The Outcome of My Recent Resolution

Anyone with even a slight penchant for cynicism probably would have predicted the outcome of my little "I'm going to wake up early to write" idea without even trying. Yes, you cynics, you were right, that never happened. Not once.

HOWEVER, it is my pleasure to stick my tongue out at you cynical bastards and say I STARTED TO WRITE ANYWAY. (Do you like how I've suddenly turned this into some sort of bizarre adversarial thing between me and unnamed "cynical bastards"? I can be dramatic like that for no good reason other than it amuses me.)

The point is, all of a sudden* I found the energy for it. Isn't that great? Last Saturday, during the little one's nap, I sat down on the couch with my laptop instead of at my desk on my gaming computer where I go to play The Sims. I reread the 48K or so words I had done on the sequel to The City Darkens and then began adding to them. I've written about 10K more so far.

Onwards and upwards. What obstacle have you overcome recently? Even the little ones count.

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* It didn't happen out of nowhere. It's all due to my friend and beta-reader Kathryn, who finished reading what I had written and told me the main character, Ginna, is a badass. And I was like, "Yeah, Ginna is a badass. I really like Ginna." And all of a sudden I wanted to be writing Ginna again.

Inspired to make a pledge

Okay, I know this is going to sound cheesy, but I was watching an episode of Glee, where they're singing Michael Jackson's "Man in the Mirror," and I got really inspired.* Not to write (although I've had a lot of inspiration for writing lately, for which I am grateful), but to make a pledge. It's still a bit hazy, but let's see... I pledge that when I break $1000 in sales (this is still quite far off), I will donate $100 to some sort of children's charity. It was a line in the song about not having a right to ignore a hungry child's need... Anyway, once I break $1000, $100 to a children's charity. And when (yes, when) I start making at least $500 a month in sales, I'll sponsor a child. I did this before for a while but had to stop because money just got too tight. I'd like to do it again. And if I ever become one of those epub authors who makes more than $50,000 a year, maybe we'll adopt a child. That's something I've always wanted to do, and if you ever read my family blog you'll know it's something we may have to do if we want a second child (although that's still not a sure thing). Adoption is so expensive though, so I'd have to be making a lot more than I am now to even consider it.

*This is weird for a couple of reasons: first off, I'm really not sure what to think about Michael Jackson when it comes to children, and unless you knew him personally, you can't honestly tell me you have all the facts either. But I am uncomfortable with at least some of what I do know, so for him to inspire me to want to make a pledge to help children, well... Anyway, secondly, it's all the more apparent that I am a sucker for Glee performances, because the previous performance in the show, a mash-up of Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive" and Destiny's Child's "Survivor" already had me all worked up thinking I could take on the world. This is nothing new, actually. I straight up cried during Amber Riley's performance of "Beautiful"--and I still do every time I watch it.

So anyway, you folks who read this blog can hold me to my pledge. I will announce it when I break $1000, and you can say, "Hey, that means $100 to a children's charity!" and you can even suggest some good ones.

How about you, have you been inspired in unlikely ways lately? Do you have any pledges you've made or would like to make?

A Dieselpunk Surprise

So I recently rented Captain America: The First Avenger from Netflix. I did it knowing next to nothing about the movie and having little idea of what to expect. There are a couple of reasons for this. 1) I generally avoid all descriptions of movies I'm going to watch because they inevitably spoil things. 2) I was not initially the least bit interested in Captain America. It sounded cheesy and overly patriotic. I like superhero movies... sometimes. I didn't think I'd like this one. But then I saw that The Avengers is out, and I'm mostly a Joss Whedon fan (although after what happened to Wash I'm not as sure as I once was). So I watched Thor, which streams, and enjoyed it, particularly because of the Norse mythology since that's a core aspect of my WiP. And I thought, okay, if I'm going to see The Avengers, I'd better get up to speed on all the individual superheroes (The Incredible Hulk is next on the Netflix queue).

So Captain America arrived the day before yesterday and the hubby and I started watching it. Due to the nature of parenting a 7-month-old, we watch anything over 30 minutes in parts. Very quickly, however, I realized something fundamental about the movie that came as a surprise: it was set in the 40s. During World War II.

I know this was probably obvious to anyone who paid even the slightest attention to the movie when it came out; I had not. So I was immediately intrigued. Somehow overly patriotic heroes like Captain America are not nearly as grating in the context of World War II. And then I began to see it: the dieselpunk. Oh my goodness. The lovely, detailed, beautifully designed retro-futuristic dieselpunk.

This was awesome. Not only had I gotten a little boost of inspiration from Thor's Norse pantheon, but now I got to spend the better part of two hours admiring the machines, planes, costumes, sets, etc. of Captain America. Totally unexpected, and a real treat.

My only annoyance: what the heck was up with Red Skull's pin? It's a death's head (okay, that's appropriate for a Nazi) surrounded by tentacles. I'm not the only one seeing a Cthulhu reference here, but nothing comes of it. Empty Cthulhu references annoy me.

I did plan to write today...

I promised myself, when I woke up this morning, that I would write for at least a half an hour today. I hoped that it was a low estimate. However, the baby is having a bad day (he's in his crib, not sleeping, right now--it's only a matter of time before I have to pick him up again, I think). We've both had colds and I switched him to soy-based formula in the hopes that it would alleviate his sinuses (when I drink cow's milk it always makes me stuffier), and I don't think it's agreeing with him. I'm especially frustrated because 1) the doctor told me to switch to soy weeks ago because of the baby's eczema, but I didn't because we couldn't afford new formula at the time, and the eczema got better on its own 2) due to a snafu with Amazon I ended up ordering a large quantity of the soy formula and now he seems to dislike it and possibly be having a hard time digesting it, and maybe even getting a bit of a rash from it 3) this all comes at a point where my own milk supply is really dwindling and I've been having to "pump-and-dump" anyway because I'm taking cold medicine so that I can actually sleep the few hours I get here and there... ugh. I feel guilty about not breastfeeding him and now I'm going to have all of this soy formula, and it looks like I have to order more of the other kind. I'd consider returning it, except we're almost completely out, and I can at least mix the soy formula with the regular while we wait for another shipment of the regular... and I have to order all this stuff online because everything at the local store here in lovely Mount Shasta is ridiculously overpriced. Basically I'd pay more than double if I bought the formula there.

Sorry. Didn't mean to go on a tirade about baby formula there. Looks like he's dropping off, at last. Of course, in about 45 minutes I have to pack him up in the car to go pick up his dad from work. I hope he doesn't freak out, poor thing. He's having a rough day.

So maybe I'll grab these 45 minutes to do some writing. I haven't been making much headway, but that has more to do with the cold, the bad sleep patterns, and all the other mommy stuff than with a problem with the story. Jeff and I just started watching the first episode of Boardwalk Empire, which is awesome as it's set in the 1920s, like my story. I love it when a tv show or movie fuels my inspiration, just by its setting, like that, or sometimes there's an actor I've envisioned for a character, and it can be inspiring to watch them, too.

Do you have shows or movies you watch to get your writing juices flowing?

A Reminder: to myself and others

Dreams

Hold fast to dreams
For if dreams die
Life is a broken-winged bird
That cannot fly.
Hold fast to dreams
For when dreams go
Life is a barren field
Frozen with snow.

by Langston Hughes

Talking about a story idea

I don't talk about a story idea until I've completed a first draft. The closest thing is to ask someone a question about some detail, and find I'm forced to explain an aspect of the story for the person to be able to answer. And even that makes me horribly uncomfortable, and I've resolved to avoid doing it again at all costs. I have two reasons for this:

1. More often than not when I have done this, the person(s) I told my story to will find some flaw in it or come up with a helpful suggestion, which destroys the idea.

2. (And this is the main one) Talking about the idea relieves the pressure to write it and get it out of my head.

I have a friend who loves to hash out her stories over the phone and it's really hard for me to cooperate with that. Inside, I'm screaming, "Dear god, stop now before you kill this thing!" And, I have to say, she rarely completes a story.

How about you? Do you ever talk about an idea before you've written a first draft of it?