Archive for December, 2009

Titanium Spork

Thursday, December 31st, 2009

spork I recently found C.J. Redwine’s blog, The Last Word, which is laugh out loud funny, by the way.

And now I NEED a titanium spork. And it’s all her fault. I never knew they existed before.

Coincidentally, I had already written a spork into the future-earth novel I’m working on. I figure if they’re low on resources, why have both spoons and forks when you can combine ‘em into one uber useful, weird looking utensil.

I wonder if there’s a 12 step program for sudden spork cravings, or if I should just give in and get one.

Make that two – one for me and one for Dave.

Then we could have spork fights.

“My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to get your heart carved out with a spork.”

Yeah, that’s how it should have gone.

Posted in ramblings | 2 Comments »

Cephalopods

Monday, December 28th, 2009

Is it octopus, octopuses, or octopi? Whatever the proper plural (the Oxford dictionary suggests octopodes as correct), the intelligence they’ve displayed is fascinating. It makes you wonder whether they would consider that we are intelligent from the evidence they’ve seen.

Isn’t it intelligent to try to escape captivity?

Nakase said that on each of its three escape attempts, the octopus had to climb out of its tank on the second level of a shelving unit and scramble down two shelves to get to the floor. On one occasion the octopus was found next to a drain on the floor, 15 feet from its tank.

Simon said if not detected, the octopus could have successfully escaped from the facility to rejoin its kind in the sea.

“REEF has a flow-through sea water system installed,” Simon said. “If the octopus had found its way into that, it could have easily escaped back into the waters at Campus Point.”

And here’s a recent article on how they can make their own homes out of coconuts. And I can’t help thinking that I really should follow the article’s suggestion and sculpt an octopus purse to start the trend ;)

Next, we’ll find that sea sponges really do live in pineapples. And I’d be fine with that, as long as they don’t have Sponge Bob’s hideously annoying laugh :)

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Subtle Biases

Thursday, December 17th, 2009

Sexism isn’t normally something I’d post about, but this post really caught me. It seems that James of the popular writing blog Men with Pens, is actually a woman.

Reading her story makes me admire her guts, but the fact that she disguised her gender because she made twice as much freelance writing with a male pen name, well– that really makes you think.

I’ve never suffered any obvious discrimination because I’m a woman. If anything it worked in my favor. I was usually the only girl in my college Computer Engineering classes. I did feel a little awkward in a room full of guys when it came time to pick lab partners, but that wasn’t because of anything anybody else did. I feel awkward in a group of strangers anyway…

I’m not a rabid feminist. I’ll stick up for myself and being treated equally, but I don’t think men are evil. If a man wants to hold a door open for me, I’ll say thanks, and do the same for him the next time I reach the door first. I’ve never seen any reason why chivalry can’t work both ways.

I thought we were getting past this sort of thing. Seeing proof that this sort of subtle, unmeasurable, possibly even unconscious, discrimination still exists–based solely on the difference of a name on the internet… it hurts a little.

But I also can’t help thinking that a slightly fictionalized version of this story would make a great movie :)

Posted in news, writing | 4 Comments »

Novel Art Collaboration

Tuesday, December 15th, 2009

I thought this was interesting… Novelist Holly Lisle is writing the first draft of a story, and emailing it out to her fans. She’s also collaborating with her daughter, Rebecca Galardo, who is creating jewelry and artifacts to go along with the story.

I’ve always heard that art sells better with a story behind it, but this is the first time I’ve seen it taken so literally.

You can see the first limited edition up on Etsy. The cool thing (to me) is that the original was made in polymer clay.

Btw, I’d recommend signing up for the story if you like fantasy with a bit of an edge and tiger shape shifters. It’s caught me so far and I can’t wait to see what she writes next.

Posted in art, business and promotion, news, writing | No Comments »

Writing Software – Page Four

Monday, December 7th, 2009

Supposedly Scrivener is the writing software to use if you’re on a Mac. But I’m not.

I use something called Page Four. I could just use Word, or any text editor but I really like the way I can break my project into chapters and scenes with Page Four. It allows you to add as many folders and pages/files as you want.

I’ve set my novel up so I’ve got one folder for outlines, world building notes, etc, and then a folder for each chapter. If I want to move a scene from one chapter to another, it’s a simple drag and drop – then I just have to do a little editing on the transitions. It’s come in very handy when I want to restructure a story without getting lost.

It’s a fairly simple editor, without too many bells and whistles, but how many times do you use all the crazy stuff Word can do anyway? It saves files in RTF format and they can be exported as one file into Word if you want, when you get to your final draft. It will also archive versions and you can take snapshots if you want.

You can try it out for free (limited by number of pages), and it’s relatively inexpensive. (Note – I have no affiliation. I just bought a copy awhile ago and really like it.)

Page Four - my NaNo novel

Page Four - my NaNo novel

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Still Writing

Sunday, December 6th, 2009

I got to my goal for NaNo, but the book isn’t done. It’s been giving me a little trouble actually. I’ve been stuck because I didn’t know what happened next. I’d gone off track – the story veered far enough that it looked like my original ending wasn’t going to work – but I didn’t know what to do instead.

I think I’ve finally figured it out. I had to delete one major scene, and restructure a couple others. I also added a new scene with a grizzly bear and her two cubs. Every futuristic story needs a bear attack, right? :)

I’m at 58,000+ words right now, although that’s including the deleted scenes – they’re in a cuts folder in case I end up using anything from them. The most important thing is that I’ve been writing again and making progress. It’s back to fun again.

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