Tuesday, March 12, 2013

Refrigerator Art or Who needs a Whiteboard?

Yes, I've been having problems with my primary project the last couple of weeks.  As I wrote a few posts ago I accidently deleted a major part of a chapter. So I've spent the time since doing a reconstruction. Major pain! I thought I would never get it back together. OK, that was straight Eeyore thinking. I knew what was going in the chapter, where the last chapter ended, and where the next chapter started. It was difficult but I got it done.

Now I found myself facing the next two and final chapters. Things were going to start to get really hairy. Action-- more reveals---more action--- oh, excrement! (yes, I use the normal Anglo-Saxon word where needed but not here)---a little more action then resolution and aftermath. I discovered three different POV were needed to get everything down and on a very limited timeline. How??? The whole process started to get hairer by the paragraph. How I started wishing for a big whiteboard to write plot points/POV on!

I got up to get a cup of coffee and walked by my white refrigerator, a big monster more suited to a family with kids than a single woman. No refrigerator art of any kind. I looked at the blankness and wondered----would a whiteboard marker stain it? I got out a dry erase marker and a wet erase marker then drew with both. No problem. Both came off easily enough but the wet didn't smear when touched. Eureka!

 
 
 
It's not a good photograph but there are three columns with viewpoints A, B, and C then plot points listed beneath with their side of the story. I've blacked them out in the graphic because I didn't want them seen. (Sorry my dears!) . I can draw lines interconnecting them, scratch in specifics where needed, and literally see three POV's at once. I will also pass it frequently on my way to the coffee pot. This is good.
 
Now I will write one character at a time then combine. With steady effort (and some already written parts) I should finish within a week. WATCH THIS SPACE!
 
 


Thursday, March 7, 2013

It Might Be Spring

It's March. The Spring Equinox is days away. The Midwest and other northern regions still have snow on the ground. It couldn't possibly be spring, could it? Maybe. It might be spring. I've been seeing evidence here in the south.

 

Spring  Tanka 2013

 
A redbud shyly
Peeking out behind the oak
“Spring yet?” Come on out.

 I whisper soft. I won’t tell.
Old man Winter’s deaf anyway.

 

Spring  Haikus 2013

            I

Want some daffodils?
Better hurry and pick them.
They don’t last in snow.

            II

Iris? Iris? No.
Impossible but oh, yes
There they are . . . the tarts.  

 

Curious Spring

Three curious things
Outside my window today
Crocus blooming,
Cardinals nesting,
Spirea buds swelling
All thinking winter is over
Shall I  tell them about the daffodils in snow?
Hush! Pushing winter out
Is best done with song and tender flowers.
The daffodils just laughed at me anyway.
 
 

Tuesday, March 5, 2013

Writer's Block: Is there anything funny about it?

 
OK, I messed up. I accidently erased a good portion of Chapter Seventeen and have been trying to recreate it so I can send it and Chapter Eighteen to my beta reader. It should have been completed this weekend but it isn't. Somewhere out in the electronic ether or the misfiring neurons of my brain are about three thousand words missing. There may be more. I can't fish them out. Ugh! I don't know about you but I call this writer's block.

I see only one solution for this right now---- laugh!

 
 
 
 
There may be another solution. I will simply have to kick a certain male protagonist. Just because I told him to slow down didn't mean I wanted him to stop talking altogether! Jeeze Louise. . . .some men are so sensitive!
 
 
 
 



Friday, March 1, 2013

Naw. . . that can't be right.


With all due respect to Stephen, I don't believe a word of this: I write like Stephen King?  Proof: http://iwl.me/s/b3a26720  Yes, I did it twice!

Sorry, the link doesn't work. I don't do html; I just snipped the graphic.

Did I miss a romance he wrote or something? This is just too funny. Or maybe I'm just easily amused. 

Of course, it also told me I wrote like Dan Brown, Anne Rice, and William Shakespeare. Please if you can figure it out let me know.