A tale of many keyboards

So I've been a bit scarce of late. Apologies to the two people who actually read this blog. I've been working on two proposals, a screenplay, my original fantasy novel, and trying to get some sleep with a nine month old teething baby screaming through the night.

I finished the proposals and I've had some great news which I can't share yet. But soon, I promise.

In the meantime, what is it about me and keyboards? I've been using a Microsoft split keyboard for the past five years, and I've become very comfortable with it. But then the shift key broke and I thought I should move with the times, so I bought a logitech wireless with a laser mouse. The problem is, the keyboards isn't split. It took me a few days to get used to the straight layout again, but I was never totally comfortable typing and I've ended up going back to the split level one. A nice waste of money, if I do say so myself. But the difference is remarkable. I can type so much faster without all those stupid mistakes of typing hte instead of the. (And many more besides.)

So I'll use the split level keyboard again, unless Caroline gets me into trouble for wasting money on a keyboard I'm not using. On the plus side, th mouse is great.

He is the law

Never mind Big Brother. Britain is turning into Mega-City One. Now citizens can tap into CCTV footage and report "suspicious" behaviour to the authorities. Add this to the proposed increased powers of arrest for the police force and you know who's coming.
And I don't mean the crappy Stallone version either. I'm talking the real Joe Dredd.

The Process of Writing

Web pages load graphics differently. (This is a writing analogy, so stick with me.) Some of them load the whole graphic in one big, pixilated rough render, then with each pass the engine paints in more and more detail until you end up with the finely-detailed finished product. The point is, that first sweep is rough and quick, and each subsequent sweep paints in the fine stuff.

Another way to render is the slow and detailed approach. The graphic is loaded line by line, but each line is perfect in detail. When the lines have finished loading, you have the finished graphic. No subsequent passes are needed.

Writing is like that as well. Up until now I have been the line by line kind of writer. I didn't like leaving rough text behind me as I went. I liked to get each chapter as polished as possible before moving on. The problem with that is that I frequently got stuck, as maybe one aspect of a character or plot wasn't quite clear to me, and I couldn't go on until I had resolved the issue. So sometimes a whole week would pass by before I could carry on.

I've decided to try the first approach, and see if it work for me. The thing is, I don't think either one of them is right or wrong. You use whatever works for you. I just want to try the rough render method to see if I can get more work done, as the line by line method is so slow. I just hope I can get past the nagging feeling that I have left this unfinished mess behind me, as I know it will be calling me to go back and clean it up.

I'll let you know if it works.

Limited head space

I received a cheque for my story, The Invisible Order today. It's the most I've made form a short story, which is nice.

I also sent off the rewrites to the Eberron proposal. It's a much stronger story now with a nice, chunky character arc for the main guy. Something to sink my teeth into if it gets approved. Now I've got to get working on a rewrite for my romantic comedy screenplay. Producer wants to take it to Germany in five weeks to show a few people, so I've got to get it done by then. I hope it's enough time, because the rewrites are pretty drastic, introducing a whole B plot for secondary character, the result of which will make her a primary character. And I've got to add this in while at the same time cut out 30 pages. Ulp.

But I'm currently trying to get back into the writing of original fantasy novel. It's the first thing to fall by the wayside when other projects come up, and I shouldn't let that happen. Even an hour or so a day is enough to keep it fresh in my mind. I've realized I need to do this to keep that momentum going, because if I leave it for a week or so it loses space in my head and drifts into the background, making it hard to get back into it again.

So I'm rereading at the moment, and will hopefully get a few hundred words done before the day is out.

Contributing to the meme

Four jobs you've had in your life: Airbrushing ceramic horses. Barman. graphic designer. Writer.

Four movies you could watch over and over: Highlander. Bladerunner. Shaun of the Dead. Pulp Fiction

Four places you've lived: Dundee, Scotland. Waterfall, South Africa. Hammersdale, South Africa. Hillcrest, South Africa.

Four TV shows you love to watch: The Daily Show. The Simpsons. 24. House.

Four places you've been on vacation: Scotland. Cape Town. Jo'burg. Drakensberg mountains.

Four websites you visit daily: Dark Horizons. Worlds of D&D. My ADSL (South African consumerism website where one can vent bile about Telkom, our "wonderful" telecoms company that is holding back the growth of the country with its monopoly.) Warren Ellis.

Four of your favorite foods: Pizza. Steak. Chicken breast with a mushroom and bacon sauce. Hot chips fried to perfection. (Nice and crispy.)

Four places you'd rather be: Nowhere.

Belly full of turkey

Merry Christmas everyone.

The first round of xmas visiting is over. We visited Caroline's parents for lunch. Isabella is 7 months old now and hasn't quite got the hang of this present thing. All she wanted to do was eat the paper. Wish I'd known that beforehand. Would have saved a lot of money.

I was utterly spoiled this year. Caroline got me a 19" lcd monitor. It's a thing of beauty and I now have space on my small desk again. (Writer's note: I can now fit two pages on the screen as I write and the font is big enough to read. This makes me happy.) I'm making the most of it as next year is going to be all about Isabella. She'll be almost two and will no doubt be asking for her own presents by then.

Tomorrow: we visit my parents and do it all again.

Some of the stupid things politicians have said in 2005, courtesy of Global News Matrix website. Link.

I've set up a link to a feedburner account, in case anyone wants to subscribe to a feed instead of having to check in to see if anything is new. Just click on the xml button in the links section to the right.

I got a few notes back on a proposal currently awaiting a nod or a shoot-down from a well-known games publisher. The changes the editor requested make the story much stronger and make me kinda wish I'd thought of them first. Will rework the synopsis and send it back. Hopefully I'll hear back in January sometime.

On the original novel front, I've been stuck on the same chapter for a couple of weeks now. It's driving me mad. It's a "revelation" chapter, where things are finally made clear to the characters and they have to reevaluate their reasons for being there. I think I've found a cool way to make the supporting characters stick with the main character, one that won't compromise their own personalities. Once I get this chapter done it's officially at the halfway point. (Again. I had already written 100k in this story, but then ripped out 40k as it wasn't working. The characters were acting stupid, the writing was crap, the chapters were not flowing. It was a really hard decision to make, but I'm much happier with the direction now. Word count currently stands at about 70k.

Stalin and his pesky monkey warriors

So I finally decided to put a website together for myself. The final kick in the behind came when John Joseph Adams did an informal poll of writers in their twenties, and I realized I was one of the very few not to have any type of online presence.

So here it is. For good or for bad. Hi to everyone who knows me, and a hey there to those that don't. Hope you'll come back.

In the meantime, for those of you who are still searching for that perfect gift, here you go. No, don't thank me. I consider it my duty to point these things out to you.

test
test