ON [TOPIC]

I’ve decided to do something a little new en regards to this blog, journal, diary, whatever.

Reading my blog (as it is now) is kind of like eating nothing but Triscuits all day.

Sure, a handful of Triscuits is fine every once in a while. They are dry, and salty, and, uh, texture-y, and have some fiber and fat and shit (figuratively not literally, if you know what I mean), and that’s just what we all need sometimes, but other times I WANT FUCKING PEANUT BUTTER DOUBLE FUDGE FUCKING ICE CREAM. And, honestly. Triscuits have figurative SHIT against ice cream.

In other words: I lack motivation, skill, mojo, and pinache. I need FOCUS. And balls. And ice cream. I just grossed myself out.

I have a cat licking my elbow.

She is a rather cute cat.

OW.

So what I am going to try for awhile (until I forget and grow bored of it or squirrel) is this: FOCUS my entries around a particular topic. On Pizza. On Antagonization. On Hard Cider. On Obama. On Tegan and Sara. On Money. On Guitar Hero. Etc.

So instead of the usual watered-down emo shit like this: “oh my life sucks I can’t find the motivation ’cause I’m all alone and we live in an illiterate backwards religinut hypocritical society blah cheese and blah crackers” and whatnot…

I’m going to try to write something more like this: “On Procrastination. Period. Oh Guitar Hero is just so awesome look at me I know how to press the blue button with my little pinky finger now! Wow look how I have progressed but man does it annoy me when the sounds of the guitar don’t match up with the buttons on the screen wtf am I playing like two different guitar parts at once AND a synthesizer AND a kazoo?!”

Hell, maybe I’ll actually learn something about something this way. And find some of that elusive motivation. And maybe I won’t despise myself as much anymore. And I’ll be a little less alone. And I’ll learn how to be an expert at Guitar Hero. And I’ll probably continue to intentionally speak in incomplete sentences. And this might be a good time to go do all that homework and job-hunting and FAFSA-completing stuff I should be doing instead of writing this. Yeah.

Anyway, I think I’m gonna relax a bit with some Guitar Hero now (and oh, perhaps make myself some pasta and sauce), so, uh, taa-taa~!

On Brainstorming…

NaNoWriMo, bitches!

The most important thing is to keep writing.  No half-assery.  No apologies.  Just, DO IT and GET IT DONE.

Of course I joined the race at the very last minute (in the wee hours of this same morning before bed) so today’s going to be a brainstorming day first and a writing day second.  Hopefully, though, this will be the last day I have to devote so much time to such “productive” procrastination (and junk food… but hey, it’s the day after Halloween, so give me a break!).

NaNoWrimo, bitches!

I had already had in mind the handful of plots I’d choose from for this year’s novel-writing shenanigans. Well, in the last 24 hours, only one seems to be consistently sticking out from that mental list: Chatter. Chatter is an action-dialog sort of schpeel following the intertwining lives of five “crazy” people.  It takes place, for the most part, in a city somewhere between the sizes and atmospheres of Denton and Dallas.  It should be a little reminiscent of Kurt Vonnegut, Chuck Palinuik, Poe, Huxley and Ayn Rand (that’s completely off the top of my head, anyway) in terms of style, plot, and overall feel (if only I felt confident enough to say it could reach the caliber of such authors’ works!).  (In other words: cynical, philosophical, and downright weird.)

I’ve had the most basic and superficial overall plot for Chatter in mind for at least a year, and have even written tidbits of chapters, but for some reason I’ve lacked the inspiration and motivation to flesh the whole thing out.  Well,that laziness ends TODAY ’cause it’s NaNoWriMo, bitches!

I think I have to take another approach to this, and I think I know just what I need to do.  See, I’m a character-driven individual.  I’d probably dig Sims if I had the money to invest in such a game.  I LOVE role-playing, and I was even once one of those dorks painstakingly developing complex characters for online RPG forums (like *cough* X-Men *cough cough*), back in the day (*cough* high-school).  Have characters without plot?  Just give those same characters an environment to share and BAM!  A plot soon develops, if not several.  Have a plot without characters and what’s the bloody point, eh?  Are we living in a ghost-town or what?

So I have in mind the five (six, if we get technical) main characters of the novel and the most basic plot lines which begins and ends with this sentence: “Samuel McCormick has always believed he could fly.” What I’m going to do is write from the P.O.V. from each character in turn, flowing through the course of the basic plot line, adding subplots and details as inspiration kicks in.  The key to this story is character development, character interaction, and plot expansion and connections.  Every day, I will choose which one of the main character’s stories to work on, and then I will work on it, devoting roughly 10,000 words minimum to each character (thus reaching the 50,000 minimum for NaNoWriMo) by the end of the month.