anachred

Not-So-Birthday Present Unexpected Success!

When my bro told me he was D.O.N.E. working on our Lord of the Rings fan music, I understood. I just thought there was plenty of room in the project...
Yesterday, though, he came home with an idea for a revamp of our Ents song. The improved version gave me chills.

Entmarch

Best played with bass boost!
Seriously, this made me see that scene of the Entmoot moving out to wreak havoc on Isengard so strong.
And it rocketed to #40 on Soundclick's Goth Rock list...out of 4000, so not a huge deal, but someone's listened to it, right?

So I'm not just plugging my own band, here:

Indie Music Recommendation of the Day:

Heather Dale, whose Arthuriana themed songs I link below because they are great. (If you like, I also recommend her song "Exile")
Mordred's Lullaby
Kingsword


As a third topic,
My Birthday Wish for this Year:
Let's go with...starting to seem like I'm in my 20s to people.
Or at least close, like 18-19.


We can dream, right?

I just found out that Robert Pattinson was born the day after I was.


"Found out" is less dubious than it sounds: I couldn't for the life of me remember who played Edward Cullen (I have a vicious head-cold) who is being dissed in "Backlash Girls" and came across that info on IMDB.com.

I knew we were the same age (I like to keep these things straight) but how did I miss that birthdate? I home in on the phrase "May 1986" like it'll crack some cosmic code in my life...

Rambling Japanese Nostalgia Post

While reading the manga "Aishiteruze Baby" (Love Ya, Baby) [a completed series--is it sad that I am suckered in by that status now?]

there was a sequence where the high school characters are on a school trip. The developments involved are uninteresting out of context but there was one page that brought to mind a vivid memory I hadn't seen in a while.
(Am I the only one who feels that way about memories, that you "see" them, and seeing them is something you should do every once in a while so you don't forget?)

I went on the school trip to Tokyo when I was in Japanese middle school. I got to see the Japanese Diet building, real live Monet paintings, one of the historic temples, and the Japanese production of The Lion King.

Between these moments, however, I was with a class of middle school kids.

The first night we spent we were in a more traditional hotel--that is, mats on the floor. Over fifty girls in one big room. Things didn't settle down before I went to sleep, and I didn't sleep particularly soundly. So sometime in the small hours of the night I was debating going to the bathroom. I sat half-awake for a while. Ayaka (who sat close to me in class) started to get up, and I joined her. I think I didn't even know where the bathroom was, which since my Japanese wasn't really great yet was a terrifying prospect. I don't remember, but I may have been agonizing until I saw she was going.

We dared the hallways. Found the girls' room, only to cross paths with Shinya leaving the boys', giggling as he made a dash for somewhere else.

When Ayaka and I met up at the sinks, we looked at each other's sleep-puffy faces, and at least I was thinking of how mortifying it was to be seen like this. A teacher yelled from down the hall. More guy-giggling. Shinya's goofy-sounding voice, too (he'd clearly not tried to sleep yet).

I journaled about this, mostly to keep that memory. The sheepish smile across the mirror at a girl who was always so together when she got to school, without her glasses or hair done, the feeling of dismay and disapproval about the guys still running around and surprising poor half-asleep girls on their way to the wash room.

There were a lot of things to that were good about that trip--but that was one of the best, because I felt like just a girl, for once, not the red-headed outsider. Ayaka and me.

...and Shinya. Thanks for that, buddy.

"Orson Scott Card sold a new steampunk series aimed directly at the YA market to Anica Rissi at Simon & Schuster's Pulse. Agent Barbara Bova of the Barbara Bova Literary Agency sold World English rights to the first three books in the as-yet-untitled series, which is scheduled to debut, in hardcover, in Spring 2011."   {rest of the article}


On the homepage at SFScope, which also has really relieving article about Realms of Fantasy's sale (!) that will keep it from going under.


But still moreso Orson Scott Card working on a YA steampunk fantasy!

This is right up there with the Colfer sequel for Hitchhiker's Guide...




In thematically related news of less import: I am currently working on my Asian-Cowboy-Punk outfit, for the con perhaps. Draft pictures to come soon?

“Some authors seem to have a fairly specific internal age; very likely it's the age they remember best from their own childhoods. When they write for this age, it sounds right; it feels right. Their characters' thoughts and speech and action feel inimitably their own, which comes both from the author's deep empathetic connection to the characters, and from the respect that empathy engenders.”

~ Editorial Anonymous, a great children's book industry blog


This made me think a bit. Particularly about the glee with which I wrote The Carnie's Conspiracy, to me a Middle-Grade novel.

Realistically, I was pretty much in literacy what I am today by 13. I was not able to write up to my ability to comprehend, and I now enjoy Jane Austen's books and others with a much better sense of nuance and humor.

However. It makes me curious. Have I been writing too old for myself?
...I wrote a picture book the other day.

Randomized Song Response Whoseemawhatsit:

IF SOMEONE SAYS "IS THIS OKAY" YOU SAY?
Pressing On

WHAT WOULD BEST DESCRIBE YOUR PERSONALITY?
Arch to Achilles

WHAT DO YOU LIKE IN A GUY/GIRL?
Boy on a String

WHAT IS YOUR LIFE'S PURPOSE?
More Love, More Power

WHAT IS YOUR MOTTO?
Simon


( In Which Some Can Make Sense, Some are Humorous, and Some Leave the Imagination Blank )

Newsflash!

I am writing a Zombie Boyfriend story.

It is SRiuS, and probably awful.

However, it is eating up my brains, so I've gotta write it!
(Plus, there's a little forum contest that got me started.)

Inspiration and accomplishment are such bizarre things with subjective stuff like writing.

Went to the newspaper museum in Collinsville yesterday--my second time. But I learned everything over again.
I hope I'm not the only one who can hold information better the second time...

One of the crazier things is the 1916 arrival: a keyboard type creator--you could type in a row of text, which would then be made into a mold for hot lead to set in. It was a great invention, cutting labor hours of picking out each letter and setting it.

I'd forgotten seeing that.

Hopefully this time I'll put it in my brain in a way that I can access it when The Cool is needed for either historical detail or a punch of wild stuff that takes on a fantastic life of its own.

I need to go back and photograph a bunch more about it. It's a dark, messy little corner of the world, but that makes a lot of sense.

Feeling kind of manic-depressive recently
...but then  there's stuff to be thrilled about and stuff to cry about.

I haven't felt this edgy toward the emotions since I was...a teen, really.

Salon tonight! Don't expect too many people, but I plan to give a good time. Despite the whole parallel emotions thing.


Break for: DAY IN THE LIFE featurette:
STEVE @ Steve's Saturday Store:
Enjoying the cold weather?
ME:          Oh yes, very bracing! [miming hypothermia]
STEVE:  Uh-oh, you're showing your intelligence there. I've never heard a kid your age use the word bracing.
ME:          And what do you think is my age?
STEVE:  Doesn't matter, using the word bracing at all shows me you're intelligent.
ME:          I am a writer...  {I rarely use this excuse, but it's polite to let the age thing slide..}
STEVE:  My son's a writer too! And he talks like that all the time. He's teaching English now, at a junior high in Tulsa.
ME:          All the more power to him.
STEVE:  Where do you go to school?
ME:          I...don't go to school. [letting him squirm.]
STEVE:  How old are you?
ME:          22. Actually.
STEVE:  Oh. I wouldn't never have thought...

Yes. Yes, I know you would never.
We then have the inevitable "you will be so tickled to look younger when you're older" conversation, in which I politely disbelieve that continuing to look 15 is in any way a boon in life. Or that it means I will look 30 when I'm 40.

      Well, I certainly didn't intend to spend New Year's Eve day in bed, napping, reading. and watching a lion's share of the BBC miniseries Pride and Prejudice. But I did. It would have been fun, too, if I hadn't felt like my throat was playing Judgment Day and not looking with grace on all my sins.
      (Apparently, my immune system DID notice all that sugar.)

New Year's Day I was generally done with living in my pajamas, and instead wrote 10 pages of The Return of Mr. Birch.
This may not seem monumental, but I'd been going about three sentences at a time before.

It also now sounds like I've been watching too many Austen dramatizations (this is true), but at least the plot's begun to move.

Win some, lose some.



Quick, what do Haku and my yarn have in common?
...too late. Beautiful colors, is what. I love interdisciplinary geekhood.







(Question to ponder: why we can't have a kissing scene
for *this* guy in Sense&Sensibility? Even as a deleted
scene?)
(This is a rhetorical question. The world is just cruel,
I know that.)

I love reading other peoples' first lines, now I know the game, so follow suit! What did you say first in every month of 2008?

Today I'm working on a stupid little non-speculative story in which a Japanese girl impersonates an emo-boy to get into a band.

This week, I revealed to my friend the wonders of Hayao Miyazaki.

So I really did want to do this meme which is  you comment on a friend's blog, and they pick 7 of your interests to hear you out on. If you've already done this, then I'll pick a few for you to comment here on. rowana tagged me for:

anne shirley, anthropology, beowulf, frances hodgson burnett, global nomad, prince charming and urban legends

 I like picking out titles from stories I'm working on. It's not just a gimmick that makes me feel clever (no doubt leaving everyone confused and uninterested: my specialty) but it helps me pick out the writing that conveys the essence of the story in a short bit.

 

I had a thought (which I think is a good one) about revision, about the mechanics of it. My hypothesis:

It requires the same creative synthesis of information to process critiques into a plan to revise as it does to write a story.

 

So, gentle reader, you won't be hearing from me in a while. *smallest violin wailing in background* I'm house-sitting and I'm not positive I'll be able to access the LifeFeed--not like I've had much of profundity to share lately, anyway.

 

 This morning I noted the llama was looking into my window, past an onion blossom.

 

I was thinking about the resurgence of the Gothic themes (in urban fantasy particularly) is interesting, and how children's literature has gone back even closer to it's forebears in terms of Gothic plotting and setting (Theodosia and the Serpents of Chaos, Lemony Snickett, Flora Segunda).

Rewriting.

 

There are good books, and there are books that are a slightly unpleasant hit of strong stuff, stuff too strong for me.

 

 Happy November!

I did get to write a little PrePoisson this morning before work.

 

 Since we last spoke, I have taken up Irish Step Dancing.

Going to Japanese school isn't something I usually mention in a positive light, but the oddest things will make you nostalgic. This is a youth choir from Singapore, it looks like, but they're singing a theme song from Spirited Away, and it looks oh-so-familiar...
My school, Yonezawa 2nd Middle School (Nichu) was fairly accomplished musically and each homeroom formed a choir for annual competitions.

And then I go and listen to this song, which makes me less warm-fuzzies-nostalgic, and more oh-isn't-the-world-bittersweet-beautiful, which almost leads to tears. You need to go hear it, obviously.

Joe Hisaishi does a brilliant job using Western classical influences to create a score that works with film the way we expect it, and yet making it mesh so well with Japanese themes, with the additions of traditional instruments and musical conventions. I think he has had a lot of fun scoring for the various projects Miyazaki has created. After all, it ranges from WWII Europe, to Steampunk Whereever, to Ancient Japan, and Modern Tokyo...

Sometimes you just dream that your life will have the same sort of breadth as the people you look up to, even if you can't compete with them in their chosen field.

Thanks for helping me out with these shoaly bits of my work here. In appreciation, I offer you a completely randomized poem, to lighten things up...
 

( Song First Line game )

 

So I do give off geek-chick vibes somewhat. I'm not always sure if I do. I need to hang out in the B&N on 81st in Tulsa more often--it has become obvious to me that I am wasted on Claremore.

Not that I necessarily want to be hit on by baristas more often, or anything. It's just fun to feel like you're not hopelessly outclassed by cowgirls and secretaries, because you have a ...reading habit.

Impetus

"Uncle Jim" James D. McDonald noted in his Absolute Write boards Writing Class thread that there's a climax he's been writing toward for 20 years. "Someday I'll get there," he said.

Basically, there's a climactic scene in his head that he's never written the book for--but it's started him in the right direction for a lot of other stories.

This may seem bizarre, but I wonder if this isn't rather commonplace? There's some ephemeral tone you want a story to be--and though what you end up with is *right* for the story you wrote, you still want that other tone in something else. Or characters.

These two are things I have experienced this with: characters and atmospheres.
( Know what I'm talking about? )

Today was my first day to not be sore from dancing,

even though I did practice yesterday.
My face is showing the exercise already, a trait I certainly cherish.
Keep it at it! the mirror says.

I also have sold 2 skeins of handspun yarn in the last two days, my first ever.


(Actually *this* yarn, whereas the feet above...not so much.)

These things (with some other random stuff) seemed to be designed encouragement for me, because there is something else in my life right now that just...whoa. Not good.
A lot of little happy stuff outweighs one hard thing for me, though. I'm cruisin'.

I'm going through Poisson No. 1 in my first sweep. Beware, lures to Beta, soon!

Since we last spoke, I have taken up Irish Step Dancing.



This is not actually a sudden development. I ordered this DVD from the library, because my sister was complaining about never getting to take lessons, yadda~yadda~day. It's been kinda nice to have the exercise in my muscles, to feel all stretchy. Also, to see that though it's been nearly 10 years since I actually danced I still have a certain amount of form. (I did NOT do Irish Step Dancing. I am not that cool. I did Scottish Highland Dance, which is a very different kind of cool.)

It's been REALLY nice to spend a half-hour or more toasty warm the past two days.

***

Because I am *finally* getting around to reading the YA edition of Coyote Wild...
If you're in need of a belly laugh (which the winter doldrums really crave) read Sarah Rees Brennan ( sarahtales  ) story An Old-Fashioned Unicorn's Guide to Courtship. Oh man. This story reads like Tough Guide to Fantasyland...only funnier, because it's a real narrative.


After that, or to warm up, read When Lina Went on the Lam, byjeffsoesbe  (Sorry I took so long, Jeff! It's fabulous!)

The whole edition is worth a read, but I love Rosamund Hodge's series she's been doing for them--you'll have to go into the archives for the first, but YA edition includes "I Heard the Angels Singing, Each to Each"

My warning is, these stories seem to take forever to load. That could be Mr. Foyil Internet, who is a flake. I dunno.

***

And now to share Today's Hottest Procrastination Tool, I would like to introduce you to The Typealyzer.

This Blog Placed as:

ESFP - The Performers

The entertaining and friendly type. They are especially attuned to pleasure and beauty and like to fill their surroundings with soft fabrics, bright colors and sweet smells. They live in the present moment and don´t like to plan ahead - they are always in risk of exhausting themselves.

They enjoy work that makes them able to help other people in a concrete and visible way. They tend to avoid conflicts and rarely initiate confrontation - qualities that can make it hard for them in management positions.


Which really surprised me. I went and tested my old blog, which I felt was much more fluffy, feely, introverted.

It got:

ISTP - The Mechanics

The independent and problem-solving type. They are especially attuned to the demands of the moment are masters of responding to challenges that arise spontaneously. They generally prefer to think things out for themselves and often avoid inter-personal conflicts.

The Mechanics enjoy working together with other independent and highly skilled people and often like seek fun and action both in their work and personal life. They enjoy adventure and risk such as in driving race cars or working as policemen and firefighters.

Well, I guess fluffy wasn't quite the net effect?
I leave you to determine whether this Time Loss therapy is right for you.

In case you wondered, I know what my Myers-Briggs type is, and am pretty happy with it's description--and it is neither of those.
I wonder what my writing would score?
I think my stories are much more *something* than I am, anyway...

I went to the second big-name concert I've ever been to last night.

Figures, we kept Tulsa up.
Apologies, Tulsa.
*what were you doing asleep before 11? this is not natural, this is not like you...*

Thing is, the Newsboys are kinda big deal.
I've been hearing about them since I was conscious of music as something that some people were really famous for making up. (Younger than 9, possibly 7.)
My brother took his bass playing to the next level by mimicking their former guitarist.
And anyone who went to church where they're into the alternative rock around my age or younger is about the same. Since the pool is rather small for anything comparing on that scene, the percentage of people who know most of the words of their song at any given concert is probably very high.

So yeah. Not sorry about that, Tulsa. Maybe next time.

...paul coleman complimented my fashion sense doo-dah, doodah... I don't even care if he mean it, all the doo-da-day...

If you like poetry at all, or like disemboweling poetry with criticism for that matter, I have a little ditty on gossamer_spun "Witch Below Water". And since I've decided to write poetry as markets have asked for other stuff to look at and I hardly have any others...I need help. Feel free to ignore this help plea if you want to. I'm in a generous mood.

I'm writing one about an Unexpected Encounter and a Spoiling Pumpkin.
Did I mention I work a Pumpkin Festival in the fall-time? Spoiling Pumpkins I can be authoritative about. I can tell them coming and going.
That one I may inflict on you all, as it is turning humorous rather than angsty.

One despairs of every fitting in the poetry scene. Humorous pumpkins, forsooth!

I watched Mulan yesterday, and enjoyed it as much as the first time, I think. That was part of my college education.


Note to Elf:
clean up your tags, it's atrocious in here!

</lj>

I am extremely sensitive to Autumn. It makes me euphoric like nothing else, and just a smidgen of hope of it's advent gets me jigging.

I put out candy-corn pencils yesterday. Today I started a cookbook of lamb and pumpkin recipes, and in transposing one from the card format we have, saw a gorgeous little bit of clip-art that had my heart racing.
I'd assume there was something wrong with me, but I've decided that blatant happiness and enthusiasm is something the world could use more of and I'm not going to stuff it. I come by it naturally and it doesn't change me.

I'm just this happy about autumn whenever it comes. ^.^



I need a new victim for Beastly. I'm thinking Realms of Fantasy, just for kicks. The idea tires me, though, so I'll decide Monday when I've slept more.
Mr. Poisson, on the other hand, has had yet another emphatically-not-rejection on the grass-roots level, and I'm wondering if I'm capable of whipping right through four or five books of this general length, and what the overarching narrative should be if so.
I'm so glad to have World Domination out of my hands so I can plan big things again.
FOR A LIMITED TIME ONLY!

Heh.
Good day to ye.

I just discovered Tor.com after hearing rumors, being linked via Elizabeth Bear ( matociquala ) who, by the way, is featured on GalleyCat, my homepage.
This set off my fan-girl, as that's the first person I've met to go up there, and certainly the first recent author I've read something by to make a splash! (Rowling doesn't count--she belongs to everybody).

Tor promises to be the blog of stuff I want to hear Patrick Nielsen Hayden talk about.
GalleyCat is a celebrity-sighting blog about the publishing biz (and of course all breaking literary drama, book LOLcat contests, and Hottest Agent polls).
Bear is famed author of transcripts of her interchanges with the Presumptious Cat (The Monkey and Cat Papers), scattered musings on the cognitive process as viewed by a person with a funky non-linear process (I am highly abstract, but ultimately linear, and always fascinated by the way people think), and also just a person honest about her bountiful interests. Including remedial math--I've been missing those progress reports. I should ask about that. (It takes a brave Red to comment on Bear's blog.)

On a me note: This week's chapter of The Plans of Poisson (new working title) is
You Can Take The Child Out of the Circus...

This is one of those delightful projects (like World Domination 101) whose primary purpose is to crack me up.
I think the reader can tell. ^_^

Cat Note:
Yesterday, Bagheera-My-Work-Cat and I were coming downstairs after I disappointed him over something (I filled his foodbowl! What more could he want? I think he finds me emotionally absent...but kid, I have to work. Would I rather pet him that tweak that Publisher document yet again? Wouldn't I?)
Anyway, tangent indulged: we were coming downstairs and our footsteps were in sync.
It was so bizarre.
His legs are three inches long and he has four of them. How come they matched up, even if he was double-time?

Global Nomad Note:
On a totally separate subject, I have moved around a lot. Still averaging under 3 years to a place. I occasionally have flashes of insight into the wreckage of my lifestyle because of this. My most recent one was to think: Hmm. I could buy an umbrella. To have one. That's something people have so they can use it.

I had an umbrella, like...four years ago. In Japan they sell what amounts to disposable umbrellas in every convenience store because monsoon season isn't traumatic there, but it is not joke, either. water, mighty, gushing from the sky kind of weather. Non-stop. For weeks.
But anyway. Sometimes I realize I don't have something really kind of basic in my life because I left it behind in whichever move it was.
So I bought a desk a few weeks ago. I was all nervous and everything.
And sometime soon, I'm going to lay hands on an umbrella.

Self-Discovery Note:
And apparently I lisp slightly. My mom mentioned it today, and I was a bit confounded. I'd never noticed.
That might of been part of that thing where my aunts and uncles would say to me "Stop talking like a baby." Really, one aunt, and someone else who picked up on it, I think.
Though I was probably not even 8 years old. That's kinda mean, if you know what I'm saying--I WAS a baby. I didn't have any idea what they were talking about. And it may be part of why I talk below my natural speaking tone a lot of the time...

I'm probably really not traumatized.
I mean, not by the "talking like a baby thing". The umbrella factor is still a problem. Some day I'm going to wake up and find that I haven't had a bed in 5 years, or something. Worse: a BOOK.

Boring Writer Notes:

Really... My littlest brother is playing my Lord of the Rings fan-music. This would be more surreal if someone hadn't REQUESTED one of the songs during a visit a little while ago.
I'm two 9 year-old-boys favorite band. Awesome Points: 100!
If we're talking for a MG writer...