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This thread is for any of the participants in the Mead Hall Writers' Society writing group to post up comments, observations, and general chit-chat about the lessons, writing in general, or what have you.
Those who are joining us new, feel free to post here and introduce yourself!
When I saw you were moving ahead with the Workgroup I took the liberty of sticking the original brainstorm thread. Hope you don't mind. :beam:
No problem at all, thanks in fact ~:) It looks like we've a good-sized group but it's always helpful to get more exposure!
A quick note on the observation assignment: make sure to follow the First Rule of the Artist: Don't get caught staring!
...unless you want to, of course ~:) but with police and drug-dealers, it's usually a really bad idea. I don't know how many times I've been caught staring while clandestinely drawing portraits, but it's always tough to cover up, and often incredibly embarrassing.
Good first assignment:2thumbsup: I'm an actor so I actually do this all the time, 'though I usually just remember instead of writing my observations down. I'll try to do this assignment if I can find the time to observe people.Quote:
Next time you are in a restaurant, market, grocery store, or any other public place where individuals, couples, or groups gather and interact, jot down your observations in a notebook.
In one paragraph, describe a loner's looks and behaviour.
In another, describe the looks and interactions of a pair or group of people.
In the third paragraph, describe how anyone with an official role interacts with everyone else. This could be a waiter, checker, stall owner, police, street cleaner, match official, etc.
Good first topic, though damn you for making me actually go out and talk to people!:clown:
:laugh4:
I promise, this won't happen again! well, not often, I mean. relatively speaking. *cough*
One thing that wasn't mentioned, at least not that I noticed...deadline. Assignment issued on Tuesday, but no guidance about when it should be posted. Probably a comfort for those who want an informal group, but my background is journalism and without deadline pressure I'm pretty near indistinguishable from dead.
Wow, completely missed that one. The lesson thread has been edited, but I'll add it here as well.
Post up Lesson 1 assignment materials by a bit past midnight GMT this coming Wednesday (7 May). Thanks Timsup2nothin, it was very clear in my head.
:oops:
Aaargh! Wednesday!? Oh jam. Must finish! :skull:
Oh jam? :inquisitive: will have to use that one!
Jam indeed!! Finished two paragraphs, one more to touch up.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tamur
Ah, so due date is day after next assignment...and I beat a deadline by...THREE DAYS!!!! Woooooohoooooo!!!
Sorry, that's just never happened before. Three hours maybe once, frequently three minutes, but never three days.
Well done Tim!
Just a note to remind everyone - you've precisely 12 hours to post your writing for Lesson 1! Gah!
Don't be shy -- this is the internet. ~:) I'll be posting materials for Lesson 2 later today.
I've really enjoyed reading the posts added so far, and hoping for more, and a good discussion to follow.
With twelve hours to deadline this may be a little late, but I have a suggestion for my fellow aspiring writers from my journalism experience.
Learn to read what you write.
When I was told this I looked at my editor like an extra head had sprouted from his shoulder, so he explained. When you read what someone else wrote, and they have words that are just jumbled out of order (which happens to everyone at least occasionally because we think so much faster than we write), you are just stoppered by it because it makes no sense. You think the writer never bothered to even look over what they wrote, but they probably did. Most people can run their eyes over what they themselves have written and their mind sees what they meant, not what they wrote.
I promptly took back the copy I had given him and read it. Repeatedly. I was really amazed when on the fourth pass I was still finding words out of order, mismatched tenses and forms, and other 'glaring' errors. Fortunately for me, with practice, I learned to separate my reader from the writer and I can usually read my own work with almost the same eye that I have for someone else's, so now I can get most things sorted out in one pass.
I talked about beating a deadline by three hours. That was in print. When I made the transition to internet journalism I frequently had ninety minutes from event to deadline, so beating it by three hours would be impossible, and my editor had thirty minutes from submit to post. If I gave them bad copy they would have no choice but to replace me.
Just closed the Assignment 1 thread. Sorry to those who almost but not quite hit the deadline, but I need to print off the posts to give to my offline editor/helper in this process. Definitely join us in the Lesson 2 assignment!
And thanks to everyone who contributed.
edit: had planned to post reviewer comments by 18.00 GMT today but it's not to be. My outside help had to put of our review till tonight, so it will be GMT morning on Thursday before reviews are up this week.
I have to ask, since in eastern cultures the family name is given first...what is the relationship between Offline Help and Offline Participant?
hehe! Ah, coincidental. My offline participant isn't related to my offline help. Very funny thought though. I should gather up a few more and we could have an entire Offline side for a game of football!
Going along with this week's theme, I was talking with a friend a couple of days ago about a story she's writing, and how there is a big disconnect at times between imagining a scene and writing it. It's inevitable that details will be lost in the translation. We talked for a while about strategies to limit the damage done by this loss.
The best one we could come up with is to examine every word in an initial scene description and be conscious of what's being left out -- and ask questions about it like whether the dropped detail could add anything to the unveiling of character, or plot, and whether the details included *are* necessary. If not, is it really worth the reader's time to know about it?
It yeilds good results, but it's fairly labour-intensive. Anyone have an easier way to deal with this?
We arent' quite to it yet, but this article shows how character building details can work well in a news story. The moments and expressions picked out by the writer are master strokes at creating an image of two very different people.
Just a note to say, sorry for being late with the lesson 4 material. My usual group work time was demolished this week but I will be putting up materials tomorrow, along with the #3 comments.
Sorry for the hang time.
I sorry that i missed the last few assignments, i was busy with exams and WoW, but i think im back now, so ill probably be writing in the next assignment
Sounds great Bartholemew-Varath! I should be able to post next week's materials in a couple of hours.
Hi everyone, I'm new to the forum and.... sorry if my writing is horrible, this is my first time doing it. :sweatdrop: I have written in stories of my own but this is my first time posting something on the writing site.
Hi Bibbin and welcome to the Mead Hall and the Org, glad you're here. And don't worry, we're all learning how to write better.
Thanks for posting already in the assignment thread, it's great to have another writer on board!
This is pretty cool. I have suddenly gotten the urge to write a story for which I didn't have the characters, the setting, and the events already provided to me on a silver platter by a PBM. I'll take a crack at the current assignment tomorrow.
However, be warned, my background is in engineering, and most of my writing has been technical reports. Expect awkwardly constructed language, exceedingly long sentences (sometimes with semicolons), a plague of superfluous commas, and outright odd descriptions. I do, at least, promise not to use the word 'sinusoidal' to describe anything.
hey FLYdude, good to see you here! Don't worry. Even if you used "affline transformation" I think we'd survive. Barely.
Apologies for missing assignment 3. Heavy work commitments and delayed flights condemned me. I did complete it though, and I suppose that's the point, to get us doing these exercises!
Assignment 4 I found hard, perhaps I need to let go of trying to make a story out of everything and just write in a stream of conciousness! Still, see what you think!
I look forward to reading all the other posts too.
Hi there, nice to see you back Ironsword! No worries about assignment three... if you're doing them, that's what really counts. I look forward to reading through this week's entries. I agree about this week's assignment. I found that trying to create a mood in the setting, without falling into melodrama, is a tough task.
Just a note... if anyone needs examples of anything talked about in the lesson 5 material, let me know. I wanted to add examples but it had grown so long already... :sweatdrop:
Hi all,
I am new to the guild, but avoided the "say hello in the entrance hall" post. I thought I'd slink around the edge of the walls, until I got to the Mead hall, and say my hellos here.
(This is me slinking = :creep:)
I have watched others play all the games since the Shogun days, but am not a gamer myself. (Were there gasps in the room at that admission?)
I am interested in writing though, and heard about Tamur's workshop. I thought I'd give it a go. I really liked Assignment 4, by the way. It was a challenge to use objects and weather in two totally different ways. It was like a puzzle. I thought it was fun.
I hope to get to know the personalities behind the avatars, and hope to improve my writing skills. Thanks for letting me hang out in the Mead Hall!
Hi Mountaintroll! ~:cheers:
I really enjoy the writing side of things too. The two great merits of the MHWS is that you get feedback on your own prose and also get to see how others tackled the task too. So more's the better!
To me 'not a gamer' isn't so much an admission as an eye opening concept, as in 'wow, what could I get done if I were not a gamer?'
Welcome to the board and MHWS!!
Hello MountainTroll, and welcome! That was fairly sneaky to skip through the entrance hall -- Martok must have been dozing.
I hope you enjoy your stay, and thanks for posting for this last lesson - great writing intro too!
So, who is Martok? Gaurdian of the Guild Gates, ready to pounce on newbies? :)
And a cheers to you as well, Ironsword~:cheers:
Thanks for the welcome.
And Timsup2nothin, I had to laugh at "what could I get done if I were not a gamer". I admire gamers for their loyalty to making sure there is fun and leisure consistently in their day. -I am working on being more "gamer-like". Funny how everyone tries for the perfect balance. Perhaps being a forum member will have some gaminess rub off. (But not in the smelly sense of the word!)
And Tamur, thanks for the hello! I hope to stick it out for a while anyways... if you start requiring full length novels, I might run away. :)
Comments up... :sweatdrop:
I have to admire the vastly different results from this assignment, and overall very high quality. Nice work everyone!
I do hope you're all talking the chance to read over each other's writing. It's very interesting to see a couple of similarities but mostly a huge difference in the way you all handle the same problem.
edit: Martok is a Moderator here, and is very active welcoming people in the Entrance Hall. A great guy, you should say hi to him sometime ~:)
And no, no novel requirements. Yet.
To be honest, I'll be plum disappointed if one of you doesn't get a story published, some really nice writing going on.
Should you smell camels while you approach him, just nod and smile. It is not the camel you see that you should fear, rather the camel that you cannot see...Quote:
Originally Posted by Tamur
Also welcome to the Mead Hall MountainTroll! Tamur has almost taken over the place as of late with his writing course, but that's fine by me, i know this place is in good hands with him. I just wish i had more time to take part in it myself. :shame:
Enjoy your stay! :medievalcheers:
Just a note to everyone to say: I will be away from the keyboard and the Org through Wednesday evening next week. I was tempted to post the next assignment before I leave, but have talked myself out of that since this current assignment should be enough to worry about without more distraction.
This means that the next assignment will be up on Thursday next week, and the assignment 5 posting thread won't be locked till Wednesday evening.
Happy weekend to everyone.
I'm happy that this is active. I'll join again once the cursed exams are over. :sweatdrop:
We'll look forward to seeing you Stephen, and best of luck with exams. :book:
I'm impressed by my inability to follow direction. In the assignment post thread Tamur clearly says 'Once you're done posting your writing, head over to the discussion thread and tell people what you thought of the assignment!' When I noticed that, which was of course long after one would expect, I edited this off the end of my post and moved it here...
This was indeed a challenging assignment. In journalism character background is a matter of sifting through a swarm of 'facts' and picking the ones that are at least marginally verifiable and support the direction you are taking. Here I think the background I came up with is horribly thin...but everything I thought to add to it would probably be better placed in backstory for additional characters. For example, I gave way more than a moments thought to names for his wife and other guys in the band, but eventually realized they would be major characters and those would be their stories, not his.
I'm left wondering if I misunderstood the entire idea, but I gave it my best shot.
^^Yes, I thought it difficult too. My effort is less factual than yours timsup2nothin, and I wonder whether my background and character disconnects are too vague.
I thought this assignment (5)was initially overwhelming... but once I found a character I was interested in myself, the details started rolling. I think listing the disconnects is an interesting way to break down a story into what a character is battling. I have had trouble coming up with ones in the past, maybe this is the excercise I need to do more frequently.
Also, I had trouble knowing how much detail to put into the backstory, without actually starting to write the story. Overall though, I thought it was fun.
I got a chance to read through everyone's assignment 4's. It seemed as if people were either really good at writing depressing settings or really good at writing exuberant ones. (I think TimsuptoNothin had a great happy one with his briefcase story!) -But I didn't see any that had two strong pairings (including me!) I think overall people wrote better as depressed. Why do you think that is? Or do you disagree? Maybe people notice their surroundings and other people when they are down, but when they are happy, just zip through life not taking time to notice the details? Maybe that's why the best writers seem to stuggle with depression or whatever issues. So, maybe the trick is (if you are not a naturally down sort of person) is to become more analytical during happy moments. I'm going to try this... I don't know if it will work.
Maybe it would suck the happiness out.
If I post again sounding very depressed, you will know not to try this at home. :)
Hah! In my case so true! I'm not really a depressed, miserable loner, but often I fall into the trap of believing that loss, pain, regret are more powerful than joy, love, excitement etc. I'm going to try and inject more of these 'happy' emotions in the upcoming assignments.Quote:
Originally Posted by MountainTroll
-Also, I never listed my characters disconnects/conflicts in assignment 5, rather just tried to work them into the story. They are, in my mind at least as follows;
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
Having been pointed out as the exception I think I can answer this question. The modern human is conditioned to avoid being out of the ordinary, and the ordinary is something fairly close to depressed. Since it is automatic to seek evidence for whatever we have chosen to believe we see depressing things much more clearly than other things.Quote:
Originally Posted by MountainTroll
As an experiment, commit for one week to answer the endless streams of 'how are you?' that we all meet with 'marvelous!' or 'excellent!' or 'terrific!'. You will stop traffic at the checkout line in the supermarket. Be prepared to be stared at. Be prepared for looks that clearly call you a liar. No one will want to believe you, because they want to believe that 'okay', or 'oh, fine I guess' is the best anyone is doing so they don't feel like they are missing out.
If you yourself can't shake the feeling that you are lying for the sake of an experiment it probably won't work. The people you say it to will be left with 'that poor soul is so miserable they have to put on a front just to get through the day'.
This is where I operate from every day. When someone says 'how are you today?' I don't take it as a request for a report on the day up to then, I take it as an opportunity to predict how the rest of my day will go. From there it is hard to ask for anything less than 'great'.
The next step is to learn that it is up to you to make your prediction true. I would say 'good luck', but luck has nothing to do with it.
I know a lot of fairly-close-to-depressed people at work, and anti-depressant medication has been nothing short of a cultural phenomenon. So there's plenty of evidence that might point to what you're saying.Quote:
...the ordinary is something fairly close to depressed...
However, I respectfully disagree - I don't think it's a universal truth. There are, for example, a lot of five-year-old children playing with friends who wouldn't qualify. I don't mean that flippantly. If you've been near five-year-old children anytime recently, you know that depressed is a term that can only be applied in rare cases. What turns a playful five-year-old into a depressed sixty-year-old?
Anyone's guess is as good as another, and until I have a 10000 sample study, I'm not going to go out on any limbs! Interesting topic though.
After reading assignment 6, I think I've got too far ahead of myself in assignment 5...
Still, i'll try and figure something out!
I'm willing to go out on this limb. What turns playful five year olds into average anti-depressant popping adults is a steady stream of instructions to 'grow up'. 'Growing up', they are led to believe, includes NOT being playful, NOT standing out from the crowd, Not openly asking for what they want, NOT being overtly happy, or sad for that matter. It also includes NOT going out on any limbs, by the way.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tamur
Five year old children hate to go to bed because they think they might miss something. They pop up in the morning as soon as their eyes open because they want to get on with life. Adults generally believe they get up because 'they have to'. If I ever let myself believe that again I'd just as soon die in my sleep.
Ha! Touché, good point.Quote:
Originally Posted by Timsup2nothin
I think I agree with you. The social pressure for all these behaviours (more like lack of behaviours) is fairly intense. And that is interesting to think of how driven young children are to milk every last moment out of the day, and wake up as early as possible - how different from the usual office worker who can't stand the thought of the alarm clock going off.
There's a story in there somewhere - or many thousands of stories more like.
Well said, thanks for the thought food.
To get back on topic here and away from my philosophy...
I just read the next assignment and I have to say I've now been pushed from moderately surprised to outright dumbfounded.
I saw this 'MHWS', and figured it would turn out as some sort of 'write a few paragraphs and pat each other on the backs' confidence builder. Not really much use to me since lack of confidence is not one of my notable weaknesses, but harmless and fun.
I was wrong. I've paid for courses that did not cut so clearly into the heart of the matter as Tamur is doing here for free. I don't know where he came from, but I for one am really glad I lucked into being here when he came along.
Seconded.
It's really given me some focus.
:whip: You shall work, writing slaves!
Seriously, glad you're enjoying the ride. I perhaps should have given people more of a warning at the front end of this, that it wouldn't be a pat-on-the-back sort of experience. I do hope it's enjoyable even if it's a stretch at times.
And Ironsword, sorry I somehow missed your post a bit ago...
Yours was definitely a very complete backstory! Nicely done. I'll have comments up by about 06 GMT tomorrow, but yes, you went well above the call of duty ~:) In your case, I'd suggest taking a different character for assignment 6.Quote:
After reading assignment 6, I think I've got too far ahead of myself in assignment 5...
Completely back on topic. I have a feeling that I'm on track here, but I may be just heading off into a field to become a jumble of boxcars. If so, slap me back in the right general direction please.
After much flailing, I have seized on the word 'introduce'. In introducing the character I may or may not include everything I have in his backstory. In fact, upon further flailing, I probably won't.Quote:
With this character, use each of the four numbered techniques above (summary, habit, self-portrait, physical) to introduce your character.
My purpose is to present the character in a way that doesn't conflict with the backstory, since that will eventually come out. Also, most importantly, in a way that engages a reader in the character. Probably not jumping directly into the character's conflicts before getting the reader engaged, so leave them out when introducing the character. Hmmmm. My feeling that I was on track is fading fast, but I might be getting on track now.
Sorry for blatantly brainstorming all over the place here, but I really needed that! Again, if I am completely off track please say so...
Yes yes, you're perfectly correct. I'm going to edit the lesson material right now to clear that up. Thanks for pointing the muddy waters out!
When introducing a character for this exercise, don't attempt to introduce disconnects or backstory unless they fit well. Your introduction of the character can be completely separate from both disconnects and backstory, and should simply give the "flavour" of the character. It should act as a teaser, leaving your reader in a state of wishing he or she knew more.
Feedback on #5 is up, only a few hours late... *cough*
Thanks to each of you who participated. It is a stretch to define a character to this level.
It was interesting to see the different styles. Ironsword's was so detailed, a story in itself, while Timsup2nothin and MountainTroll went for a more loose style. Either of these work.
Also, note the differences in time focus. MountainTroll focused on the near-present, doing a complete but sketchy coverage of the long-past and middle-past. Ironsword on the other hand had significant coverage of the long-past and the near-present but the space in the middle (between the family deaths and the near-present) is left blank.
Thanks for the feedback Tamur (ED1?) and the enigmatic ED2. This story originally came from assignment three, I missed the deadline, but thought it applicable here. Though in assignment three, the urn was replaced by a bowl. I expanded it for this to create a backstory.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tamur
Also, I've not given up on this potter, I would possibly introduce an apprentice (One that reminds him either of Molly or Tom) so he may yet get closure.
I was trying to get a timeless feel too, but I don't know how well that came across. ie. What era did you guys picture him in?
Quote:
Ed. 1 This was well done. I can easily see it becoming a screenplay and a movie because the character of the band leader is very vivid. The conflicts are clear and intriguing. It's very amusing too, which makes me think the result will be a comedy.
Ed. 2 This is a great character introduction. I come away from it with a basic feel for the character, but primarily sympathy for him and his predicament. It points me towards the inevitable discovery of his bad habit, or the possible escape he makes through some major life change.
A couple of unresolved questions:
- Is he a solo robber?
- When does he do the robberies? Broad daylight when he has more chance of being caught on the run, but less chance of having to make excuses to his wife? Or night-time, when he has less chance of being caught but more need to make excuses to his wife about false gigs, etc?
- How does he deal with the robbery money? Does he hide it somewhere in his house? Deposit it overseas? Deposit in a US bank (at least) would be risky due to the treasury serial numbers. How has he been able to keep his wife from finding the stash?
I expect that in expanding Rockin' Ron into the main character of a story the bank robbery scenes will provide high action points, and they will illustrate the answers to most of the 'how to' type questions. Seeing him distribute cash to the other band members, then give his wife the check to deposit without taking any cash back will present a bit of a mystery until the first time a robbery is shown.
I'm glad he came across as likable rather than just a lazy villain. Holding that tone in the face of the obvious criminal behavior will be the biggest challenge.
Very good to hear. I was tempted after this assignment to encourage everyone to stay with these characters and use the rest of the course to finish off a 40-page story about them. Unfortunately that doesn't work for the writers who will be joining us in July and early August, but I would very much like to see some of this great character work developed more.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ironsword
I pictured the 1930s/1940s, with the whiskey and the note blowing by the window. I asked my editor friend just now and she said she had pictured as contemporary.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ironsword
Yes, that will be a challenge. But I think he's in that "between a rock and hard place" spot that a lot of people could identify with, so as long as he doesn't appear to be an abusive scumbag or something repulsive, he should be a nicely flawed character to root for.Quote:
Originally Posted by Timsup2nothin
Just a reminder for participants that Lesson 6 assignments are due soon. The current week's assignment deadline was extended to Thursday GMT 00.01 due to my AFK-ness last week.
I've had a couple of requests via PM to extend the deadline to Tuesday at midnight on the other side of the world (NZST or UZ11, i.e. GMT -/+12). We may start that with lesson 7.
Just an observation on deadlines, and perhaps my own dysfunctionalness...
0001 deadlines have always made me crazy. I relate to the 'Wednesday' before I relate to the time, then have to figure out that I really only have until the end of the day Tuesday...then 0001 Wednesday GMT has the poor grace to fall somewhere in the middle of Tuesday so I don't really even have until the end of the day!
hehehe... I know it. Setting deadlines for a 24-hour wide world is its own nightmare!
Maybe what I should say is "Tuesday before you go to bed, no matter where you live in the world"? That's what this new deadline is in essence.
Likin' that!
Argghhh.. I should really try writing sometime other than the middle of the night before an assignment is due. https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/image...gc/gc-wall.gif
:wall:
I thought this one was tricky because your assignment had to show the reader from the outside the character, as well as mix in something from the "self-viewpoint" or whatever you called the Dostoevskii example.
And by the way mead hall writers, I have still been thinking about that little debate a week or so ago about depressed versus happy writing. I have tried to make note during my days of moments of pure joy and look around and see how I could describe that. Initially it was annoying to have my feelings interrupted by such a logical task (right brain, left brain battle), but after a while I was amazed at how often it happened. I have a lot to be happy about!
I was also really struck thought by TimsuptoNothin's comment:
''Adults generally believe they get up because 'they have to'. If I ever let myself believe that again I'd just as soon die in my sleep."
It has made me think about what I look forward to the next day, and if there is nothing... then to plan something. It has added more fun into the days, which is always a plus! I was surprised I had gotten lulled into that brain-numb worker bee mindset.
To have my comment credited with this result is to be credited with having fulfilled, at least briefly, the intention that gets me out of bed every day. Thanks.Quote:
Originally Posted by MountainTroll
You will be even more surprised if you try the experiment I suggested.
Timsuptonothin,
I can only imagine the looks I would get... and that is enough to keep me from trying it! I don't need to be known as that "crazy lady" about town!
On assignment six...
I was perhaps trying too hard to completely isolate the four styles, which was challenging. Then I made it even harder by alternating tenses, just because I'm a bit masochistic. I really did learn a lot from this one though.
I see that all the portrayals of Ron were very centered on the band, but I was looking ahead somewhat. Ron needs to be very compartmentalized, to an extent that when he is set in his various environments the reader is almost left with 'is this the same person?'.
Hopefully in assignment seven I will be able to show him passing across one of his disconnects. I'm working out his wife as the second character so I can contrast the 'Rockin Ron whose life is the band' with the 'family Ron whose band is the job that supports his wife and kids'.
Comments are up. These were very enjoyable to read, but you're all too advanced! MountainTroll's especially could have served well for the next assignment, since she had character interaction thrown in. Ah well, I'm not going to complain too loudly about good writing.
Unfortunately I'm under a deadline here, would love to join in the discussion! Maybe I'll be able to make it back a bit later.
Yes, I wanted a younger mischievious counter-point to him...Quote:
Originally Posted by Tamur
For the next assignment I've created characters closer to my main fictional love. A little less complicated perhaps, but more fun to write about!
@Timsup2nothin I've taken your advice and now say 'fantastic/splendid/wonderful' etc. when asked how I am, and boy, what a difference a word can make...!
Last year I was working on a historical fiction story and constantly felt like I was falling short on research, daily life detail, etc etc. It's a very rich story with lots of possibilities, and it's good to stretch into uncomfortable areas. But I came to be half done and needed a nice long break, so I stopped and wrote about characters who required no research at all. The feeling of freedom was amazing, never appreciated my "own" characters as much.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ironsword
Excellent. If you keep at it you will find some really surprising cumulative effects. After five years I'm at a point where it is literally too much trouble to have a bad, or even just ordinary, day. So I very seldom have them any more.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ironsword
Just from a quick read it looks like you're all finding what you enjoy writing, which is a great find indeed. I hope as we go onward that you learn something about your likes and dislikes, what's easy and what's difficult. Although the course is on writing techniques and methods, one of the best lessons you can take away is what makes writing truly enjoyable for you. And that's what it's all about.
As a wise friend of my father's often said, "Life is uncertain. Eat dessert first."
The entries are really good. I feel I need to put more time into this.
I do love writing, although my main two recurring problems are; finding time to write and not getting bogged down with continous re-editing. How about everyone else? Do we all suffer together...?
My greatest problem is without a doubt finding the time. Often it seems nearly impossible to find writing time, with family and work responsibilities in competition.
When there is time, my greatest problem is wordiness. I could cut a lot out of what I write (you all have probably noticed!) and I'm always told to drop unnecessary words when my writing is edited. I just like English a bit too much.
hey every body.I really love writing and i would love to be a part of this society.I really wanna get better and share with others writing and stories and i believe this is the perfect place to do it.I barely have time to think nowadays,im really busy getting ready for my brother whos coming back from korea on military leave.I got tons of Paintball tourneys and stuff so im not sure how much time i would have writing here.but all i know is that,with the little time i have,im gonna try my best to make a sizeable contribution.
hi WarMachine, good to have you along. Yes, feel free to join in! You've popped in at a good spot, where we're just launching into two or three weeks of work on plot, and onward from there. The lessons (generally) can be taken separately, so feel free to join in when you've the time.
My apologies everyone. It's been a very busy week, I've been feeling a bit of burnout in many areas of life, and needed a break. I should have seen this coming, but anyway...
Things are much better now and I'm ready to finally, finally put up comments this evening. Again, very sorry... anyone want to suggest a punishment? Public flogging? A week in the stocks? Having to watch endless replays of the first 80 minutes of the Turkey-Croatia game?
Better yet...imagine yourself as a Croatian and watch 120 replays of the last minute.
Welcome back.
Hey Tamur,
Welcome back! I hope everything's cool.
Hmmm, I spent 120 mins watching Italy vs Spain last light. There's two hours of my life i'll never get back...
Ouch! Well, at least that would provoke some emotional response...Quote:
Better yet...imagine yourself as a Croatian and watch 120 replays of the last minute...
...unlike this game which really did remind one of paint drying. Oi oi.Quote:
I spent 120 mins watching Italy vs Spain last light. There's two hours of my life i'll never get back
Thanks for not suggesting a long keel-hauling ~:)