“Be My Sexy Dead Wife”

Andy and I have been watching more of The IT Crowd, a bizarre and funny sitcom-style BBC show about an IT department in a large corporation. The first season was a blast–so odd, and yet so hilarious– that we actually rented it twice from Netflix, so we knew we had something good. This last week we got season 2, and while it’s different, it’s been a lot of fun. Hence, the bizarre quote. XD There are lots of them.

It’s been an excellent weekend so far. Last night, we hung out with Nate and Sadie, made spaghetti over at their place and then went out for gelato. Caught some live music in the process, which was delightful, and then headed back here to watch a few episodes of Futurama. ^_^ All in all, an excellent evening.

Today has been pretty laid back. I kept meaning to play a bit of Grand Theft Auto, but just never quite got around to it. (HAHA! I didn’t “get around” to playing video games! XD Love that.) Did watch some of my guilty reality-TV-show pleasure, Australia’s Next Top Model (I’ve been through most of America’s NTM, and Project Runway). It’s a fun show for just mind-vegging on.

Also got some quick editing in on the still as-yet untitled “DYSTOPIC SF SHORT STORY” and sent it off to meh mum, who’s my regular editor. Switched it to present tense, which I think works a lot better for the flow.

Then I topped off the afternoon with some painting. This face is slightly more realistic, I think, than the first one, but I still need to go back and add a little more peachy-orange to the left side of his face in places, just to warm up the lighting.

Then Kaku and Andy’s classmate Leon are coming over for pizza and to watch Solaris, which I’ve heard is very good. Should be a good evening! ^_^

 

Painting Progress

Haven’t had a whole lot of time to paint lately, so today I snuck in a little oil on canvas.

Yay for progress! ^_^ I forgot how much I enjoy painting.

Yesterday, when Andy and I went to the Boeing Museum of Flight up in Seattle, I saw the small oil-paint gallery they have of specifically spectacular World War II dogfights. O.O I was in heaven. And also shocked by the amount of detail on even relatively small canvases! It was intense, and inspiring. Can’t help but love that! ^_^

I need to work on backgrounds soooooooooo much. >.< But doing any kind of still life just doesn’t interest me. Maybe I should take a class sometime that will *make* me do still life for practice. I sure could use it.

 

Write In/White Out: Hydeditor

If only it were this easy. ^_^

For the record: I do not look this evil when editing… I do, however, wear glasses…

Note: I wish I could post it larger, but wordpress is stupid like that. Click here to see it in full.

 

Show and Tell

It’s late, so I’ll be brief! Thought I’d showcase my amateur painting process just for kicks. Here’s the basic paint-sketching I got done this last Saturday after spending waaaaay too much time trying to figure out a subject. Turns out, Andy is my subject this time around. I’m really stuck on the portrait thing, and on close-up face shots. I’d like to break out of that sooner rather than later, but I liked this set up a lot. Tentatively titled “Dorian”.

Very, very rough. But started.

Also, I’ll post some of the pictures Andy took of his and my and Nate and Sadie’s trip to the beach in Pacific City yesterday sometime either tomorrow or whenever.

Writing Stuff:

Finished the POV rewrite at the end of “Swallow”. Check out the Writing To-Do List (WTDL) page to keep track of the things I check off my list. Also, got MY SISTER’S KEEPER on audio-book for the car since I finished SENSE & SENSIBILITY (not my favorite Austen), and picked up two nonfiction books on firefighting for research purposes.

 

Write In/White Out : Meltdown

I’ve determined that I have an emotionally abusive relationship with my muse. 

Writing Stuff:

Yesterday evening was a stupid evening. I think the inspiration center of my brain (open M-W 10AM-2PM, Th-F 8AM-11AM, closed S/Sun/and whenever the heck it feels like it) and the anxiety center of my brain (24/7/365–always there when you don’t need it!) are in the same grimy strip mall I call a mind. It seemed like any and all hope of ever writing anything half-way decent was crushed to crap by my own twisted logic. It was *lovely* I assure you. Hence, the above doodle.

This afternoon, during my lunch break, I resolved–still aching from the self-inflicted emo-blows of last night–to not worry about getting anything accomplished. Instead, I would only try *not* to worry. It was the voice of my protagonist which was throwing me into agonies, so I figured a little mindless, unproductive practice couldn’t hurt. As an exercise, I did this: Try to write the story of The Three Little Pigs in the protagonist’s voice. How would she tell the story? 

It worked.

500+ painstaking words on the second section of “THE UNTITLED NOVEL PROJECT” to now be nicknamed “DARK MATTER” because that was the original title way back when, and that’s how I refer to it in my head and in my notes/saves. And they’re not horrible. In fact, since I finished reading THE TERRIBLE HOURS last night, I really dug into the whole submarine rescue stuff. 

Note: I just spared you from yet another attempt at my being “cute”. You can pay me back later.

 

Rejection and Monkeys

Also, monkeys are hard to draw.

Writing Stuff:

+ 900 words on the “UNTITLED NOVEL PROJECT” from the beginning–shock of shocks! Figured out I was mixing up the hero and the main character. Problem solved! ^_^ <–proud of myself face.

 

I’s so tired…

I am tired. It’s been a long week already, and it’s only Wednesday!

O_O <–my scared face. 

On the plus side, I’ve been playing around with Write In/White Out, a comic strip which is pretty much just me making fun of the fact that I’m insane, and the fact that I think too much, and the fact that when it comes to writing, I have so little self-confidence. I figured it would help me lighten up about myself in the process, too, which would be good! Plus, I love drawing/cartooning, so it’ll give me yet another thing to do INSTEAD of actually getting writing done! YAY!

>.O <–my ouch face. 

Also, check out my blog article for Apex! And keep an eye out for my review of the new Star Trek movie next week on the Apex blog!

Writing Stuff:

T_T <–streaming tears face

Grand total this week: a measly 248 words on “THE UNTITLED NOVEL PROJECT”, but I’m just messing around with that anyway. Only ~1000 new words on the “UNTITLED DYSTOPIC SF SHORT STORY”. *le sigh*

It’s been a bad week for writing. I usually get only about an hour during my lunch break at work to get anything written, but this week has been chalk-full of meetings, training sessions, and various other lunch-break-eating activities. So it’s been slightly unproductive from that perspective.

 

If it comes to war, I call dibs on the sharkapolt!

I was going to begin this entry with a lengthy, nose-to-dirt grovel session for being so bad at updating lately, but then I decided not to. Truth of the matter is, things have been going well, but I’ve been super busy with rather everyday, mundane things you probably wouldn’t care much to hear about. So until I have more time, I’m just going to do a quick running pros/cons list, plus the writing stuff at the bottom, par usual, in order to keep me accountable to what I do and do not get done. ^_^

This weekend:

+ + Cleaned the house. Much needed. I would post the video I took of it “before” and then do another for “after”, but it was seriously awful, and no one deserves to see that enshrined on the Internet for all eternity.

+ Hung out with Kaku! YAY! We’ve all been so busy, it seems like time to hang out just slips through the cracks. But not this weekend! Walked around Mt. Tabor in Portland (+), had a shoe-throwing contest which was sorely weighted (one of us has extreme shoe-throwing skills) (+), ate Little Caesar’s pizza (+), watched “Steamboy” (-), and played some Halo (+, always). 

+/- Minus, because I wrote 1000 words of Chapter 17 for “Thief Dilemma” only to realize I couldn’t use any of them. Plus, because it made me realize what I *actually* needed to do for this chapter, and because I got a fresh, usable 1000 done today at lunch.

+ Did minor grocery shopping. We’re trying to maintain damage-control for our arbitrary April budget. 

+ Changed bank account over to Oregon, at last. 

- Didn’t get any painting in.

+ Hung two of my paintings (see “House of Mirth” and “We Are–All of Us–Robots”) on the walls, and they look good there!

- Didn’t finish backlog of Apex submissions.

+ Did get through a huge batch. Hoping to close the gap over this week, and dive into more recent submissions. Finally reorganized my day planning to make more time.

+ Write Nite is awesome, and I get a lot of work done!

= (+8) vs. (-2) = +6. A Good, Productive Weekend ^_^

Writing Stuff:

 

So yeah…

I’m sick. Somehow I managed to get the flu, and since yesterday have been enjoying all the wonderful perks of a fever and no energy, drippy nose, and general achiness. Yum. Today, still have a fever, but it’s the achiness that’s driving me mad. Makes it hard to get comfortable. Bah.

At least today I can look at a computer screen without my head yelling at me. Figured I’d post the latest painting I’ve done–the one from last weekend (and a few weekends before that–it’s been a long project).

So there it is. Posted the Work-In-Progress shot Andy took a few weeks ago, too.

Now I’m going to try to rest some more… >.<

 

Sooo…. Uh… Yeah!

It has been so busy lately. My life seems to swing between either super busy or super dull within a few days of each other. I think I’d rather find a nice happy balance, but at least the busy has been a lot of fun. ^_^ Hung out with a friend yesterday and went down to the Portland Museum of Art, which was *awesome* and made me want to paint all the more. Did finish the latest painting today, but I think I’ll wait a little while to post it. I still have a long way to go, skill-wise. >.o 

Finished the second Edith Wharton novel I was working through, The Custom of the Country, though I must say the ending struck me as a little slipshod, like she didn’t know how to end this one so she just sort of stopped. Needless to say, it didn’t have that feeling of finality that Ethan Frome and House of Mirth both have. Huge list of books to read piling up–not sure if I’m going to continue with another Edith Wharton (the book I have from the library also contains Age of Innocence which looks a lot shorter than The Custom of the Country, so maybe I’ll try to plow through that before it’s due next Saturday). 

Looked and did taxes today. T_T Haaaaaaaate taxes. But I guess that’s the usual response at this time of year.

Oh! As a side note: Apex has finally got Nate Kenyon’s novella PRIME up for pre-order! I have been waiting for this one, because I have a soft spot for cyberpunk sci-fi, and this looks to be a really, *really* good one. Plus… IT’s A NOVELLA. Which you all know by now is something I’m absolutely obsessed with at the moment. 

Speaking of…

Writing Stuff:

Friday, 1:00PM, Clackamas, OR: 15k into the current novella project and I suddenly realize that one of the characters has disappeared. He’s there at the beginning, stands around a little in the first 10-12 pages, but then after that, he’s just gone. Vanished. And the worst part is, I didn’t even miss him when he left. 

1:12, Clackamas, McDonald’s Drive-Through: After a bit of pondering, recognizing that if the character is missing, it’s because he isn’t important enough, I come to the conclusion that I must make the choice between two options: 1) Remove the character, or 2) Make him more important to the story. I know I don’t want to remove him, because he’s so cool (in theory), and because he represents so much. SO, that means I have to make him more important. 

1:30, Portland office, Break room: It occurs to me that making him more important won’t actually be that hard–theoretically. I’ve thought about it, and with the new stuff I’ve come up with, both he and the Main Character have a heck of a lot more personality. Always a plus. However, this comes with a trade: it means reworking the first 15k words to reflect the changes. Doesn’t have to be *completely* rewritten, but portions will, and all of it will need at least minor tweaking. Bummer. Positive: The story will definitely be stronger and the MC’s personality will have more definition and rationale behind it, plus it makes it a little more of a coming-of-age story, which with this current subject, I think works well. 

But still-! So much more work. >.<