Black Dog Blog

Archive for the ‘writing’ Category

Turns out you can't create multiple accounts on a Drupal site using the same OpenID identity (including if you stay logged in to your OpenID provider while trying to create/log into another account).

This is a Good Thing for Pro 2.0. We'll be enforcing the "one account, many character sub-accounts" model. You won't need separate accounts¹, and they won't be allowed.

This isn't how it's done among the old Viners who liked to pretend to be different people, but we're more about openness (no secret admin accounts, for example) and ownership of our own work – which is why our copyright rules are as they are. I try to keep those values in mind when making decisions.

¹ This software limitation does mean that I can't easily create a separate superuser account, as would be recommended practice, but I'm used to using messageboard software with the same limitation…

Electroshock collars banned in Wales. Ha! In your FACE, Cesar Milan!

Sheepies in the snow

Taking home leftovers from work parties can be bad for you, Ancient Egyptians find.

Stemming blood flow to the arm protects heart during attack. Not sure if I'd dare do this as part of my first aiding…

Naughty tigie behaviour. Remind anyone else of The Life of Pi?

'Most unfortunate names' revealed. How I adore puns.

Personally, I've come across the name Pritti Mistry – which is quite sweet, actually – and know of a Jane Eyre in my family history. Of late, I have persuaded a Ms Robson of my acquaintance to call her first son Jerome. (Luckily, I'm sure she'll forget long before she should have this opportunity.)

And as a Baskerville, don't think I have considered adopting a Howard or Howell. Not that a wolfhound would understand the intricacies of wordplay, so it wouldn't be cruel.

Is Switzerland a hotbed of "Zionism and foreign aggression", then?

Children 'over-exposed to sexual imagery'. I saw Dr. Papadopoulos interviewed on breakfast news this morning. Amazingly, it was a good interview (though dumbed-down, as usual). I can't see that clip online; here's another video report on early exposure to sexualised imagery.

No, I'm not talking about gay boys, although you could say I am something of a fairy in that sense (and vaguely proud of it), and also sometimes quite boring.

No, I mean the other fairies. The little winged gobshites.

So some people love cute little fairies. Some other people are into the dark, sinister side to fairies (which, when you think about it for more than a second, ARE bloody scary).

I just don't engage with the concept of fairies/faeries/fae/fairfolk on any level. They bore me and – well, they do repulse me, but in an unemotional way (since even hating or being scared of them would still be some kind of reaction, whereas they don't grab me in any way).

I suppose it's partly the "small humanoid" angle that totally turns off any sympathy, interest or engagement that I would have in abundance for any animal creature. I don't know. I've just never had any interest in fairies.

I actually stopped reading the Harry Dresden books because they degenerated into "whee, fairies fairies fairies and more bloody fairies I'm so cool, oh and just to turn Mutt completely off, let's add a knight prat who's so pure and Has Faith and wields a Magic Sword of Faith". (Well, that and it got boring seeing Harry get beaten half to death every book without fail and still pull some magic whupass out of his arse.) Shame, because the writing in the books is really pretty OK, the wisecracks are excellent and I do like the hardboiled genre.

But yes, fairies. They don't do it for me. I tend to hate anything with them in. The one exception I've found is Pratchett's Lords and Ladies, which is at least a very complete and competent treatment of the idea, explicitly drawing them as personalityless (an important angle for me) as well as the usual cruel, feline flibbertigibbets.

(Next time, maybe: why Tolkien-D&D-style elves are boring. Or maybe why prats with swords are boring. Then, that selection probably leaving basically nothing in the genre of fantasy for me to read, I'll have to think of some sci-fi things I find hackneyed.)

(Oh, and just in case: I don't actually expect other people to change their interests/writing styles based on my opinion. Hell, somebody go off and tread some genuinely new writerly ground with the idea and I promise I'll be happy you've made boringness into a topic that I can actually enjoy…)

Milli-grandiloquent
Herm 'Hellmutt' Baskerville,
Having a crack at a
new form of verse,

Blames double dactyls for
brashly inciting a
sesquipedalian
poet to worse.

Interesting form. Can't say it's one I'd normally have tried… although it looks like it'd be great for comic nonsense poetry, my favourite genre.

Yummy article about the conlang (constructed language) in the Avatar film.

Part of a comment I posted to Platitude of the Day.

As someone who 'creates' by writing fantasy/scifi as a hobby, I was struck by the Bish's statement "that it is of the nature of love, whether human or divine, to be creative". (What does that say about high-fantasy authors who make up planets and then make them fight for our entertainment? Eh, Tolkien? Looking at you, Feist!)

I've had a creative urge all my life – not to pass on my genes, but to pass on my memes… you could say, to have brainchildren!

This dichotomyduality has found its way into various bits of my writing – but not as the either/or thing it is for me personally. I just like memes. And to have a culture where your ideas are your pseudo-children and are imagined to breed with other people's ideas… much more exciting than terrestrial intellectual property law, right?

(The concept of "murder your babies" takes on an interesting additional angle when it comes to a magoscientist announcing that hir theory is wrong.)

Alluring Swiper realised now that attacking an entire crew of pirates had been somewhat ambitious.
Sankmarray: Clouded Hearts (section two of about five). © 2009 Herm Baskerville, all rights reserved.

In other words: Part Two is complete, yay!

Brrrr. I'm either ill or just vaguely run down after this week, which has been kind of a doozy. Last night I was completely out of it, and I mean unable to talk, let alone do anything else; symptoms that, when I flipped back through my mental notebook, I found next to a pencilled annotation reading "←Stress?"

I hope taking it sedentary over this weekend will get me back on my feet, but the cold weather isn't helping. I don't want to go for walks or do anything but huddle with hot water bottles. I definitely hope I won't be ill-definedly sickish all this winter, because the novelty there wears off fast, I can tell you from experience.

NaNoWriMo writing has completely stalled. I won't make the 50k, that's a given, but I'll easily get to 30k over the weekend. Heck, just writing up what I've handwritten on my tram journeys should take care of that.

All that's still to go on Part Two, after transcribing my own handwriting, is some wrapping up on Taupeshank's side. Taupe needs to realise in what ways pe's been rather silly, while Alluring… well. Let's face it. Alluring Swiper isn't learning any Important Moral Lessons any time soon. Alluring considers nerself far too fabulous for Important Moral Lessons.

Lest anyone accuse me of writing only heroes I agree with 100%, this section features binge drinking, the afore-alluded ass-headedness and a downright fist fight. Part Three features FIRE! Also bribery, but mainly FIRE. (Could fire really be a problem on a planet that's 95% water? You bet.)

As of tonight, I've finished rewriting the short story I wrote last year, which is forming Part One of Sankmarray-the-Novel. Yep, the cheaty part is over. We're now in uncharted waters.

And to prevent myself from being show-stoppingly nervous about continuing to write in said uncharted waters, I made sure to write the first bit of Part Two before I stopped.

I'm now at 11,938 words. *writerly glow*

I'm aiming for roughly 2000 words a day, i.e. a 60k word book (because I hate messy numbers like 1667, and anyway Mews turned out at just over 60k, so there).

By that projected total and my current word count, I should be a fifth of the way through the story now. Since I've only just reached the end of Part One, and I don't know how long the other parts will turn out (or even how I'll end up dividing the rest of the plot outline into sections yet), I have no idea if this is accurate. It feels awfully odd that my 'short' story, with a lot of crap taken out and only a couple of thousand words added overall, is technically a fifth of a novel. But, well, to be honest, I suspect this is going to be a rather long book.

The first of two books, I remind myself…

I'll shortly be contacting the people who offered to alpha read and probably have no idea what they're letting themselves in for (er, well, Anke and Vespers probably do, so they really do have no excuse whatsoever). For the rest of you, there's a second excerpt up now at my NaNoWriMo profile. This one shows a little more of the worldbuilding, and a tiny bit of Roseeye, the piratical first mate, of whom I'm rather fond.

Let me warn you now that I may not keep up with friends' blogs, Twitter etc this month. If you need me for anything and aren't sure I've noticed, drop me an email or wave.

First day of writing went OK…ish. I'm not sure. To begin with I'm rewriting a short story I wrote last year, which is forming the opening stages of the book. This is difficult (because details have changed and the nuances of the characters likewise), but also ought to be easier than staring at a blank page. What I'd really like is to burn through this part and get into uncharted waters.

Excerpts may be posted up, or there may be some kind of closed alpha reader scheme. I haven't decided how I'm going to work this yet.

So, it's official: I'm doing NaNo this year (my profile), and it happens I have next week booked off from work (having had a lot of leave days to use up) to get a good head start.

My outline is shaping up but there are huge blank areas, and I'm no good at changing plots on the fly; in order to write easily, I have to have a rough outline nailed down. By tomorrow night. This is where you can help – and all you have to do is fill in the blank:

Well, Herm, knowing that you're going to write a very silly novel about pirates and ninjas (and dinosaurs and robots), I would be very disappointed if _____________ doesn't happen at some point!

When I finalise the outline, I'll make an honest attempt at working in all of your ideas that don't clash with what I've already decided. If they don't fit in the first book of the duology, they still might get into the second (particularly if they're ideas related to the dinosaur-men and the robots).

This is your chance to weasel your silly ideas into the Sankmarray Duology! You'll be doing us all a favour: me, by helping with the plot and giving me a challenge, and yourself and the rest of the world, by making it more fun to read.

Read the rest of this entry »

I've just caught a half-hour meeting (off the clock, of course, because I'm working a bit later this afternoon before Magers meeting) with a work friend to bounce some ideas off her for Sankmarray, my NaNoWriMo brainfoetus.

I think that went well. Ex…cept that she's persuaded me that what I have here is TWO books, not one.

She's right, I can see she's right, and at a stroke she's taken it from one not-really-ready book to one ready book and one not-ready book, but… two books is two-thirds of a TRILOGY, and… that makes you a real writer, and…

Wait a minute! That sneaky coworker! She just wants more books!!!

She also likes Taupeshank very much from my brief sketch of pim (both literal and verbal). This is good.

• Wow, science: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/8297467.stm I thought every schoolchild knew the Romanovs had haemophilia! Ra ra Rasputin. #
• Damn, Obama, don't you dare peak too early now. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8298580.stm #
• Graze are trying to win me over with pecans and honey cashews. Bam, headshot. #
• UK fruit and nut lovers, try http://www.graze.com – natural food to your desk. Use this code to get a free box: MDNP1VFL – please RT! #
• Wondering "Has this section already been reviewed, or did I just code it incredibly well in the first place?" From clues, I think latter… #
• Cannot stop listening to http://bit.ly/Xgqx6 – which is particularly stupid because I should be heading home. (wakawaka) #
• I've been saying to the cat things like "Well, you've had a good innings". You should see the look of terror on its stupid face. #

New character. Like her?

• #vss Mags sheathed her rapier and mopped her brow. Her groaning opponent staggered off. He'd hoped her offer of a workout was a euphemism… #
• #vss The perfect marriage. They never spoke; Mags led his troops; he entertained her mother. She'd met his lover. He didn't know about hers. #
• #vss Mags was a mediocre Rockaferry player, but did all right provided she could play as White. Or cheat while her opponent bought drinks. #
• #vss Her cackling laugh earned her the sobriquet 'The Magpie Countess'. Mags obliged by dressing in black and white and laughing often. #

Three new shortish updates since last post. I'm going for little and often so I don't lose the momentum.

In this update:

• The perennial disorganisation of genius!
• Find out what Mistake considers important enough to swear on!
• And, lots of lovely murder!

"And don't try telling me she's suddenly discovered her maternal side, 'cause she hasn't got one."

OMG, the drama reaches lava pitch!

Letters page of Life academic journal, issue 134 [PDF]

A little background material for Profusion. >:)

(SPOT THE SUITOV!)

High Flight, for those new to the maze of footless twisty hallways of my head, is one of my favourite poems, about the joy of being a pilot. I'm not alone: pilots and astronauts everywhere find it touching, and according to Wikipedia "it is required to be recited by memory by first-year cadets at the United States Air Force Academy" (way to buzz-kill, USAF).

YouTube: Old US television channel sign-off: setting of High Flight to footage of PLANES! :D

The reading and music in that clip don't do anything for me; the overall effect's a bit corny (not too much, though, just to the extent that even the most dignified American things are). They're nice plane clips, though. Reading subtitles of the poem along to those would probably be quite uplifting.

I'm not old enough to remember channel sign-offs (not because I wasn't born, but because I don't have much memory). This one is from 1986, the year my little brother was born. I believe our ones in the UK had the national anthem or Big Ben or something…

My little love affair with planes has never been requited (thanks to my rubbish eyesight) or consummated, other than one short flight we took at Space Camp where I experienced weightlessness for a short time. That's discounting international flights, of course, which are to jet fighters what the number 42 is to a Formula One car.

In an amusing coinkydink, jet fighter duels are commonly called "dogfights". Hmmm…