Digital Eclipse

FIRST! Meme from kijikun.
Leave me a comment saying "Resistance is futile."

• I'll respond by asking you five questions so I can satisfy my curiosity
  
• Update your journal with the answers to the questions
  
• Include this explanation in the post and offer to ask other people questions

( My questions )

Next news. I still don't have my hands on Reborn. I am so close to throwing a hissy fit over that, oi. My comic book store absolutely sucks at stocking things. And I mean sucks. They keep selling out the day they get it in, and now they're not getting any more. I'm going to have to trawl around for it. HMPH.

Finally. OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMFG stormseye drew me fanart homg homg homg! Dragons! Steve! Tony! THREADSCARS. You have no idea how happy this makes me. No, really, you don't. It's love and win and so many levels of shiny I could scream and did squee. ♥ Everyone go tell her how amazing she is!

Crossposted to Dreamwidths ohnoz!

( SPN SPOILERS )
( MORE COMPREHENSIVE REACTION!SPOILERS )

(faceplant) I want to edit my NaNo. Badly. Even though I've promised that I'll focus on prompts instead and let that simmer I will never be able to spot wonky characterization without distance! And those prompts won't write themselves! (1.1 rough drafts written!) D: Why do I fail so hard?

I've been inspired to watch the Free Hugs video again. It is ridiculous how that makes me tear up. Yes, yes, I'm an old softy. :D

ANYWHO. I had a topic, but then I discovered that some genius put in a new login management protocol and didn't tell me. How fun. It really would have been nice to know that 5 misfired attempts would lock down a user name for 30 minutes. (headdesk) Way to keep me informed, IT!

Okay, going to make myself write. Really.

Okay lol. Answering this seems a little redundant, since I'm certain I've ranted on the topic of books before. I know that I've gotten into long, frothy, frequently horrible fights with people over it with certain family members. To this day, there are people who don't talk to me because of this. Diving in anyway!

I'm a Bibliophile. My shelves runneth over and all that. I have books shoved into places that were never meant to hold books. So obviously my answer is "NONE". Seriously, there is nothing so harmful, degrading or just weird that someone can't get something good out of reading it. Even the process of reading and enjoying a book for the sake of it is beneficial, especially in places where literacy is low and falling.

I've heard all sorts of arguments for banning some books. I haven't heard one that I can't shoot down. Books on making pipe bombs? Research. Seriously, just as a writer, that's useful knowledge. Since I'm writing Tony Stark a lot lately, I have no doubt that I'm going to end up looking up explosives one day. "Taboo" subjects? Whose taboo? Get back to me when there's a universal. Religion? Sorry, but I actually believe that the Bible belongs on school shelves. Put it right next to the Qur'an, books on neo-paganism, Catholicism, Buddhist texts, Shinto texts, Satansim, the book of Mormon and, for anything that's not in the budget, a computer with internet access. Even the most disgusting, degrading, sexist/racist/ableist/ageist/etc book can be held up as an example of why that's bad.

The thing is, it's not books that are bad. They're things. Things have no inherent value except what we assign to them. The value is in a book is what people do with the knowledge that's in them, and someone who will build a pipe bomb because "they found it in this book" has deeper issues than the library they got the book from. Everyone's heard the old one, "Knowledge is Power". Well, yes. And that's why books scare some people. Its putting power into other peoples hands. Power to choose. Power to be different or the same, as they see fit. Power to do things that other people might disagree with or are uncomfortable with. Some of those things are going to be horrific. Some of them will be miraculous. Most will be just a flip of the page. We can't know which it will be until the book's been opened.

People who advocate banning tend to talk about "society"—we have to protect it, defend it, keep it locked up tight in its little seal so that nothing bad can hurt it. But the really important thing about that sort of attitude is that when you lock the world out, you're also locking yourself in.

It's easy, really easy, to hide away from things that scare us, and gods know that books can be scary. Hold one in your hand and just think of all the potential it has, what it can drive someone to do. That can be terrifying. But giving in to that fear is a form of societal suicide.

So put the books in the student's hands, the skeezy romance novels and the Shakespeare, the Engineering 101 and the Discworld. Maybe they won't change the world. Maybe they will.

And man is that weird. No, seriously, I've spent pretty much all day feeling like I'm procrastinating, when I'm not. Every couple of minutes, I glance down at my task bar and have a moment of confused panic when I don't see a word doc down there. I'm also battling my tactical error of letting people at work know that I'm writing.

Me: \o/ I finished the rough draft! It's done! 53k! (dances to coffee)
John: Oh, that's great! Can I read it?
Me: (stops dancing) ... >>;;; (backs slowly back to my office, coffeeless not making eye contact)

Needless to say, I am a premier source of entertainment for my coworkers, one way or the other. I've gone into stealth mode, on the theory that if they can't see me, they won't be able to ask to read. They know I write fanfiction, and what that is, thanks to Vince who (as he puts it) "spends lots of time in the intertubes". Some of them have even figured out a few of my fandoms. But content? Oh no. Not a clue. And it's staying that way, thank you. I do not want to deal with that fall out.

NaNo is finished with the "cut this, change that, add this" part, and is now going to sit for a while before I fine-tooth comb it. I will resist the temptation to look at it. At no time during this week shall that file be opened! I WILL BE STRONG. (twitches gently)

In the meantime though, because I couldn't get rid of the sensation that I should be writing something, I wrote one of my cap_ironman prompts. I love my prompts, but all three of them are shorties. Not too short, mind, but hard to stretch into a sink your teeth in sort of fic. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing. I just broke my brain with NaNo. Short is sweet. At the same time, I can feel the need to write something more substantial already building. Oh, NaNo, what have you done to me? I have projects that have been started, but nothing feels like it's going, "Write me, write me!"

IDK. I think Nano broke me. D:

Crossposted to Dreamwidths ohnoz!

LIFE! I can pretend to have it! Or something that almost resembles it! \o/

In other words, I finished the rough draft. :D It clocks out at roughly 53k. I honestly thought there would be more to it, but then it just sort of went "okay, done!" and that was that. What, you wanted exacts? Okay, exactly 53,253 words, so I wrote 2,983 words tying this mess up. And then immediately lost about 500 words going back and removing the bits I had highlighted for Do Not Want. I still have some things left to do before setting it aside to simmer for a while. It doesn't feel like I started it a few weeks ago. @.@ Today I mostly fleshed out a few scenes, changed some details that honestly I will only ever care about and removed a shiny vampire power that I consistently forgot about except when I didn't. The only things I really have to do are touch up Pepper's character (it's a little inconsistent), double check some details (damnit Google Maps, be useful!), and systematically wipe out all traces of contractions from my Main Female Villain's dialogue. I may (may) add in a villain wrap up scene; I can't decide if it needs one or not. Eep! And I'm a little concerned that the final scene is too... I don't want to say fluffy. Soppy? Maybe. IDK.

It's really, really weird thinking of this as "rough draft done". A tiny little part of my brain keeps flagging me down and going, "Too soon, too soon!" Tomorrow if I finish with the editing I'm going to try and get started on my cap_ironman holiday prompts. (I have to choose, what?! This is hard already!) >.>

Last excerpts, and then it's all to be edited until I'm sure I got all the wrinkles ironed out. D: D: D: And then beta'd. >> I may end up asking around. My usual beta has been terribly quiet. And, again, DC girl. :o ANYWAY. You guys are love. Hugs all around. Thank you for cheering me on! :D
( Final shots! )

Ow ow head ow. I have a headache the size of Utah right now. x.X An icepack seems to be helping a bit, but still. However, today was interesting, and so I will ramble. Maybe putting thoughts to paper keyboard will ease the pressure on my poor abused lobes.

I woke up today with the most incredibly powerful urge to give Ultimates Tony a kitten. Just to plop one down in his lap and watch the staring match commence. And not even an expensive breed, but an all American alley cat, one of the ones whose mother was probably a stray that happened to be smart enough to have her litter near a soft-hearted human. I have no idea where this urge came from, but it remains to this very moment. I'll get back to you on that.

Anyways, I love my family. A cousin woke me with homemade cinnamon rolls and Starbucks. \o/ We visited for a few hours, and then I did the 'sorry, have novel, will see you for Thanksgiving' thing. And then I wrote. Sort of. I wrote in between fixing a vacuum cleaner, using said vacuum cleaner, washing a dog and doing laundry. Blech. And guess what? Still all action scenes. (headdesk) This may be why my head hurts so badly.

Buuuuut. I did it. *\o/* Today's total is... (drum roll) 50,269! I wrote 3,529 words and I DID IT! WOOHOO!

I only hit two quotas today, and after this, I am out of quotas--not that I'm slowing down. I
am finishing this thing. But I'm also running out of story. I'm finally to the very top of the climax. I have the rest of this scene, and then maybe one or two more to mop up and the rough draft will be done. Then I'll probably start going through and removing the bits that I have highlighted for removal, and then I will let it sit for a week or so while I gain a little objectivity before really editing it.

Which brings me to a question. Do you guys want the daily rambles and excerpts still? There's probably only a few more days of them left, unless things take a massive turn. I would not rule that out, but it seems that my massive turns have been to cut rather than to add, for the most part. I promise I won't be hurt if you guys would rather I shut up and save the spoilers. (crosses heart)

Fiiiiinally, I have something very amusing. I ran what I have through Word's Autosummary. No spoilers, I promise, but the 10 sentence summary of my story is as follows:

Tony!" "Steve?" "Steve." "Steve." "Tony, Tony, Tony. Steve. "Tony?" "Tony..." "Tony." Steve.

(facepalm) Okay, two excerpts for you. Spoilers, etc.
( 50k! VICTORY! )

@.@ I hate writing on weekends. BAH, family. Okay, so they need me, and I love them, but one day I'm going to lock my door and do the emo "playing music really loudly to ignore them while I write angst-tastic things" thing, and that will show them. It might be more effective if the music weren't highly likely to be country.

I meant to post about this before, but it completely slipped my mind. We lost one of the puppies. :( As far as we can tell, Zippo accidentally suffocated and then ate him. (We are assuming he was eaten, seeing as we can't find a body, but we did find a mysteriously bloody spot in a box of old rags, and Zippo had bloody paws.) At least, we're hoping that's the way it happened, because if she just ate him then we're likely to lose another one, and maybe both. She's really bad about not laying on them, though, so maybe...

Anyway, less depressing news: NaNo. Writing wasn't easy today, even taking out family-based reasons, but I think that's because it's combining my two weaknesses: Steve PoV and Action. We are now firmly in the Dramatic Climax arena, though, so there's nothing I can do about that except slog onward. Using the reward system helped a bit (every 100 words I gave myself some mint M&Ms), but not much. The End Is Nigh, however, and it looks like I am actually going to write my very first story that tops 50k. \o/ Unless all of my characters mysteriously die sometime soon, there's almost no way I can tie up the loose threads in less than another 5,000 words. This is very exciting, since previously all of my stories topped out at roughly 20k.

This has been incredibly different from normal writing. Not just in the "sit down, stop whining and keep going" way, since I got used to that back in college, but in the way it developed. Looking back at my now almost completely redundant outline, I had a ton of filler material. The story itself is really pretty straight forward. I also picked an event driven plot, when usually I go for character driven, so that was new (and painful), so I did need a hard outline of what happened in what order, even though I ended up veering wildly from it. But I had room to play, to toddle after a tossed one-liner and see where it went. The characters had room to expand, and dear gods did they expand. I'm noticing patterns in my writing that I never have before (I need to stop using the "he did X, and then he did Y" sentence format), and also finding out things about my own headspace that actually make me feel a little uncomfortable (I enjoy hurting my characters in creative fashions way way way too much).

Even if I end up sitting down in a year, when I have some more objectivity, and deciding that this story is utter crap, I'm glad I did it. It broke my head open and let me poke at all the gooey things that spilled out.

Okay, now that I'm done rambling, totals! Total word count: 46,740, which means I wrote 3,722 words today! Tomorrow, assuming all goes well, I will top 50k. *\o/* I barely managed to touch three quotas, but it counts, so ha! Spoilers, ect, does anyone care or am I just paranoid? Also, warnings! Torture. Violence. Blood.
( Almost there! )

See Icon.

Today was not a good day at all for writing. Not only did words not want to come, but work is finally on to me. Every time words started to happen, I got a phone call that interrupted me just long enough to break the flow. They didn't even have the decency to be real problems. I must have had five variations of "sit on the phone for twenty minutes while someone rambles at me about "I don't know what to do so I click this and then that and I press here and there it goes thanks for your time".

SIGH.

On top of that, I was cold enough that my wrist warmers did nothing. Typing got awkward. I remembered to do my weekly shopping on the way home though, so tomorrow it will be me and wooooooords. Most of today's writing got done at home, really. I hope to hit the golden 50k this weekend. I'm at the downhill part of the battle here, so we'll see. (hopehopehope)

Totals are a bit dismal, compared to the last few days. I hit 43,018 words, so I only wrote 3,002. But you know, that's still more than a single day's quota, and I did manage a quota. So I am content. Also sleepy. But content.

WARNING FOR TRIGGERS. HIGHLIGHT. Torture. Violence. Blood. Suicidal thoughts.
( Only one spoiler. D: )

As posted earlier, Porn Appeared. At Work. This Was Bad. And it really messed up my writing. I was doing so very well, and then I had to skip and it fell apart. Argh. x.X However! I persevered. Just not at work. Work day writing was a nice, long example of Things Not Working. I have two ridiculously tiny and yet necessary scenes to show for it. Tomorrow I'll try to flesh them out a little if I can. I struggled on and reached my personal goal, but only because I kept writing during commercials while I watched Supernatural, and really only stopped writing just before midnight.

I had a horrible realization that my plans for a certain minor character may fall through. Steve doesn't need said minor character, and in fact may end up calling other people. (facepalm) This isn't a big deal, but it kind of sucks because I was looking forward to it. Ah, well.

It is late, and I am a tired Faery, so I will spare you the rambling. Totals! I hit a total word count of 40,016, so I wrote 4,259 words! \o/ ALMOST THERE!
( 3 quotas, 3 excerpts, 1 NSFW )

(headdesk)
( Yelling at Characters )

Today I slept and wrote. Mostly slept lol. I needed it. I seriously don't get nearly enough sleep Monday through Friday, so this Wednesday was a nice little break. The puppies are squirmy and healthy; two boys and a girl. So far I have managed to resist the pressure to move their box into my bedroom. I don't sleep well when I have little ones in my room, so they can stay out in the living room until there's a better reason than "this way you can keep an eye on them".

Tony would like me to report that Goldschläger is indeed very nummy, though he thinks that it should be in a mixed drink rather than sipped from the bottle. I think he's just being picky because he can't have any. BRB, going to mix a drink, just to make Tony stop complaining.

Note to self: cinnamon schnapps and raspberry ice Crystal Lite: weeeeeeird flavor mix. Maybe try coffee next time.

Today's writing wasn't easy by any means. Action Scenes. ARGH. And, as always when I write at home, family does not know how to wait until I am not writing to try and catch my attention. Other than that and a few hiccups (really, Steve, you need to stop pushing so hard, I promise I'll make it better), writing was good. :D

Totals! \o/ Total words: 35,757! Which means that today I wrote 4,880 words! (happy dance) I'm almost there! And since I passed three quotas, you get three excerpts. Spoilers, etc.
( Forward, mighty flist! )

Eventful day was eventful! First, tomorrow is Veterans Day, which means I, as a worker bee at an educational institute, will not be working. I plan to sleep, eat, and write. Not necessarily in that order.

First, Zippo finally popped! @-@ And she did it all over the house. New mothers, sigh. There were four total, but we lost one. :\ The other three are looking a little scrawny, but honestly, they always do. I don't know why. The good news is that it probably wasn't incest. Two of them came out black, and the other is really dark. That suggests that Teddy was the culprit, and thankfully he is not related to Zippo in any way. If anyone is in the Southeastern US area and interested in a companion around, oh, Christmas, PM me please. They're going to need homes, because I am not keeping them. I bring you pictures (with my shiny shiny new camera) under the cut: Before, After, and The Munchkins.
( PUPPEHS )
I also had an interesting talk with my aunt that kind of made me go oO. We were talking about how I was never really a social animal as a kid; I'd find a corner and read or draw rather than share gossip or whatever it is kids do when they're on the playground, and she shared a story. When I was little (okay, for like, 90% of my childhood), I had long hair. My mom, like many moms who have never had long hair, was kind of rough brushing it. She says that one time she asked how I stood it, and I told her that I "go away to a place where it doesn't hurt". That... um. Doesn't sound good to me. o.O; I'm not really worried, but it's just one of those weird things that make you look back on your childhood with new eyes and a wish for a manual of some sort.

I may have also had one of those upsetting moments when you look at a grainy old black and white photo and go "HEY, she's hot!" and then you read the text and find out it's your grandmother. D: TRAUMATIZED. I will get a copy of said pic up one day.

NaNo! NaNo hated me. No, really, I walked away from work today with words that I was certain I'd have to highlight and trash. I had no idea where I was going, wtf the boys were doing, and I was about a thousand words from breaking something--possibly Tony. It Was Not Working. They had veered so far off track that I had no clue what to do with them, and ended up spilling out a day of writing that I believed was horrifically OOC and, worse, would completely neuter a later scene that I actual need! I had huge chunks of text highlighted in green for later removal, and had reached the point where I'd considered randomly killing someone for the sake of plot. It was that bad.

And then I got into one of those conversations that make everything clear up. Well, I say conversation, but what I mean is that I monologued at my cousin until she gave me a solution just to shut me up. Not only did this salvage MASSIVE OOC CHUNKS OF TEXT, but it also moved the story along and gave me a reason to hand Steve some info he'll need for later. I still had to leave some chunks highlighted, but they're only about three hundred, rather than an entire day. So this plot twist around 25k? That's all her. I will name a villain in her honor. Maybe even one that lives. (collapse)

Totals! Today's word count is 30,877! Meaning I wrote 4,031 words, and I don't have to throw away a ton of it! *\o/* I only passed two quotas, but I'm so close to the next one that it's a gimme. :D Excepts/spoilers, of course.
( BOYS CONFUSE ME )

OhgodsIthinkImayhavebrokenmybrainhalpme.

(collapses in a pitiful pile of Faery)

In other words, I think I left my sanity on my other flash drive.

This was a Do Not Want day. I needed Write or Die to get my personal goal before I left work, and I also had to switch PoVs--this was supposed to be Steve, but I guess Tony needed to have his say. If it doesn't work, blah blah, rewrite in December, you know the drill. But I did it! \o/ And then I reached a very important marker: Porn. I didn't realize what I'd stumbled on until I was on my way home from work, innocently pondering what would come next in a story that is veering ever more distant from my outline. Unfortunately, I have a hard rule that Thou Shalt Not Porn At Work. I'm sure everyone understands why. And the porn was next. Not just in a scene or two, but about two paragraphs down the line.

So I sucked it up, got home, and kept writing until the porn was gone. In the process, I stopped being frustrated with Steve and remembered why I actually like his ass. Somehow dinner happened in there, along with rescuing a Very Pregnant dog from where she was wedged under the garden shed. Okay, I think dinner happened. I know it happened for other people. Not too sure about myself. The Freeing Of The Dog definitely did though.

So. Now we come to totals. And this is why I think I broke something. Total words: 26,846. Which means I wrote 4,763 words today. WTF self. I've passed the quota for the 16th—I HAVE PASSED 50%. \o/ AND I'm a week ahead!
( Spoilers: THREE )

Today, I did battle with Captain America, and lemme tell you, he beat the crap out of me. And, incidentally, all shreds of characterization I might have once clung to.

Totals first, then rant! I'm a bit proud of my totals today, for absolutely no valid reason. Words happened, and if they did not happen well, at least they happened at all. Mood music was less WTF (though listening to Broken by Lifehouse on eternal repeat may explain some things right now), and though family still seems to not get the point of "go away and leave me aloooooooone, can you not see I am in an agony of creativity here?!", I think I Did Good. And I managed to make sure I'll have clean clothes this week.

Total Words: 22,083. Daily Words: 3,324. If I keep this up, I should crack 50% by tomorrow. :D My only worry now is making sure the plot lasts that long.
( Spoilery Rantness of Rantsfield )

Today's words brought to you by 13 hours of sleep and Cher. Gods have mercy on me. (hangs head in almost-shame) In other words, I ended up oozing out about fifty words in a hour and decided that mood music might help. WTF THIS IS NOT MOOD MUSIC BRAIN. I had to play this on repeat all day. The second I turned it off, the words stopped coming. I really wonder about myself sometimes.

Other than that, today's big obstacle was family. I've discovered that we have a lingual disconnect. It seems that we've been speaking two different languages in my household, and I've been ignorant of it. Translation issues abounded. "I'm writing, please only bug me for an emergency," in Faery-speak seemingly becomes, "Call me out for every cute thing a dog does," in human-speak. Procrastination methods today again included painting nails (green this time; hopefully my fingers will get the point), bathing a dog and, strangely, vacuuming the hallway. I sort of think I might be coming down sick, if my stuffy nose, slightly blurry vision and mild headache are taken as evidence. A garlic clove took care of the sinuses, at least.

Plot has appeared. Plot has also taken a right turn in Albuquerque. (facepalm) I have to believe that the story knows what it's doing, because I'm starting to think that I don't. There's still a chance to turn it back in the direction it's supposed to be going, but I think at least one surprise scene is going to come out of it. Words are words, I suppose, though knowing wtf they're doing there would be nice.

Word counts! Today, I reached a grand total of 18,759, meaning I wrote 3,152 words! Getting back on track! YAY. Two snatches of fic, again, since I passed two dailies (the 10th and the 11th).
( Actual spoilers, for once! )

Today's words brought to you by Write or Die. Trust me. I wouldn't have hit quota today without it.

Ow. Ow ow my brain ow. Today writing did not want to happen. Okay, so I procrastinated a bit. (A lot.) And I spent my morning on data entry. Then I just sort of... choked. Maybe it's Steve-voice. He's been the perspective on the last several scenes, and Tony is just honestly easier for me. Wherever the block came from, it stood firmly by the river of fic and said, "No. YOU move." So I did. To Write or Die. And behold, there were words!

I am still getting strangely attached to an OC. o.O; Don't know what I'm going to do with him, other than what I'm already doing, but I want to do something. He's already too unique to let fade away. Steve is becoming less pleased with me. I think he realizes that we're almost a third of the way through and get getting started.

Totals! Today's grand total is 15,607 words, which means I wrote 2,243 words. Passed the daily minimum, but it's not my greatest. @.@ Stupid writer's block...

Ohgods, I just realized that I just finished (planned) scene 4 of 29 in my outline. And we're only at 15k. D: NO FAIR. (falls over) Spoilers below. I think I'm going to go soak my brain in warm water or something.
( You know the drill by now. Spoilers, etc etc )

This is not a post.

DO WANT.

And will have. WILL. (broods) clex_monkie89 Pointed it out to me. I love being suspiciously well-known by my friends. :D

Okay, back to data entry.

Crossposted to Dreamwidths ohnoz!

Remember yesterday's prediction? Well, it happened. In spades. I think I can feel my brain melting from crunching things into a database for six hours. Ow ow ow. And I'm still not done. You see, Kim who was supposed to show me what to do, lovely lovely Kim who is getting an eraser from me for winter because of this, didn't show up until 11. This meant that I got a very late start on a very headache-inducing project and, thus, had no time to write. Tomorrow will hopefully be better.

So, what I did, was I rushed home and somehow managed to squish myself into writing. Sort of. I'm pretty sure I have an entire scene that has no point other than Jan being catty and Steve being broody. Oh, and a half-scene where I may be falling in love with a taxi driver. >>;

Totals are not the love they could have been. 13,364 is the new total word count, means I only wrote 1,329 words. However, the total due by the 8th is 13,336, so I managed to break that open.

I need sleep. @.@ Except, only one, but nothing exciting was written today, so I warn you: don't expect much.
( Spoilers, of course )