nineveh_uk

Real life crashes into the best intentions of more regular posting. But before January is quite out, another challenge post.

Challenge #12
In your own space, set yourself some goals for the coming year. They can be fannish or not, public or private. Leave a comment in this post saying you did it. Include a link to your post if you feel comfortable doing so.

I don't do resolutions, other than the years I did the easy "spend more money on having fun". Looking at the challenge DW, I saw this meme about writing goals done by commoncomitatus, and it looked fun to give a go.

( This got quite long... )

That experience when writing fic when you have very, very nearly finished and yet it does need something to finish it off and it refuses to come. Unfortunately, while I had a breakthrough as an undergraduate when I realised that the reason I found the 'conclusion' but of my essay outline so difficult to implement was that I'd already written the conclusion in the penultimate paragraph so could just stop, the same doesn't apply here. I think it's time for that ever-useful solution, put it away until tomorrow.

In other news, Housman was wrong about the loveliest of trees. It isn't the blosssoming cherry, lovely as they are, but apples.

( Photos )

NOT ONLY did I at lunchtime suddenly realise completely out of the blue that by a small addition to an existing* scene I could solve a plot hole in the giant Wimsey/Potterverse crossover that I've been writing at glacial speed for ages.

BUT LATER when I went for a walk after work, I suddenly realised that in another existing** scene, I could add a bit and resolve a different plothole and wrote 700 words. Can you tell I did not plot out the mystery element of this story sufficiently in advance? I know what I'm doing this weekend! The iron is hot, it must be struck. Of course, then I'll stop for months again but hey, jerky forwards motion is still forwards motion. The damn thing will be finished yet. If I could just think of a title...

*Existing in the plan, not one I have written in full yet.

**As above.

Realising that you have been inconsistent in your use of the second person pronoun in an annoying way.

Also, what on earth am I going to call it? Tennyson would work, but is unsuitable. Suspect I shall fall back on some sort of 'extract from the Tale of Years' theme. Of the need for a summary, I shall not speak.

Is once again that something that seems intimidating before starting it turns out to be straightforward once I stop procrastinating. In this case, going back to the beginning of the Wimsey/Potterverse crossover and giving a substantial edit before continuing, which I finally got my act together and started this afternoon and found I was making very respectable progress. Admittedly I didn't get to any of the bits that are going to be tough, but they look a lot less tough from where I'm standing now than they did a few days ago.

'Twas ever thus. But I have begun and will endeavour to continue. Actually, no, I should take a lesson from Yoda on this one. It is do or do not, and having been do not-ing I had damn well better do. Onwards!

I am grateful to the bank holiday* for the opportunity. I am grateful to the bank holiday full stop. I didn't take the last one*, but however much I have to do this week at work, and the answer is a vast amount, there was no way that after a weekend visit by my sister and my 5 and 3 year old nephews I wasn't going to need a weekend to recover. They are nice little boys, but they have a lot of energy. Also, they discovered the piano. And, it being an electric piano, how to operate the sound effects...

I am re-reading Monstrous Regiment for the first time since the first read. Like a lot of Pratchett of that period, I am enjoying it a lot more the second time round than the first. I am still not sure whether this is the tone shift, or me at the time of reading.

*I see from the internet that technically this is not Whit Monday, but so I think of it.

**Will get time in lieu.

Among other things...

Trousers taken up: 1 pair
Trousers let down: 1 pair (NB they were different trousers)

Tennis matches watched whilst doing the same: 1
Inevitable Serbian victories: 1

Summer holidays booked: 0
Rueful acknowledgement that you ought to have started sorting out summer holidays much sooner: many

Hollyhocks purchased: 1
Hollyhocks planted: 0

Pieces of writing worked on: 2
Web searches in conjunction with said writing include:
- How long does a body take to fall*
- Electrocution
- Electric shock deaths UK
- How long does plaster of Paris take to dry

I really hope that no-one I know turns up electrocuted with plaster casts taken of any part of their body before they're pushed off something. Obviously I would hope that anyway, but generally with less self-interest.


*Alas the Wikipedia page on equations for a falling body is the wrong kind of body, but the Splat Calculator (from a climbing website) was very helpful.

Help me, I seem to have forgotten a word and inexplicably do not own a thesaurus.

I want a synonym for "evangelist" in the sense of "person attempting to persuade another of a religion" rather than "John the E- ". I feel sure there is a word that exists that I can't quite remember and that would be better for my purposes; possibly I am wrong, but suggestions as to what it might be will be very gratefully received!

I seem to have failed to have an early night again, but never mind. At least this time it was in pursuit of fic.

ETA: Americanisms especially welcome.

In this case, "Inability to come up with the single short sentence you need to finish the blasted fic." It's not even the final sentence!

Continuing the theme of November as the month of getting on with things, an update.

This year I decided to participate in picowrimo as a means of trying to get myself tackling some writing again - any writing that required a commitment. I meant to do some fanfic and some original fic. Due to being fairly busy over the last fortnight, I’ve done less than I had hoped because I haven’t managed any at the weekends, so its been evenings only and often short ones at that. Nonetheless, I am feeling pleased with my progress, which I am sure I wouldn’t have made had it not been for the challenge of the comm. I’ve been intending to write the fic I’m working on at present for about two years, and now I not only have nearly 4000 words of it*, but I made myself work through the tricky bits. Moreover, instead of thinking “Oh, I haven’t time to write much now and I’m tired” I have made myself start writing and discovered that in fact I have got time, and that though I didn’t completely feel in the mood when I started, I soon got stuck in. One of the reasons I’d put off writing it, thinking “I need lots of time” was the issue of structure; the fic has quite a few shifts in time and POV (so that, for example, Harriet remembers kissing Peter in the punt before the narrative reaches it) so how to structure it avoiding the twin perils of one damn scene after another and too much shifting about. Ironically, it was a problem that only came to be solved when I sat down and thought “I don’t know what bit to put next. Try this”. It’s a reminder that there is more than one potential right way for something to come out. I think I have got the rest of the structure more or less worked out, thought there’s room for movement. The next scene, according to my jottings on the bus this morning is “Punt – sit down. Initial snogging.” I am just about managing not to stuff it with my interpretations of particular bits of canon, although there's still quite a bit in there.

On Tuesday night I finally made it to Mayerling, in the excellent company of dolabellae. We started off with £9 in the Upper Slips, which were pretty good for £9, but did involve a certain amount of leaning forward and a partially obscured bit of stage. So at the first interval we moved to a pair I had identified in the main Amphiteatre, which cost about £45 and had a very good view indeed. The ballet itself was an interesting contrast to Sleeping Beauty – much less a one classical move after another showpiece, but more of a drama and with a lot more plot (occasionally confusing. I’d have been stumped if I hadn’t bought a programme). It also contrasted in that whilst SB gave most of the glamour to the women, Mayerling was decidedly focussed on the lead man. The sets and costumes were gorgeous, though I heard a couple of people making similar comments to and me, that some of the women characters weren’t sufficiently distinctively costumed to tell them apart easily. Its portrayal of the Hapsburg Court is not a flattering one – they’re hypocritical, violent, treacherous, sex-mad, and in the case of Rudolf a syphilitic lunatic. The most admirable character is Rudolf’s mistress, Mitzi, who reports him for asking her to commit suicide with him.** It’s definitely not the Austrian Tourist Board’s version of Empress Sissi.

I am very much looking forward to the weekend. However despite being absolutely shattered I am continuing to get myself out of bed at seven and thus into work earlier than my usual wont, thanks to taking advantage of the clocks going back to reset myself.

My new boots had their first outing in Cambridge at the weekend (though I changed into old ones for the fireworks in the evening). I even managed to drive there and back in very little over the AA’s predicted time, which I was rather pleased by. The chest of drawers I bought in Ikea is still in the boot because I can’t lift it out in the box and haven’t had time to put it together. A task for the weekend.

I am 475 page through the 991 page Bible. Hurrah! Psalms is, alas, less good than I expected because it really requires reading alongside a commentary, which is far too heavy for the bus. I shall have to give it a skim at the weekend. Yes, it is after all going to be a busy weekend.

*I did have 1400 words before the month started, but still wrote them under the pico spur as I had decided to get this done as my first project.

**One of those odd historical notes that chimes somehow. I was reading The Glittering Prizes recently, which didn’t simply mention pasta as something that the characters would have experienced for the first time on holiday in Italy (some time in the fifties), but published in the seventies still italicised it.