a fool's musings

Fool, said my muse to me, look in thy heart and write...

Warning: Adult Content achromatic unfinished fic graveyard recs journal new stuff recent stuff my back pages January 2004 December 2003 November 2003 October 2003 September 2003 August 2003 July 2003 June 2003 May 2003 April 2003 March 2003 February 2003 January 2003 December 2002 November 2002 October 2002 September 2002 August 2002 July 2002 June 2002 May 2002 April 2002 March 2002 February 2002 January 2002 December 2001 November 2001 the five Ws, or, all about me profile e-mail victoria my livejournal the original P&R comments current mood: "pathological and unbalanced" Items of Interest People LiveJournal folks Baraita bishclone claritylit Jintian Kat Allison Kit Mason metablog mix-tapes Neil Gaiman Nestra Sarah T. Seema Shrift Sundry Mourning zendom Music Walk On - U2 Thunder Road - Bruce Springsteen If I Can't Change Your Mind - Sugar Sick of Myself - Matthew Sweet Town Called Malice - The Jam One - U2 The Space Between - DMB Books Lord of the Rings Catch-22 The Neely Trilogy Absalom! Absalom! Possession: A Romance Foucault's Pendulum Dreamhouse LA Confidential I Capture the Castle Sandman Waking the Moon Shows Angel Buffy the Vampire Slayer (in reruns) Alias West Wing The Simpsons webrings < ? fanfiction ! > < ? writers ! > diaryreviews.diaryland.com NYC Bloggers Comments by Haloscan.com all links, if I haven't screwed up somehow, should open in a new browser window

02.18.03 - 5:53 p.m. Chandler on LA Some more of my favorite bits from The Long Goodbye, since I'm not really doing any deep thinking right now, just watching a very pretty pink-orange sunset over the snow out the office window (dad's office. You don't think I went to work today, do you? I'm may be crazy but I'm not stupid. It took Anthony a total of 6 hours to get to work today - he left home at 4am and got to work at 10am. I'm nowhere near that dedicated.). On LA: Far off the banshee wail of police or fire sirens rose and fell, never for very long completely silent. Twenty-four hours a day somebody is running, somebody else is trying to catch him. Out there in the night of a thousand crimes people were dying, being maimed, cut by flying glass, crushed against steering wheels, or under heavy tires. People were being beaten, robbed, strangled, raped, and murdered. People were hungry, sick; bored, desperate with loneliness or remorse or fear, angry, cruel, feverish, shaken by sobs. A city no worse than others, a city rich and vigorous and full of pride, a city lost and beaten and full of emptiness. It all depends on where you sit and what your private score is. I didn't have one. I didn't care. I finished the drink and went to bed. On millionaires: "There ain't no clean way to make a hundred million bucks," Ohls said. "Maybe the head man thinks his hands are clean but somewhere along the line guys got pushed to the wall, nice little businesses got the ground cut from under them and had to sell out for nickels, decent people lost their jobs, stocks got rigged on the market, proxies got bought up like pennyweight of old gold, and the five per centers and the big law firms got paid hundred-grand fees for beating some law the people wanted but the rich guys didn't, on account of it cut into their profits. Big money is big power and big power gets used wrong. It's the system. Maybe it's the best we can get, but it still ain't any Ivory Soap deal." Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose, eh? And a real short one, that just tickles me, and probably anyone else who's spent as much time in hotels as I have: A hotel room is a pretty sharp indication of the manners of the guests. The Ritz-Beverly wasn't expecting them to have any. One day, I shall write a line as clever and funny and true as that. I hope. And now the sun is gone down and the sky is grey. ~victoria link [current mood: lazy] [current music: news in the background] [random quote: All the leaves are brown and the sky is grey] ~*~ 02.17.03 - 6:46 p.m. On Signs and squicks Just watched Signs with Mel Gibson and Joaquin Phoenix. There's an hour and a half of my life I'll never get back again. I'm going to kill Leslie, who recommended it. Come on! What kind of lamebrain aliens attack a planet that's 75% water if water is lethal to them? Makes. No. Sense. Also, it was slow, heavyhanded, and used a child-in-jeopardy gimmick that really tends to irk me. I have a thing about fiction that puts children in jeopardy so adults can have epiphanies. I didn't like it or forgive it in The Bone People,which was a far more interesting, well-written book than Signs was a good movie. Ah well. I've had a couple glasses of wine and a nice dinner, so I'm feeling mellow. I'm editing the Eowyn/Eomer bad wrongness and contemplating a "Five Things" fic for Eowyn. And possibly for Rogue. It's the kind of thing you'd think would play to my strength. Relatively short, AU, can be dark as all hell. Just ... yeah. I still can't believe that I'm writing LotR fic. Part of me is happy as a clam, because dude - I spent most of my formative years trying to recreate LotR. But part of me is disturbed, because dude - Lord of the Rings! It was the most formative thing read as a child, bar none. It's like writing Chronicles of Prydain fic or Narnia fic (not that I haven't read and liked some Narnia fic. I just don't think I could write it). It's the movies. I'm blaming the movies. Makes everything much more accessible (read: Makes Boromir human and likable. Will be quiet on the Faramir issue). And of course, Aragorn's cliff dive was really fortuitous, as it never happened in the books, but it makes lovely fodder for fic. It doesn't get much slashier than, "You're late... You look terrible." I still need to write a Legolas/Aragorn bathing fic. *g* Plus, I'm hoping to finish Nothing Like the Sun soon (and because I'm not a kid reading HP, I don't have the same, "Omigod, you're ruining my childhood!" vibe from writing HP fic, though I still find underage sex highly problematical, because I envision the actors, and the actors are too young and that's not going ot change for a couple years yet. Hence my recasting Hermione and Draco as Helena Bonham-Carter and James Marsters [or Jude Law, as the case may be. I'm flexible]). And I think I really need to finish the Giles fic, and pick out a Remix story. I'm probably not going to work tomorrow, since I'm still out here on Lawn Guyland, under 2' of snow, so I can probably get some more writing done. I hope. If the comments are still broken, you can always use the LJ. ~victoria link [current mood: sated] [current music: news in the background] [random quote: eight days a week, I love you, eight days a week is not enough to show I care] ~*~ 02.17.03 - 12:38 a.m. E/E Oh! Eomer/Eowyn bad wrongness up in the LJ - Blood Remembers. It's not complete, but I hope it will be soon. [current mood: ] [current music: ] [random quote: ] ~*~ 02.16.03 - 11:59 p.m. POV responses Comments are still not working. Grrr... There's always LJ for that. So in response to comments on the POV plea: Dr. Science - how does one go about posting on the Fanfic Symposium? Anonymous - I did specifically say when writing from the POV of one character, or having one character narrate, which tends to exclude third omniscient (which is a rare POV to find in fanfic, as well). Third omniscient brings a whole host of other problems with it. *g* I think some fanfic writers *think* they're writing in third omniscient, or are trying to, but they just rotate the narrative duties amongst the characters, which isn't quite the same thing, and can lead to this same problem. Jae & Mel - thanks. As for describing the POV character, yeah, it's something most of us want to read and to convey, but with fanfic at least, we're pretty lucky that most of our readers will know already what Buffy or Clark or Josh looks like, so we don't have to rely so much on that physical description in the narrative. For original characters, it's more difficult, but there are various ways around it (most notably by having other people point out what the narrator looks like, or having hte narrator compare/contrast him/herself with someone else. To use a fic example (again, made up off the top of my head) "I was nothing like Lana. She was dark and delicate and always dressed in shades of pink. I was a strawberry blonde tomboy whose hair would never behave and whose mouth was always too big for my face. *Of course* Clark chose her. Who wouldn't?") *g* It's not even snowing here yet. ::pouts:: ~victoria link [current mood: sleepy] [current music: news in the background] [random quote: “Free your mind and your ass will follow.” – George Clinton] ~*~ 02.16.03 - 4:07 p.m. LotR ages This is for my own reference only and is probably of no interest to anyone else. It contains spoilers for RotK, so turn back now if you don't know who ends up with whom. Approximate ages: Eowyn at the time of TTT = 23-24 Eomer = 27-28 Faramir = 35-36 Boromir = 39-40 Aragorn = 89-90 Eowyn and Eomer come to Meduseld when she's 7 and he's 11. Theodred is 24 at tht time, so he's almost of an age with Boromir when he dies (which is funny, because in the movie he looks younger than both of them, and I'd always pictured him as about Eowyn's age, having never done much reading in the Appendices about the Rohirrim). Eomer marries Imrahil's daughter after the war, and Eowyn marries Faramir. I think Faramir's mother was from Dol Amroth, but I'm not quite sure. I find it surprising that Eowyn and Faramir have never met before, because you'd think that Rohan and Gondor would have their aristocratic sons sent out to spend time at other courts, but maybe I'm imposing too much of a medieval European mindset on them. Though of course, Aragorn spent time as a counselor to Denethor's father, and he and Denethor may have been rivals, though at the time Aragorn was called Thorongil. ... Can you see this is why I find Tolkien endlessly fascinating despite the problems I have with his writing style? Because it's a world, a whole, fully-realized, well-thought out *world.* I don't ever get the sense that he slapped it together and said, "Oh, it can change if I think of something better." By the time he finished, it was real and worked according to the rules he'd laid down, unlike a lot of other fictional universes, which require fanwanking of Herculean effort to spackle plot holes and inconsistencies. As someone who can't seem to create a cohesive plot without a huge amount of effort, I admire that seemingly seamless world he created and the singlemindedness that he had to have had to do it. It just amazes me. ~victoria link [current mood: unwell] [current music: tv in the background] [random quote: I was open to pain and crossed by the rain and I walked on a crooked crutch I strolled all alone through the fallout zone And ca] ~*~ 02.15.03 - 5:13 p.m. Crazy space incest, yes. Barbarian horselord incest... er ... I'm not sure I was going to post answers to the comments on yesterdays POV rant, but the comments are down at the moment, so that's not gonna happen until the comments come back. I was up until 3am last night because of the caffeine, so I was reading The Play's the Thing by Shakespearechick, which I'm enjoying despite its reliance on quoting large parts of Much Ado About Nothing in the text (it's about the kids putting on the play, so it's not wrong to do it, there's just more than I'd say was necessary). I printed it out at work and I'm reading along and there's a good 80 pages or so of story and 7 chapters and then Boom! It's not finished. Grrr... God save us all from posted WsIP. I HATE THEM. I really, really hate them. Because you can't get me all wrapped up in a story and then leave me hanging, with no clue as to when the next bit's going to be posted. That just sucks big hairy donkey balls. In other news, my Angel dvds came, as well as my copies of Minority Report and Bourne Identity, and this afternoon at the video store, I bought a "previously-viewed" copy of Ocean's 11, because god help me, I'm thinking Rusty/Linus or (or possibly *and*) Rusty/Danny thoughts. I need to write a duology named "Hard Eight" and "The Vig" and really, it ought to be set in Vegas, right? So naturally... Ocean's 11. I'm also kicking around Eomer/Eowyn ideas, which scares me. Crazy space incest yes. Barbarian horselord incest... er, I always saw it in the books, but ... I'm not sure. Not sure how to make it work. Maybe as a pre-LotR story. The incest taboo is incredibly strong in Middle-earth, at least amongst the Elves (and the Numenoreans, who are descended from the Elves), but if the Rohirrim really are more Viking/Saxon types, then it's possible that there could be incest without the attendant wasting away from horror afterwards. Rohirrimcest. It could be the next big thing. I'm not sure. Of course, now I'm wondering how the Rohirrim adopted that name for themselves, because it's definitely Elvish in origin (it means 'horse people' the way Galadhrim means 'light people', so hrim is some sort of suffix, and 'ro' relates to horses and is seen in other names, like Elros and Elrohir, one of which means rider of some sort or another, iirc). A trip to the Appendices is probably in order. Sigh. So yeah, add those to my ever-growing list of stories I'm not working on. I would like to finish Nothing Like the Sun soon. I think I know how I'm going to do it, as well. I mean, duh, the ending is already written. It's the middle part I need to do. So that, plus the Giles fic and one or two L/R fics that are dangling, plus the sex comedy. This is making me tired. I think I need a nap. We watched My Big Fat Greek Wedding this afternoon, the parents and I. I liked it a lot. Some of it was very recognizable, even though we're not Greek. ~victoria link [current mood: tired] [current music: golf on teevee in the background] [random quote: \"I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now.\" - \"My Back Pages\" - the Byrds] ~*~ 02.14.03 - 12:33 p.m. A plea from me to you Bleh. Black Friday. I'm going to the parents'. In the past, this day would be one for getting together with other single friends and getting blitzed. Now, I just don't care. I'm giving my blood bear to Patricia, I think. I may buy some candy for Nicki (swedish fish) and Victor (chocolate) if I'm going to see them this weekend, and also something for Alyssa and Anthony, I guess, if I'm going to spend the money. My family was always very good with getting me little trinkets and chocolates, but I can't remember the last actual valentine I got, and it seems so pointless to get worked up over what is simply another manufactured holiday. And I just got distracted by badfic. Badly written sex is just... urk. Also, [rant mode on] when writing from one character's POV, one does not describe what their eyes, face, hair, body looks like. Example: Eowyn POV of Eowyn sitting in the moonlight should NEVER read, Eowyn sat, lonely and cold, outside the tent in which she was supposed to sleep. She wondered why she was being tormented with desire for a man she could never have, a man whose heart was given before she was even born, if she believed what Legolas had told her. The light of the moon made of her hair a golden halo, and she shivered under its pale luminescence. (Note: I just made that up.) Maybe, maybe, with someone really vain, or in a parody, you could get away with a character thinking, "Ooh, I bet I look fabulous in the moonlight. It turns my hair to molten silver and my eyes to a smoky grey" but otherwise, no. (And now I'm having Draco thoughts. Good lord, somebody stop me.) NO. No. No. No. (as an aside, Legolas is not going to refer to himself as the Elf if he's the POV character, unless he's speaking and being self-deprecating.) Rogue is not going to talk about how her white streaks gleam in the dim light of the atrium, framing her face in platinum as she turns to face Logan. A character may wonder/think about how s/he appears to another: She feels his eyes on her and knows she looks like the vagabond she is -- leather breeches, rough cotton tunic, dark hair full of leaves, escaping the tight bun in which she keeps it wound. While this story was in beta, Jen asked me what Fin looked like, why didn't I have a full description of her, so the reader could picture her. And my response was, because she wouldn't think of herself that way, and this is all you need to know, really. If you've read the Earthsea books, and I tell you Fin is Gontish, you can imagine what she looks like, based on the descriptions in the books, and all you need to know here is that she has dark hair, is dressed like a man, and is shorter than Ged. If the story were from Ged's POV, i would have described Fin on their first meeting, and that would be kosher, but since it's from her POV, it's not. A character may even look at him/herself in a mirror: Searching through her makeup case, she took out and opened a new tube of lipstick. "Passion," she murmured, before applying it. She hoped the name was a good omen. It was red, rich and full and soft as roses, and along with the black kohl lining her eyes, it changed her face dramatically. Her hair hung loose down her back, wild, wanton, yet also a curtain she could hide behind if necessary. She looked smoky -- seductive -- and it was good. She fixed her bra again, admiring her cleavage in the mirror, and pulled on the matching green silk opera gloves. Though many writing guides suggest avoiding 'character stares at self in mirror' beginnings. Like the rule that you shouldn't begin with your characters waking up, I ignore it when it suits me. *g* I realize POV is hard, and you think you've got such a pretty description of your character and you want to use it. But *THINK*, please. Would someone say those pretty words about themselves in the narration? Would Logan think of himself in terms of looks? Would he talk about his own smoldering hazel gaze? Would Lex? Would Boromir? Of course not! Not unless they were being facetious or ironic. I can see Lex quoting Shakespeare at Clark, "Item --two lips, indifferent red" etc. and Clark not getting the reference. But a serious description of the adorable scar on his lip in the narration from his own POV? No. So consider this a plea from me to you. Consider POV when writing, and *don't put in something your POV character wouldn't know or see, mm'kay? [/rant off] ~victoria link [current mood: pleading, also crampy and drained] [current music: wrapped around your finger - police] [random quote: item, two lips, indifferent red; item, two grey eyes, with lids to them; item, one neck, one chin, and so forth.] ~*~ previous - next DiaryLand Disclaimer: Reading this diary is not required by law. If you do not like or agree with the contents herein, or find them to be offensive on more than one occasion, please go elsewhere and don't come back. Management is not responsible for any adverse reactions to content within. The painting is "Boreas" by John William Waterhouse. Again, not a muse, but I like her. She suits the color scheme. The quote is from Sir Philip Sidney. 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