On Writing and Design

But Kate! I haven't used up my 15 Minutes yet!! G...

2009-04-15T06:50:00.000-07:00

But Kate! I haven't used up my 15 Minutes yet!!

GBG = BIG $$$ ;)) Hugz*

9000 followers? you are much kinder than me, 1000 ...

2009-01-26T00:46:00.000-08:00

9000 followers? you are much kinder than me, 1000 already is way beyond my limit for a personal account. 300~500 are the following count limit. I don't believe that anyone (a person) can handle that many. If that's account is company-owned, I don't mind how many it has.

Thank you :-) And for the no waffle bit - you shou...

2009-01-25T15:24:00.000-08:00

Thank you :-) And for the no waffle bit - you should have seen the first draft LOL

A very comprehensive article. As I've used twitte...

2009-01-23T09:53:00.000-08:00

A very comprehensive article. As I've used twitter more I've gradually come to understand some of the issues you've mention, but with others I wasn't completely clear. You've explained them all very well (with no waffle!); thank you.

Luckily, I don't even know what this Twitter is, s...

2009-01-15T13:03:00.000-08:00

Luckily, I don't even know what this Twitter is, so I don't have to worry about it. Blogging is complicated enough for me.

Personally I follow anyone who follows me, and blo...

2009-01-07T22:08:00.000-08:00

Personally I follow anyone who follows me, and block them if they turn out to be a jagoff. Fortunately I have never had to do this with Twitter. I did have to do it once with MySpace when this idiot from Holland was trying to hit up on me to get a green card. It was actually kind of funny but it did make me wonder how stupid he was, seeing as it said right on my profile that I can't stand people who hit me up for cybersex!

Glad you found the list useful :-)

2008-12-26T09:26:00.000-08:00

Glad you found the list useful :-)

Wow, what an amazing array of links. Might take m...

2008-12-26T03:35:00.000-08:00

Wow, what an amazing array of links. Might take me the rest of my holidays to get through them all. Thanks very much for posting; very useful stuff indeed.

Matt: His article was so pointless! A couple of ye...

2008-11-27T06:32:00.000-08:00

Matt: His article was so pointless! A couple of years ago, a lot of professional journalists did feel the same, but now, most seem to get the point, and are even blogging themselves. Mr Seate is sooo 2006 LOL

Diddums: You make a good point about BADD! Or there was the recent day for blogging about poverty. That kind of thing is really worthwhile, especially when posts are written by people who are directly affected by such issues.

(From the article you linked to): "Without our wor...

2008-11-26T08:50:00.000-08:00

(From the article you linked to): "Without our work, the bloggers are forced to actually write something on their own. This explains all that blogging about football scores, favorite cat toys and which episode of "Lost" someone missed last week."

As you say, Kate, people need to express themselves and I don't see why that should be frowned upon. I have to say that what appears to be trivial often isn't... self-expression certainly isn't.

To add to that, not all blogs are always about the topics listed above... I wonder if the detractors have even heard about BADD ('Blogging Against Disablism' day)? Are blogs that participate in such events (or aims) trivial too?

Hmm...

I think it depends on the book itself whether or n...

2008-11-26T08:33:00.000-08:00

I think it depends on the book itself whether or not it will work. I will accept controversial deaths in a plot if it's a plot that has me hanging on... and if the main character at least survives to the last few chapters (he might then die or go missing, but if he's achieved something and it was an interesting story, I will accept it).

I would say the death of the swimming grandmother in the Poseidon Adventure was controversial; she was such a nice woman! But it was such an gripping yarn that you stayed with it -- and she saved somebody's life (probably all their lives).

I tend not to accept controversial deaths in a plot if I wasn't enjoying the story anyway, or it was confusing to follow, or was generally making me think "am I going to keep reading this?" There was a book recently that had something really bad happening to someone's pet. I found myself gritting my teeth and saying "if the pet dies, I'm going to stop reading this..."

In the end it survived, and I read another chapter, then decided I really didn't like the book anyway, for various reasons, and threw it across the floor. :-) It wasn't good bedtime reading.

I suppose the main rule would be to make sure your readers / audience are well on board before you start wielding the knife indiscriminately. :-)

Gaargh. ;-)I wish I knew the interests of local wo...

2008-11-26T08:18:00.000-08:00

Gaargh. ;-)
I wish I knew the interests of local women; I suppose because of our not being able to communicate easily, I know little or nothing about them. I end up poaching from Mum's circle of friends; I can't ask them about themselves, but I can ask Mum. ;-) We were at lunch the other day with 4 of her friends and they made me laugh (in a friendly way of course).

Glad you're keeping up with the NaNoWriMo... I got a bit lost, but I suspected that might happen! I've still got the start of something I would like to expand on.

You argue a strong point young Kate.

2008-11-25T02:26:00.000-08:00

You argue a strong point young Kate.

I've killed off one half of a romance - felt like ...

2008-11-24T05:12:00.000-08:00

I've killed off one half of a romance - felt like a complete git for doing it, but it did work in the context of the plot.

I can see how killing off a loyal side-kick would enhance the evil personality of the bad guy, especially if it seemed that he would be there till the end - it makes the reader wonder about the safety of other apparently endgame characters too. Nice move!

Sometimes death is senseless and sometimes it just...

2008-11-24T04:50:00.000-08:00

Sometimes death is senseless and sometimes it just follows. So I might have the bad guy fire is gun or cross bow or whatever at the group. Stop roll a dice and decide who gets it. Because death is like that.

Or if I wanted to be mean I'd kill one half of the romance I'd been building for the entire story.

There are other ways. For example one character in my NaNoWriMo a few years ago under the side effects of powerfull hyposis ended up locked in a room. Mean while my other characters killed off his capters and then left wondering where he was.

End of character (but with the hope I could bring him back). It was senseless but just the way the characters flowed.

Anotehr time I had a favourite side kick run after a guy with a gun. I typed "... saw him turn and fire. His knees gave out and blackness came."

It was at that stage that the most logical thing had happened and the bad guy with the gun had shot my guy. It made the bad guy more of an evil character because he'd just casually offed a character that people will have been cheering for who had been written as if they would be there for the end game.

I was as shocked as everyone else and the next few pages reflect that shock. (I had to stop for a breather to get over the death of the character too).

You're wrong - I'm totally glad I picked you!! :)G...

2008-11-14T07:48:00.000-08:00

You're wrong - I'm totally glad I picked you!! :)
Great answers and they were fun to read.
Have a great day, off to check my centering ;)

I'm right there with ya Kate. Sometimes I think t...

2008-11-10T04:47:00.000-08:00

I'm right there with ya Kate. Sometimes I think that pulling my own teeth would be easier than adding to my word count. It doesn't help that the inner editor keeps screaming at me that what I am writing is all the biggest load of tripe ever written in the history of the written word. If anyone has ideas on how to shut up the inner editor, I'd be grateful.

(Gargantua29 on the NaNo site)

Kate, it's okay hon. Don't give up. Just keep truc...

2008-11-07T07:12:00.000-08:00

Kate, it's okay hon. Don't give up. Just keep trucking along even on the days when it seems the words won't come. I'm an old pro and NaNo and I still get stuck. I didn't write more than 20 words yesterday, so I have days like that too. Don't give up. Skip ahead and write a scene that comes later in the book. Try your hand at your ending, come back and add a chapter in the middle or towards the beginning. Just play around a little - you don't have to write in order. :)

Can't wait to see your meme. Thanks for the link and I have a lot of faith in you!!

It's All About Writing

And that site is so slow (the NaNo one)... it keep...

2008-11-04T10:00:00.000-08:00

And that site is so slow (the NaNo one)... it keeps freezing on me.

3500 words? I haven't written anything at all... I...

2008-11-04T09:59:00.000-08:00

3500 words? I haven't written anything at all... I can't think of anything to write about. :-)

Nice post.This is not a spam comment. :)It says th...

2008-11-04T00:23:00.000-08:00

Nice post.

This is not a spam comment. :)

It says there that you published this post two years ago. Well, it still rings very true today. There's nothing more that I hate about blogging than the usual spam that I get in my comments.

I don't mind if people leave a link to their site as long as they leave a good comment on my posts. Participating in the conversation through commenting on the posts is one of the things that make blogging fun and meaningful.

I agree with you that spam commenting is a waste of time. I never followed a link.

Thanks for the tag! I was going to come and moan a...

2008-11-02T13:09:00.000-08:00

Thanks for the tag! I was going to come and moan about my NaNo novel, but me meme will be more interesting. I love your blog BTW!

I so wish I lived closer because I would absolutel...

2008-10-31T12:41:00.000-07:00

I so wish I lived closer because I would absolutely be there.

I left you a 'tag' on my blog. You don't have to do it but I picked you because I enjoy your blog so much and want to know more about you :)

PS Twitter sounds a dog-eat-dog world. :-)On one o...

2008-10-23T23:25:00.000-07:00

PS Twitter sounds a dog-eat-dog world. :-)
On one of my arty sites, someone's name came up two or three times as having added me as a friend, usually just after I'd commented on one of his pictures... which I only did about once every blue moon as they were so grainy and poor. Somehow you don't care about something like that; you just think "oh, one of those!" and move on. :-)

Funny cartoon... and it's just the way I'm feeling...

2008-10-23T23:16:00.000-07:00

Funny cartoon... and it's just the way I'm feeling! :-)

I've often wondered that about leaving blogs, galleries and other things on the internet after I pass on. Even if family or friends found a way to log in and maintain them, they eventually pass on as well. At that point, I guess, it's all deleted eventually, through lack of use or payment.

Meanwhile, some of those pages, galleries and blogs could be up a good long time, and that's one reason why it's nice to go through the sites periodically and delete things I really don't want up there any more. :-)

You might remember I mentioned a digital artist about my age who died a year or more ago; I searched on her just now and there's a memorial site with all her pictures, which is nice. Her deviantArt gallery is still there too, and that one is 'frozen in time'. One person did leave a message a few months ago without realizing there was no one to reply, but everybody else who commented seemed to be aware. I also noticed evidence of a spam message which was flagged and removed before I got there. Somebody has to do a little weeding. :(