If you've been with me awhile, even just lurking, you will know how much I love changing my layouts. Even though I loved my previous Green Spring version, it took a huge amount of willpower to resist changing it early to the Orangey Red Autumn one that you see now, because autumn is without a doubt my favorite season. I love everything about it. I love the colors, I love the smells, I love Halloween, I love pumpkins, I love the chill in the air when it's just cold enough to go outside in a pair of jeans and a hoodie and still feel really comfortable. I love October the most, what with it being the month of Halloween and all, and if I ever get married, I hope it's in October.

Just so this post has something of substance and coherency: first, I am hemming and hawing over participating in NaNoWriMo this year, solely because I have two current works in progress, and I'm not sure I should distract myself with a third. One month is a lot of ground to lose to a novel that's just for fun, although I guess really you never know. Second, I am embarking on An Abundance of Katherines by John Green, and then possibly Blue Noon by Scott Westerfeld, though I have borrowed a book from a friend, and as I feel like I should return it in a timely manner, I may be reading that before Blue Noon. Also, there are at least five books I want to check out from work through the book loan program, not to mention reading several books I already have. And October - being October - is going to be devoted to two of Ray Bradbury's that I had never heard of until I started doing research for my ghost story: The Halloween Tree and Something Wicked This Way Comes. And I am very excited for both of those.

One of my homework assignments for my Thursday class is to interview the Production Manager of a magazine or book publisher, so. That should be interesting, if I actually manage to get around to it. I have several magazine names I'm going to research and possibly inquire about tomorrow, but I figured it would be good to come up with some questions first. I'm terrible at being interviewed, and even worse at interviewing others, so I'm hoping maybe this can be accomplished over email.

Also, I am going to the RennFest this weekend, and naturally, it's supposed to rain all weekend long. I'm keeping my hopes up, though, that the Weather.Com gods will - typically - be wrong, and that Saturday will be pleasant and sunny.

Last thing. I just finished catching up with Season 4 of The Office - OMG JIM AND PAM. OMG JAN. OMG ANDY ANGELA DWIGHT. And GO PHYLLIS for throwing a kickass party - and for the first time ever, will actually be attempting to follow it weekly once Season 5 starts (THIS THURSDAY YAY.)

Oh. One more thing. I've also started rewatching Bleach (I'm through the Soul Society Arc and am into filler) and have been lent several episodes of Death Note. So, yes, all and all, I guess I've been keeping pretty busy!

Not that this has anything to do with anything, but I went grocery shopping the other day...and had my lowest bill yet since moving! It's really exciting. I think I'm really learning which foods I can use as staples in any meal, and which foods are worth splurging on. I don't buy soda for myself anymore - I only buy milk - and I allow myself two treats with each shopping trip. Typically I get one pack of cookies and one thing of some sort of chips. Everything else is meal fixings. And I'm really learning how to make one meal go further leftovers-wise.

Also, a milestone for me in terms of grocery store history: I went to the butcher! And got ground beef! Because there weren't any packages small enough left in the refrigerated section. I felt like such an adult!

I've shifted gears with my ghost story - such as it is - and decided to write the second chapter from the other main character's point of view. Seeing as the female protagonist is completely indisposed of - having just survived a car accident - I figured I could explore the male protagonist's character to keep things in motion.

I've been doing some mind-bending math over the past couple days. I have to figure out the average number of deaths on each continent in order to figure out how many 'soul reapers' are necessary to keep up with all the deaths. I have one reaper being able to take care of an average of four spirits per hour, so I think the math might be correct?

I spent hours on it two days ago, and the numbers I used turned out to be 2005 estimates. Granted population numbers all over the world are changing every second, but I wanted mine to be even more realistic than that. Today I went back and instead used estimates for continent populations in 2010. I actually ended up being able to simplify my calculations using those numbers and also 155,000, which is the average number of deaths across the world per day. I know, it all sounds very morbid, and none of this information will ever be included in my book, but it's something that I, as the author, thought I should know. It's important in describing the scope of the soul reaper world.

In other news, I finished Touching Darkness by Scott Westerfeld. It's the second in the Midnighters trilogy. The creepiness factor certainly escalated exponentially in this one. I don't know how he does it, but Westerfeld certainly has a way with words in that he seems to effortlessly make nightmares seem horrifyingly real. He can make my skin crawl, basically. I'm not sure yet how I feel about the ending, although I'm certainly glad there is a lasting effect on one of the characters for the trauma s/he faced (hopefully that's not too spoilery!) In any case, I'm thinking of shifting gears for my next book, perhaps embarking on An Abundance of Katherines by John Green, not because I'm not looking forward to the final installment of Midnighters. No, it's because I know Blue Noon - Midnighters #3 is going to get a lot worse before it gets better, and I need a break from the sheer creeptasticness of it all (that's creepy fantasticness, if you were wondering). I still intend on gobbling up everything else Scott Westerfeld has written at some point when I have the money to buy books again -_-

Last but not least, I had my first shift volunteering at PetSmart this weekend, and it was fabulous. I feel a bit of pressure, because it seems like there is a lot to remember, but I wrote most of it down once I got home, so here's hoping I manage to keep things straight. I get to go back and play with the kitties again on Wednesday, so that's what I'm looking forward to right now.

Did not accomplish any writing today, and alarmingly I suddenly feel like there's not enough time in the day to complete all my tasks. Since I moved to PA, I've always felt as though I had way too much time on my hands. In fact, I'm going to volunteer a couple mornings a week at the local pet store to help socialize the cats that are up for adoption.

So I am going to attempt itemizing my To Do List here in an effort to help me prioritize and not panic.

* Research summer internships
* Organize said internships
* Finish reading Touching Darkness, followed by Blue Noon
* Review Elements of... books
* Read Idiots Guide to Writing for Young Adults
* Read Hooked: Grab Readers At Page One
* Read What Would Your Character Do?

I feel panicky already. I keep telling myself to just do it piece by piece, one strikethrough at a time. And really, this is over the course of the next few weeks. There's no deadline unless I set one, and I plan on reading fiction titles from my aforementioned list throughout to break up the monotony a bit. It's not that I don't enjoy reading about writing, it just gets to be overwhelming, all that information and no way to sort through it. Tomorrow I have a midshift, which just eats up the entire day, so that isn't helping matters.

Although on a bright note, I have off Thursday (yay) so will have lots of opportunity to get things done during the day before my class starts (also yay!).

If I have recently friended you, it is because I am a fan of your writing and aspire to someday do what you do :)

Was AWESOME. I am so glad I got the second and third one today, because I'm definitely going to inhale them. Along with anything else Scott Westerfeld has written. It's times like this that I really wish I could write coherent book reviews. Westerfeld has such a way with words, and that was what originally won me over. But then, to have a killer storyline with characters who feel real and (HOORAY) have faults? Icing on the cake. Just. I haven't geeked out this much over a book since I read Twilight, so. ^_^


amazing artwork by Shira-chan

Today was...weird.

It was just...I feel like I failed at a lot of things.

But I made some headway on the ghost story I'm writing. And I think I'm finally at least satisfied enough with the first 10 pages that I can allow myself to move on to bigger and better things, like Chapter 2. I'm pretty sure I have too much happening too fast, but it felt boring without the action so. Whatever. That's something I can fix later. I have to get the bones of the story written first, then I can worry about all the extra fluff.

And, I think I might even have an idea for NaNo this year (OMG can you believe it's two months away?). I've always just sort of rehashed the same idea over and over again - all three rehashes have been completely different - but I thought of an idea just yesterday, and it occurred to me just now that if I let it sit a bit, perhaps I could use it for NaNo.

Also, I am so totally in love with Midnighters: The Secret Hour. I was just now trying to figure out how to afford the other two in the series, along with just about anything else that Scott Westerfeld has written. I have the option of returning two books I got two weeks ago, that I probably won't be reading anytime soon since I want to read books on my paranormal/occult/heaven&hell list first, at least as much as I can within reason without taking a break...so I guess it would make sense to return them but...I don't return books. And I want them, even if it will be another year before I read them. I think I'm going to do it though. I can always buy them again.

=LATER=
I'm exhausted. I even got out of work an hour early, and I'm exhausted. I have to shower, eat, and pack, and hopefully after doing all that I'll still be this tired, because I would love to get some sleep tonight.

...I just noticed I have three new friends! New as in I have not seen their names before on my flist, but I don't recall the last time I actually checked it for updates.

So. Hi!

So I've recently developed a fondness for crossword puzzles. When I was an undergrad, our newspaper always ran one puzzle each day a paper was printed, and it was something to attempt during a particularly boring class. I always got frustrated with them, having no real previous experience with crossword puzzles, because they do require a different sort of Jeopardy-style way of thinking that I wasn't used to, and of course, a ridiculous vocabulary and pop culture knowledge. The pop culture knowledge was my downfall for the most part.

An irrelevant aside - eventually as Sudoku became popular, the newspaper started printing Sudoku puzzles as well, and it was this I turned my attention to during class.

Anyway, a professor who taught one of my summer classes is the editor for a local entertainment newspaper, and every week he would 'treat' us each to a free copy. Since I still don't really have a life here, I would come home at night sometimes and attempt the crossword puzzles. I found that either his puzzles are much easier than the ones I'm used to, or I'm getting rather decent at them. This has nothing significant to do with anything, but it's a nice feeling to find out something else you enjoy doing, isn't it?

At any rate, it's not like I have any extra money to spend at the end of the month, after grocery and gas bills and rent are paid, but I think I might have to peruse some of the crossword puzzle books at work to see if there are any not TOO easy, sort of relaxing ones that I should invest in.

I also have developed a list of YA fiction that I need to make my way to reading. I might post the list in its entirety, just in case I lose the hard copy, but right now it seems like a waste of time. I basically spent several hours searching the web and online bookstore sites for YA fiction falling under several categories: heaven and hell, ghosts, horror and suspense, paranormal romance, and the occult. Randomly the other day I got inspired to write a story that essentially deals with an epic battle between forces we perceive as Heaven/Good or Hell/Evil, and wanted to do research on what was already out there. I don't typically read books with ghosts, probably because ghosts are a semi-real fear of mine (in the dark, lonely hours late at night), but figured it was a good starting place.

Mostly, my list just contains works that are probably more considered urban fantasy, as opposed to paranormal anything. For right now, I'm trying to steer clear of vampire novels, though eventually I would like to read a few just to see how they compare to Twilight.

Ones that I have read so far include Gossip Girl, The Summoning, and Sweethearts. The first was because its obviously insanely popular and I wanted to find out why. The second was because the main character can see ghosts, and I wanted to see what laws applied to her and them, if any were out of the ordinary. The third was because I've had my eye on it since I first saw its corrugated display several months ago.

Right now, I'm reading Midnighters 1 - The Secret Hour and I am really enjoying it. I found myself getting sucked in right around the time Jessica experiences her first Secret Hour. Scott Westerfeld has an amazing way with words, so that normal cliches like 'Jessica felt a chill...' are superbly and effortlessly woven into the story so that I ended up feeling the chill as well. Some of his passages are so charged that when several teenage girls are talking about the spooky goings-on of Bixby, Oklahoma in the safe setting of a school library, I still felt on edge and hyper-aware. I have to admit I am very impressed, and if this first novel continues this way, I'll definitely be buying the others, and possibly looking into his other series as well.

I also have two writing projects that I'm sort of playing with - the aforementioned one, and one whose general idea has been in my head for almost five years now. And I found a sort of kindred spirit at work yesterday, which I am trying not to get too excited about, because the same thing happened in one of my classes, and I emailed the girl, and it's been over two weeks and she hasn't gotten back to me. I don't want to get super excited and have the same thing happen again. Anyway, the girl at work (we'll call her Elle), already sent me the two stories she's currently working on (and we only just talked about exchanging emails and comments yesterday!) so it's hard not to get excited and hopeful. I'm going to be reading through at least one of them today and hopefully sending her some comments, though I'm not sure what she's expecting.

I can't wait for classes to start again, and I'm thinking of volunteering one or two days a week at either the local SPCA animal shelter or the local PetSmart. And that's pretty much it.

The drama surrounding Breaking Dawn doesn't make me feel good. I now see first hand what the Harry Potter fandom deteriorated into, and I hate it. Of course we are allowed to have our alliances - I am, always have been, and always will be, Team Edward. I do NOT think he's abusive, just as I do NOT think Jacob is aggressive. I enjoy engaging in debates with girls who go for Jacob, because I like hearing what they have to say, why they think Jacob and Bella are a better match than Edward and Bella.

But I digress.

It makes me sick and sad that this novel has generated so much...outrage. I loved Twilight. I was ridiculously disappointed in New Moon, mostly because of the lack of Edward and the fact that Bella became a severely diminished pathetic shadow of herself. Upon rereading it, I can appreciate the development of Jacob and Bella's relationship, and I recognize that it was necessary. Eclipse was good enough to keep me vaguely interested. I didn't get sucked into all the hype about Breaking Dawn's release until I moved. The combination of where I work, plus rereading Midnight Sun drew me back in.

I don't understand what the big deal is about how Stephenie Meyer writes. She isn't a writer, at least, she wasn't when she started the series, and it's told from Bella's perspective, so obviously it's going to have a less than literary tone. If her grammar is bad, blame the editors. Authors can only go so far without them.

I had issues with Book 1. And I stopped short during the first chapter of Book 2, when the perspectives changed. I do not like that character, and that entire chapter made me furious. I did not know if I could finish the book. But I had already invested time in reading the first three, so what the hell?

Besides those, I loved it for the most part. I did. And no one is ever going to be completely happy with what someone writes. It will never be completely perfect, it will never be what YOU want it to be, or what YOU want it to be, unless you write it for yourself.

My thoughts are all over the place right now. It saddens me how much control fandom thinks they should have over the product an individual produces. It sickens me how readers feel they have the right to just bash and abuse something, because it didn't turn out the way they wanted it to. And the excuse that you were disappointed with Meyer's writing in BD is just ridiculous. You've read the first three. You know what to expect.

This isn't directed at any single person in particular. It's directed to everyone in general. I am beginning to hate fandoms. They don't make it fun. They make it mean and deriding and petty.

And they make me want to flip you off and say, "You don't like it? Go fuck off and write something better." And when you do - what will you do, when the backlash of fandom hits you?

When did reading a book stop being something to enjoy, and become something to critically analyze and take personally?

I KNEW IT. I KNEW IT!
( vague spoiler )

Oh. Right. THIS is why I love Edward so much.