Superpowers and Handicaps

It's interesting how little things can affect you so much.

When I'm walking around listening to fun music on my ipod, I sing along and dance and I don't care who sees and hears. If I try to be that carefree without the false invisibility and security and ego boost my headphones pump into me, well... it's a different story.
I know it's just a mental thing, which means I coils conceivably get over it, which would feel like a superpower all on its own.

I've also been acutely aware lately of my actual physical handicap that I can't do anything about: my eyes. Just in case anyone doesn't know, I can only see out of one eye at a time, which means I don't have stereoscopic vision (ie: depth perception, I don't see the world in 3D,  I can't tell how far things are away from me).
What all that means is that the only way I can really KNOW something's place in space in relation to me is by touching it (which is called proprioception).
I notice problems from this the most at work, when I am draping/undraping an arm or leg. If the client decides to "help" by lifting their limb themselves, if they lift it out of my grasp, it's like I am suddenly blind. I have no clue where the limb is or where to put the sheet or anything. It's really frustrating. :/

Money well spent...

The other day I was walking around downtown. As I passed several stores, I looked at the window displays, thinking about things I wished I was able to buy.
Someone on a street corner addressed me with a big smile, and I thought for a moment that maybe we'd met and I just didn't remember. I stopped and greeted him, and it turned out I didn't know him. I figured he was taking a survey or collecting signatures for a petition or some such thing.
He was with Children International. He didn't show me pictures of teary-eyed children in rags, and he didn't tell me any sob stories; I didn't need them. He told me the facts: what most of the countries they work with are in need of, what their organization does to help, how the supporter's money is used, etc. He told me that sponsoring a child was $7 per week and asked if I could afford to / would like to sign up to sponsor a child and help give them a better chance for the future.
I thought about it, and I realized that $7 per week is easily covered by one bad tipper per week. I thought about all the nice things I'd wanted (but didn't need) to impulse-buy. I decided that this would be a much better use of my money.
So I signed up.
You can choose the gender, age bracket, and country to select your child from. I chose "no preference" for all of them, and checked the box for choosing a child on the emergency list.
So, I would like you to meet my child, Diego Felix Gonzalez Suar. He is 11 years old and lives in Guatemala. I will sponsor him until he graduates from the Children International project when he is 19.

Words, words, words!

I've been bombarded by words lately! This is no bad thing.

I've been writing, although I haven't written much since something a bit traumatic happened two weeks ago.

Luckily, I had other people's writing to read and proofread! It acted as a bit of a "reset button". I feel ready to write again.

One was a vampire book by my friend Duncan; vampires aren't usually my thing, but I am enjoying this one, even though it's making me a little freaked out waiting at bus stops after dark. ;)

Otherwise, I have weekly submissions from a writers' group to read. Last Tuesday was my first time there, and I gotta say, I was intimidated. I always get nervous having people critique my writing, and the other members were pretty blunt to that week's writer. Not rude, but definitely blunt. She was noticeably nervous, and hadn't submitted since July. She kept putting herself down. I feel like I'm going to be like that. I decided with the prompt from Sunrise that my first submission will be a comedic short story grossly exaggerating my worst fears about writers' group. Hopefully it is well-received and will serve to gently let them know that I'm fragile.

Also, I want to start a club or something advocating the correct usage of words. I get so tired of words losing their meaning to people and being used when it really isn't appropriate.

What A Wonderful World

This morning my iPod alarm finally worked the way it was supposed to. For the first day in what will hopefully be a long string of days, I awoke at 6:45 to Louis Armstrong singing What A Wonderful World, followed by guided breathing meditation, followed by another round of What A Wonderful World.

It is a relaxing, positive way to start the day and I highly recommend it. I was more awake in the continuing morning, and felt better than usual throughout the day, with a few awesome bursts of creative inspiration. I may have even had less pain.

Suspense VS Predictability

How much foreshadowing is right?

I want to build suspense in my book and have a big twist at the end, but I started the book making it pretty clear that there's something up with the character that will have the twist.

I tend to worry when trying to make foreshadowing that the reader won't pick up on the subtle clues that are meant to increase their curiosity. However, I don't want to make it so obvious that the climax is... well, anticlimactic.

In my favorite old (1908) book, The Lure Of The Mask, there is a plot development that is pretty dang obvious. When the truth was revealed, rather than being shocked, I had the small but satisfying "I knew it" experience. Is it better to make the reader feel good about seeing what was coming or to give them the thrill of the Big Plot Twist?

Mortified.

Mortified is a really good word. It's a good word in general -- very colorful and strong. It's also a very good word -- perfect, in fact -- for how I'm feeling right now. My heart won't stop pounding and I'm nauseated and I wish I could just erase the last 24 hours from existence.
And no, I don't want to talk about it.

WTF, Snidely Whiplash?!

So, for some reason I was just thinking about what it would be like to be run over by a train. I think it started by my idly thinking about suicide. (No, I'm not suicidal, I just think about methods sometimes because I'm sick in the head I guess.) I was picturing lying down on the tracks, and would you put your head on a rail? Would the train slice right through you or would you die from being pushed/dragged along by the train? I imagined what it would look like to see a train coming right for your face. I imagined the mess. Then I remembered Dudley Do-Right from Rocky and Bullwinkle. The villain, Snidely Whiplash, is always compelled to tie women to train tracks. After picturing what would happen, I'm horrified by the thought of someone being murdered like that. And does Snidely like to wait and watch? What a sick bastard!

One of these days...

One of these days, I really have to unpack my books. It's just such a daunting task... exciting, but daunting. Maybe I'll do it after work tomorrow.
Yeah, yeah, "tomorrow"...

It's just, I'd rather write. Or read. Or write. XP
All of my time has been taken up with either writing or working or sleeping. I realized today at the end of my work day that I hadn't eaten anything since breakfast the previous day. Oops.

And now I'm temporarily too sleepy to finish this post. :/

Working title!

So today with the prompting of my friend Aviel, I came up with a working title for my book!

Playing Games

Woo, this calls for more ice cream! I think I should take him out for sundaes at Back To Eden for the inspiration. ;D

Ice Cream Reward

Today I will reach 10k words in my book. I'm embarrassed to tell people this if they know how long I've been working on it, but you know what? I took a lot of breaks to deal with life, AND I proofread and edit the whole thing every day before I start writing again. So my first draft is going to be awesome. So nyah nyah.
You know what ELSE? This is my first real attempt at a whole novel, and I'm pretty sure this is already the longest thing I've ever written (business plan not included because that's no fun).
And lastly, I'm going to finish this. I know it.

So I'm having a hot fudge sundae to celebrate. :)