March 2010
2 posts
I just noticed...
I just noticed that when I’m watching TV, i immediately fast forward whenever a character in a show or a movie is about to do something embarrassing or confront someone else. I’ve been doing it more and more for weeks now.
Does that mean something?
February 2010
28 posts
Sometimes writing is SO FUN.
“That doesn’t have anything to do with it,” Constance said dismissively and Henry felt, rather than saw, Tommy’s softly humming anger at the response. Inwardly, he sighed. The lines, the sides, they were always drawn. “I’m telling you. There’s no other explanation.”
“Please.” Val snorted.
She feigned ignorance and set her mug on the counter behind her. “You have something to say, Val, maybe...
"Lost"
I forgot to watch Lost two weeks in a row. I’m watching it now, catching up, and wondering why I don’t feel an urgency to watch this show, to see what’s going to happen week to week. Why don’t I feel this kind of low-grade desperation for Tuesday night to get here, just so I can camp out in front of the TV and see what happens next?
Maybe it’s because this whole air...
“Life is a combination of magic and pasta.”
– Federico Fellini
Even the dog's feeling it...
I sit at the top of the stairs that lead to the backyard, on the phone, and pause to call the dog. I tell him to come but he doesn’t. Once, and then one more time and louder too in case he’s around the corner and my voice didn’t carry enough. I call again and this time I hear him shake, hear the rattle of his collar. He’s by the gate, ignoring me, ignoring the call. He...
Writing Gets Infinitely Easier
when you remind yourself that no one needs to see it until you feel it’s ready.
when you're right you're right you're right
“You suggest — without irony, as an American, in 2010 — that we, a nation with a population one tenth the size of yours, should have spent another $360 million on an opening ceremony because, I guess, it wasn’t good enough for you. Call us crazy (or boring), I know, but here we save up for our retirement, not our heart attacks.
We put the proudest, butchiest lesbian ever...
look
I need to rewatch a scene that I love. I’m feeling lazy and lazy will not get me through this book.
This morning while I was dozing on the bus I thought about how novel writing progress feels a lot like your perception of the week. Mondays, the beginning, you’re full of hope and To Do lists and energy (at least I am). Tuesdays are awful. Wednesdays are awful but slightly less awful....
Part I
“WE’RE going through!” The Commander’s voice was like thin ice breaking. He wore his full-dress uniform, with the heavily braided white cap pulled down rakishly over one cold gray eye. “We can’t make it, sir. It’s spoiling for a hurricane, if you ask me.” “I’m not asking you, Lieutenant Berg,” said the Commander....
This is why I get angry about Avatar FYI →
No Resemblance
It just occurred to me, sitting down to write and opening the document that clearly reads “Draft1” in the title, that the final version of this book could very well have little to no resemblance to the thing I’m writing now.
It’s a little bit terrifying, that thought. And AMAZING too. Is this what’s it like when you’re about to have a child?
Love (Day 4 of 5)
Kari from LitWit posted this months and months and months ago and I loved it so much that I made it the quote in the beginning of my second book (I love saying “second book” even if it goes nowhere further than my computer desktop)…
Love? Do I love? I walk
Within the brilliance of another’s thought,
As in a glory. I was dark before,
As in Venus’ chapel in the...
1 tag
On Winter- From Dwell Deep →
We’ve all been hibernating a bit, working unseen on the roots of things…
Before Sitting Down to Write
It has become necessary to get all THIS out of the way (replace contacts with glasses, wash face, walk dog, feed dog, Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, emails, find music, change music, tweak tweak tweak) first.
Trying hard not to remember my unemployed self, with her hours upon hours upon hours to write. Now my time for “The Witches Sib” has shrunk to an hour after dinner. If it were...
1 tag
Someday...
Someday I’ll write a casual, breezy email to a publisher and not feel this knot in my stomach. Someday I’ll laugh about it. Right?
1 tag
Lovable Characters
can get away with anything.
I was watching Modern Family last night and it occurred to me why the gravitational pull to this show is so overwhelming.
When you write about families, write about them as if this is the sequel to a story the audience already knows and knows well. The best part of a sequel (the reason why we demand them, wish for them) is to get a glimpse of the life these...
Love (Day 1 of 5)
I’m not falling for the same old “I’m single so I have to be miserable on Valentine’s Day” schtick. I’ve always been a sucker for love stories.
One of the first romance novels I ever read as a kid was Wings by Danielle Steele. I can vividly remember reading it at my grandmother’s house in Brooklyn when I was twelve, maybe thirteen. And yes, this book...
From "Next Time On" →
I may have a problem. This was WAY too easy to write.
Naming Your Babies After Your Friends
And the winner is…
Fabiana Shanahanigans.
Welcome Kittens!
It’s STORY TIME! Get excited…
2009 Held On to Its Suck With Both Hands
This morning, I woke up and jumped out of bed, high on Clean Slate Fever. 2010, new year, new rules. I was PUMPED. I pulled out a stack of old magazines I’ve been meaning to read (some people have an addiction to prescriptions, others to subscriptions), a pile of old Time magazines that come up to my knee (it’s really not news anymore, can’t I just throw them out? I was trying to be a grown-up...