Tag Archives: Writing

What in tarnation?

Why have I suddenly become obsessed with reggaeton? Don Omar, Daddy Yankee, etc. Weird. I’ve got to be scaring coworkers and my roomie if they hear what’s blaring out of my headphones.

Then again, I may do that normally…

I’ve hacked out a few thousand words over the past couple of days, and while not all of it is published yet, some of it is up on the Ila des Mains series page. My character is morphing on me, becoming less nervous and neurotic in some respects, but I shall endeavor to keep her close to the brand of psychotic she was in the first couple of stories. That, of course, is the problem with not touching a storyline for three months on top of a writing a character that isn’t much of a mimicry of yourself.

Continue reading What in tarnation? →

The other beast emerges

About Wednesday, I slipped into a weird mood that I haven’t felt in months, thanks to the stress of school. It’s my weird “work hard, play hard” mood that brings with it an unimaginable focus.

Right now, my mind is set on about four things. Two of those are work-related, one is writing. None are social, unfortunately, so socializing for me has hit the back burner–if I don’t have a purpose for talking to you (be it technical or otherwise), I probably won’t spare many mips for discussion. Alas, this meant IMs and e-mails have gone largely unanswered this weekend, that I’ve been the antithesis of soft and warm (although not bitchy–just… focused), and that I have short shrift for what I perceive as listlessness, [excessive] frivolousness, or blockades to me working.

I don’t even have the good grace to feel bad about being anti-social right now. Ugh.

Since Friday night at 23:00, however, I have written 10k words of fiction in the form of a couple of short stories, and I have seeds for about three more. None of these will be published, but I may pick up some publishable stuff soon.

I’ve refrained from doing much actual work this weekend, thanks in part to the writing binge and in part to the fact that I don’t want to leave myself with not enough to do come next week.

I love summer. I’ve got to find some way to keep this focus during the school year…

Linkage on writing

For the lit-geeks inclined to spend their Saturday nights writing instead of doing homework or being particularly outgoing.

Reading suggestions on writing can be such a sticky subject, because people can get into the mindset of “How dare you say this is the the way to write?” (Much like people did with Mathias’s web design canon, come to think of it.) Granule of salt, a nice chill pill, and a bit of perspective, folks. Really.

Why, yes, I did just use the term “chill pill”. Welcome to the early nineties once again.

Minisinoo‘s written three articles on writing recently that have been sitting in my “read/comment/link” pile in Bloglines:

  1. Issues in Style: Sentence Length & Format
  2. Critique, critique, critique — also hits on what it means to edit.
  3. The vagaries of feedback.

Bring your Spanish-speaking accent and read aloud.

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The quote below is the awesomest piece of writing I’ve run across recently, and is courtesy of a professorial candidate that presented this afternoon. It has to be read as though it were completely Spanish, though, or it loses all effect (I may have left an accent mark off somewhere—don’t shoot me).

Rafael Pernett y Morales, Loma ardiente y vestida de sol

La noche cayó, y Macorina volvió del monte con Pito, justo a tiempo, just-a-time, para subir al autobús latino que volví a la ciudad… En el autobús latino se cantaba en español. En los autobuses chombos se cantaban calipsos con ukeleles y las mujeres decían que iban a los stiets to bai som clots bicos ai jav notin to put uen ai got to a pic mi buai. Y la vecina la decía que di las taim ai uen to di stiets ai brot a lot of fanci suts and den dei tel me ai uas a licu yonga, yu si, and di buais on di stit chout mi a lat, you si? (Pernett y Morales, 69).

If I could read it correctly (damned French…), I’d post a recording, but my current Contemp. Latin America professor happened to be the one that read it, and his face when he got to “que iban a los stiets to bai…” was just wonderful.

If someone (*nudge*, *nudge*, all my Spanish-speaking amis) is inclined to record a reading of this, I’d host it, because it’s all kinds of cool.

Then again, this could just be a case of “simple minds, simple pleasures”…