Calamity Cove

Goodbye, journal.

2009-10-24T09:25:03Z

I am INTERMOVING.

The short version is: I tried using my real name everywhere online because it's what everyone at conventions told me to do, but for various reasons, it makes me uncomfortable. You can still call me whatever you were calling me before, even if it was Marvin O'Gravel Balloon Face. I'm just shifting my usernames back to things that amuse me and carry more significance than mere identity.

Also, I'm not posting my art in a separate place anymore. I'm tired of compartmentalizing my existence--it's all going into one feed. If you are all, "Wah, I hate the art but I wish I could see more blathering about daily things," then I think there's something wrong with you anyway. haha

On LiveJournal, everything will be crossposted to plunderpuss. I will still read and comment with that account.

P.S. As a parting gift, check out my new hair in the photo that makes me the second-coolest person on the planet:

See you at plunderpuss!

Foolscap: Day 01

2009-09-26T08:44:00Z

On the way down, we saw:

He was double-fisting it, guys, with a mug that you can't quite see. No joke.

HA. I can break one faster than that!

And then when we went to eat sushi, we passed this:

But do they have mustache corsages?!

Perhaps best of all, I can protect us against supernatural threat. I will force you to view my mighty mini-vampire stabbing weapon:

...And also, You Can't Do That At Foolscap--no, I don't know what that means--provided this favorite-colored fountain:

Non-photo events: I won two ribbons (one rosette, and one for my badge) with my last-minute entry into the First Annual Marie Antoinette (From The Neck Up) Memorial Masquerade. I was a steampunk villain. I charged our host, Dave Howell, with making my theme music, and he did such a swell job that I apparently won a ribbon for his hard work. Go me him! Then we went to jaylake and calendula_witch's room, and some people tasted fine scotches while kehrli read some scary New Age instructional text that he stole from his dayjob at a copy center, and after that, Jay regaled us with a yeti sodomy scene from one of his short stories. Then we all ran in fear, and that's why I'm home at mikigarrison's house now instead of ~~sandwiched between two hot SF nerds~~ hitting on more high school reunion attendees in the elevator.

Foolscap has so far given me free books, a ten dollar copy of a big fat hardcover I REALLY REALLY WANTED (!!!! <3 to tbclone47), and an exorbitant amount of free chocolate.

CON IS WIN.

My friends!

2009-09-24T10:48:10Z

me: hahahaha I AM SOFA KING AWESOME
awriter: Sofa king?
me: Read it out loud :P
awriter: ... YOU MADE ME SAY THE F-WORD. XD
me: Hahaha, no you said something about furniture royalty.

Anyway.

My friend kehrli has an excellent story in the newest issue of Apex Digest, called "Advertising at the End of the World."

My friend kaerfel has put the first chapter of The Rise of Renegade X on her website ~~to tease you since it doesn't come out until May~~ for your reading pleasure!

My friend Tara sadly must give up two of her cats because of a move. If you are in the Northwest Washingtonish Area, and you could adopt an adult cat or two (they are friendly and have adapted to other cats in the past), talk with her about it and see if they would be a fit.

My friend zeldyn has somehow wangled me into doing a webcomic again. We're matching pages for each other on a weekly basis. It has graverobbing, tricorner hats, ~~Haley Joel Osment clones~~ kids who see dead people, and your grandmother. Zing! (No, you can't see it until September 30.)

My friend mroctober publishes Icarus, the Magazine of Gay Speculative Fiction. If you like your SF wrapped in rainbows, or if you just want to own this bitchin' cover art by the aforementioned zeldyn and I (my lineart, her colors!), you should pick up the Halloween issue.

And my friend Abraham Lincoln is still dead, but he is nonetheless insulted every time you leave currency with his face lying on the ground because "it's not worth picking up." Have a care, people. Scoff at someone who deserves it, like that Jefferson bastard.

Snore alert! (My process hows and whys)

2009-09-08T04:39:28Z

I had a very spotty output schedule until I discovered this magic fifteen minute cycle. I have no idea if this would work for anyone else (and in truth, I don't know if it actually works for me, since I've never sold a book!), but since I regularly get drooling green jealousy from some friends when I post my higher wordcounts, I figured it wouldn't hurt to describe what I do and why I think it works.

History

I do a (semi-)weekly writing exercise with some friends called "Story Ninjas" in which we all start with common prompts and write for fifteen minutes, then read the results aloud. This is our third year, and I've written 68,786 words this way. I write between 300-500 words in fifteen minutes. From the beginning, I noticed how focused my writing was when I knew how long I had. I time Story Ninjas with a playlist--fifteen minutes and change--that has a quote from the Venture Brothers between the fifteen minute segments to let me know when my time is up.

Once on a whim, I used that playlist while I was noveling. After all, usually 1K an hour was pretty fast for me, but if I wrote 500 words every fifteen minutes, that was twice as much.

And it worked.

Why it works

Even when my output was only 300 words per fifteen minutes, I still had 200+ words more output per hour. Somehow, splitting up the same amount of time into four smaller pieces made me 17% more productive. Weird, right?

Well, it took me a long time to discover this, but when I'm writing, the thing that slows me down is thinking about what comes next while I'm writing what happens now. I find myself gazing off and then backspacing, and then writing again, and then backspacing. Even though I have a general idea of the book's skeleton for everything I write, it doesn't mean I don't worry that I'm going about it the wrong way.

If after fifteen minutes I let myself plug a summary of what I've written into my outline while I drink hot cocoa, I get to see where I am in the book and reassure myself. And then it's much easier to turn off the two voices that screw me up: my internal editor, who is afraid this is all crap, and the second-guessing writer, who is afraid it might be brilliant but useless because it derails the story somehow. I can't shut them up for long, but fifteen minutes is a battle I can win.

Yes, sometimes without the extra thinking, the path I take is wrong, and later I do some snipping and rearranging. But usually my trust in myself is well-placed. If I just give myself a chance to tell me a story I want to hear, it is surprisingly just what I asked for.

Focusing on all this math is a mistake

While I'm well-aware that a lot of novice writers spend too much time focusing on things that don't really matter, like how fast they can write, or how much, or whatever, I think as long as you're reasonable, it's helpful to examine what you can and can't do, and how you might alter it.

For one thing, I'm not only more productive writing in these fifteen minute cycles, I'm happier. Additionally, I am way too curious to move through this process without recording it for scientific posterity! ;) I like to look back later and see how I've changed.

I have two spreadsheets for Immortal Showdown: daily stats and hourly stats. The former is what I record before I go to bed; the latter is where I write what I yielded in each fifteen minute cycle. Looking at these makes me feel accomplished in a way that skimming over the entire project doesn't. The sheer size of my novel makes me stressed out; rendering it into stacks of tiny numbers makes me feel accomplished, and like there's a history of success that I'm simply continuing.

Other thoughts

- It doesn't work as well for me with short stories. I don't know why.
- It works perfectly on the bus ride to work, which I discovered on Friday! :D
- I have only tried it on projects which are mostly-plotted, at least in my head.
- I'm not suggesting this will work for you (though I don't suppose it hurts to try), only that you should examine your circumstances when you write your best, and try to arrange them on a regular basis.

Immortal Showdown stats + photo

2009-09-07T09:07:22Z

Taken by me at mikigarrison's house. (My foot, her lawn juice.)

Title: Immortal Showdown
Words today: 5,025 (201% of a lake)
Accomplished: Murder or self-defense, depending on who you ask.
Excerpt:
A smoking red hole appeared in his forehead. The tiniest spray of blood misted over his face. Tiny crimson droplets beaded on his one long eyebrow and clung to the ends of his lashes—which didn't close. He didn't even blink.

He grinned and yelled to be heard over the rattle and roar of the mechanisms beneath them. “You already ruined this meatsuit, bitch. A few more holes won't hurt me a bit—they just mean I have to change clothes sooner.”
Behind the scenes: I have a cat resting under either elbow. hehe

31177 / 100000 words. 31% done!

Screw you Noah + Immortal Showdown stats

2009-09-04T09:56:39Z

If I can do a lake per day, I can write a 100K novel (my usual goal) in forty days. That doesn't work because I often must do things other than write. Screw you, Noah. You wasted your opportunity. If I got to float around on an ark for forty days, I'd have a novel to show for it, instead of a strained relationship with my arranged wife and a bunch of really pissed off, pregnant animals.

24287 / 100000 words. 24% done!

Words today: 2,858 (114% of a lake)
Accomplished: Put my favorite character in terrible danger and then yanked him back out again. Hopefully everyone will be as scared when reading it as I was writing it.
Excerpt:
“Where have all your cats run off to?” Boyd said, artfully leaning away from her to look for her pets in the corner behind the bookshelf.

Sally spread her fingers and stroked Boyd's thigh. He could feel her nails as they scratched over his dungarees. Her eyes were intense when she answered, her tone silky and cool as the cream in their tea. “I don't know. I'm sure they're around. But tell me, Deputy. Is that twisted ankle the worst you've ever been hurt?”
Behind the scenes: I have three beverages, at minimum, while creating fiction or art. Does anyone else do this? Sometimes I've had five open containers surrounding me like hunting lions!

Also, writing scary stuff improves my words per hour... I did 1661 wph today! :D (Almost 1 jph.) And those stats don't include the short story I was working on earlier... which was also scary. Haha!

Immortal Showdown stats

2009-08-31T07:09:13Z

I am making another of my pathetic attempts to be responsible again, and actually devote regular, scheduled slots of time to doing the things I love (as well as things like washing dishes and paying bills, ugh). Every night, from 8:00 p.m. until midnight, is writing/drawing time. Today, I wrote. (Because the last few days, in between mouth misery* and work, I drew! You can see it later. After it's printed. After you buy the magazine it's in.)

21295 / 100000 words. 21% done!

Words today: 2,645 (106% of a Lake)
Accomplished: Introduced the concept of dead gods early on, which I kind of failed to do in the first version. Also, POV character's spunky little sister shakes things up.
Excerpt:
“Hmm,” Otter said, his tone carefully neutral. “I will draw less attention to myself with only Chiaha as company. I had best go, though. I'll see you soon, and if all goes well, I'll have a surprise for you when I come back.”

“I hate surprises.”

Otter wondered if he'd been like this when he was fourteen. He didn't think so.

Quolamina snatched a rock from among the others by her feet and inspected it before deciding it didn't meet her requirements. She discarded it in favor of another. Otter didn't know what the requirements were until she finally thrust an egg-shaped agate into his hand.

“That one is lucky,” she said. She sounded furious that the stone dared to have such a property. “Don't lose it.”

Behind the scenes: For the second time since I got these teeth out, I just got a bite of scrambled egg several hours after I had ostensibly swallowed all of the scrambled egg I put in my mouth. EW. Oh, something relevant?

Okay, I remembered that I can write much more efficiently in fifteen-minute increments, so I got out that playlist again. It worked pretty well. Excluding my bathroom/food/drink breaks, I wrote for three hours. And while I've done better than 882 words per hour, I've also done worse--like zero words per hour!

* I maintain that for the most part it really doesn't hurt too much, though eventually the constant low-grade ache got to me and I did take some ibuprofen. The misery really stems from not being able to eat all the cheese and crackers and summer sausage that Seamus and I had just bought and were looking forward to sampling together while we watched Venture Brothers. >:| This tiny trove of forbidden culinary treasure mocks me from the bottom shelf of the refrigerator.

Reading recommendation (and a fish video)

2009-08-31T07:04:35Z

scott_lynch has impressed me once again, this time with his new FREE online novel, Queen of the Iron Sands. jaylake professed Title Envy, and I have to agree; then I read it, and I profess Voice Envy. I know the protagonist intimately and I've only read her for a chapter. P.S. I want to marry her. So go read it!

...Also, have a video of my carnivorous fish eating a cranefly who was bumbling about a little too near my chocolate milk! And if you're eyeing my chocolate milk yourself, don't think you're too big to get fed to my killifish, because I only have to cut you into little cubic centimeters, and I bet there's a machine that'll do it for me.

Missing: Four teeth. And common sense.

2009-08-31T02:40:54Z

On Friday night, we walked by the delicious El Capitan's on our way back from the critique meeting, and I wanted a hot dog, but there was no way I could properly chew one. kehrli teased me and said I should just put one in a blender.

...Oh yes, I did.

It needed Pepsi, however, before it would actually blend.
(The video didn't come out or I'd show you.)

A FAN PIE!

2009-08-28T04:16:16Z

kehrli made a pie with a darkling face on it.

Darklings are creepy sort-of-faery monsters from I Didn't Want To Go On Your Stupid Quest Anyway. In the book, some people may or may not eat them, and they may or may not taste "...thick like jizz and just as salty, with an aftertaste like a dry wine."

Let's hope this pie is infinitely more delicious!

UPDATE: It was delicious. I won't tell you whether or not it tasted like the above description.

SURPRISE!

2009-08-27T20:35:25Z

I had four teeth extracted today. Now I will tell you about it, before the numbness wears off.

You have $8 for an excellent read, I know it.

2009-08-25T20:12:37Z

Remember that ARC I beat the crap out of because I loved it so much I had to sleep with it at night and bring it in the tub with me and while I was gladiating lions?

Well, it's available online, even though it's not officially out until September 1st.

That book has gritty, bad-ass characters who don't read like Mary Sues or one-dimensional noir heroes; its treatment of ghosts and the spirit world is unique and feels like a real culture; and the prose is beautiful. I could imagine everything, and I didn't want to stop.

stillsostrange, to date, has more fan art from me than any other published author, and there's a bloody good reason for it. One...

two...

three...

BUY! :)

Grants Pass party, my book haul, and monkey underwear

2009-08-25T19:45:56Z

(I lj-cut some of this, but my favorite photos are exposed for your viewing revulsion.)

Saturday began with a 9 a.m. trip to mikigarrison's house. We had lunch at Red Robin, and were seated outside--which I hypothesized was because they knew they were going to end up kicking us out anyway, so they might as well serve out there to begin with. And Miki saved this effing scary surprise in an attempt to ruin my dessert...

...What horror hath she wrought upon me?!

That shirt is so cool it almost cancels out the clown.

As you can see, it didn't really ruin my dessert.

Apparently kaerfel has treasured that monstrosity from some early point in her childhood, and decided to donate it to the cause of encouraging me to get better friends.

(I do kind of like these ones, however, which ate our meal properly and without clowns or underwear.)

After that debacle, which was complemented by French onion soup that was like eating Stretch Armstrong, we attended the Grants Pass book release party. I met jennifer_brozek, who is just as sweet as everyone says about her behind her back! (Something tells me my reputation is smeared in my absence by quite differently flavored gossip.) seanan_mcguire read "Animal Husbandry," and calendula_witch read, "By the Sea." Both stories were awesome--I loved the twist in McGuire's and the voice in Page's. We ate cake that had dangerously thick frosting--I saw someone fall in and become a fossil that was discovered hours later and converged upon by interested paleontologists. (I took photos but they didn't come out.)

Before we had one of jaylake's famous open dinners at the Canyon restaurant, a few of us (criada, mikigarrison, Elizabeth Stephan, and me) sneaked off to shop. Tree Top Toys forced me to buy this:

Seriously. I heard this phantom voice inside my head. "Walk to the gay octopus aisle," it intoned, and as I'm not the kind of person to gainsay a spectral order, I sort of wandered around until I found what it was talking about. Then the voice was like, "It's your duty to buy this slightly-overpriced plush toy, so that its fabulous influence doesn't gayify any innocent children."

Then we hit the Ben Franklin. When I was a kid, Ben Franklin was like the Grocery Outlet of craft stores, and you could find merchandise so bizarrely ugly it was insulting that they thought you would buy it, and most of the people trying to sell it to you were quarrelsome and tired of life. I was disappointed by its quality goods and friendly, non-suicidal staff. I WON'T BE SHOPPING THERE AGAIN. It's too good for me.

However, it did yield this bit of hilarity:

Cute, huh?

THINK AGAIN! These are dangerous to thirteen-year-olds.

At dinner, I was given another...present.

+

=

mikigarrison is smug and should be punished. criada has a satisfactory expression and should be lauded.

Then, as if I hadn't had enough sugar, I went with kehrli, criada, mikigarrison, Lindsey (whose name I probably spelled wrong), and her fellow James to Half-Price Books and Dairy Queen. No one gives a shit what I ate at Dairy Queen, but check out my book haul for the day!

(This is my Jeff Vandermeer impersonation. Some day, I am going to be as cool as he is and have as many stacks of books.)

Twilight hilarity + finishing my book

2009-08-16T20:05:52Z

NSFW NSFW NSFW. Shane Dawson KILLS me with how Twilight should have ended. You will get fired if you watch this at work; you might vomit if you watch it at all.

...And in other, more me-like news, today I go to rdeckert and anghara's house to read aloud the last chapter of I Didn't Want To Go On Your Stupid Quest Anyway. I'm going to the store soon to get celebration goodies.

In which I politely don't tell you what's wrong with me.

2009-08-13T07:52:14Z

scott_lynch on How Fantasy Stole Your Precious Body Fluids: "...Every time some half-informed crusader comes along and tries to make science fiction out to be a lonely outpost of virtue surrounded by a sea of pink unicorn piss, they do no justice to it or to fantasy."

Bwahahaha! So, you know, I had to illustrate it.

I didn't mean to get that detailed, and I am well aware that this colored version is crappier the black and white cartoon I envisioned, but I have one of those illnesses you don't talk about in public (no, I didn't get it from someone else, smartass) and so I basically just sat where that unicorn is and tried to eat up some time by proving how terrible I am with computer coloring.

Also, in case you hadn't had enough fandom-bitching-hilarity yet, well... Have you tried Fevre Dream? To date, that was my first and is still my favorite of Martin's books, so I was particularly pleased to see it tucked into that song. :)

Why I Love SF Fandom

2009-08-13T04:20:42Z

Today, I discovered a new reason to be glad I'm a member of SF fandom. But first I'll give you the ones I already held dear.

3. We're all nerds. And as such, we are much more forgiving of social blunders, much more eager to be friends instead of measuring each other for coolness, and even as adults we are collectively bullied by the world for being unfashionable, awkward, and too smart for our own damn good. Like any group of people, there's no way to generalize all of us, but for the most part we are the kids who would lend you a pencil when you needed one. I always liked those kids, and tried my best to have an extra pencil.

2. We actually steer the future. Our creators illustrate how things are and imagine how they could be. Our fans discuss this, analyze it and create working hypotheses. Creators try again; fans refine it, and so on. Eventually, people with the time, skill, and energy to build the future work from the fiction. We owe all of our space exploration to science fiction. Artificial intelligence, some medical advancements, the acceptance of alien culture within our own... I'm not well-read enough to back this up, but I'm willing to bet a chocolate milkshake with whipped cream and a cherry on top that the concept of the Internet came from some pulp story long before it was explored by government scientists.

1. We don't just speculate on it, we embrace the future. I just saw a blog post on "moral decay" that cracked me up. This poor man is terrified that homos are going to get coverage on fictional TV shows. Terrified, you guys! It's clearly his biggest nightmare that someone might treat queers like all the other human beings, and that's just until zoophiles and people with a fetish for toasters wave their own PC flags--he's scared of that too. I was simply laughing until I saw one of his constituents voice a concern that fornication was being made to look natural while marriage was being made unnatural. And that's when I felt bad for all of them.

There is a deep and terrible fear that I may never know because I've always been fascinated with the future, the alternate past, even alternate reality. It's the feeling that the culture you grew up in is the one that your kids should have. These people who cling to their past (which they think is the present!) are losing this war against societal evolution. Well, thank you SF, for teaching me not to be afraid of change.

In fact, change has been my friend since the first time I crapped myself.

...Yes, this whole post was an excuse to make that pun. BWAHAHAHA! But liking puns probably cements my membership in the nerd club, so it's you know, relevant.

So while you were all having fun at WorldCon...

2009-08-11T07:51:18Z

... I was busy cleaning out my room. Oh, the glamor of it all.

Because when it comes time to toss something, I am often possessed by the ghost of my great-grandmother Nana, who was temporarily homeless with four children to care for, all on her own, during the Great Depression. Afterward, she kept everything--even rubber bands, old magazines, and stray cats. (I wouldn't be surprised to find out she laundered and reused dental floss or condoms. She washed plastic, disposable fast food straws, you guys. FROM MCDONALD'S.)

As a result, I own everything on Planet Earth. Oh, you might think you have belongings, but go look for it. It's in my room! My room is a junk city where goblins store everything they've stolen from mankind. Or it was, until I actually started liquidation.

So I am quite proud to present the first success: a pile of clothing I am getting rid of!

For reference, this dog weighs fifty-snazillion pounds.

It contains mostly old work shirts I've had to admit are too big for me (all shirts are too big for me), gifts from my well-meaning but hopelessly unfashionable mother, and some really awesome goth clothes that I'm sure a fourteen-year old girl would swoon over, but I have better ones now. Run forthwith to the Salvation Army, little Twitards, as that's where this black velvet Renaissancy shirt is going! And the sparkling pantaloons in size bigger-ass-than-Sän-has!

Don't applaud yet, though, since the pile hasn't actually left my now-mostly-uncluttered room. I could still freak out and change my mind. After all, I might need that Bertie costume again! Or that scarf, or that other scarf, or those other six scarves. Or those boots that don't fit, or these underwear that inexplicably came from my ex-boyfriend's dead grandfather.

...Yeah, I'm keeping those.

My cat is trying to kill me

2009-08-07T13:44:01Z

He woke me up at 5:30 a.m. by suffocating me with his big fat cow ass.* This is he, wearing kehrli's sunglasses. Or maybe they're just sunglasses that were lying around that kehrli put on him. I can't remember.

He posed for quite awhile before I took the photo.

I think he might be a Scientologist.

...Okay, now I'm going to try to sleep again. >:|

* Look, this is the technical term. It's not like I chose it or something.

I am never moving to my own fictional worlds.

2009-08-07T07:04:07Z

After a certain author (who shall remain nameless because I am so bitter) wrote a book that had a really cool world in it, which I wanted to read about more than my own damn worlds, I realized I hadn't ever built a fictional setting simply to impress myself. So I did. I'm not sure what I'll do with it yet. However, I did get as far as a system of government for the northern continent that was settled by pirates.

Here are the laws that govern their republic. If you care to read them, try to think of a crime I didn't account for! I think I got them all, but if I didn't, I'll need to make adjustments.

I. Every captain must stand accountable for his company, for their 
crimes as well as their honors, and he must guide them to provisions, 
shelter, and other amenities as needed. The company draws up their articles
as they please, shipboard or landbound or both, but for the following, which 
must be included therein:
	i. Every man has a vote in affairs of the moment, and in event 
		of a tie the captain is given a second vote
	ii. Every man must be counted free and take his share in 
		prizes, whether meager or grand
	iii. No man shall be punished with death by his captain or the 
		brothers of his company for any infraction, but instead 
		must be cast out, or marooned, or flogged, or amputated, 
		or other non-fatal means of discipline

II. A man can swear himself to or away from a captain at any time, 
for any reason, as long as he has fully discharged all obligations 
laid upon him by the captain during his voluntary service, and if 
he leaves unfinished any duty the company witnessed him charged with, 
he may be brought to heel and punished under the terms of the articles 
he signed upon swearing himself to the captain of said company.

III. What a Sworn man cannot hold himself, he may ask his captain to 
retrieve, and negotiations will be between captains. What an Unsworn 
man cannot hold himself, he has given by default to they who wanted it 
more. Only Public Works are exempt, and in the cases of such 
structures as bridges and piers, ferries and elevators, to steal all 
or part will result in a Tribunal.

IV. A Tribunal may be called by any captain, and must consist of no 
less than five of his peers, but as many as fifty. A Tribunal may only 
be called for the crimes of an Unsworn man, or a Sworn man who has 
done damage that exceeds the jurisdiction of his captain. These crimes 
are Murder, Rape, Mutilation, or Hostage-taking of any Sworn man, or 
any violence against a man Sworn to another company. 

V. No Tribunal may be called for petty disputes or lesser crimes:
	i. Murder, Rape, Mutilation, or Hostage-taking of Unsworn men
	ii. Theft or vandalism of property held within the company
	iii. Violence of non-lethal nature among the men of the company
	iv. Disturbances between companies that are thereafter dealt 
		with by the captains to both of their satisfaction

VI. No man must Swear to a company with the intent of breaking up that 
company, or replacing its captain, or otherwise endangering its function 
as a Company of the Republic of Saltesia.

That's my shirt

2009-08-04T20:00:25Z

I'm always telling it not to put gross stuff inside itself, but it doesn't listen.

Wildlife photography

2009-07-31T17:17:06Z

I had to creep up on it on my belly, Army style. I hope you appreciate what I go through for art.

The twins are here!

2009-07-28T18:53:52Z

DEAR JENS_FIRE,

NOW YOU CAN WEAR THAT DRESS.

<3

SÄN

Question for horse people! + stats

2009-07-28T09:45:58Z

The horses in this story are supposed to be characters, and I'm looking for ways to give them unique personalities without anthropomorphizing them. If you have memories of quirks and personality traits that you found to be unique to a certain horse you've known, would you mind sharing?

I'm also interested in horse body language, because I haven't lived by horses in ten years now (sad!), and my knowledge is pretty faded, but I can probably find that on my own. The personalities are harder to pull out of my Google hat!

So tell me what makes your favorite horse different from other horses you've known (and the same with your least favorite horses!)

Edit: I'm just going to add these in this post, for efficiency.

15345 / 100000 words. 15% done!

Words today: 1,582
Accomplished: Added an argument, plus the exciting beginnings of a daring rescue!
Excerpt:
Coyote Cody glanced up and chuckled to find his fellow outlaw in a dry, pristine shirt with mother-of-pearl buttons and the lengthy, fold-over cuffs favored by Spalteran gentry. Even wrinkles and stains were scared of Jake Bagley.

Behind the scenes: I hate when you write something, and then later you read something that's already published that you feel is a lot like that thing you did, and then you want to cut it because you're afraid it looks like you're copying, but you also really like the thing, and you don't know how to tell if just being a paranoid idiot or what. >:| ARGH.

I'm writing slowly lately, but I'm still feeling out the beginning. I think it'll snowball as I get more of the foundation built. :)

<3 City Birds

2009-07-28T04:51:26Z

Crows Can Do This, But Can You? - I got two of my crows right on the first try; the other crow took me three times. I wasn't just guessing either, so after thinking it was so easy twice, I'm really surprised on the third. Try it!

And just as a side note, I knew about crows recognizing people because I found a dead one and I wanted to cut off and cure its wings, so I asked my friend vebelfetzer how, because she knows everything and she knows it better than you. Her first instruction was to make sure no crows saw me molesting a dead friend of theirs, or they'd divebomb me for a long time. I now have five crow wings (my dog ate one), and I'm still not getting harassed because I followed her advice. I had no doubt she was right, because I fed the crows on my way to work twice now, in different places at different times, but they all caw at me and hop along expectantly, waiting for me to toss out some tidbits.

NPR just recently brought a lot of attention to the subject, but months ago criada showed me this, which I think is fascinating and opens up all kinds of possibilities. If we could train our urban critters to become useful, starting with crows but perhaps including raccoons and other clever animals, we might be able to make a positive change in the ecosystem by rendering animals that are now a "nuisance" into a working part of our cities. I'd like to see that happen, though I'm unclear on all the details. It just seems like a more fair way to share the planet.

Also, I've kept this link for awhile, but I think now is a good time to let you know what tammypierce has to say about rock doves, which you probably know by another name.

Immortal Showdown

2009-07-27T09:56:00Z

In this novel: Someone was dumb enough to lock a big old demon god inside a mountain, and then some other people were dumb enough to decide a train tunnel ought to go straight through there. Yet some other people are dumb enough to risk their lives to stop this tomfoolery. !Bonus zeppelins and rideable carnivorous dinosaurs.

Words today: 1,751
Accomplished: Added another supernatural mystery + toe-curling racism; or in other words, pissed off two main characters and scared the holybegerbil out of another.
Excerpt:
Juniper's stomach tightened, the way it had when he was a kid and he suspected he'd done something wrong.

Behind the scenes: I was writing this part down by the bay with my dog, and a skunk came running up to us, investigated about ten feet away for a little bit, showed me his tail in a blatantly threatening fashion until my heart rate was suitably raised (NOT THE LAPTOP, SKUNK, PLEASE NOT THE LAPTOP) and then scampered away. If I meet that stripey bastard when I don't have the dog tied to my belt or a computer on my lap, we are going to play a game called I Don't Actually Care About Getting Sprayed As Long As I Spray You Back With A Shaken Up Bottle Of Mountain Dew, You Little Jerkoff. And yes, I'll recognize him! I never forget an ass.

13673 / 100000 words. 14% done!

I'm aiming to finish the first book by the end of September, so I have October to recuperate before NaNoWriMo.