it?

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2nd October 2008

damn yankees

You know what, there is bias in the media, an unfair slant. And it’s making me mad.

With one more loss to the Phillies, CC Sabathia and the Milwaukee Brewers will have all winter to rest.

First it was the coverage of the Mets and how the Mets “helped Brewers earn 1st playoff since 1982”. Um, no. The Brewers won without the Mets help, thank you very much. I don’t recall the Mets players throwing any pitches or hitting a ball in the name of the Brewers. And if the Mets had won, there would have been a playoff game. Then, you could argue that a Mets loss would have “helped the Brewers”.

And I seem to recall Ryan Baun’s grand slam 2 nights before, and nary a mention of it on the Yahoo Sports page.

And now this. Seriously, people, we’ve still got the fat lady and a game to go in home territory. The Brewers are notorious for the last minute saves. So don’t be writing them off yet, yanks, they may surprise you yet.

*wanders off grumbling*

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29th September 2008

This is going to be different

I arrived at work around 8:30 this morning, feeling positively guilty for sleeping in. I wandered over to the pathology department, where I’m supposed to be rotating for the next month. The secretary blinked at me. “Oh, Dr. H doesn’t usually arrive until after 10. I’ll call you when he wishes to meet with you.”

At 10, I found myself in the autopsy lab examining a brain, being asked all kinds of questions that I’m not sure I’ve studied since medical school… and certainly not in the last three months, where my focus has been on treating alcohol withdrawal, pneumonia, and acute renal failure. By 12, we were done and instructed to come back at 3–tomorrow.

*blink*

It looks like there’s about 6-8 hours a week that I’m expected to show up. The rest of it is self study. I haven’t self-studied since med school and I wasn’t very good about it then.

So, instead of studying and instead of doing the 22 clinic notes that I’m behind on and instead of writing out disability paperwork for a patient that I’m not entirely certain should be on disability, I came home and took a nap. I had a migraine from the formaldehyde fumes and it has been a very long month (I flirted very close to the over 80 hours a week limit. I’m sure I went over) and I deserved some time to myself.

Thursday I have an appointment to get my teeth cleaned, the first time in over a year. I hope to get my hair cut and get to the gym on a regular daily basis. I have a week of vacation coming up where my girlfriends are coming out for a long weekend and then my dad and grandparents are driving out to see me.

It’s shaping up to be a very good month.

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7th August 2008

cooking adventures

(Notice the date… written last week and accidentally posted now.)

Chicken spagetti made with spinach and yogurt is an interesting combination. Not bad, really, but it took a couple of bites.

This started out as an attempt to make chicken tikka masala. But I’m missing ingredients for this new recipe I found (there is an appalling lack of ginger in my house), and I couldn’t let the chicken go to waste and I’m rather infatuated with cooking with yogurt recently (I think I perfected my salmon recipe), so… the above was the result.

I’m not sure that I’ll be repeating it soon.

So, my mother noted that I haven’t been updating my LJ and called in a panic on Sunday to make sure that I was alive. To alleviate those other worries about my safe-being, yes, I’m alive. I’m just bored and have little to talk about. Okay, I do have things to say: I’ve got a post brewing about the Vienna Teng concert that I went to on Tuesday which may have even been better than her first concert two years ago (her music makes me want to write in purple prose. I love it!). I’m still not a clinic person and I’m really glad that I didn’t go into orthopedic surgery (sample of the conversation today: “Is [he/she] on pills? [He/She] sounds like someone who would be on pills” – referring to antidepressant medications. And this gem to a young, but overweight patient coming in for referral “So, is this you? I mean, when we do the operation is this what I have to deal with?” UGH. Please note that this is not an attack or rant against orthopedics or surgeons in general. My favorite, most inspiring doctor in the entire world is an orthopedic doc. Because of my bone disease, I have to see them periodically as a patient, and the number of muscles and ligaments that they have to know thwarted me in med school and hasn’t gotten much better. That said, this particular orthopod was a jerk.)

My new blog s almost, almost ready for its unveiling. I’m trying to figure out the heading, and once that’s done, I need to transfer all of LJ entries over (which I keep putting off in the hopes that somebody will figure out how to import moods and current music fields. Tags would be nice too), and then it’ll be ready. I think. I can’t tell you how much effort this has been. I started working on it back in March, messed something up, deleted it, started again in May, deleted, repeated about 3 times in June and finally got the current version partially running in July… just in time for the upgrade of wordpress to 2.6. *sigh* I’ve devoted much of my spare time over the last two weeks to figuring it out. Most of my problems have been related to the fact that I know next to little about webdesign… the little I taught myself for my little website was all HTML (and sloppy HTML at that) and that has been long since forgotten. WordPress does make it easier in that most everything is run through plugins, but if something goes wrong (and it always does), then I had to dig through the code to figure out what was up. The only thing I haven’t figured out is how to expand out the default size of the comments once they’ve been posted and how to get the UserPhoto working so that it actually shows up inside the comments, rather than haphazardly across the page as it currently is wont to do. I’ve given up on that for the moment (unless of course some computer programming brainiac out there might know the answer!) and have accepted that my blog won’t look quite the way that I want it to. At least at this point.

But, Julia, why the switch, I hear some of your asking (I’m psychic, did I tell you?). There’s a variety of reasons (I like lists):

– One, I’ve got a lot of friends and family who read this journal and don’t have a LJ themselves, and I don’t think any of them enjoy replying as an “anonymous.”

– Two, I have been rather disgruntled by the change in management styles and the addition of advertisement across all of the pages, and while I completely and totally understand that this is a for-profit business and they can do whatever they want, that doesn’t mean that I have to support it with my money.

– Three, I’ve been paying for my own web domain for over 4 years now. I probably won’t ever finish my LOTR Inklings project, but the thought of giving it up breaks my heart. So this is a little bit of a compromise and allows me some relief of the guilt of money wasted.

– Four, WordPress has some nifty, nifty functions, like a picture gallery plugin that’s even prettier than Flickr and customizable sidebar widgets.

– Five, I don’t know if you all are aware, but there’s been some backlash and criticism to physician blogging, thanks to a couple of articles in the LA Times, the NY times, and JAMA. I’m such a lurker and rarely update my other medical blog, so I’m not showing up on anybody’s radar, but I like the idea of being able to more closely control who is seeing what I write. And while LJ has this great feature of being able to friendslock an entry, that doesn’t change problem #1. WP allows me to register readers.

– Six. I can’t recall what the sixth reason is. It probably doesn’t matter.

I’m not leaving LJ, no worries. All of my entries will be cross-posted to both, the entries here will just be much more censored and locked down. And I’ll still be active in reading my friends’ LJ, although comments are still expected to be sparse.

The problem with wordpress is that it is a blog. LJ is great because it’s a journal, my journal. I can write down everything, regardless if it has a purpose. But a blog conveys that posts have themes and reasons, and I’m not sure that I like that. I’ve tried writing a couple of pure medical blogs and failed miserably. We’ll see.

I might go camping tomorrow. Yay! That is, if I manage not to get called in for back-up call and I get out of clinic on time.

And I don’t want to go to clinic in the morning.

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18th August 2007

you’ve lost that writing feeling

So, a few months ago, I volunteered to participate in the Anywhere But Cardiff ficathon. It has been ages since I wrote anything beside histories and physicals, and frankly, I can’t be the least bit imaginative with them.

Anyway. I signed up for the ficathon and was very excited and very nervous, because if it did turn out sounding like a H&P, wasn’t so sure that would go over. I was a bit disappointed with the prompt that I got. Blackpool, England. 21st century, because it didn’t spark anything in me. I mean, I knew what was expected, but I haven’t seen the show and I don’t even like most crossovers (although, I’ve been toying with the idea of a Doctor Who/His Dark Materials crossover, because that could almost work). But I had been hoping for something foreign and exotic, you know, and this prompt just wasn’t either. So I’ve been lost. Oh, yeah, and not to mention, I really haven’t had a lot of time to write either. 🙂

I finally figured something out, or rather something that at least mentioned Blackpool, even though it was pretty insignificant in the overall plot. Now, I’ve changed the rest of the story (or at least the bits that I have written, and it’s so choppy right now and man, I write soooo slowly!), that stylistically, it doesn’t fit at all. *sigh* So either I try to fit it in, or I end up writing two stories, which at the rate I’m going, will take me forty years to do. Or I just give up entirely. Which even though I’d be branded as a QUITTER and a LOSER, might not be such a bad thing.

And, um… Legally Blonde: The Musical is scary (it was free from iTunes, I swear!).

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14th May 2006

not done

*sigh*

Paper is still not done.

Right now, it is 14 pages of mess. 6 pages are the “appendices” of the survey that I had already written (and don’t count), 2 pages are references (of which half will be cut out), one page is completely blank which for some reason won’t delete (why? I don’t understand. Nothing shows up abnormally in the “reveal codes” stuff). That leaves 5 pages… 3 are from a paper that I had to submit to administer the survey to human subjects (my fellow medical students) and in the wrong tense. The remaining are outline notes from my presentation. Not to mention the various notes concerning what the paper is supposed to be around that are inserted randomly.

And yet… this is an improvement. Everything’s organized in the way I want, most of that will fix with some editing (I hope), leaving me only the discussion part to tackle, which I’ve been trying to work on to no avail most of the day. I’ve discovered that I’ve misplaced several of the articles I had researched earlier. And I haven’t been able to track down some information that I desperately need to make the discussion stronger. So I’m stuck, and I can’t be, because there will be serious repercussions if I don’t get this submitted this weekend.

*sigh*

Can I just be pathetically woeful and state that I miss my study-buddy and friend? Stupid git gets to play in the warm sun and frolic in crystal beaches and I’m stuck here writing this endless dribble. And if his stupid fiancee hadn’t been so stupid (still kinda hate her. Am trying to improve on that), I’d be there now, enjoying a wedding reception and the beaches myself. *grumbles* But nooo, instead I’m lonely and writing a paper by myself without the pleasant distractions of our word games or laughter, or without his input that always seemed to light the muse so that I could finally get the words out that I needed to say.

If anybody’s up for a really, really, really bad editing job, let me know. It probably would qualify you as certifiably insane, but…

*sigh*

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26th March 2006

On writing…

I’ve been wanting to do more writing recently, more short stories and drabbles. It’s been so long since I took a pen to paper. When I was in Kenya, I was so determined to finish Like Never Before that I wrote for two afternoons, transferring crumpled paper of many edits to computer, writing two new scenes. It was great, I was on a roll, things were progressing, and I was going to come home and surprise everybody–not that I think anybody has missed my story, it would have mostly been for my satisfaction. I saved it on my memory stick and when I turned on my computer the next morning, somehow the stick had gotten corrupted and I lost everything. My sister has the same brand and it died two weeks later, so we think it’s some error with the stick itself, but I lost all motivation again. I hope it comes back.

I’ve missed the creative outlet that writing provides, the satisfaction that came from getting just the right word and turn of phrase. I keep thinking about trying to tackle some original short stories or essays (you may have noticed some of the attempts in my journal entries, to make them sound a little more like prose rather than ramblings. I have no idea how well I’m succeeding–this entry would not be an example, btw). Especially since I heard that Brooke was writing a children’s story, which knowing her will be completely wonderful and witty and alive, since that’s how she writes naturally, and Michelle’s been corresponding with a friend, a la “Sorcery and Cecelia”. But I don’t have the time or the ideas at this point. Okay, I shouldn’t use time as an excuse, since Atul Gawande wrote Complications as a surgery resident, snatching 15-30 minutes away from precious sleep, and I have a ton more free time than that right now. (BTW, that’s the best book on the practice and culture of medicine I’ve ever read. I highly recommend it, even to those who have no medical knowledge at all. It’s a fantastic, enthralling read).

No, for me, the real hiccup is the creative side. I can’t seem to come up with a single original idea. Every time I attempt to invent characters or plots, they feel like pale ripoffs of every single author I’ve ever read. That is the reason that I love fanfiction so much–the characters are there with preformed motives, personalities, behaviors, etc and the trick is to write your own story within those boundaries. It’s difficult, yes, to stay in character, but I like the challenge combined with the ease. However, I really love the opportunity presented with the minor characters–people that we might have names and looks for, but everything else is a blank slate. Why I can invent personalities and mannerisms in this case and can’t with OF is beyond me.

Anyway. As I said. I’ve been wanting to write. Gilmore Girls has passed beyond inspiration. Even with the lure of Jess coming back for one more eppy hasn’t been enough to light the fire (maybe that will change come April). And I’m really wanting to try something new.

So. The sum up is that I found a prompt community called 7spells for Harry Potter fiction. It’s only seven stories which is much more manageable than the fanfic100 communities and I like the prompts, and even more amazing, there was a character pairing not taken that I thought I could actually maybe write something about.

Behind the cut is my master list for writing Harry Potter/Luna Lovegood. I’m rather excited, actually. I had so hoped that Luna would become a bigger character after she proved herself in the 5th book and was disappointed in the sixth book. I loved her scenes, she was hilarious, but it was lacking in substance–she was just the humorous situation generator. Where was the whole “Hermione and Luna balance Harry” plotline? Or the mystical “life after death” connection.

Erm. I’ll stop now. I’ll be posting the stories to my journal, since communities have a tendency to disappear and I don’t want to lose anything, but you have no obligation to read anything. Promise. 🙂

Harry/Luna challenge stories

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5th March 2005

Sticks and Stones – Lit Fiction Exchange

Literati Fiction Exchange

To Include:
– some type of problem in Rory/Jess’s relationship either being resolved or being explored b/c it can’t be resolved.
– dialogue about some random detail of the setting they’re in…i.e. “that clock on the wall” “this carpeting” “how the sun reflects off the wall”…anything.
– a book reference that isn’t often mentioned.
Not to Include:
– Jess crying (almost is fine if it happens to work that way *shrug*)…(I’m sorry, it’s just…a thing…I have…about writing Jess. Now, at least, lol. =$)
Rating: anything is fine *nods* …not NC-17? =P

A/N: Special thanks to Becka for the application of the whip to make sure I finished this. She’s the bestest! Please review!

Sticks and Stones

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14th February 2005

The promised “for real” update!

They do have chipper as a mood!

Please don’t ask me why I’m chipper. I’m sure if you asked me to analyze it, I would find out that I really am not so. My ankle hurts. My non-existant ab muscles hurt. I spent all afternoon hanging around a tiny office with 5 other doctors, so I could exam 2 patients. (So. Painfully. Boring.)

Yep, started a new rotation, pediatrics, which I have been excited for, but stuck in clinic has kinda sapped me of the glee. I was looking forward to doing well baby checks and looking into kid’s stuffy noses, but I can’t stand just sitting around in a too-small room and changing attendings every half day! Thankfully, this does not count towards evaluations. And it should get better. I hope it gets better.

Only three more rotations and I’ll be done with third year!

Only three more rotations and I’m done with third year. When you really think about it, it’s scary. I went to a med school party this weekend, where I mingled with so many of my classmates that I haven’t seem in months. And it hit me. In just a year and a bit, we’ll be separating and spreading across the country… These close friendships and associations will end. I can’t stop it, and even though it’s so far in the future, that black dread is taking over residence in my stomach.

Hey, come back here chipper feeling!

No, things are good. Really. I just won’t let myself think how miserable my life is going to be when Chris and I are on opposite coasts. 🙁

I am such a nerd. No, really, it’s true. How did I spend my evening? My wonderful evening free of responsibility? Not to mention Valentine’s Day?? Reading articles from the latest Grand Rounds. I discovered this a couple of weeks ago, and I have to admit, when I read these blogs, written by actual doctors talking about real patient encounters, or just the science behind our bodies (they’ve figured out the genetics of why people have different sleep habits??? how cool is that!) I get so excited. Medicine is definitely my calling. Marissa, you should check some of it out–it’s written for the layman, and might give you an idea of the field.

Is tomorrow a new episode of GG? I haven’t seen the previous two yet (oops), but I still plan to and would like to tape it if it is.

And speaking of GG, can I do a bit of shameless plugging? Of course, ff.net messed up half of my formating (they’re taking out commas before quotation marks now!) and I’m not in the mood to go back and change it by hand, so believe me, it really doesn’t have nearly the number of errors in RL.

I’ve had to go through and make all most of my journal friends only. I had been planning on it, but I got friended by a rather, um, unsuitable person. And I really don’t need stalkers. 😉 Unless, of course, you guys want to stalk me, and if that’s the excuse it takes you to come out and visit me, then by all means, I give you my blessing.
.

Geez, after this randomness, you’re going to be begging me not to keep my promises!

*hugs* to flist.

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5th September 2004

A Call to Arms

Desperate times and all of that…

I haven’t been able to write a word for months now. Granted I’ve been consumed with real life school and work. But I haven’t even been able to come up with ideas to pursue. And that’s not normal.

So I’m giving to you an opportunity, to throw down the gauntlet and challenge me.

Pick any fandom (and if it’s one that I’m not familiar with, we’ll try again), any person or couple (ditto) and give me an idea that you want a story written about. Quotes or song lyrics are fine, although I’d like to have more of an idea of what they make you think of than just “Oh, I love this song.” Specifics would be fabulous, since I really want some direction. And I will write something for it… At least a drabble, but probably no more than 1000 words.

Let see if this gets my keyboard turbocharged!

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30th June 2004

There and Back Again

I am sooooo loving my week off!! Just got back from North Carolina… Had a wonderful time, hanging out with Sam and her boyfriend and her roommate. Fort Bragg was not quite like I expected, but then I’m always surprised by new places. It wasn’t as hot and humid as Sam had threatened–but then it rained most of the time, keeping it pretty cool. She showed me her new place that she’s moving into in a week, and it made me go lusty. It’s a real house–two stories, with enough rooms that a vagabond could take a room downstairs and they’d never even realize it. And it has a patio, and living room and formal sitting room, with hardwood floors. I’m so in love with it–I want a real house so badly, with a real sofa–no more apartments. I’m thinking about doing my family practice rotation there, and Sam’s offered to let me stay with her… It would be so fantastic.

Didn’t meet all of the cute boys that Sam promised me. No, I take that back. I did meet a few, but they were very inebriated (I have no idea how they managed to drive themselves to the bar) and maybe I am a prude, but I prefer to be remembered for at least a few minutes… And, really, the military haircut looks good on very few. The uniform–hot. Crewcuts–not so much.

But I’m off again in an hour. My parents and I are going camping for a few days up in Wyoming. We haven’t been on a family vacation in years, and neither of my sisters could get work off, so it’s just the three of us. We’re just wandering over the state, exploring some of the mountains that we’ve missed. It’ll be nice and relaxing… I tend to write on vacations, so I’m bringing along a notebook and my drabble book. Here’s hoping that LNB manages to find its way to paper!

Ciao!

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30th March 2004

And you’re sure your name is Julia?

I can’t believe that I just did that!

I’ve been in a writing funk for weeks. Haven’t been able to write anything. I’ve been attempting working on LNB and, as usual, it’s been picky and stubborn. Paris didn’t like the way I was taking things, too much peace and teenage novel happiness, so I’ve had to brainstorm for new ideas… I’m starting to get a little worried about it. I have only about four months to get it all done. Once rotations start, I doubt I’ll ever get a chance to work on it again. I’m actually getting “update now!” reviews… new experience that one!

So, after reading bjorks_defender‘s lovely story, Stupid Reasons, I was inspired. One-parters! I love fluffy one-parters, and I haven’t written any since my first, What A Wonderful World. That was over a year ago.

I dug out my sketch that I had done after A Family Matter aired. Too angsty. Couldn’t think of how I could make it happy. And I needed happy.

And last night, an idea came to me, so I went for it…

Never mind that it hints at things that I should never ever write about. Oh, it’s clean as a whistle, no swearing, no nudity (described at least) but this is me, folks, the girl who blushes at everything…

I actually wrote a bedroom scene! You can read it here: One of the Moments

AHHHH!!! I really wish I could find a little rock to hide under right now.

Marissa, this story was for you. A couple of years ago, my best friend and I did this story-writing thing, where we put ourselves as the main character with the “loves of our lives.” I tried writing one with you and Jess, and him comforting you about all the stupid college application stuff, silly and pointless fic to make you laugh, but it didn’t go anywhere… So, instead you get this. I hope you at least enjoy it. 🙂

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Oh, and yes, in case, you were wondering, I am back from Guatemala. I’ve been back a week and a half now (sheepish grin). Beautiful place, I loved it so much. Still can’t speak a lick of Spanish, but other than that, it was great. I’m uploading some of my pictures, so I can gush about it all soon!

But I’m horribly behind on commenting to my friends… Sorry if I’ve neglected you!

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17th February 2004

A Few of my favorite things

Current favorite fics:

GG: Over Time by Elise _starsinhereyes. She just updated it, after I had been so worried that she would never touch it again. LOVE this story. And this chapter is probably one of her best yet.

LOTR: If Wishes Were Elves, Even Fangirls Would Dance by Teanna. This is probably the best “Mary Sue and Elves in Modern Times” stories around. Teanna’s got a thing for The Elf (Legolas) which is evident in her conversations between Legolas and Gimli (my favorite parts). And her original characters are so well written–and I see too much of myself in them. Then add in Nightcrawler from X-Men and you have a story unlike any other!

BtVS: Black and White by Kinkor the Knight. Massive novel-length story that he’s still working on. It’s a sequel to his phenomenal Harsh Legacy Series that he wrote as an alternative Season 6 (and it was so much better than Joss and co should have been getting ideas from him. His stories are sadly overlooked, but they are the best written. He’s got the characters down!

Question for GG fans: How do you think Jess would answer the phone? I’m missing one line for a scene where he responses to a “hello?” I can’t come up with anything! Any suggestions?

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24th January 2004

Well, it’s done.

Extra, Extra!!

LNB has been brutally mutilated and slashed. My poor baby, it was for your own good…

Chapters 1 and 3 have been combined, as well as Chapter 2 and 4. Jess’s conversation was slashed and revised all over. It sounds so better to my ears at least. But I hated doing it too… That means, it looks like I’ve spent over a year just writing 7 chapters. Oh, yeah.

It’ll probably cause problems when people try to review the next couple of chapters, since ff.net still records it as nine chapters, but, I guess that’s the price I have to pay. 🙂

But now, I can devote all of my attention to the next two chapters. Whee!

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23rd January 2004

Well, that was stupid of me!

Rereading your own stories is sometimes a risky endeavor.

After being nominated at the Literati Fanfiction Awards, (waves gratefully to very sweet person), I decided to reread my “What A Wonderful World.” I am truly vainly proud of that story, mostly because I swear someone else wrote it–I must have been channeling a spirit or something. I just remember that I was especially giddy because a particular crush seemed to be going right at that time (of course, it fizzled not long afterwards), but seriously, I don’t recognize that brand of Romantic!Me.

Anyway, I decided to go through the rest of my stories, especially LNB, just to make sure that I didn’t have any glaring errors or major inconsistencies. Yeah, bad idea. My early Jess is laughable in his conversation… sometimes I get him, and then other times, who was I writing, an English professor? kimlockt told me that he needed some work–and I agreed at the time and changed a few things, but I just hadn’t seen until now how much!

And the more I thought about it, the more I realized… the first four chapters are really just an introduction to the story. Compared to my later chapters, they’re short, only about 4 pages each and not that much important stuff happens.

So I’ve been editing all afternoon. I combined chapter 1 and 3, and will be doing the same for 2 and 4. And Jess is getting a trim. All of the “really” and “so” that I use are going bye-bye, as well as most of the first words of every sentence.

But now, I’m concerned that I’m going to have to repost the whole thing at ff.net. Combining like that will make my story two chapters shorter and it’ll mess up my reviews (I hit 50! Woohoo!!) and I remember reading something that if you try to delete the last chapter, it wipes away your whole story.

But it needs the changes so badly. I can’t even think about continuing it until I get this fixed. Grrr.

Any advice?

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11th January 2004

More…

So many of my thoughts and ideas are just fragments, little wisps of ideas that float into my brain. Invariably, I’ll think up some idea of a story, some part of a relationship that I want to explore. So I sit down and write–and lose it completely after the first paragraph. Writing Like Never Before has been one of the most grueling processes for that very reason, because while I have an outline of my ideas and what I’d like to occur, I still have to fill in… And the fill-in, the fleshing out of the ideas into sentences and paragraphs can take me months, many of them sitting in front of my computer in completely frustration because I can’t get out the words that are there. So often, I feel like an amateur sculptor, staring at a blob of clay, seeing what it could look like, but never knowing how to get it out.

Perhaps that’s why I like drabbles so much. I read other people’s and I’m inspired… They’re short, just 100 words wrapped around one moment, where I strive to express as much as possible. I can put down my fragmented thoughts and somehow get it to say what I want it to–like my drabble about Jess’s leaving and how Luke was dealing–there wasn’t enough in me to make that a complete story, but in a drabble form, I think I got down pretty much what I wanted.

I’m not a person who thinks poetically–there’s too much of the scientist in me, but with drabbles, I can come close. Lately, I think I’ve been thinking in drabbles… cutting out words, rearranging phrases, finding words that get just the right meaning. I think I verge on the sentimental a little more than I would like, but I think the form forgives that.

And I try to experiment more with drabbles than with any other form. Besides my experimentations with LOTR, right now I’m attempting to write two about Kirk–one a sonnet to LuLu and the other in the viewpoint of Cat Kirk… And it’s so hard!! I have a hard time writing humor, but I hope that playing around with this will give me some practice. I’ve tried writing different couples than I normally do (hence the Kirk and LuLu)… but as hard as I try, I cannot write Tristan–I wanted a Tristan/Paris one and considered exploring one about Rory from Tristan’s viewpoint, but it’s no use. I just can’t get inside of that character, he’s so foreign to me.

So here’s a couple more that I’ve been playing with. Same theme: lost cause, first one is slightly AU.

More GG Drabbles

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7th December 2003

For better or worse

Like Never Before chapter 8 has now been posted on ff.net. I finished it Friday night, had my sister read it (she’s my unofficial beta), who told me that it wasn’t as good as my other chapters but it wasn’t as bad as I thought. Eh. According to her, my Paris was out of character, which really worries me because I spent so much time making her believable. All I had was one episode to go off in showing this side of Paris. One episode–“The Big One” from last season, where Paris has her breakdown. Yeah, not a lot of inspiration.

Ugh.

So, I went back and edited. Big time. I think it’s better now, but… I’m really nervous about posting it. Meeting the groom on the day of the arranged marriage kind of nervous. I don’t want to be tarred and feathered here! I tend to lean on the freak-out side, so hopefully things aren’t as bad as I fear.

Chapter 7 was rewritten too, to attempt to get more of Jess’s voice. My biggest fault, I think is that my characters tend to become as verbose as I do and I struggle to rein them in. But it’s so difficult to convey conversations in monosyllables as Jess demands.

Chapter 9 was done and I was going to post it in a couple of days–I had that one written a year ago, when the idea first came to me–it honestly was the reason that I wrote this story. But it was only 4 pages long and after this last chapters’ record of 8958 words on 17 pages, it was way too short. So, I’m rearranging, combining some chapters and other housework before it’s read to be displayed. I am aiming for Christmas/New Year’s. We’ll see how well I succeed. At least I like the chapter more!

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3rd December 2003

The dead will arise and speak again…

Wow, do you realize that the last time I posted here was back in August?? I realized that today was December, December 2nd my calendar tells me. I’m not really sure what happened to September and October and November–are you sure we really even had a November?

First of all, updates: Yes, to those few people who know what I’m talking about, I’m still working on my Gilmore Girls story, Like Never Before. Honestly, I swear. I’m working on chapter 8 and have been (bit by painful bit) for the past three months. It’s sixteen pages long now, sixteen pages and I think I hate it. Which is funny, because when I first started thinking about this story a year and a half ago, this was one of the major chapters of why I wanted to put my ideas to paper. But right now, it’s hitting too close to home. I’ve had a hard time writing this fight scene and having such an easy resolution, when I know from hard, personal experience that it never goes this smoothly. Even when you’re trying so hard to communicate, things still get mired and knotted. And yet, to change it, would just lengthen the story out even longer. If it wasn’t necessary to move the “plot” along, I’d just trash it. I have one scene left. One scene that’s probably less than two pages long, but do you think I can write it? NOOOOO! Stupid story.

Update number two: And I’ve been once again hit by the drabble bug, so look for an update to my drabbles, as well as some LOTR ones–I’ve got an inkling to write a Eomer drabble, and I don’t know where that one came from!! As of yet, no one has taken my drabble challenge, although Agent M at ff.net wrote a perfectly delightful one entitled Tana and Kirk. Read it, it’s fabulous.

And speaking of drabbles, I just finished reading The Da Vinci Code and really really enjoyed it. The author did an incredible amount of research to justify every one of his theories and well as add layers and layers of details and symbolism. I feel like I need to read it again, just to understand all of the symbolism. Right after I read it, I stumbled across another of fileg‘s beautiful drabbles that struck me as ironically appropriate: Earth, Water, Fire, Air. Read the Arwen drabble….And then do yourself a favor and go and read the rest of fileg’s stories and see why I love her writing so much.

Update number three: We’re starting to discuss The Hobbit on my Tolkien discussion group. I just posted the first five chapters of musings and thoughts, the next five chapters will be done by this weekend. I hope to get all the way through it before RETURN OF THE KING opens….Can anybody guess how excited I am??? Today, I saw one of the tv trailers for the first time and it induced the “moment-of-silence” followed by “utter-squeal-of-excitement.”

Um, yeah. That’s all the business I guess. School’s been kicking my butt, mostly because I’ve become so apathetic towards it. I cannot wait for Christmas. One of my best friends is flying in and spending almost two weeks with me!! I have two lovely weeks with no classes, no endless hours of studying the disease processes of anemia or the electrical circuits of the heart, no trying to avoid certain people because things have gone so horribly wrong. Nothing but sweet, delightful boredom.

And I had to laugh. Last week, driving home for Thanksgiving dinner, I heard the new Evanescence single, My Immortal, and completely, totally, head over heels fell in love with it. Seriously, it was one of those songs that caused an emotional reaction where I felt the words and music just beating in my veins. I haven’t been able to get enough of the song since then. And what was the quote from GG tonight “And those who bring Evanescence will be severely mocked.” Yeah, I’m ridiculous.

Only 14 more days until ROTK!!!!!!!!! Just wait until the day before, then I’ll be shouting it!

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    • Books read October-December 01/01/2024
      My goal was to read 120 books this year. I just finished number 129. (Some of these I reviewed as part of my WWW posts). October: Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt. I had high expectations for this book, as it had been so praised, and I felt let down by it. Still enjoyable, […]