Oh. My. God.

I have learned a valuable lesson today, kids. When your backing up your novels and other things, make SURE you have more copies than what you had, because OOO boy I have lost a lot of documents now because I can’t find my “Stories” CD.

Where this cd is, I would like to know, It’s supposed to be IN MY FOLDER where I keep all my cd’s but no, it’s not there. I’m mad. And frusturated because my life’s work’s on that cd.

Well, thank god that I actually do keep updated copies of my stuff on hardcopy so I can just scan those in if I need them anytime soon.

Again, make sure you actually DO have things backed up before you actually go deleting anything. OOO boy!

Wow… Jumping out a plane without a parachute!

I joined the site on October 1st just dedicated a NaNoer as I could be. (used to be Mitja25 at the web site before I flipped names and lost my cred status.) Well, our Municipal Liason, you know, the one who puts all this stuff together every year couldn’t participate this year and I got to take over. How fun!

 It’s been interesting and I’m starting to see a few things I could do for next year already although I’ll see if I survive my first year. LOL I’m thinking I will, and I’ll know what not to do next year.

More NaNo Blatherings

Yes, I really am excited for NaNoWriMo. I can’t wait until it’s here. I’m going to do so much for it. YAY.

 I found out my story if we don’t know this already. I really read my own blogs, don’t I?

 I found out said story is almost exactly the same as the show Pushing Daisies. Only mine’s better. <WEG>

I’m excited for NaNoWriMo and wish it was that time already. I do, honestly! I know I’m not as insightful as I normally am, I’m feeling kinda off today. I think the weather isn’t helping.

Yet More Editing/Hey! I Found My NaNo Novel!

I found the idea of notecards from Chris Baty’s No Plot! No Problem! book ages ago. I decided to impliment it for my last NaNo novel but as it normally goes, I found out that I simply cannot edit any NaNo Novel. I don’t have enough practice with so much… stuff. And with NaNo you put in a bunch of…. stuff… just for the wordcount.

So I decided to edit a novel that I’d put aside for NaNo back in 2005, then finished up after that. It’s seasonal too, right as fall is making it’s show, with Momma Nature’s amnesia about the temperatures.

Now I download a ton of music. If you’re ever around me I allways have music going. Mainly because either it’s something new or the last song I heard that I recognize gets stuck in my head. So I allways am downloading and looking for new music.

 While making a foray into download land I decided to download this one song, and while listening to it I got my idea. I’d wanted to do something dark, mysterious, like the picture at the top of my page (which is why I like this format, I love that picture up there, it’s very inspiring to me. I want to wander those trails and find where they go, because it’s gotta be under 80º in them.)

 The song I’d downloaded with a bunch of other music I was thinking of while watching fan trailers for the Twilight Series, I downloaded the song Don’t Fear the Reaper by Blue Oyster Cult. I thought it was interesting. What if a girl did fall in love with Death. That would be interesting.

 So I decided to keep with that theme and that’s going to be my novel for NaNoWriMo… Now only one problem. How do I keep myself from writing it NOW? LOL

More more more…

I’ve been creating notecards for my novel. Kinda like making a physical representation of it.

It was hard going at first. I couldn’t find my notecards so I had bought some more. Only to find out they were like post-it notes, sticky on the back. I did my best with them but ended up shelling a little more money for different cards.

 However I’m feeling where I’m lacking, and where I should up the ante.  I see a lot of holes. A few plot holes but conversation and scenes are to help with that. Because there aren’t enough scenes period. I hate when that happens.

 I’m going to continue on writing these down into notecards before I begin that lovely project. I’m excited, just like when I get a whole part of the house organized. I’m excited to see how I can get it finished. I’m excited for once on editing it and seeing how it comes out. It gives me something to move, to shuffle, to play cards with. LOL.

 It definately will end up looking a tona different. I’ve already decided to change the two MC’s names. They’re driving me NUTS. To Similar. And the Manda’s are changing. One’s going to stay Manda and the other’s going to be a Mandy.

 Dad’s here so I’ll update later if need be. Muah!

Circles…

They tell us that we should write every day. Today just hasn’t been one of them. It’s been a ride through everything imaginable. Impossible day at my invisible job not having enough work to do, and also talking with my friends to get my stuff back I left at their house.

Sadly, I went to pick up notecards and apparently the notecards were the sticky kind. I was peeved off at this point so I used them to brush off my cats. Nothing can stop post-it-not sticky quite like cat hair. I don’t know why.

My aunt yelled at me for not taking enough initiative in my job search. But I feel I’ve searched everywhere. I’m at a point of going in circles. Circles are not fun. I even hated circles when I was a Wiccan, I just passed it off as something fun. Or at least what I call the amature ones. I just don’t feel it like others do, or say that they do. I force the experience on myself instead of enjoying it. I do admit though, I love the opening and closing rituals. I have to go to both.

Here we are in another kind of circle, the circle of my interests. How I continually talk around circles as well. I don’t know why I do but it’s just how it goes. Some of my interests go over some people’s heads. I don’t know why I grasp on ideas so well, forms as plato calls them. It just works that way. I have visuals for everything and I don’t even think I could write about it.

Example, I’d be reading say, In Search of Shrodinger’s cat. I get engrossed to a point I don’t even read the text. It’s like watching nova in my head. Only without the cool quoty people because I don’t konw what half of them look like (although I have q is for quantum so I do know what SOME look like). The weird thing is that even when watching NOva I go refering to the images in my head, I don’t see what’s on the screen. THAT is how I can sit there and read these technical things. Because as I’m learning them, I’m creating my own visualizations of said systems that I’m working with.

But going back here, that’s why some of my interests are varying. Because I can visualize whatever I read as I’m reading it. Even novels I’m say, Bella in the Twilight series, being chased by a rather enthusiastic Edward. That’s why I can read these books, and laugh out loud, or actually cry, or get frustrauted, or mad at characters. Because I’m living their lives.

I think that’s what got me writing in the first place as a kid. I used to enact stories, just like normal kids (although, all of mine seem to be me, alone, but mabye that’s just my imagination) me and my cousins used to play “Baby Sitter’s Club” where we’d pretend to be characters from the thing. Or we’d be characters from “beetlejuice”. I’d be on a bus, or someplace boring, and I would mentally do this in my head. I’d escape into my own world, we could say, instead of reality.

I found out that as a young kid, when I was put to bed, I wouldn’t sleep until about 10 or so. I do remember my mom making me go to bed at 7 when the lights were still on. I lived on Seventh Avenue, at least in the more conscious memories. I’d look out my side window and see the skyline and think about it all. I’d imagine things from books, enact things, only it would all be downtown. Even now I have this weird attraction to it.

These stories were what kept me sane, I think, through the torment and stress of school. I’ll save all that crap for my biography, juicy as it was.

I remember writing my first story in sixth grade. Not even CARING about any of the people around me reading it and scrutinizing it. There was a terrible thunderstorm coming to my school and it got dark as night out there. I know it was pure plagarism but I remember there being a story about a witch who stole the sun back when I was in elementary school. I wrote it out.

*dusts off the nostalgia* okay. Anywhos. Going back here to the topic. I didn’t do anything today really. Went to psuedo-work, picked up a few things, then went home. I played around, tried to stay awake, and then watched The Big Bang Theory. It’s sad when you understand what they’re talking about! It’s even weirder when you’re jealous of the stuff they have! And it’s only because I think they raided my thinkgeek.com wishlist.

Rambling again, I know. oh well. Deal.

Eating the Broccoli again…

So I sat down last night and went through my novel, Mirror. My notecards seemed to have dissapeared into the void so I was unable to actually write out the scenes as they happened. However I did write out basic problems in a notebook that I’m referencing. I have a lot to think about.

I didn’t finish the book last night, only because I ran out of time. I had to get up this morning to go to the one-day job. With the way I was feeling, I wasn’t too happy today at all at work. I didn’t get much sleep last night.

After the one-day job I went over to my friend Ash’s house to pick up my notecards. I was starved at that point. So I had about the only thing they had, a nutter butter, and a swig of chocolate milk, nothing more.

So now I’m at home, about to dive back into writing, well, editing. I seriously have some thoughts to think out. Problems to work out. It’s very daunting but that’s what the notecards are for. The holes. So I can see those holes and fill them up with other ideas.

Mirror is a story about twins separated at birth, and about vampires. LOL See, even my one sentence summary doens’t work. But I’m working on it. LOL Just like the rest of my life, I’m working on it bit by bit.

A lot of what I’ve noticed is that I rush a lot of things, and there’s a lot of rambling around. I suck with descriptions when first starting out I think, but that should come better. If these people have so much in common to fall for eachother they gotta actually have some kind of personality. What music do they listen to, who do they idolize, what are their dreams, what are their favorite subjects in school. Things like this seem to be missing. They weren’t reall

Thoughts

Well I decided that I’m going to continually use this as a forum for all my writing efforts as well. I don’t know why I used pagannation, since this is a pagan site, but it feels that my pagan side is more part of me than it is actually something to write about. LOL. Besides, I don’t do much with that spirtual side lately, seeing as my physical side is messed up.

I would love to have someone in my life, who would annoy the living hell out of me when I don’t write. That would rock. Because I’m editing.

Let me tell you, writing is like eating a plate of broccoli and cheese. First you must eat the cheese laden broccoli, and that’s the greatest. It’s the best tasting, and it is awesome, but by the time you get to the bottom of the plate you have nothing but broccoli to account for, plain ole steamed broccoli. Good for you, but oh so booooring to eat!

Writing is like that. You get the writing part, which is so much fun, writing and writing about the stuff that just falls out of your head onto the page. You get to a point too, where the characters take over and you’re just passively writing down their story. That is my favorite part.

However, you get to a point that the cheese is gone. The writing part is done. You’ve written The End and you take a breath before plunging into our plain stewed broccoli. Editing is the stewed broccoli. You may look at it as boring, and unoriginal, but it’s also good for the novel. You gotta eat it or it’ll never get finished (I have several plates of broccoli in this example) and you’ll still be hungry. Or maybe I’m taking the analogy too far. Either way the point is that editing is the hardest part of writing.

There’s so many little bits to pick up. I’ve learned to do it like an inverted pyramid. The big picture first, because that’s what I see in my head when I’m done rereading, and go down the pyramid to the point, which is sentence structure, and grammar.

I’m not a real consistent person. Anyone who reads my posts over on Pagan Nation will see this and know. I should be more consistent, but in some ways I’m not. I’m learning how to, now that I’m a grown-up, but it’s a process as any are. I’m beginning to think that you don’t honestly grow up until you’re 25. That’s what I’m noticing more.

I’m trying to be consistent. Trying to do things on a daily basis. Getting my apartment not just clean, but organized, writing every day, editing every day, looking for a job every day.

I’m not trying to let this blog get too personal, that’s what my livejournal is for. But if I need background I’ll post some of my background information as it’s needed.

National Novel Writing Month/Real Witches Ball

So, soon it shall be the time known as National Novel Writing Month. For the ambitious among us who would love to actually write a novel in a month, there’s the official web site .

I’m officially in the stage where I’m brainstorming an idea to use for NaNo. I realized that some ideas just take off on their own and beg to be written that instant, which is why I hold off till October to brainstorm. I haven’t come up with anything yet, but that’s fine.

If you don’t notice, while at the RWB I start getting prepared for NaNoWriMo. I normally have a notebook in hand, writing. Most of the time it’s just notes from the lectures, and how I can integrate these into my life, although sometimes my journal does a few note jogs on description because of the cool moments.

This is the time of mentally preparing for the RWB as well. I spend a good chunk of my time obsessing over what to wear, (coming out wearing my cat ears, tail and wiskers on at least one day), what classes I want to take, and weither or not I have books I need to take with me. Seeing as I’m going to be broke as ever, I’m going to have to bring my own food. It’s the end of the month so foodstamps will be kinda tight, so I can’t rely on that.

But I’ve decided that I’m going to use this as a place for all my insane writing ramblings, and wordcount updates, late night writing sessions and coffee. That’s going to be fun. I’m already excited.

Tomorrow the forums open at NaNoWriMo.org and I’m all set to sign in and get aquainted with people in the Columbus forums.

I seriously wish I had a laptop to borrow for the coffeeshop writing sessions so I could write updates in here while drinking a cup of coffee. We usually hang out at Panera, so if you see in the one room a group of frantically writing people on laptops in November, that would be us.