Logomancy

Stupid Anxiety Attack

2009-07-07T03:50:55Z

With everything else that's been going on, I really (really really really) didn't need that.

*sigh*

While distracting myself from how much editing I didn't get done this weekend (*rolleyes*) I came across dwqueerlygen, which is about the stuff that queer characters do when they're not having sex, thinking about having sex, wishing they had someone to have sex with, etc.

Considering that Blade in the Dark is about a bisexual woman, and there are a lot of queer characters in my other stories, it was interesting stuff.

Okay, now that the calm-down meds have taken effect, I'm going to go back to pretending to edit. Or something.

Happy 4th of July,

2009-07-04T18:39:52Z

to everybody who celebrates it, otherwise, happy Saturday! :D

It's gonna be a low-key one for me, I think; I'm working toward independence from this round of edits of Blade in the Dark. I'm hoping to get through 20 scenes, minimum, today. Though I may go out later to Blow Stuff Up with Ceece and Bruce.

baka_kit @ 2009-07-03T23:22:00

2009-07-04T06:26:46Z

Just got home from work. Which was mostly painless, except for the part where I had to not laugh in the face of the customer who was buying Glenn Beck's Common Sense but had never even HEARD OF the original by Thomas Paine. History fail, dude.

R.I.P. Lennier Fishie

2009-07-03T08:08:56Z

Vir is, appropriately, the last fish standing ... er, swimming.

baka_kit @ 2009-07-02T15:12:00

2009-07-02T22:14:42Z

Is it just me, or does everyone associate "parley" inextricably with Pirates of the Caribbean?

Yay Conflict!

2009-07-02T22:05:47Z

(At least, in the fictional sense.)

I managed to give a 179-word scene some coherence and conflict and purposefulness, and 213 more words in the process.

Poll: What Color Should I Dye My Hair?

2009-07-02T20:05:01Z

View Poll: #1424307

Still Alive

2009-07-02T19:47:00Z

It's been a not-fun ... few weeks? Month?

I've been sick for what seems like forever, first a cold, then strep throat, and now? I got sent home from Cermics because I couldn't just coughing. Dust aggravating my lungs, I guess. But not-fun.

For a couple weeks I was off my meds. I was on my last refill, so the pharmacy was supposed to call my doc to authorize more. But when I went in to check, they didn't have any record at all. At that point I was down to only a few, but I figured they'd be able to do it by Monday, so I'd only miss one dose.

Aaaaand, Monday rolls around and there's a message from the pharmacy that my refill had been denied. So I call the doctor's office, but there's no answer. When I finally get through, it's another doctor entirely. The woman tells me that my doc has left her practice and given all her files to the new doctor. And of course, the new doc can't approve the refill until she sees me, but because I'm a) working and b) taking Grandmommie to her appointments, so I couldn't get in until over a week later.

So yeah.

Twits from Kit

2009-06-28T07:01:17Z

09:55 Aaaand ... "Unseemly Pleasures" was rejected by JRET, with a "well written, just not what I was looking for" note. #

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Twits from Kit

2009-06-27T07:01:50Z

15:20 Hate my job. Why can't I just get kidnapped by pirates? #
17:39 So, first I got in trouble for missing too much work. Now I'm in trouble for coming in when I was too sick to do my job. #

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Twits from Kit

2009-06-20T07:02:31Z

17:06 Has anybody seen my voice? I seem to have lost it! Halp! #

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I Fought the Germs and the Germs Won

2009-06-19T09:48:49Z

I've got the cold/flu/thingie of doom that's been going around at work. Slept for a few hours after work, but now I'm awake, but feeling like crud. Still. So I'm gonna see if I can get back to sleep, once the advil and sudafed kick in.

Twits from Kit

2009-06-19T07:01:39Z

03:11 @girrygirl: don't worry, I'm alive. #
17:47 @sefania: that's cause you're one smart cookie! #

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Twits from Kit

2009-06-18T07:01:53Z

12:05 *headdesk* x 58,000 wtf is Mercury retrograde or something!? #

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Twits from Kit

2009-06-17T07:01:49Z

17:41 "And at least he'd had pants." well at least some of my characters have their priorities on straight! #

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Twits from Kit

2009-06-14T07:01:44Z

09:17 @sefania They're ALWAYS penultimate drafts. :p #
14:53 Payment arrived from Circlet: the Erotic Author's Market Guide! #

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Twits from Kit

2009-06-13T07:01:48Z

12:12 Finished penultimate draft of Unlocked laaate last night. Will hand it over to Crystal for beta & get back to Jecine revisions tomorrow. #
17:13 Dear customer: zombies are NOT the sum total of the Horror genre. Also, saying you've never even heard of Lovecraft makes me *rolleyes*. #

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Insider Joke or Not -- I LOLed

2009-06-10T22:52:52Z

There's a restaurant in L.A. called Zhankou Chicken. Really, really, really good restaurant, with this garlic sauce that is indescribable in its deliciousness.

So I turned on the TV and hey, Oded Fehr! In leather, even! So I stayed, even though it was Charmed, which the only couple times I'd watched I'd been completely "meh" about. And he's playing a demon named Zhankou.

So the sisters bust in through the door on him and throw him out, and one of them says "What's the matter Zhankou? Chicken?

I burst out laughing.

(It's entirely possible that it's deliberate; Zhankou Chicken is pretty famous in a local kind of way.)

Hmmmm ...

2009-06-09T00:37:10Z

Quiz, ganked from lots of people.

Your result for Which fantasy writer are you?...

Lian Hearn (b. 1942)

-3 High-Brow, 7 Violent, 1 Experimental and 9 Cynical!

Congratulations! You are Low-Brow, Violent, Experimental and Cynical! These concepts are defined below.

Lian Hearn is the pen name used by Australian author Gillian Rubinstein when writing theTale of the Otori series, beginning with Across the Nightingale Floor (2002). The trilogy (which has spawned a sequel and a prequel) was a great success, becoming bestsellers world-wide and being published in more than thirty countries. Part of the reason for the series' success is probably that it is traditional fantasy but with a twist: The books are set in a country resembling feudal Japan, rather than some vaguely European environment. This setting gives Hearn a great opportunity to explore themes such as war, revenge, power hunger and clashes between cultures, all of which makes for an occasionally very violent tale, where nothing is ever coated in sugar. The books also feature at least one strong and very believable female character. While there have been japanese-style fantasy written by Westerners earlier (such as the Book of Years series by Peter Morwood), Hearn uses the brilliant technique of describing her world from inside, calling typical japanese phenomena by generic names rather than exoticising Japanese terms. Thus, swords are called swords, not katanas, we hear of wrestlers and realize that they are sumo wrestlers, characters eat bean curd rather than tofu, etc. All in all, Hearn has succesfully expanded the borders of what can be done within the genre, while still writing for a mass audience!

You are also a lot like C S Lewis.

If you want something more gentle, try Orson Scott Card.

If you'd like a challenge, try your exact opposite, Susan Cooper.

Your score

This is how to interpret your score: Your attitudes have been measured on four different scales, called 1) High-Brow vs. Low-Brow, 2) Violent vs. Peaceful, 3) Experimental vs. Traditional and 4) Cynical vs. Romantic. Imagine that when you were born, you were in a state of innocence, a tabula rasa who would have scored zero on each scale. Since then, a number of circumstances (including genetical, cultural and environmental factors) have pushed you towards either end of these scales. If you're at 45 or -45 you would be almost entirely cynical, low-brow or whatever. The closer to zero you are, the less extreme your attitude. However, you should always be more of either (eg more romantic than cynical). Please note that even though High-Brow, Violent, Experimental and Cynical have positive numbers (1 through 45) and their opposites negative numbers (-1 through -45), this doesn't mean that either quality is better. All attitudes have their positive and negative sides, as explained below.

High-Brow vs. Low-Brow

You received -3 points, making you more Low-Brow than High-Brow. Being high-browed in this context refers to being more fascinated with the sort of art that critics and scholars tend to favour, while a typical low-brow would favour the best-selling kind. At their best, low-brows are honest enough to read what they like, regardless of what "experts" and academics say is good for them. At their worst, they are more likely to read what their neighbours like than what they would choose themselves.

Violent vs. Peaceful

You received 7 points, making you more Violent than Peaceful. Please note that violent in this context does not mean that you, personally, are prone to violence. This scale is a measurement of a) if you are tolerant to violence in fiction and b) whether you see violence as a means that can be used to achieve a good end. If you are, and you do, then you are violent as defined here. At their best, violent people are the heroes who don't hesitate to stop the villain threatening innocents by means of a good kick. At their worst, they are the villains themselves.

Experimental vs. Traditional

You received 1 points, making you more Experimental than Traditional. Your position on this scale indicates if you're more likely to seek out the new and unexpected or if you are more comfortable with the familiar, especially in regards to culture. Note that traditional as defined here does not equal conservative, in the political sense. At their best, experimental people are the ones who show humanity the way forward. At their worst, they provoke for the sake of provocation only.

Cynical vs. Romantic

You received 9 points, making you more Cynical than Romantic. Your position on this scale indicates if you are more likely to be wary, suspicious and skeptical to people around you and the world at large, or if you are more likely to believe in grand schemes, happy endings and the basic goodness of humankind. It is by far the most vaguely defined scale, which is why you'll find the sentence "you are also a lot like x" above. If you feel that your position on this scale is wrong, then you are probably more like author x. At their best, cynical people are able to see through lies and spot crucial flaws in plans and schemes. At their worst, they are overly negative, bringing everybody else down.

Author picture from http://www.lianhearn.com, used by kind permission.

Take Which fantasy writer are you? at HelloQuizzy

Actually, the description of her series sounds kinda like what I'm working on with Blade in the Dark. Which means I probably shouldn't read her until after it's done.

baka_kit @ 2009-06-08T17:02:00

2009-06-09T00:05:50Z

Brainz? Not really.

Grandmommie is going to have a bone marrow biopsy next week. The doctor thinks that she's got a condition where she makes more and more white blood cells at the expense of the red blood cells. (Which sounds like an autoimmune thing to me; she's had a couple of them before, my mom has RA and my sister is a Type-1 diabetic.

I'm about to go to ceramics, though I've got no energy and less motivation.

I've been awake 25 hours. Why can't I sleep?

2009-06-08T07:07:53Z

Anyway, the new Chapter One. Unedited, because I can't engage my brain for crap. Copyright Kit Russell, 2009

Paul Lucas staggered for his car, fumbling for his keys. He kept his left hand pressed against his belly; his blood felt hot on his cold fingers.

There was a roar behind him, and he turned, fearing the worst. To his relief, he saw the warehouse collapsing in on itself.

He hoped the boy had managed to get out.

Finally, he reached the car. He leaned against it for a long moment, gathering his strength.

Keep moving, he reminded himself. He stabbed at the lock; it took three tries to get the key in and turned. He half-fell into the driver's seat, gritted his teeth, and pulled his feet in one at a time.

Sirens. Coming this way.

He couldn't be caught here. They'd want answers. They'd want to know why his fingerprints were the shotgun and machete that had slaughtered a dozen people. And they'd want him to explain the thing that had died there.

Somehow, he got the car started and into gear one-handed. Pain blanked his vision for a moment.

"Focus," he panted. He stepped on the gas; momentum slammed the door shut. He eased his way out into the darkened street.

He had to get to Father Mac.

He nearly hit the median before he realized that his headlights weren't on. He took his hand off the steering wheel; it took a long moment to figure out how to get the light on. He wiped the sweat from his face, and only then realized that his right hand was covered with blood, too.

If he was stopped --

He had to get out of here. Had to get home. No, back to the rectory at All Saints'. Father Mac could patch him up, like he'd done so many times before, bandaging smaller cuts, stitching larger ones.

He wouldn't think about the chance that this was beyond the priest's skills. He couldn't go to the Emergency Room.

"Focus ... "

He'd missed the on-ramp. Didn't matter; he couldn't shift one-handed anyway.

"Not that far."

He didn't realize his eyes had closed until he drifted into a lamppost. The jolt jarred something loose in his belly. He thought he felt something bulging from the wound; it took him a long moment to realize the low whine, like a wounded dog, was coming from behind his own clenched teeth.

He had to get home.

He locked his teeth and somehow got the car into reverse, backed away, and fumbled it back into first. It took all his concentration to drive the familiar route home.

He hadn't meant to come home. He shouldn't have come home. But he didn't think he could make it to All Saints'.

He needed an ambulance. He needed an ambulance and there was a phone in the kitchen, if he could only make it that far.

Somehow, he got the car into park. Remembered to take the key from the ignition. Got the door open and himself up and out, and how had nobody heard him cry out? He took one step, and then another, and if he fell on the steps he knew he wouldn't be able to get up. He clung to the railing and half-dragged himself up the steps.

Almost there. Through the door and past the living room and a right turn into the kitchen and Carol was going to be furious when she saw the blood.

The blood.

He almost turned back, but the damage was done. He could help her clean it later. He got the key into the lock on the first try though it was hard turning the handle with his hand slicked with blood. Ten more steps. He'd made it this far.

His foot caught on something, and he collapsed to his knees. Pain ripped through him, and he let out a breathy scream. Looked down, and saw something slick and glistening in his hands, and

"Daddy?"

He looked up and saw Samantha standing on the stairs, Samantha who was too young to see this and he wanted to tell her to go back to bed and it was all a dream and he heard a rushing in his ears and then everything went dark

and all he heard was

"Daddy!"

baka_kit @ 2009-06-07T03:32:00

2009-06-07T10:37:19Z

"Wear away the pilings, and the pier will fall, and we'll have nowhere to hole up during heavy weather."

I think Big Gun Kate is the one to say it; it's solidly within her idiom (she was a member of the Royal Hydrangean Navy for several years before turning pirate), not too poetic even though it's metaphorical, and a ruthlessly practical reason for doing the right thing.

baka_kit @ 2009-06-07T01:42:00

2009-06-07T08:49:56Z

Came home, was asleep by 6ish, woke up, finished the new Chapter One for Unlocked. (AKA Paul Lucas's [first] death.) Kinda goryish, though I tried not to go into full-on Body Horror mode because that's not the style of the rest of the novel. 705 words. Will edit it tomorrow.

random

2009-06-07T07:11:37Z

Pretext: the act of thinking before sending a text message.

Oh, look! A new kind of crazy!

2009-06-07T06:38:37Z

sestina_week starts Monday!

Hey, it'll be a change from cudgeling my brain for prose-type thingies!