Venialia

Today's obscure word of the day is venialia.  It means minor sins or offences.  I might need to find a way to work that word into a story, I find it to be a neat word.

So, as you may have noticed previously in my blogs, I prefer to write all my stories by hand first.  I have a logical reason for that.  If I'm typing on a computer, I tend to make immediate corrections, and edit, and edit, and edit as I go along.  This slows down the creative flow, and often causes me to lose focus on what I'm actually writing.  As a result, the first time I get my story typed up, it's actually my second draft.  I find that the edits and corrections are more suited to the story after the segment is already written, and therefore does not detract from it as much as not getting the segment properly written would do.  It also helps me attempt to keep up with my creative mind.  Granted, neither method of input comes close to keeping up with my mind.  Some stories I write the entire story before typing anything up, others I will write a few pages at a time before typing it up.  Either way, the only personal writing I do directly to computer are items like this (my blog posts, Facebook statuses, etc).  I've also tried to have a portable recorder of some type to dictate, but that doesn't work for anything except ideas.  I don't "see" what I've dictated, and have a tendency to lose focus if I'm trying to orally state a story.  Also, if I'm orally stating a story, I have to be in the mindset with a story in mind already to tell it, otherwise, my creativity completely drains out (often for days at a time).

My wife will hear me when I start typing something long, because I have a strong typing method when I type fast.  When I'm typing something short, the keystrokes tend to be softer.  When it's longer, though, my speed and intensity increases, which sounds harsher on the keystrokes.  It's especially noticeable with the space bar on most keyboards, probably a result of how the space bar takes input and is much larger with more hollow area underneath it for a sort of echo sound.  She often thinks I'm typing up a response to someone being an idiot online, because until recently, I haven't been doing much writing (also, as noted above, I tend to hand write most stories first).

Lately though, I've been using http://750words.com to try and keep momentum going.  It's a sort of challenge to use it for my intended purpose of story writing, but I use it as follows:  I type up my "second draft" of my stories there before cutting and pasting them into the Microsoft Word document the words will eventually call home while they wait to be published.  I also type up my blog posts there before copying them to my blog site.  I have noticed that I need to copy it on the same day I type it, because once it goes into the archive, if I "export it" it no longer has carriage returns, etc. to mark paragraphs, so I either need my hand written version to use as a guideline, or I need to figure out where they are on my own.  It's a real pain to do after the fact sometimes (unless there's lots of dialog, in which case it isn't quite so hard).

I've made some changes to my blog site recently.  I've put a picture behind the blog title.  Currently, it is Michael Konrad Hirt's A vanitas still life with a candle, an inkwell, a quill pen, a skull and books.  I might change it up from time to time.  Also on the side is recent books I've finished reading (which usually, though not always, means unabridged audiobook).  I also have struggled to figure out how to get my blog posts to automatically post to my other social media sites, then I found "If This Then That" (http://IFTTT.com) where you can set up a "recipe" that, in this case, says "Anytime there is a new blog posted, create a post on <Facebook> or <Twitter> or <Tumblr>" (I had to set up three recipes for it.  It seems to be working so far, so I no longer need to post a link, or copy the text and paste it anymore to accomplish the same task as I used to do.  In theory, every blog post I make will be linkd from each of those sites (and any others that I join in the future).

That's all I have for this blog post.  Thanks for reading.

Lalochezia

Lalochezia is the use of vulgar or foul language to relieve stress or pain.  What do you utter when you stub your toe or smash a finger?  For me it's S.O.B.  (not just the letters, but the whole phrase).

There's your bit of knowledge for the day.

My vampire story is fleshing itself out in my head.  The protagonist will be Josef Mengele.  The challenge for me will be to make him sympathetic while still making him a deplorable human being.  I think I know how I plan to do it, but I've been playing out the different ideas in my head along with the basics of the plot before I write any more on the issue.  This is also the same story where I break most of the rules of vampire lore, but with a logical explanation as to why/how.

I'm also kicking around a zombie story where the protagonist is a zombie.  Still working through the concept of how that can happen in my mind.  I do know that it will start from the same beginning as the story Darkness that I'm writing where Itzpopalotl attacks a group of cmapers in the jungles of Mexico.  My zombie epidemic will stem from the dead of the attack that opens the other story.  Their bodies aren't found in the other story, and this gives the explanation as to why.  My zombie outbreak will not be a global one quite yet, at least I don't think so.

Anyway, I promised an update to my blog on what is happening in my writing world when I posted the link to my last blog post on Facebook, so here it is.  Thanks for reading.

Pareidolia

First, let’s learn something.  The word of the day is pareidolia.  That's the phenomenon of seeing an "image of significance" in another object.  Like seeing the image of Jesus in burnt toast, Lincoln's silhouette in a sock on the floor, a Dorito that looks like Xenu, the Virgin Mary’s image appearing in a piece of paper chewed by a dog, seeing “666” or the devil’s face in fire damage on the side of a building, or even seeing images such as bunnies in clouds.  It’s part of the human condition to try and find significance where there almost certainly is none, because if there isn’t more meaning to the world, then we’re doomed, I say!  Doomed!  Okay, enough hyperbole.  Let’s get on with the blog.

As you saw from the previous blog post, we finished Donna’s room enough to move her into it.  Well, now we’ve started on Megi’s room.  The ceiling is now painted and the trim is tapped off.  I just need to tape the accent wall away from the other three so we can get started on them.

Candice and I started a discussion the other day on whether we still want to restore the ’53 Mercury.  She noted that we’ll always have higher priority financial projects.  I’m good either way, but want her to be sure that she won’t have any regrets before we make the final decision if we don’t do it.  The plus side of doing it would be that we’d have one sweet ride.  The plus side of not doing it would be reclaiming garage space and having extra money (presumably) for Candice’s business and/or a snow blower (and a place to put it).

Megi’s at that awkward size where size 18 month clothes make her look like a superhero wearing tights and 24 month clothes make her look like she was shrunk by a “Honey I Shrunk The Kids” ray, but her clothes didn’t shrink.

We just replenished Gabe’s pants wardrobe again for the fourth time in a little over 12 months.  He now wears size 14 pants.  He turns 8 in a few weeks, ughh.  Fortunately, his upper body growth isn’t as pronounced and he can usually wear shirts slightly longer, but he’ll need the next size shirts within the next few weeks, too (size 12s I think).

Donna doesn’t have much going on.  Amazingly, since she moved into her new room, she’s been pretty good about putting her dirty clothes away in the hamper.

Candice broke a finger on her right hand, and has been out of commission for her business and will be for a few more weeks.  Also, her oxygen concentrator has started to malfunction, which is fortunate timing that they are at the same time and not consecutive (though she needs to get back in touch with the company to make sure it’s still under warranty and get it fixed soon to keep them from being consecutively timed events).

My sister-in-law Jan came out to Denver for a work related conference and got to come visit with us one evening.  It’s too bad she didn’t have more time to visit.  We’re also sending out a couple of books to her that she informed us that hadn’t read (Pillars of the Earth and World Without End).  Hopefully, she can make some time to read them as both are excellent books by Ken Follett.

That’s all for this post.  Thanks for reading!