Category Archives: Writing

NaBloPoMo – October Experiment

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I blogged more in September than I have in a while and I only wrote six posts. However, most of those fell at the end of the month so when my friend asked me “what are you doing?” and I said “writing a blog post”, it seemed like I was doing it a lot. They asked me whether writing a blog post helped me with my main goal of writing fiction. I didn’t know what the answer was. I think I said something about it at minimum being good practice for NaNo, as the typing would exercise my hands.

However, I thought about this last night, so yes this is very much a spur of the moment idea, and I wondered if maybe it would help with writing generally. It’s NaNo next month, my favourite time of year, and as I do every year I hope that I will turn a corner. I want to write, I need to make time to write, I need to make myself write even when I don’t want to. I won’t get anywhere if I don’t.

In the past I once started a fanfiction to ‘warm-up’ for NaNo, as I hadn’t written since the previous November. That fanfic got abandoned at October’s end and hasn’t been touched since which I hate, I don’t like leaving things unfinished. How about a different way to ‘warm-up’? If I make time to blog everyday then it’ll be good practice. It’ll also force my brain to actually think, something it needs help with.

I have a blogpost I was holding in reserve. As once I got a few ideas, and updated a lot, I thought that I should slow down, pace the updates a little better, so that they wouldn’t all get used up and then this blog turn into a ghost town again. However, the challenge is to “blog everyday”, not “write multiple posts in one day, save them up and post them each day”. Although admittedly the latter is usually how I approach NaNo. I get a good headstart, then I take a couple of days off, then I write some more, then I take a week off, then I have manic catchup days etc. which isn’t a good way to write. Routine would be better, a commitment every single day to making progress. So I won’t hold that blogpost in reserve. This mini-post will count as today’s entry, and the larger full entry will just get posted.

30 more days left in October, 30 posts. That will certainly give my brain something to think about, especially as half the reason this blog has been so quiet for a while is lack of post ideas. Still it’s an experiment, we’ll see how well it works.

The importance of secondary characters

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I finally got the DVD set for Stargate: Atlantis. I posted about it on twitter and listed some of the characters that made Atlantis great. I then looked back at my tweet and realised something. Only one of the characters mentioned had ever been in the credits, the rest were just recurring guest stars.

There’s this TV show Alias. I’ve mentioned it a few times I think as it proved inspiring for this novel I’ve been attempting to write for years. However, one of the points about Alias that I always laugh about is that it’s a hard show to actually watch. The headcanon I have for Alias works much better than the actual show. Why? Because I loathe the main characters. I can not stand Sydney or Vaughn.

Obviously I like the main characters in Atlantis but that doesn’t stop me from sometimes wishing that the secondary characters got more screentime, and a little more respect. There’s a running gag in Atlantis that no-one likes Zelenka and I don’t understand why. He’s a genuinely nice guy, a good scientist, a loyal friend, has none of Rodney’s arrogance. He gets the job done but no-one likes him or trusts him. It’s because he’s a secondary character, they can make fun of him and we’re not supposed to care – but I do care.

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Rewrite and Rebrand: A Random Lockbox of Words

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aka I wasn’t sure what to call it. You know those lockboxes, those bags of potential you get in games? Well, you don’t know what’s inside and it’s a mixed bag, a little like this post.

I started writing this post weeks ago, some posts are like that. I write them, then rewrite them, then add things and rewrite some more etc. I know I write in quite a conversational style, but I don’t just type continuously from beginning to end and hit post, I do go back and read what I have written. With some posts, I realise that what I’ve said is just a variation on a theme, it’s something I’ve posted before. Then I realise that my mood, or current events, are perhaps overly influencing the direction of the post. Then there’s the question, what is the point of the post? I like to, usually, try and at least say something in a post, start with a theory, talk around the subject, and then write a conclusion. After all that I wind up either rewriting or just scrapping the whole thing.

This post started off life with the title ‘Journey vs Destination’ which is something I have written about before. How the way a player approaches a game, and their expectations of it, have an affect on the way that they play and their enjoyment. It’s no secret that I’m less than thrilled with Warcraft right now, either how it is currently or the direction that it seems blizz is taking it in. So that first draft went over old ground, all things that I had said before, about how raiding had changed, about how the way that I raided had changed. There was nothing new and the whole post came across very miserable. It was basically asking the question should I quit? It seemed like the obvious answer was yes. However, I’m not ready to quit, and I’m not going to lose everything I have until I’m sure, no matter how unhappy I am with the game right now.

So what is this post about then? It’s about a lot of things, it’s one of those mixed bag posts where I have a bunch of things I want to say, and I just combine them all into a post. I’m going to talk about Marvel Heroes, Amazon Prime Instant Video with a side order of Hulu, a little bit of general TV, some Stargate SG-1 and of course Camp NaNoWriMo. I’ve been itching to tweet about these things but 140 characters is not enough, that was the impetus for starting this blog in the first place.

I know this is supposed to be a Warcraft blog. However, everything I write about that is just so negative right now. I think it would be better to wait for more concrete information, after all beta has to be soon right? I can scarcely believe that it’s not been announced yet, it’s March already. Besides I’m thinking of changing the definition of the blog, it started off as Warcraft, then went to Warcraft and Swtor, before back to just Warcraft. Considering I am writing about more things these days, and more often rather than just occasionally, especially Marvel Heroes, it is probably overdue.

Right, on to the post.

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November Retrospective

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I nearly entitled this post December Retrospective but then I thought that didn’t sound right. I’m looking back at November not December, I’m just writing it in December. Oh lets face it my brain is fried, I’m not even sure retrospective is the right word. Basically a post looking back at November and the madness that is NaNoWriMo.

I wrote a post about NaNo before November started stating my goals and what my thoughts were about the challenge this year. So it’s time to compare what I thought and hoped would happen with what actually did. What lessons did I learn this year? More importantly what am I going to do to carry it forward?

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It’s that time again

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Next month is November and every November since 2007 I’ve tried to write 50,000 words in a month, aka taking part in NaNoWriMo. Posting about this insanity here isn’t new, in fact I just created a category for it. I attempted to spread the insanity around and do the challenge in April for Camp NaNoWriMo, but I failed that miserably as the word count meter to the right has betrayed ever since.

So if I’ve posted about it before, which I have, why am I posting about it again? Well, because I feel like it. I’m not going to disappear for the month, I’m still going to post here if I get a topic in mind, I’m still going to raid with my guild, in all probability I’m going to get blizzcon virtual ticket. November isn’t going to just be about words, but I do hope that it contains a lot of them.

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Camp NaNoWriMo

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Every November, bar one, since 2007 I’ve gone a little nuts and tried to write a novel in a month. 50,000 words is the goal which isn’t bad for a first draft, as first drafts do tend to balloon a bit on revising. I wrote a little bit about this last November and now I’m going to be writing about it again. “Hey wait a minute! It’s not November!” I hear you exclaim. Yeah that’s very true but this year I will be taking part in Camp NaNoWriMo.

Camp NaNoWriMo is a smaller program run by the Office of Letters and Light, the not for profit that operates NaNoWriMo. Rebels writing anything other than 50k words of a novel aren’t shunned in November, but they aren’t actively supported either. However, at Camp whatever you decide to write, and whatever word count you decide to strive for, is supported. You can put your custom word count goal onto your page, something that is missing (but should be added for overachievers) from the main NaNoWriMo program. This year Camp is in April and July. Today it’s March 31st, the first day of April’s session is tomorrow.

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November’s End

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I’ve been a bit absent this month, with the blog and in game. My guild have been incredibly supportive with it, and haven’t complained once. You guys are awesome! I’m interrupting the Warcraft posts yet again with this. Maybe I should change the tagline to ‘A mostly Warcraft blog’ as it’s been mostly not this month. I’m not going to go back to playing as much as I was, so I need to organise my playtime better so I actually get things done. Dailies, I am looking at you, I haven’t done you in a month, haven’t capped valor in even longer. Oh I’m a bad Warcraft player, but I just need to be a little more organised. Can’t do everything, but could do more.

Anyway, the month of November and the challenge of NaNoWriMo are coming to a close. So it’s time for a little bit of a recap on how the month went.

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National Novel Writing Month

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This is a Warcraft blog. I’ve tried to blog a few times over the years but never had any success at sticking to it until now. That being said I do on occasion blog about other stuff, and this is one of those occasions. A little short post to explain what that new widget on the sidebar is.

You see while I might not have had much success at regular blog posting, I’ve always liked to write. I started off, as many do I think these days, writing fanfiction. Truly, dreadful fanfiction but the more you write, the more you learn about writing. You start seeing the plot holes, you start learning about pacing and conflict, you learn to show rather than tell. Every story you write you learn a little more about crafting stories and fanfiction, for all it’s bad press, does give you a vehicle to practice story crafting. Eventually though the ideas can’t be constrained by someone else’s universe and you have to make your own.

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