Anotherblog

Last days

Last days
These are the last days of not-working-on-novel for a while, so I celebrated by playing Advance Wars for much of the evening, finally pushing through one of the advanced maps that had been troubling me for some time. I finally got around to switching off all the animations, which sped the game up no end. It is good to be lazy.

I also talked with Kate about the characters in Dr Who, particularly Fitz, and I read through some plot summaries of recent Dr Who novels and I think I’m up to speed. To my relief, the character of Anji has left in the second-most-recent novel. I really had no grasp of her character at all. Unfortunately, she’s been replaced by another character about whom I know almost nothing, except that she is a mistress of disguise. That’s her big schtick. I have no idea what would happen if she met herself – to follow pop psychology, she presumably likes disguise because of some kind of self-hatred, so this would be a nice way of making her face up to that.

Fitz is going to be good though, I hope. He’s apparently a bit of a good musician, so I might enroll him in the music faculty. On the other hand, he didn’t show all that much interest in “The Year of Intelligent Tigers”… maybe I’d better ask Kate…

The Last Resort

The Last Resort
I finished of the Dr Who book “The Last Resort” last night. It has left me with mixed feelings. On the one hand, parallel universes have been very thoroughly *done* in the current Dr Who novels. I can very easily imagine people groaning at the thought of another one. On the other hand, I think Fork does have new stuff to say.

Fork has a couple of points in common with The Last Resort. One of the key characters in my novel is something that can only exist in one universe at a time – a property shared by Sabbath in “The Last Resort”. Although Fork has no place for Sabbath, I’m thinking of making my “Singleton” owned by him, perhaps putting in a reference without mentioning his name. There are similar scenes of multiple copies of the same person running around caused by a forking process (this is a little vague in the book but seems to be caused by people exiting the TARDIS.)

There are some interesting failures, I think, in The Last Resort that are points to watch in Fork. Firstly, it has a very complicated plot. There is a lot of time-travel, a lot of people meeting themselves out of sequence, and a very confusing series of twists and time-travel logic. Reading TLR has confirmed that I need to put a lot of work into making sure the plot of Fork – by the end at least – is crystal clear.
Secondly, TLR shows different versions of the same character in rapid succession. It makes it a great deal harder to empathise with the characters: I think I will have to concentrate on the POV of one character throughout, and perhaps only one or two “versions” of that character from different forks. And make it abundently clear which one is talking at any given time.
Lastly, TLR’s plot is so fiendish that the characterisations seem to fade into the background as well. Again, something to concentrate on, which is nice because characterisation always fills up valuable wordcount.

Wordcount is the most important thing in Nanowrimo. Some of my non-writing friends were very disappointed in this mercenary approach, but I see this primarily as getting a big lot of Craft, and Art can look after itself until the second draft…

Inventor

Inventor
You know, it just hit me. When I was a kid, I always wanted to be an inventor. And now, here I am, grumbling to myself about having to deal with patents. My inner child is telling me to shut the hell up and enjoy.

Kinda sick

Kinda sick
I was feeling kinda sick yesterday, so I went home early and was all prepared for runny nose, headache etc. today, but woke up fine. I guess the headache was from lack of caffeine, and the sore throat was… dunno, maybe from going through my book collection, which was pretty dusty.

Anyway, all that adds up to an even more lazy day than most.

Bulletproof Monk
Anna and I watched Bulletproof Monk and cried out in pain – frequently – at how bad it was, but didn’t turn it off. Chow Yun Fat had evidently learned his lines phonetically, because he delivered them with odd inflection and without apparent understanding of what he was actually saying. Or perhaps he was just embarassed by them; who knows. Bad. Sean William Scott did a profoundly energy-free rendition of standard bad-guy-makes-good, while everyone else couldn’t wait to get off the screen. The problem? Well, the direction was pretty inept, the editing did a terrific job of spoiling the effect of the stunts (some of which might have been quite cool had they not been chopped into sashimi), the CGI was godawful, but it was the script that really let the team down.
To be specific, it was the dialogue. There were some mildly clever plot moments (or rather, unexpectedly clever plot moments, given how dumb and bad everything else was) and even spots of amusing dialogue, but on the whole, it was howlingly bad. Anna and I laughed a lot, cruelly. It was so mockable that it fell squarely into the so-bad-it’s-good camp.
What disappointed the most, I suppose, was Chow Yun Fat, his once-unassailable coolness destroyed by this debacle, despite (actually, because of) their many attempts to show the iconic CYF moments. Watch him do two-fisted gun action! Standing on top of a car that he leaped onto! As the wind billows his coat! In slow-motion! With intense gaze!
His one nice moment was when he is telling Scott to climb the side of a building, and watching him smack into the side of it again and again. In that scene, he is delightfully cruel, and perhaps someone had the grace to tell him what scene was actually about.

Nanowrimo
Half-way through (reading) “The Last Resort” – plain sailing so far. There’s not much that would conflict with Fork, I think I’m getting a fairly decent picture of Fitz, but I’m still stumped as to what to do with Anji.

Nanowrimo

Nanowrimo
Excellent to see that Dave is pushing closer to joining in the great race. It’d be really cool to see a full novel from him, even if it is as shoddy as he fears (and I’m sure it won’t be).

Anna and I went to dinner with Jon & Kate last night and talked books and scripts and Nanowrimo and such. We ate a lot of Indian food (no sugar for me today!) and became sillier as the evening progressed. Excellent fun.

Kate lent me one of the recent Dr Who novels that has parallel universes as a major plot point (“The Last Resort”), and I started reading it when I got home. It’s pretty decent, but fortunately not very similar to my plot. So far. There are some thematic similarities, but they’re no more similar than Sliding Doors or Groundhog Day. So far.

I’ve reached a tentative decision that I will write a Dr Who novel, and that it will feature the eighth doctor and Fitz, and probably Anji as well. Fitz will slot in perfectly – most of the novel is set in an underachieving university – but I’m still not quite sure what to do with Anji. I’m only familiar with her from Kate’s “The Year of Intelligent Tigers”. Hopefully this current book will give me a bit more to work with. Jon & Kate have promised to lend a helpful ear throughout November.

Nanowrimo

Nanowrimo
I met up with some of the other Nanowrimo participants last Saturday and was rather delighted to find that they were a very pleasant, intelligent and creative lot. Why did this surprise me? I’m not sure. Perhaps I was expecting people a little more obsessive and strange (which certainly isn’t the case with my writer friends, so I don’t know where I picked *that* up from!) but yeah, all very nice. A lot of buffy fans. Quite a few of them were planning to write fantasy – two even brought maps to the proceedings! I wished I could have stayed longer – the vibe of being surrounded by other writers is a very good one; it made me look forward to Saturday even more.

Fork
The big day gets closer, and I have to make a decision: Dr Who or not Dr Who?

“Fork” could be Dr Who fan fiction, or it could be an original novel. It would be nice for it to be original – I think the idea is just about good enough to survive against all comers – but as I was coming up with the ideas, I kept finding wonderful ways in which the Doctor and the TARDIS would fit in. It meshes so nicely with some of the Dr Who tropes, it would almost be a pity for it not to be a Dr Who novel.

One odd node of the Nanowrimo group meeting was that I couldn’t bring myself to mention that my novel was Dr Who fanfiction. It was a very strange place to get a geek cringe. I suppose I didn’t mention it because it doesn’t really feature in the SF ideas of the novel, but still… I guess I was shy.

I’ve spent a long time thinking about “Fork” – probably about four years – and most of that time I’ve considered it a Dr Who novel. In fact, the reason I wrote out the plot summary in the first place was to submit it to the BBC as a Dr Who proposal. I also tried writing a first chapter but kept getting stuck, in the usual way that is the whole reason I want to do the Nanowrimo again. My hopes for Fork are that I will get a much more coherent draft together, which I can then use to write a better plot summary and first chapter, and finally submit them to the BBC. The Dr Who guidelines are such that even if (ha!) my proposal did get accepted, it would then have to fit into the ongoing Dr Who series of books – I’d have to incorporate the latest companions, overall plot details, and so on. So, even in the best case, I would have to rewrite it. Finally, I have a lot more invested in “Fork” than “A Lotus Blossoms in the Monastery Garden”, which will probably make the writing task more difficult too: I suspect I will be taking breaks in which I do nothing but say to myself “It’s OK that it’s crap! It’s OK that it’s crap!”.

All this brings up the question: why write it? Part of the reason is that, although the current plot summary is OK, I’d really like to explore the Fork idea further. It’s one of the best ideas I’ve ever had. It gives me chills and makes me jump up and down with excitement at times. I want to write it because I think it’ll be great, and I’m still naive and arrogant enough to think that, because the writing in “Lotus” was better than I had expected, the Nanowrimo “Fork” first draft will be readable and enjoyable.

As you can see, I’m setting myself up for a big fall.

One other thing I should really do, if I do decide to make this a Dr Who novel, is read the most recent one (“Timeless”) before November 1. And then decide what do do about the companions.

Anyway, I’ve opened up feedback for this log entry. Let me know what you think. Should I excise the Dr Who references?

Again, not much

Again, not much
My days seem currently bereft of dramatic incident, or at the very least, amusing anecdotes. I’ve been watching “Edge of Darkness” and “Twin Peaks” (which I’ve never seen before) instead of going and and creating things that might be better than TV.

Though I’d probably not set “Edge of Darkness” or “Twin Peaks” as things that I’ll aim at being better than. Not at first.

A deliberate strategy
Be Lazy Now, for Tomorrow You Shall Be Writing Like A Fiend… actually, it’s still eight days away. In the meantime, however, I’ll take a double dose of delay, top it up with ichor of idleness, sprinkle with salt of sloth, stir with a spatula of stupor, and drink to the dregs. Maybe I will start work on things in the middle of next week… a little web page design, or a book cover of some sort… just so that the contrast is not too shocking.

Therefore:
The weekend holds for me: a social meeting with my fellow Nanowrimo contestants, roleplaying, a BBQ, and no doubt more Twin Peaks. Much, much more Twin Peaks.

Nothing much, really

Nothing much, really
Nothing to report today, move along. I’m only putting in an entry out of habit.
Last night: Guitar practice & feelings of guilt about not working on Lotus or Spit editing.
This morning: walked to Luke’s place for my lift to work, felt good ’cause my feet aren’t too sore and my legs are back to normal. I think I might walk to work every Tuesday.

Tired

Tired
For some reason, I was tired when I got home and didn’t manage to do much beyond my guitar lesson. Another day of uncreativity. Me suck. On the bright side, though, Anna has been a very busy girly indeedy and will probably have the clinic open next week, and then we will have to get an extension to the house just for somewhere to hold the bales of cash.

Guitar
The guitar lessons are going swimmingly at the moment. We’ve started playing first position at different places on the fretboard, and it is making my head ache pleasingly. I’ve learned a simple riff, and many of the different ways of playing it depending on which position you start in, and which position you finish in; and the some of the advantages of sliding up and down the fretboard instead of going across it. I would never have believed that the theory would actually be fun, but it is.

Nanowrimo
The big date approaches. It looks like it’ll be at least Chris & me, and possibly Dave and/or Ted at the starting blocks – in just ten days time – having a go at a great big novel. My stomach hurts at the thought. I’ve got a plot outline, this time around. I’ve never worked to a plot outline before. I’m vaguely skeptical that I can: the idea that I’m working towards a definite end-point seems like a recipe for writers block to me. There’s just one thing that can save me, and that is: the writing can be crap. The writing, can, becrap.

No worries there.

Another Number
I’ve been listening to a co-worker’s CD Another Number and I’m relieved to report that it’s actually rather good, from my early listens. There are elements of ’60s electrica, as you would expect from something that incorporate musical themes from The Prisoner, a bit of Phillip Glass (although not quite of the calibre of King Missile’s effort: “Hey Einstein! Hey! Get off the beach! Hey!”), and although the arrangements are a little sparce at times, it’s an enjoyable listen. I think it’s time to introduce Carmel to the world of “music” that is Spit.

Magic
I’ve been playing a rather enjoyable deck lately, one that doesn’t win often, but is very satisfying when it does: the old control/sacrifice concept where you steal your opponents creatures with a “Ray of Command”, hit them with their own creature, and then throw them back at the owner with a “Skull Catapult”. Deliciously provocative. Rather than running black/blue, I thought I’d give white/blue a try. For those of you who care about Magic:

1 Reins of Power
4 Ray of Command
4 Psionic Blast

4 Preacher
4 Icatian Javelineers
4 Mesa Pegasus
2 Icatian Town
1 Spirit Mirror
3 Disenchant
2 Sacred Mesa

4 Skull Catapult
3 Hornet Cannon

2 City of Shadows
1 Kjeldoran Outpost
4 Flood Plain
11 Plain
6 Island

The deck is mainly designed around cards that I have, rather than cards that are the best possible for the deck (eg. the psionic blasts and city of shadows are just there ’cause I’ve got ‘em). It is very, very slow. I’d have put in more Kjeldoran outposts and/or spirit mirrors if I had them. Apparently there’s a new card that is a creature with a ray of command effect. But I’m not buying more cards. Uh-uh.

Walked to work

Walked to work
I walked to work again this morning. This time, I didn’t go quite as quickly, and it took three and a half hours, setting off at 6:15am and arriving at 9:45am, just in time to realise that I was late for a meeting. So I sat there and tried not to sweat too much. When I got back to my desk, I risked a look at the soles of my feet: not too bad, only four or five blisters, mostly very small. I suspect the relative blister-freeness was due to the more relaxed pace this time around. I confidently predict that the next time, I’ll get no blisters at all.

Japanese
I finally caught up on my remedial Japanese lessons (ie. relistening to the CDs), so I am once again up to lesson 13. The lessons are strangely confidence-building: after each new lesson, I am filled with dread and a kind of helplessness, a fear that I’ll never ever absorb what the lesson just taught. Then, a couple of listens later, everything has resolved itself and I can’t believe it actually seemed difficult. Then I move to the next lesson, and the cycle repeats.
What is strange about this is that the emotion persists each time, and I have to remind myself that I went through the same feelings with the previous lesson, and when I finally conquer the lesson it feels like a major achievement. I have a stupid kinda theory that when artificial intelligences emerge, one of their genuine feelings will be the desire to accomplish, the love of learning that dissipates in most people during schooling. Of course the AIs won’t get it from language lessons. Anyway, I do, and it’s the learning-stuff equivalent of chocolate.