Writer's journal and other random insights

[jinn]

(random notes from Jinnland)

Today I got to pull out a new Sharpie pen from the pen drawer. Boy do I love that feeling. Cracking open a new pen means I used the old one to death (or lost it to the world beneath the couch cushions) which means progress is being made. All that ink had to go somewhere.
Recently it's been going into villain scenes, which have been a little excruciating to explore. It's those moments in stories when things horrible live on the pages, exercises in pain while the characters journey through their darkness. For the story to live, I have to go there with them. It's part of creation. The dark thread makes all the other threads that much brighter. It's exhausting lonely work. Friday word count: 700+ and counting.
When I'm finally done with this manuscript, I'm going somewhere happy, with balloons and dancing.

[veryblessedmom]

My Mr. Hero and Ms. Lady Love have been arguing with me.

I'm working on chapter 20 of my WIP. It's time for some action, so Mr. Baddy McBad is coming to town. The problem is, I need them to get out of Dodge, but the two of them keep yelling, "What about Granny!"

I've tried to write them going back for Granny, but it's taking from my action. So now I've scrapped the 3 pages I started. I'm sending Granny on a vacation before all heck breaks loose.

Now, maybe Mr. Hero and Ms. Lady Love will leave me alone and let me write their story.

[jinn]

Somehow my villain is a horrible talker. He's got great motives, deep regrets...and when he opens his mouth to explain himself he might as well be saying, "Pants! Pants!"

I've rewritten one of his scenes four times. The process is starting to feel like watercolor: Sketch, paint. Let it dry. Paint again. Let it dry. Paint over that for deeper colors. Mix in some new ones. Let it dry...

Oh, well. Best to get the scene done right, many times as it takes.

[jinn]

Writing, feverish.
Literally.
The week has been long and the sun shines bravely through the open window. The week to come is going to be even longer, and then I fly to California. Rent is probably going to be late. Again. I may have bronchitis, too early to tell. No worries-- if King can write in spite of a broken hip, I can write in the face of bronchitis. Heck, I could write in the face of zombies if I had to. Sometimes I draw pictures on a mini whiteboard, and that helps. Sometimes I fall asleep and wake up with the words all lined up in my head:

"The sun was already baking the top of the city, sliding gold heat down the walls. Soon they would all be drenched in it."

"She sat with her knees together in the frame of the doorway, watching the boy trudge past. Behind her, the cook murmured instructions while her subordinates thumped dough onto flat stones, splashed mint tea into tall pitchers and scraped nut paste into serving dishes."

Being a writer is fantastic.

Sunday word count: 899 and climbing.

[Teskas]

Cool journal.

[jinn]

Oh, and I just got this shirt for my birthday, which is in June: Failboat.

[jinn]

Donald Maass is fast becoming one of my heroes. Unrelated sidenote.

Sunday was a great day for this writer. Monday has turned out substatial, thank goodness. One week of yuck lies ahead of me, and in stark defiance I have written 1,518 words and created a decent metaphor of prison cells. Now hopefully I will quit coughing up green sputum to top it all off.

I shall now go make myself a sammich.

[Christian Soldier]

Hmmm.... sammich. Hooray for foods you can eat while you write!

[Spokane Flyboy]

I'd just like to get augmented with a cybernetic pair of arms just below my real ones so I can eat and type at the same time.

[jinn]

I'd prefer wings with digits on the tips, so I can also fly.
Failing that, I just eat really fast. ^_^

[jinn]

Or watch an episode of Gungrave while my noddles simmer. Have to get creative with what I'm handed.

...

Hah.

[Christian Soldier]

Hmm.... this is true. Still, four arms would be nice... and the attention span to use them

[jinn]

[It's awkward to say I blog. Blog is an uncomfortable word, like flatulence. But there's no other way to explain the thoughts below because they're so random. I blogged this.]

Been sick this week with symptoms of acute severe vertigo, nausea and transient nystagmus. I think it was from swimming. It turns out you can still write while the room spins around you if you sit very still, but coherent thoughts are hard to come by.

In other news...

I keep a people journal for the same reason I keep a texture journal. From time to time I run across someone who stands out for whatever reason. I write very quickly, to capture them in some way, on the page, before they're gone. This one was in a coffee shop in Oroville, CA, while I was visiting my family. She'll be in the books somewhere, once I think of a place for her. Of course, once an idea becomes part of a story, the idea merges with the world of the story and sometimes doesn't look like the original thought at all. In the end I might be the only one who knows where that piece of the story came from.

A girl walks in, skinny on the lower half and top heavy on the upper. Black pleated skirt that reminds me of a horizontal slinky, springy around her thighs when she walks. Rainbow striped socks, red, lime green, bright yellow and orange. Black shoes. Black and white zebra tie, collar folded down. Black hair in steppes around her dark round face, silky little stripes running down her cheekbones and brushing against her collar.
White linen button-up shirt with a skull and crossbones beautifully airbrushed across her shoulderblades, like a Japanese tapestry.
She's dainty. The boy with her, her friend or perhaps a cousin, doesn't fit.

And then I had to go.