NaNoWriMo.... because I'm sure you want to read about my concerns again!

Well... this November I'd pretty much decided I was going to write a murder mystery. But now... I'm not so sure. I tend to work faster when I've only got the beginning and the end and maybe the middle point mapped out.... and over plotting is actually what killed me last year. Unfortunately, mysteries require a ton of plotting. And I'm really just not quite up to it.

So I've got two choices:

a.) go back to square 1 OR
b.) continue plotting this novel and hope that my brain will be able to handle it. (even though I'm about 99% sure I can't handle it. My brain is slow.)

Sadly, I've got a lot of fun characters planned for this story. I recycled a lot of my old ones that I'd forgotten about (Elsie, Vermeer, and M.D. the Nurse, just to name a few!) and I think I'd have a lot of fun playing with them and re-discovering their quirks. On the other hand, Mysteries are mostly plot-driven, and I pretty much always have more fun while working on a character-driven story.

Therefore, I think I'mma gonna go with option A. Or... at least explore it. If I can't decide on another plot to use, then I might just end up working with my original mystery. At any rate, I'm not just gonna box all my dusty old characters up and stick 'em back in the dusty section of my scull. I bet I can come up with some ways to use them all, regardless of what I ultimately end up doing...

Magical

Last night A.C. and I caught a jar of fireflies. At our house in the Boro, fireflies are elusive and there aren't that many of them. Firefly catching is a very fruitless sport. Here on Chigger Hill with our Nana and Grampy, however, the fireflies are everywhere.

I had so much fun. I haven't caught a firefly since my visit to Amish Country a few years ago, and I'd forgotten how much fun it could be. And the best part, by far, was A.C. trailing behind me, carrying the jar of bugs and whining, "Chloooooeeeeee, you're a bad catcher. I need more firebugs!!"

I missed her a lot.


I spent today sitting in the back of the Gator (it's like a cross between a four-wheeler, a pickup truck, and a golf-cart) while each of my siblings showed me their impressive driving skills. (And yes, this includes A.C.) Beowulf the Hero, who is not on house arrest anymore, rode in the back with me, and seemed quite pleasantly surprised by the gust of wind that flew in his face when he hung his head out the side. (he looked a bit like "Bolt" from that Disney movie...)

I've only driven the Gator once, and that was yesterday. It was actually kind of fun, but I still don't plan to get a license anytime soon, despite the fact that every member of my family is practically begging me on bended knee.


NOW! For ze drawings!!!
.... I don't have any. :P

That DOESN'T mean I haven't been drawing, though! Au contraire, I've drawn a lot of faces, sketched the Hephaestus Cabin photo for a group project I'm doing, humanized my wolf, Homer (I gave him a samurai ponytail, a keyboard, and a suit.... he looked strange, to say the least) and also Jeff and Tunie, my sister's and my twin poodles, and that's only a couple of my projects. Unfortunately, there is no scanner at this house, and no scanner means that I am sad. :( Luckily, my Nana stocked up on Ritz crackers and chocolate milk before I came, and my siblings are present, so I've kind of forgotten about being sad, actually. XD


Last but not least..... I ate breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snacks!! I'M GOING TO LIIIIVVVVEEEEE! Yay!

Red Scarves...

What is it with my strange obsession with red scarves lately? It's literally pretty much the only thing I can think of. I even felt the need to write a haiku about one:

a red, threadbare scarf
wrapped once, twice, three times around;
smells like cinnamon

Seriously, though, what is it with my bizarre fixation? I don't even particularly like red scarves! (Purple ones are my favorite ;D)

Anyway, I suppose I shall simply have to live with my obsession for now, and get back to drawing my latest book cover which, by-the-way, features a red scarf.

Updates!

Well, I haven't posted in a while! Hello, people of earth.

I'll start by saying that my lovely, amazing, beautiful, perfect, awesome, gorgeous, kind, sweet, innocent and in all other words just really cool siblings, whom I happen to really miss, are STILL with my Nana and Grampy. I literally have not talked to any of them for over a month, simply because they are having such a good time that they can't find the time to talk to me.

Anyways, here's a picture of Ben getting his tooth pulled out. (it was super loose, he couldn't eat, and it really needed to come out.) I miss him (and all his teeth) so much. :(


Moving on.

Okay, so guess what I did last Wednesday? I went and saw Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 with Kievan and Greta! It was amazing and wonderful and stuff! I'm really really depressed now though, because when you think about it, this really IS the end of Harry Potter. It's like, the end of a great era. It's like, signaling the end of thousands of teenagers' childhood. It's like... the grand finale to a brilliant story.

Yeah. Kind of like that. If you allow for poetic liberties. (Now be careful, the next part has a spoiler warning. I think.)

Anyways, my favorite parts about the movie was... like.... everything. I didn't particularly like the parts where the movie strayed from the books... but those parts were far and few between. I cried pretty much the entire time, which would have been embarrassing except that everybody, including my sister Kievan (who has a heart made of lead when it comes to sad movies), cried at at least two parts. (Except my friend Greta, who actually doesn't cry at movies. Lucky.) After the Prince's Tale (those of you know know Harry Potter well already know what I'm talking about) I dried all my tears, blew my nose, and mentally decided not to cry anymore. I'd actually decided not to cry after that part hours before, and had mentally prepared myself for every sad aspect of the entire movie. (Or so I thought.) So, anyways, there I was, totally ready to not cry any more, when Harry took the snitch out of his pocket, and it said, "I open at the close."

Well, I immediately started bawling. Somehow I'd forgotten the whole resurrection stone part of the story! And you know, that's just about the saddest part of the whole entire story! I'd totally forgotten to mentally prepare myself for the most tear-wrenching scene in the whole movie. I'm seriously insane. But that part was probably my favorite part. :)


Anyways, good night and everything. I am off to watch Star Trek! (At 10:23 at night.)

Dude! NaNoWriMo!

It's always about the middle of July that I start thinking, "Wow, why do I do this kind of thing???"

It's the middle of July, and I am so thinking, "Dude! Why do I do thins kind of thing???"

Honestly.... I don't know. But I did finally figure out what I'm gonna write about! It's gonna be a murder mystery set in the present day on an ocean tanker. (yeah, I know that those things are no longer in use. A girl can dream, right?) I made up about half the characters from scratch, but a large portion of them are actually remakes of characters I've had in the past. Some of them are actually personifications of some of my stuffed animals. XD

Anyways, last night I suddenly realized that the number twelve kept cropping up everywhere. There are twelve suspects, the main character is twelve years old, and he's also got two extra fingers, meaning he's got twelve fingers total. (that's gonna be an important clue. ;)) There are a couple more instances, but I just thought that was really weird. :P

So anyways, I'm off to planning!! After all, there are only 113 days and 9 hours until it all begins!!

365 Haikus

Do you know how long it takes to write 365 haikus??? It takes forever!!
I'm not joking. I love writing them, but this is just crazy. I'm not even sure I have a whole 100 of them yet, 'cause I write them everywhere. Seriously... in my literature textbook, on my many blogs, in random notebooks, and a few actually where they're supposed to be.

The hardest thing about writing haikus is actually sitting down and writing them, though. Ideas for my haikus are also hard to come by. Luckily, I've written so many that syllable counting and idea summing-up isn't hard at all.

And now, to end the rant, my favorite one I've written this week:

trouble is lurking
sitting on her chest at night
prodding, whispering...

And also a link to my 100 Themes blog (where I'm writing 100 haikus.)
"A Hundred Haikus"

Motivation

So this morning I woke up, still super tired and ready to crumble into a million pieces. My mother walked through the room with a cup of her "motivation" (a.k.a. Pioneer Woman's Iced Coffee).

About one hour later, I was still ultra-groggy, very sore, and a little bit grouchy. So I sit at my mother's desk and randomly take a sip of her still icy coffee. Then I took another. And another.

Now, about twenty minutes later, I am SUPER MOTIVATED to do anything and everything, and I've already accomplished more in these twenty minutes than I did the entire rest of the morning. Who knew coffee could make me so hyper, right?

(coffee picture belongs to the Pioneer Woman. I stoled it.)

So now, with my mother's coffee in hand, I am gonna go draw some yearbook pictures! Yay for me! ;)

4rth of July!!

Well, it is Independence Day here in the United States of America!! To me, this means a multitude of things:

1. It's time to grab the little red, white, and blue flags!!



2. It's time to finish drawing my holiday drawing (I'm almost done already... I'll post it soon.)



3. It's the birthday of one of my great friends, Zuri S. Snicket (no, that's not her real name...). I made her a card that I'm really, really proud of. :D



4. Tomorrow is the birthday of two of my characters, Jean and Dan LaRue. (twins. ;)) Happy almost your birthday, imaginary people!!!



5. The library is closed. (Cue the wailing and lamenting. I love the library.)



6. The time is ripe to watch that great old Sci-Fi movie, titled "Independence Day !" It used to come on television every 4rth of July, and sort of became a tradition, kind of like watching "Chicken Run" on Thanksgiving. ;)