Keep on Trucking

"Tomorrow is the only day in the year that appeals to a lazy man."

- Jimmy Lyons 

Geez, I didn't realize the last time I posted was Monday. How lazy have I been? To continue that theme, this weekend I found myself making a few excuses where...well, everything was concerned. Writing, cleaning, college, cooking, exercise, etc. Nothing got neglected to the point of anything bad happening, but it kinda made me feel like crap.

Sometimes it seems like no matter how motivated we start out, it can all go down the drain at the drop of a hat. It can be range from something simple, where we know we're just making an excuse, to something serious. In the end, though, they really all are just excuses, right?

For some reason, my drive seems to kick in right when I want to go to sleep. Then, as I am falling asleep, I tell myself that tomorrow I'll do better, do more. Then sometime between falling asleep and my alarm going off, it fizzles out like fireworks in the rain.

The thing that is difficult to keep in mind is that 'feel-good' feeling you get when you accomplish something. Like kicking ass in a workout, finishing off a chapter, or making a meal that your family enjoys.

Right now I'm stuck in my book. Not like rooted in place stuck, but more like slogging through the mud stuck. Part of it has to do with the fact it is a scene I've written, and re-written, a few times. Another part is, like I said, I was attacked by the lazy fairy this weekend.

--

Pretty she may be, but a helluva pain to get over. So what to do? What is the cure for sloth? If I find the answer I'll let you know. Right now it seems to be, just keep on trucking.


Tell me what's the word, the word count:

I know the picture looks a little funky, and that would be my camera on my phone acting up again.

Finding Motivation in some Very Weird Places

"I promise."

     

With Randall choking on the words, we watched as the little girl we didn't know the name of sighed, content in his promise. She didn't draw another breath.

      

The Demon started to charge, and Randall's head jerked up sharply in response to the thundering steps. In a flash, his liquid gold eyes changed from his human ones to those of his reptilian second nature. Turning to look at me, he said the words I'll never forget.

      

"Do it."

-A (very) brief look at Nyx's former partner. 

Well, I have a few odds and ends to talk about tonight, but nothing too terribly profound.

Today was absolutely gorgeous, and I spent more time outside today than I probably have since the cold set in last year. We actually might see 70 tomorrow! While I look forward to the weather change, I do not look forward to the absurd practice of building houses with no air conditioning. Who the frock does this? Some of them don't even get air conditioning in their cars...

"It is too temperate here to need air conditioning!" The people of the Pacific-Northwest proudly proclaim. 

"Bullshit." Says I.

Tell that to the windows in my living room, bedroom, and bathroom, that face the sun all flipping day. We spend the majority of our time in the living room, and it has two PC's, our big honking television, XBOX, PS3, and kitchen very close by; all of which, as most of you know, produce heat. Tack on the weather getting into the 80's & 90's the last couple of summers, and you have a recipe for one pissed off, displaced Floridian who grew up with air conditioning. 

They didn't even have the decency to build the house with a screen on the front door, so if I open it to get a cross breeze, I also get flies.

Ahem, any way.

Have any of you ever found motivation in the oddest places? For some reason, watching shows with Gordon Ramsey in them motivates me to write more, and writer better. Strange? Probably. It is not always easy to explain what motivates me. Some things are obvious: like wanting to tear it up exercising after watching the Biggest Loser. Others, eh, not so much (see example above).

On an amazing note, I have exactly 1 follower! Whoo! You know who you are, and I <3 you. No, it isn't my husband.

I was going to write about something else, maybe even something profound, but it leaked out of my brain as I wrote my paper for college tonight. Which, by the way, was boring if you didn't guess. 

The idea of leaving the house to write has been fruitful. If only Barnes & Noble were closer, or the Starbuck's a minute up the road stayed open later. But nothing in life is perfect, and I'm working with what I've got.

Tell me what's the word, the word count:

Title inspiration.

What's in Your Head?

“I don’t see why you had to cook for him,” a voice grumbled sullenly from across the room. Shooting an unfriendly glance over my shoulder toward my roommate, letting him know with a look he was being childish, I went back to concentrating on the stove. My food might not be five-star worthy, but when I set out to do something I tried my best to make sure it was done well.

“I’m cooking for him because it's polite; especially since I might be turning his life ass over teakettle soon for my own benefit.”

Tasting the sauce, I judged it acceptable and poured it over the chicken sitting in another pan. The liquid sizzled and spat at me when it hit the heat, much in the same way I'm sure my grumpy companion wanted to at the moment. 

“That's fine and dandy, but you could have ordered pizza.”

His voice was closer, and I turned around completely to face him this time. Crossing my arms over my chest, he spoke before I could say anything. 

“You always cook real meals for the ones you truly like.” His words came out soft and bitter, like someone who had their heart broken; only to find the person who left them had moved on without a second thought.

I started to deny his proclamation, but the serious look in his eyes made me swallow the words before they passed my lips.

-Nyx, and her roomy, Sorren.  

What's in your head?

I watched a tutorial today by the lovely Kristin Nelson, and it was about the way to properly submit a Science Fiction & Fantasy query; on top of letting us know why they fail so much. That isn't the point I wanted to touch on, though. One of the things she brought up was about the Science Fiction and Fantasy community in general. Apparently, compared to a couple of other genres, there isn't as much support on teaching fledgling writers in these two genres on how to improve their writing. Even the tutorial I watched by Ms. Nelson was apparently met with little fanfare or interest. 

This got me wondering: why?

Not to psychoanalyze an entire genre of authors, especially since I want to write in said genre, but I have a couple of theories. They could be completely off-base, and obviously it doesn't apply to everyone. 

However, one of the ideas I came up with was the fact that we create entire worlds, races, and so on, making our writing highly individualized. Yes, there are sub-genres of fantasy and science fiction that work off preconceived or existing elements, such as alternate history stories like Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter. Even with that, there is a highly creative element that goes into fantasy and science fiction I can't see coming into most other forms of writing. Call me narrow-minded, but there is just a 'wow' factor I get from reading SF&F because I know the good authors had to come up with all of this in their heads, and I just don't get that same feel from other categories. Not that authors from other groups aren't amazing writers, because they are, they just don't spark my interest the same way. 

The point being: is it possible to teach that level of creativity? I'm not so sure. Of course there are the basic structures a person follows when writing any kind of story; events that need to happen for the reader to enjoy the novel. Formulas. But there is an extra step I feel SF&F writers need to take in order to make their book unique. Everything else just feels so...limited. All they have to work with is this reality, the one we live in. 

The second theory plays off the first one. Due to the (hopefully) highly individualized nature of SF&F writing, and pardon the cliche, it turns our mentality into that of a lone wolf. Trite, I know. 

Actually, I might go out on a limb to say that we guard our ideas and creative methods like dragons hoarding gold.

 -link

Not all writers, and not everyone can explain how they get their ideas. You'll hear a lot of, "It just came to me one night/day." Which I can relate to. Some of the stories I've written happen after gnarly dreams, or downright nightmares. The novel I am writing has evolved, an inordinate amount of times, from an idea I had when I was twelve. If I compared the two stories now, they wouldn't resemble each other at all. Which is a great thing, believe me.  

Or maybe we're all crazy and grumpy? 

 -link

Any way, those are just my thoughts on the matter. Like I said, they could be completely wrong; but I'm sure there is one person out there it applies to. 

 No word count tonight. See you next time, boys and ghouls! *cackles*

-link

Location, Location, Location

“Are you okay?” The words held true concern, and the air shifted as he moved closer. His warm, delectable energy danced over my skin, and I had to brace myself on my knees to keep from falling. With my breathing coming out in ragged gasps, I didn't notice when the boxes thumped to the floor. In that moment when he put a hand on my back, all my efforts to keep things from going downhill amounted to nothing.  

Before I knew I was falling, he caught me in his arms and we tumbled to the floor in an awkward heap. My head was muddled, as if I had drank too much alcohol, and in his lap the power turned from pleasant to near scorching as it enveloped me.

“You’re scaring me, Nyx, what's going on?"

-Nyx, and her new partner. Ooh la la. 

What's going on indeed?

This weekend I discovered that it can be very difficult for me to concentrate on my writing when at home. So I took a chance and schlepped myself and my laptop to Barnes & Noble, utilizing their spacious Starbucks cafe and somewhat scarce power outlets. It worked almost like a charm. The only problem I had today was jockeying for a position near an outlet; and of course an unused one. 

Some of these people are downright cutthroat. When I was trying to be polite and not rush someone out of their space, another person just walked up and plunked his laptop down before the other man had even cleared the table. Manners, people, get some! Yeesh. 

Any way, I am happy to say that I was effective in attaining a higher word count. However, I ran into a problem as one of my favorite 'editors', (see: husband), and I butted heads about my new writing techniques. I am rather horrid at explaining things verbally, as some who are partial to the written word are. I think another problem may be the male-female perspective. Sometimes I read a sentence and it says one thing to me, but when he reads it, it says something completely different. We'll see. Hopefully these differences can be reconciled, or at least grudgingly noted so we can agree to disagree. 

 - What we think is happening.

            - What is actually happening.

So, the moral of the story is this: if you find yourself in a rut, change your environment. It may or may not help, but it doesn't hurt to try.

Tell me what's the word, the word count: