Hello everyone! Happy Thanksgiving to everyone! I hope your day is full of thankfulness and turkey. Or your preferred roast beast/veggie meat option. ^_^
I found a bit of a treat for my bookish friends. A list of books and stories focusing on either Thanksgiving or foodie stories. I hope you enjoy this with your meal.
Well, I didn’t want to write this, but I failed Nanowrimo. Again. This time I was thrown out of it when I wrecked my car. And I have never been behind the wheel of that before. It was so bad.
I just lost my focus. And by the time that was for the most part over, I just never got back in momentum. It was understandable, I guess. And at least I have almost 20,000 words to my name. And to the name of Solaria, my world I had been working on in my head for at least a decade. And now I finally have some of it written out. I may not win Nano with this, but I will keep writing this novel in the next month. Next month, my writing goal is 25,000 words.
I am belatedly announcing my participation in a readathon that is running right now. It is the Christmas Spirit Readathon. The shorter one runs from Nov. 19-Dec. 2, but the reading challenge goes until Jan. 6. I think I will participate in both because of CHRISTMAS!!!
http://seasonsreading.blogspot.com/
https://truexmasspirit.blogspot.com/2018/11/2018-christmas-spirit-reading-challenge.html
So far, I have read the following…
Kate’s Choice
What Love Can Do
Gwen’s Adventures in the Snow
All three was written by Louisa May Alcott, and were short stories. I am not done with her yet! Or short stories, as that will be my main focus this challenge. I often neglect them for novels, and that is a great shame because the are often so very good!
The Little Match Girl by Hans Christian Anderson, a famous short story, and one I read every Christmas.
I am currently reading…
Little Women by LMA
To Light a Candle by Mercedes Lackey. This is not a christmas themed book, but it has a LOT of winter in it, and I just really wanted to read it. I might just go back and read the whole trilogy. Again. I am kind of in love with it.
I gave up on reading lists, for the most part, I never seem to be able to stick to it. The only one that I am even attempting is the 1,001 Books you must read before you die list, as that one is just so very long that I am using it more as a guide to steer by so that I will end up reading the books people agree are the best of literature. Sooner or later. One day I will post how many I got through on that list so far.
November 17, 2014. That was when I wrote my very first blog post for this blog. And clearly, I was doing this without Grammarly. Oh, the bad writing.
And sadly, I don’t think I got much better, but consider how often I wrote a post. I guess it’s like weight loss. Only backwards. The amount of word skill you take in is only equal to the number of words you put out. Or something like that. Sorry, just came from a science kick, and my brain is still trying to think along those lines. See what happens when I get curious?
But, even with the less than the stellar number of posts for the years I have been writing, this is a pretty neat feat! I started in November 2014, and it is now November 2018. Four years. Four years of daring to put my work out there, struggling against self-doubt, laziness, and learning to improve my writing. There are even some good posts here.
And many of my readers have been here for three years or more. That is incredible! Thank you for following me. I would never have stuck with it if it were not for you. Thak you. And a question. What would you like me to do to celebrate? Leave a comment, post on Facebook, write an e-mail. Let me know. Or visit my Pateon account. 😛 Yeap, #shamelessplugging
So for now, here is the very first blog post of The Ink Splattered Desk! YAY!
Day 16, and I currently am 35,000 words strong, give or take ten. I also have at least one fanfiction idea, and started a fanfiction for the turtles, that is an additional 2,500 words. November is becoming my favorite month of the year, for I feel free to write and create, without excuse. I have ideas for other books, lots of other books, and I’m going to spend some of the last half of the month outlining them, both fiction, christian non-fiction and christian fiction!
Also, this happens to be my very first post for this blog. I didn’t want to start it with the obligatory Hello Internet, I’m Blank. But I have no problem acknowledging the fact, at the end. Hello Internet, I’m the ink splattered writer. Cowabunga, Dude!
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Authors are like their creations. The further one gets from their actual lives the more mutable they become. They are molded and shape according to the current generation’s needs.
Thus, a rascal becomes a saint, a rogue becomes a hero, and so on and so forth, so we never know the true nature of a writer unless there is plenty of first-hand accounts. Such as journals, letters and the like. and those could be fabricated or altered. Or just written in a bout of wishful thinking.
Of course, now we no longer allow a writer the dignity of dying before trying to change their life story around. But as this is not really a new trend, and the author is still alive and hopefully capable of defending him or herself, I will no longer dwell on this.
Well, I did it again. I jumped projects during my Camp Nanowrimo month. Again. And I had just tackled it in a major way.
Let me set the stage. I have gotten interested in a series from Josh Scorcher, really two of them. Both of the series are really good, by the way. They both are D&D campaigns and both the stories and the characters in them are really interesting. And it is so much fun listening to the interplay between the people as they play out the games. And I have some real favorite characters in each of them.
I won’t give away any spoilers. But I was playing with the idea of novelizing one of the streams for a few installations for a week or so now. My other projects suffered because of it. But then something happened in one of the installations that pushed me to a real drive. I had a real fire under me today and had written/edited for the last several hours to get this segment right. I admit that I worry that this event, which I admit was devastatingly sad, got me to get so focused on this is really troubling. But I’ll admit that one of the first rules of writing is that if it makes you feel the emotions you are trying to write, then your readers will feel them too.
Of course, that might also be because of the wonderful roleplaying ability of the various players who are portraying the characters.
Here is a link to that one.
Here is the link for the start of the other campaign, which is wonderful.
So anyway, This is what I have to report. I am working on a new project, but I won’t completely shelf the others. Even though one I gave away, and regretted afterward since I really don’t care for it when I looked at it afterward. Still, he said it was interesting, so I take hope that he had at least been slightly amused by it.
And until I see you again, take care, and keep creating!
I have been lagging behind on my writing goal. Next time I’m going to set a lower goal…
But here is a sample of how the new novel is going. I actually liked the premise behind this one. Almost all of it so far is by random rolls and generators. ^_^ I’m a happy little crazy writer with generators!
Trisra loved to people-watch. No matter what else was going on, just the simple act of sitting at the step of her master’s shop and watching the people passing to and fro always seemed to calm her nerves. Maybe it was because of her background as a half-elf. Maybe it was simply her retiring nature. Regardless of the reason, she always seemed more comfortable observing life rather than actively participating in it.
She jumped at the sound of a door being banged nearby and turned to see a willowy boy hammering away with a basket on one slender arm. He noticed her glancing at him and winked cheekily. She rolled her eyes and pointedly looked away. This caused her to see a woman on crutches hobbling along the street. She was at best half-dressed and looked rather upset. She half rose, her reluctance momentarily set aside in a rare wave of concern, but before she could stand, a tall brown-haired man strode over to her side, and picked the hurt woman up with a sweep. She didn’t have much time to register the look of relief and hope that flashed over the woman’s face before the pair vanished again in the stream of humanity.
A chanting song caught her attention next, and turning toward it, she saw a cheerful girl concentrating on some kind of game that seemed to involve chanting to the timed clapping of hands and juggling of some kind of marbles. Trisra watched for a moment in bemused silence, wondering what the skinny girl could possibly be doing, but again her attention was pulled away by a young man who raced by her lookout, looking like he was hiding something in his cloak.
There was an oddly dressed young man who is walking unsteadily as he left a tavern a few buildings down. he was singing an obnoxious and somewhat off-color song off-keyed. He staggered passed a dark-skinned old woman who was tossing a coin in the hat of a beggar. There was a man standing near the pare, with a strange-looking staff in his hand, and a calm, relaxed smile on his face. An ugly girl walked by, mumbling something in a language Trisra didn’t understand. A minute later a man with very developed muscles and a stunning amulet around his neck paused and glanced around him as though lost, then pulled out a map. The flash of a golden ring almost blinded Trisra for a moment. Then he too was gone.
Trisra leaned back on one of her arms. The other hand reached up absently to push back a stray brown curl that was insisting on tickling her nose. Then a man appearing near the closest alley caught her attention. He was heavily tattooed and seemed to have been in a scuffle recently. For he sported both a black eye and a split lip. He seemed to be scanning the area around him with eyes that flashed with both arrogance and rage. But he somehow missed a short man who ducked into the alley behind him with a barely stifled yawn.
I thought I would share this to give you some idea of how I learn and think. To give you a taste of my chaos, as it were.
These are notes I made from an online video, a German class that was online, and an online video on writing. Yeah, it is pretty all over the place. But the older I get, the more I realize that I am this way. And to make myself more logical would be a huge disservice to how I really learn.
I almost deleted this as soon as I put it up because it felt silly. But I pushed through. I hope you enjoy reading my notes.
What are the differences between the rich and the poor?
The rich pay themselves first. The Godly pays God first, and themselves second. But still, the main point remains.
The rich base their decisions on long-term rewards rather than instant gratification.
Rich people have several sources of income
rich people continually invest in themselves
the rich never blame but take full responsibility for their failures,
the rich don’t sleep in.
the rich have a clear vision or purpose
the rich make progress before entertainment
I recently started teaching myself, German. I found myself preferring to read out the words first, and sounding them out loud to myself. I took a few notes now and then to try to help build vocab in my head. But then I lost steam and started skipping. I know this was a mistake now.
Why did you decide to be a student, and what do you hope to gain from your studies?
Well, I love to learn for its own sake to begin with. And now that I am forty, I feel like I really need to dig in and learn as much as I can to better myself and be more employable and useful. I don’t have the energy of youth anymore so must use my mind to keep ahead. Besides learning is fun for its own sake. ^_^
write a million words, the very best you can. Then throw it away and turn your back on that work. Only then do you really began.
die banana ist gelp. the banana is yellow
The Ink Splattered Desk 