What I'm doing...Sunday
May. 15th, 2016 01:18 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
untonugganCat Update
Lily creepy-staring at us as we try to go to sleep (link to twitter, because I shared it in the middle of the night and the photo's stored on my tablet)
My parents are getting their bathroom redone, but only on weekends, so the cats are shut in the office with me and Chance is intermittently crying by the door because he is the Saddest Cat In the World and Lily is just sleeping and periodically looking at me like, "Can you please make him stop?"
Fortunately birds have finally been attracted to the birdseed I threw outside the office window, so sad cat song has stopped. For now.
Yesterday my mom tried to put Amelie in our office, but she was having none of it, and was very upset, and growled at our door and Chance and everything. So my dad is just having to deal with the fact that she may walk on his keyboard while he is trying to work. Like the rest of us.
The jackhammer has, for the moment, also stopped.
What I have been knitting lately:
I used my prettiest handspun, which is my first chain-plied yarn, and is all alpaca except for some bits with sparklies, and was VERY fun to spin. It's a farrow rib cowl (I did a simple mattress seam at the end to make it a cowl, it comes to about 48" total). Sent as a gift and of course I don't have photos of it done, but that's okay. Ravelry notes are also up.
I am working on a sweater but it is in time-out. I do not wish to speak of it right now.
I started another color affection shawl (Warning: addictive). Am knitting outside my usual color comfort zone of blue/green/purple or neutrals. It is orange, light purple, and a blue variegated yarn. So...not totally outside my comfort zone, but the orange is gorgeous and also very orange. I met the person who dies the yarns at my LYS and am very excited about using them. If you are interested, she makes Fandom Colorways as well (mostly for Scandal)
I have three other skeins in fingering weight yarn I want to turn into a shawl together, and while they would make a pretty color affection, I sense a different pattern might be called for. But one that doesn't require a ton of thought, because I really am in a zombie/mindless knitting mode right now. Will probably start some more scarves too. Basically I don't want to do any shaping unless it's for a hat. Am sick of shaping. *glares at sweater and also misbehaving sock that shall not be named*
Writing Meta
My writing is tentatively going well. I am rewriting a scene that has been bugging me for the third (?) and hopefully last-ish time, and unlocking that solution unlocked a bunch of other THINKYTHOUGHTS for later in the novel which was good and I think I might actually know how it ends? At least how to incorporate a bunch of loose plot threads which have been percolating.
My worldbuilding seems to consist of research rabbit holes, copious notes about characters and their relationships (some of which are color coded because it makes it easier for my brain fog to understand them), and then doing theater-type "who is this character, what is their background, what are their motivations" and "what is the setting" and then some sort of improv-type "OKAY NOW GO." Knowing that this is what works for me world-building wise makes it easier for me not to feel guilty for "wasting time not writing", because it actually IS part of my writing. Also, apparently I *do* need to go back and fix things before I move forward. So, yeah, this project is really helping me understand more about my own process for writing fiction (and especially loooong fiction).
I'm about 30k words in and I started in November, and there's still lots of rewriting sure to come, so I have no idea how long this will take, but I'm very excited about the process and bits of my brain I get to exercise doing it.
Here's a short excerpt I wrote the other day that I am particularly proud of (from the introduction of one of the characters who strong-armed her way into my narrative):
"Adelaide?"
As girls, Marion Fossard and Adelaide le Fevre and had been friends; Barons Skelton and Holderness encouraged the alliance. Together, they learned embroidery and proper behavior and household management. They watched Adelaide's brothers at arms practice and tried to copy their poses. Once, Marion had even shown Adelaide her favorite spots in the Forest of Galtres. Then her father -- or perhaps Adelaide's -- had grown angry; their visits stopped. There was talk, it seemed, of them growing too close, of teaching each other improper behavior.
For a moment Adelaide grinned at Marion, her grey eyes showing genuine amusement at their situation. Then they seemed to pull closed over a canyon of other emotions.
I've been on Twitter a lot in the middle of the night when I can't sleep because of hip pain, because there's lots of other people who can't sleep either, and also because when I have brain fog 140 characters is easier to handle than larger chunks of text.
However, joyously! my brain is letting me read now. Possibly because I am utterly sick of television, as for months I couldn't really do anything after 6 pm other than watch Netflix under a pile of cats. So, rec me your books! Quick, while I can enjoy them!
Lily creepy-staring at us as we try to go to sleep (link to twitter, because I shared it in the middle of the night and the photo's stored on my tablet)
My parents are getting their bathroom redone, but only on weekends, so the cats are shut in the office with me and Chance is intermittently crying by the door because he is the Saddest Cat In the World and Lily is just sleeping and periodically looking at me like, "Can you please make him stop?"
Fortunately birds have finally been attracted to the birdseed I threw outside the office window, so sad cat song has stopped. For now.
Yesterday my mom tried to put Amelie in our office, but she was having none of it, and was very upset, and growled at our door and Chance and everything. So my dad is just having to deal with the fact that she may walk on his keyboard while he is trying to work. Like the rest of us.
The jackhammer has, for the moment, also stopped.
What I have been knitting lately:
I used my prettiest handspun, which is my first chain-plied yarn, and is all alpaca except for some bits with sparklies, and was VERY fun to spin. It's a farrow rib cowl (I did a simple mattress seam at the end to make it a cowl, it comes to about 48" total). Sent as a gift and of course I don't have photos of it done, but that's okay. Ravelry notes are also up.
I am working on a sweater but it is in time-out. I do not wish to speak of it right now.
I started another color affection shawl (Warning: addictive). Am knitting outside my usual color comfort zone of blue/green/purple or neutrals. It is orange, light purple, and a blue variegated yarn. So...not totally outside my comfort zone, but the orange is gorgeous and also very orange. I met the person who dies the yarns at my LYS and am very excited about using them. If you are interested, she makes Fandom Colorways as well (mostly for Scandal)
I have three other skeins in fingering weight yarn I want to turn into a shawl together, and while they would make a pretty color affection, I sense a different pattern might be called for. But one that doesn't require a ton of thought, because I really am in a zombie/mindless knitting mode right now. Will probably start some more scarves too. Basically I don't want to do any shaping unless it's for a hat. Am sick of shaping. *glares at sweater and also misbehaving sock that shall not be named*
Writing Meta
My writing is tentatively going well. I am rewriting a scene that has been bugging me for the third (?) and hopefully last-ish time, and unlocking that solution unlocked a bunch of other THINKYTHOUGHTS for later in the novel which was good and I think I might actually know how it ends? At least how to incorporate a bunch of loose plot threads which have been percolating.
My worldbuilding seems to consist of research rabbit holes, copious notes about characters and their relationships (some of which are color coded because it makes it easier for my brain fog to understand them), and then doing theater-type "who is this character, what is their background, what are their motivations" and "what is the setting" and then some sort of improv-type "OKAY NOW GO." Knowing that this is what works for me world-building wise makes it easier for me not to feel guilty for "wasting time not writing", because it actually IS part of my writing. Also, apparently I *do* need to go back and fix things before I move forward. So, yeah, this project is really helping me understand more about my own process for writing fiction (and especially loooong fiction).
I'm about 30k words in and I started in November, and there's still lots of rewriting sure to come, so I have no idea how long this will take, but I'm very excited about the process and bits of my brain I get to exercise doing it.
Here's a short excerpt I wrote the other day that I am particularly proud of (from the introduction of one of the characters who strong-armed her way into my narrative):
As girls, Marion Fossard and Adelaide le Fevre and had been friends; Barons Skelton and Holderness encouraged the alliance. Together, they learned embroidery and proper behavior and household management. They watched Adelaide's brothers at arms practice and tried to copy their poses. Once, Marion had even shown Adelaide her favorite spots in the Forest of Galtres. Then her father -- or perhaps Adelaide's -- had grown angry; their visits stopped. There was talk, it seemed, of them growing too close, of teaching each other improper behavior.
For a moment Adelaide grinned at Marion, her grey eyes showing genuine amusement at their situation. Then they seemed to pull closed over a canyon of other emotions.
I've been on Twitter a lot in the middle of the night when I can't sleep because of hip pain, because there's lots of other people who can't sleep either, and also because when I have brain fog 140 characters is easier to handle than larger chunks of text.
However, joyously! my brain is letting me read now. Possibly because I am utterly sick of television, as for months I couldn't really do anything after 6 pm other than watch Netflix under a pile of cats. So, rec me your books! Quick, while I can enjoy them!
no subject
Date: 2016-05-16 12:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-05-16 12:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-05-16 01:55 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-05-16 03:25 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-05-16 03:39 am (UTC)books
Date: 2016-05-16 05:55 am (UTC)The Fifth Season. A heartbreaking fantasy novel with an unusual setting and main cast.
The Left Hand of Darkness. An old and very good science fiction novel.
Re: books
Date: 2016-05-16 12:09 pm (UTC)have not read Left Hand of Darkness for awhile, so it might be time for a reread...
Have not tried the others. ^_^
Re: books
Date: 2016-05-17 06:37 pm (UTC)The Amazing Adventures of Lovelace & Babbage tells the (admittedly sketchy) bits re: these two proto-computer designers in lovely graphic novel format. And then because they can, the author leaps into a multiverse where their every move was carefully documented. Because those two minds worked so well together that their project must be documented, even if it's fictional.
The link is to the web version which preceded the hardcover out now.