Stuff From Everywhere

Below is a list of things to inspire/entertain you:

1) Check out this video of how to print a book... in 1947.

Mercilessly borrowed from BoingBoing.net


2) Have I told you how in love with Strange Horizons I am?

Read their Fiction archives here.

It's all so dreadfully good I've ignored the rest of the site.


3) A Softer World co-creator Joey has just made his book 'Lockpick Pornography' available for free online.



WARNING: It's got a LOT of homosexual relationships, transsexuality, illegal activities including robbery and guerrilla political tactics, but this either a) doesn't bother you or b) you can get past it, this is a very creative, fun, hilarious read.


4) A list of the best opening sentences from Science Fiction books




5) Tress can communicate with each other! As a writer, you should be thrilled.


6) Cats have wings


7) Dictionary of Etymology


8) Lingual oddities: A map of the United States showing who says 'pop' and who says 'soda'

Encouragement

I may have posted this quote before, but you don't mind.

I figured that with all of Jaden's informative lectures, you may be overwhelmed with the enormity of the publishing-project you are about to undertake, and you might need a little bit of encouragement.

From Barbara Kingsolver (You know her as the writer that wrote The Poisonwood Bible, The Bean Trees, Pigs in Heaven, and Vegetable,Animal,Miracle, to name a few):


"This manuscript of yours that has just come back from another editor is a precious package. Don't consider it rejected. Consider that you've addressed it 'to the editor who can appreciate my work' and it has simply come back stamped 'Not at this address'. Just keep looking for the right address."




This picture has nothing to do with the above, I just liked it.

Indie Decorating

A new room in a new house means new decoration. Unfortunately, my room is baby blue (it'll have to go), but until I get around to painting it, here are some of my decorating quirks:

1)These keys were found on a nail in my grandmother’s cellar, and I’ve kept them for about two years, finally developing a purpose for them, seen here strung together with black thread.


2) A small collection of safety pins, hanging on a nail.


3) A pufferfish, also inherited from grandmother, and a collection of bottles, each with a paintbush in them. I’ve had a fascination with pufferfish ever since fourth grade, when I learned how they were used in making voodoo zombies.


4) A corner of my bookshelf, seen with perfume from Anthropologie, a horse bookend, a bird statue got from a furniture store in Geneva, Illinois, a small bottle got from an antique store in Standwood, Washington, a Devil Rubber Ducky found in a container of Pirate Bandaids, a tiny snail shell (not exactly pictured, but it’s there), a small baby, a finger-puper, and a butterfly.


5) A gargoyle bookend (which I made myself), and some fabulous books, including two of the Post Secret collections: Lolita, Middlesex, The Bluest Eye, A Wrinkle in Time, Rant, The Bell Jar, Invisible Monsters, The Lovely Bones, Post Secret 1 and 2, and Emotionally Weird.


6) A Chou dog; a statue used in China to ward off evil, which I picked up for a mere $20 in a store in Geneva. I’m sorry I don’t have names for you!


7) My favorite plaque, bought from the art museum in Chicago, and a door-chime of sorts, made of keys again, in my bathroom.


8) A mushroom I picked up at an antique store here in Huntsville, which now lives with Fred the Fern (more on Fred later).


9) My cat, adorned with butterflies, which I also got at that same antique store. I’ve been really into butterflies lately, having been working on a book mostly about them.



10) My lovely Grindhouse poster, the purchasing of which led to me making a new friend and possible romance (seen backwards because of quirk of program).


11) My cat, peeking out of my hamper.


12) God's Hands, seen with pearls from both market in Hawaii and Clair's, and butterflies.

Quotes from Working in the Dark

I read the book Working in the Dark by Jimmy Santiago Baca and Adan Hernandez, and here are selected quotes pulled from it:

(NOTE: Most of these are probably fragments of sentences, because I only pulled the good parts. So try to take in the imagery and ignore the context.)

While the president’s son in the Rose Garden snares a butterfly into his net and rips off its wings.

Ocean moaning in her blood vessels.

My heart is a cow’s tongue slowly licking a block of ice.

Poetry sits in God’s chair when God is absent.

I reach my bladed hands into the haunted heart of the woman made lonely by her beauty, because she is too beautiful for men to love her soul.

And when I finish a poem I measure its authenticity against their hearts’ reality and their imagination. The voice of poetry runs steadily and faithfully in the veins of all children.

My ears and arms become pollen sacks where butterflies and bees pollinate in language.

In the poem I plant my seed and lick the birth-film from each vowel.

My dove self is eaten and my wolf self growls.

The privilege of poets is that they can become all things in the act of creation, everything –and nothing.

And gently bit her lips.

I have failed many times to water the tree that grows in the heart.

I want to embrace all of life, the beautiful and the ugly, to sit with cowards and warriors and listen to them all.

Each true poem is the pear-handled pistol you point at your heart.

Let poetry be your open space that you transverse with courage.

He can sing the most hidden secrets of the heart. And these are gifts from God.

Visual AHHHHHHHHHHHHHness

As a writer, you are also a reader. Let's not get into lecturing on how great readers make great writers; that is for another post, or perhaps even unnecessary.

As a writer, you are also an observer.

And sometimes, observing takes a great toll on the mind... like observing four hours of television every day... or observing the hell out of your cereal box.

Sometimes the materialism and commercialism gets to be too much.

So, take the idea of author and artist Keri Smith, and cover up the labels with something creative!



Read this post for ideas.

25 Reasons to Keep Writing

Taken from Maya

25 Reasons to Keep Writing

1. Because sometimes metaphors work better than just words
2. Angst makes me feel alive
3. Impossible yearning is the most powerful feeling of all
4. Drugs are expensive
5. I like infinity, and combinations of letters are endless
6. Because I am a gateway to the Land of Unwritten Ideas
7. I like feeling important
8. I like laughing at typos
9. I want to remember everything
10. Because sometimes you just have to escape
11. Because sometimes no one can tell the story better
12. Characters are counting on me
13. Friends are counting on me
14. The what-ifs are more entertaining
15. Absolute omnipotence and power
16. There is nothing else
17. I’m bored
18. Keyboards make funny sounds
19. Dreams are more realistic anyway
20. To educate the world on the importance of cats over men
21. Everything sounds better in poetic format
22. Because being brainless is overrated
23. Cause people fear you easier
24. It helps with the loneliness
25. The electric possibility of getting it right, and the smaller, quiet beauty of almost.

Printing

I have just completed my first professional printing. I have a stack of my work, my first manuscripts, piled neatly on the desk beside me.

I feel very, very young and innocent, like this is the time /before/, when I still had hopes of being published and still had hopes of making everything work out. Hey, what am I saying? This /is/ the time before!

And so this week we shall focus on courage (and proper formatting, because man oh man are there a lot of rules).

Firstly, on random courage:

I don’t have the courage

I don’t have the courage
To stand in the dark
In the middle of the room
Staring at the mirror

I don’t have the courage
To tell my father what I think
Or tell my step mom that I really don’t give a fuck
What happens to her damned towels

I don’t have the courage to go out door to door selling things
So that I’ll have enough money for me to have the courage
To invite people over to our house and
Not be ashamed

I don’t have the courage to tell people
That they are rich if they live in a house that big
And have that many pairs of Gucci shoes
I don’t have the courage to tell that boy how I really feel
Or tell that other boy to get his filthy eyes
Off my fucking body

I don’t even have the courage
To write louder
Than a tiny spider creeping across the floor
Because my step mom might still be up
Trying to catch me in the act
And then I wouldn’t be able to write anymore

Burkina Faso


Secondly, on courage for writing:

It is impossible to discourage the real writers - they don't give a damn what you say, they're going to write. ~Sinclair Lewis

This manuscript of yours that has just come back from another editor is a precious package. Don't consider it rejected. Consider that you've addressed it 'to the editor who can appreciate my work' and it has simply come back stamped 'Not at this address'. Just keep looking for the right address. ~Barbara Kingsolver

A good many young writers make the mistake of enclosing a stamped, self-addressed envelope, big enough for the manuscript to come back in. This is too much of a temptation to the editor. ~Ring Lardner

Somewhere I have never travelled

I do not remember if I shared this before, and because blogspot will not let me look at my July entries, I shall just repost because this is good enough for you to look at a second time.

Introducing 'Somewhere I Have Never Travelled', by E.E. Cummings
(And yes, this is all how he wrote it; I'm not copying from a gramatically-challenged website somewhere)



somewhere i have never travelled, gladly beyond
any experience, your eyes have their silence:
in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,
or which i cannot touch because they are too near

your slightest look will easily unclose me
though i have closed myself as fingers,
you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens
(touching skillfully, mysteriously) her first rose

or if your wish be to close me, i and
my life will shut very beautifully, suddenly,
as when the heart of this flower imagines
the snow carefully everywhere descending;
nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals
the power of your intense fragility: whose texture
compels me with the color of its countries,
rendering death and forever with each breathing

(i do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens; only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
nobody, not even the rain, has such small hands


-----------------------------------------------------------------------

The love abounds for that phrase 'not even the rain has such small hands'. Kudos to Cummings for the imagery.

And now for your favorite part, the pretty pictures:

The Phrontistery

Have you ever been writing and you wanted to use a word but you didn't know what it was? Did you ever, after hours of searching and using dictionaries and thesaurae, come to find out that the word you had in mind did not exist?

Perhaps you were looking for a word that your writer's genetic memory knew -but that you did not.

Folks, I've got the answer: The Phrontistery



The Phrontistery is a registery of old and forgotten English words that you can find in no modern (or even semi-ancient) dictionary.

Some of my favorites that I've discovered lately are:

Welmish –of a pale, sickly color
Empyreal -of, like or pertaining to heaven; sublime; skyward
Inocciduous –of a star, never setting
Nubivagant –moving through the clouds

And, for you classical poets out there:
Rhodologist –one who studies or classifies roses

(Remind me to rant about roses at a later date)



Anyway, I encourage the checking-outage of the website. If you want to go straight to the glossary, and are having a hard time finding it, here is the direct link:

The Phrontistery's Glossary by Letter

Marillion

Introducing the musical group Marillion. As musicians they have yet to appeal to me, but their song lyrics/poetry are certainly worth examining:



Excerpt from their famous song, Kayleigh:

Do you remember chalk hearts melting on a playground wall
Do you remember dawn escapes from moon washed college halls
Do you remember the cherry blossom in the market square
Do you remember I thought it was confetti in our hair



Excerpt from Psuedo Silk Kimono:
Huddled in the safety of a pseudo silk kimono
wearing bracelets of smoke, naked of understanding.
Nicotine smears, long, long dried tears, invisible tears.
Safe in my own words, learning from my own words,
Cruel joke, cruel joke.



Excerpt from Beautiful:
Everybody knows that we live in a world where they
give bad names to beautiful things
Everybody knows that we live in a world where we don't
give beautiful things a second glance
Heaven only knows that we live in a world where what
we call beautiful is just something on sale
People laughing behind their hands while the fragile
and the sensitive are given no chance
And the leaves turn from red to brown
To be trodden down
To be trodden down
And the leaves turn from red to brown
Fall to the ground
Fall to the ground


---------------------------------------------------------------------------

So. Take a look at their lyrics, be inspired, go to town. Peace out.

Brian Andreas

Welcome to the artwork/stories of Brian Andreas.

I discovered him while shopping with my best friend in a small town, and always meant to look him up, but never got around to it, until Super Hero Journals made an entry today mentioning him, and I knew it was time.



Brian combines watercolor/pen artwork with unique stories or phrases or short sentences that describes an idealistic truth in life, and I think we can all sympathize with his work. Please, please, please check him out. I think you'll find a picture there that you'll absolutely adore.

Writer Love

What every fluffy teen writer really wants:



Taken from PostSecret.com (see link to right)

Jazz and snazzy art

I finally buckled down (mainly out of need to good off while writing a paper on Langston Hughes, or perhaps because of the man himself) and downloaded practically every classic jazz song I could find, and I'm here to tell you about my infatuation and joy in this music.



If you have a music downloading service, such as Limewire, Napster, or iTunes, I recommend the following songs/artist:

Anything by Miles Davis and John Coltrane, in particular:

The Feeling of Jazz
After the Rain
Body and Soul
Naima
In A Sentimental Mood
Summertime

Take Five
This is Jazz
Autumn Leaves
Kind of Blue
Smooth Jazz
Blue In Green



And by other artists:



Berimbau: Mandrake
Billie Holiday: Strange Fruit
Ray Charles: Unchain My Heart
Rob Dougan: Will You Follow Me?



In terms of Art, I'm fascinated by the painters of jazz, particlarly those with styles favoring abstract characters and brigh colors. Scattered throughout this entry was artwork by:

D.D Ike
Ivey Hayes
Laverne Ross
Wilhelm Gorre
Bernard Hoyes
Jerry Butler

If there is an artist I did not list, please let me know.

Dating encouragement

Dating? Female? Need encouragement?

Pre-date

More Collected Phrases

This time from the band Hole, featuring Courtney Love
(But perhaps you'll excuse that fact when you read this excerpt from her song, 'Awful')


...He's drunk, he tastes
Like candy, he's so beautiful...

Just think about that for a second.



By the way... can anyone else practically feel the texture and taste of sprinkles just by looking at them?

Interrobang ‽ ‽

While perusing the livejournal of a very mislead young man, I found mention of an "Interrobang." His only explanation of the word was to, "google it", so I did, and this is what I found:

FINALLY! AN ANSWER TO OUR PRAYERS! THE INTERROBANG: ‽
(Lifted from Wikipedia)

The interrobang (‽) is a rarely used, nonstandard English-language punctuation mark intended to combine the functions of a question mark and an exclamation point. The typographical character resembles those marks superimposed one over the other. In informal writing, the same effect is achieved by placing the exclamation point after or before the question mark, e.g. "What?!".

Examples:

* How much did you spend on those shoes‽
* You're going out with Marika‽
* You traveled to Paris in a submarine‽
* You slipped on a banana peel‽

The code for the interrobang is, in html (with no spaces) &# 8253

The entire wikipedia article can be found here.
---------------------------------------------------------------

It's a brilliant marriage, and as a writer, I am enthused. At last there is a justification for my computer's grammar check always being annoying with the squiggly green line...
‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽ ‽
(I'm excited)


Also of interest to note is the "irony mark". The article for it can be found here.

Random Phrases

A hobby of aspiring writers: Collecting random phrases, such as

"Window on my shoulder"

The Abyss

“When you stare into an abyss for a long time, the abyss also stares into you.” – Nietzsche

This terrifies me. Can you imagine the abyss staring into you and knowing you? Terrifying...



That was the human in me speaking. The writer in me is going:

I have /got/ to work that into a horror story.

Sometimes... being a writer is the best thing in the world. You get to turn everything you feared or hated or were embarassed by into something you love.

Assignment #1

Create a visual journal.

Examples:


Taken from kitche at livejournal.com



Taken from jr__nal at livejournal.com

Every Teen Writer Needs...

I had the idea for this list, and got several of my friends to contribute to it.

To be a successful teen writer, you will need:

1) A favorite pen, preferably customized with an engraved name, or an animal sticker
2) A very elegant notebook you are too afraid to write in
3) A notebook you /aren't/ afraid to use. And have open. Near the computer and phone.
Gum. Lot’s of gum. Oodles of gum.
4) A Beta. Someone to confide in.
5) Your beta's phone number on speed dial. Or memorized. Whichever is fastest.
6) Some type of fuzzy animal, cat preferably, to whom you can whine when your characters are being annoying
7) Hidden chocolate bars
8) A Magic 8 Ball, to help answer such questions as, “Should I kill off Bob the Sub-Character?”
9) A slinky
10) A good, worn pair of sneakers that can be slipped on in a hurry to go out walking
11) A typewriter. You don’t necessarily have to use it, but it’s something fun to contemplate.
12) A book of art for inspiration, preferably one of people
13) A dictionary (Good for random flipping)
14) An elaborate thesaurus, to come up with synonyms for ‘said’. Also useful to alleviate boredom in trying to find a synonym for ‘synonym’.
15) A Baby Name book, for naming characters
16) The Book, “Lanterns and Lances”
17) Post-It notes, for writing down such trivial things as plot details, grocery lists, and agent’s phone numbers
18) A CD player with a mix-tape of inspirational music.
19) A bookshelf, stocked with favorite stories and authors
20) A digital camera, so you can have a low-traffic blog like this one.
21) A list of people you know who look like your favorite book characters.
22) Someone to tell you you’re a good writer when the reviews are bad, and someone to deflate your head when the reviews are good.
23) Straws, because you’re too young to buy cigarettes
24) Numerous half-drunk (or half-un-drunk) room-temperature water bottles
25) A window with a view of something. Anything. Brick walls to cemeteries to skies. Anything.
26) Tragedy. Yours or others. Random gossip will work, too.
27) A Library Card (Who will trust a writer without a library card?)
28) A calendar
29) A subscription to word-a-day (this tends to really make you think)
30) A secret stash of Jelly Bellies, particularly the nasty-ass coffee flavored ones, because they make you feel special and cool and avant-garde, which makes you want to write more (but you have to have all the other flavors handy to wash out the nasty-ass coffee taste afterwards)
31) Something that smells like lavender. Doesn't matter what.
32) An addiction. It doesn't matter what it is--Zoo Tycoon, 24, potatoes, some video game... anything that makes you feel really good when you say, "Know what, I think I'll write instead of indulging in my addiction today," because that always makes your writing better, and you're more likely to write if it means you're spiting yourself by doing it.

(All of these requirements are currently in use by my fellow writer friends and I, and we're awfully successful, don't you think?)