Casually Watching The Glades

I may be somewhere in the … fourth season? I don’t know, it’s some marathon on A&E.

Main characters parents are getting a divorce after 42 years. He wants to continue working, meaning travelling to Brazil. Now that she’s on her own, she plans to move somewhere warm—Florida, to be near family—and also start travelling.

WHY doesn’t she just travel to Brazil with him now that she’s retired?

I don’t mind the effects of a broken marriage so many years on, but give me a reason other than MISSING the OBVIOUS resolution, please?

Mini Update

NaNoWriMo isn’t going all that well. Just up to a little over 19000 words today, which is still a couple thousand under. And then there’s tomorrow. I’d like to catch up, but it’s so much easier writing somewhere else, where distractions don’t feel as acceptable.

Also, I’m back to obsessing over White Collar, the television show, and then the fan fiction of it, mostly because I have some great fan fiction ideas for White Collar which would be so much easier than trying to figure out this original novel thing I am at this moment attempting to work on. Like, White Collar, it has a genre, and I know the characters—as much as one can know a character as depicted by an actor, because at that point the character exists for so many people: the writer, the director and only then the actor. It makes for a fascinating (to me) philosophical discussion, but not really one useful otherwise. Maybe if I go into the philosophy of theater I can use it as a thesis. If that is already your goal, I may allow you to steal it so I don’t have to do the work.

But still, given my understanding and familiar with television show characterization and all attending issues, I can make do. Writing a new plot turns out to be the easy part, though I’ve always said it’s what I have the most trouble with. I suppose that’s because knowing the characters (however possible) and the setting and the genre. There’s already even a style there to build from.

This novel thing? At best the genre is a fantasy/dystopia*/magical realism and unfortunately even I don’t know exactly what that means, which is no good, given I’m the one writing it. In theory, I should have control over this sort of thing. And most of my characters don’t have names: even those who do only have place holder titles. One has just been dubbed O until I can think of something better. Also plot is hard. I have the beginning fairly down, and last week it seemed brilliant. This week, while I still have hope for the beginning I’m not convinced it’s possible to make it go anywhere.

Oh well, if I do ever manage to make it until the end of the month, I can go from there. At least I’ll have somewhere to start. It’s like discovering a new genus. I don’t have the full shape yet, so I can’t even start thinking of the connections to everything else.

*and google wants me to correct that to ‘topiary,’ which wouldn’t not fit either.

 

P.S. Can I add this to my word count?

Monday’s moon over Modoc County, taken just about 7 am. Not when I expected to see it.

For personal reasons, posting today isn’t going to work out.

And then I got all the ranting I wanted to do with my family—for once we were (nearly) all in the same room, so now it’s all out of my system. Which doesn’t leave much for me to talk about now.

I will say I’ve been getting some creative writing done: not much, but far more than I have in months. Maybe it’ll help with November.

Right this moment I’m watching NCIS. Yes, it’s your fairly stand police procedural drama, but it has humor and eccentric characters. I love it like woah*. And I remember telling my brother about how annoyed I was about the denial Tony fangirls have (like fangirls in many other fandoms) that he has any flaws whatsoever, and for some reason hate McGee. Since I think both characters’ best scenes are where they play off each other, I’m rather unforgiving of that attitude. So I ranted about it at my brother, and though he hasn’t watched nearly as much of the show as I have, he immediately came out with “but in the later seasons Tony adores McGee!”

He’s not a shipper. He’s not in fandom. It isn’t what he meant. However, it was hilariously appropriate because they totally have a big brother, little brother dynamic going on, and if you can’t take the snark, you should turn off the tv.

Which is why I love White Collar, they snark all over everywhere.

Oh look. For not wanting to talk about anything today, I sure found a lot to say. It’s a good thing I’m an introvert, or I’d never shut up.

 

*Misspelled deliberately, re: Urban Dictionary: “like woah”: an exclamation to add emphasis**

** woah: 2:“Woah, I have nothing better to do with my time than to look up the misspelled word ‘woah’.” ***

***I only first saw it today, so I’m using it too. And yes, I had to look it up.

 

And before I post, I just want to send my prayers to all the victims of Hurricane Sandy.

 

Sick Days

Well, my brother finally finished his blog post on how the ‘nice guy syndrome’ is as bad for men as it is for women, but he’s disappeared again, and we never got him set up to post here.

Oh well. I’m sick, it started last night, although I didn’t recognize until after I’d posted. I knew subbing was dangerous.

And yet, it was a fairly productive day. I walked myself over to Rite Aid and found cold medicine—there are so many—and managed a reasonable budget for lunch. Still got my cookie though. I finished the first wrist warmer, though I haven’t yet started the second; I’ll cast on after finishing this post. And at work, after my boss left, a woman came in fundraising for an international student’s program and I got a very nice necklace and made a donation. My last roommate was an international student, too.That made me happy.

After I got home from work, I went on a nice long walk. Only half an hour, but considering I hadn’t expected to walk much at all, and had barely been able to focus at work, it went pretty well. It was sunset, with gold-edged clouds streaked across the sky, which meant most of the time I wasn’t walking with the sun in my eyes. Also, the sun just hit the mountain pass, leaving the rest of the range in shadow. The odometer has been a worthy investment.

Finished one of my books, too. And it was a library book, so I don’t have to worry about running out of time. It was Blackout, by Connie Willis, and a really interesting time-travel historical novel. Unfortunately it less ends than stops, because it’s part of a two-parter, and the second book isn’t offered by the digital library or the local library and I’m not sure I want to pay $11 for an ebook, and I don’t have any more room on my shelves.

Oh well. Even if I didn’t finish The Invention of Solitude in time for the book group, I enjoyed it, and it was worth buying. And we had some fantastic tangents in the discussion.

Meanwhile, I want to kill the rest of the time until my next allowed dosage by not thinking, as I have to do when writing, so I’m going to watch more White Collar and starting on that mitt. Something nice and simple but will keep my fingers busy. Let’s hope this cold doesn’t hang on.

Waking up to news that the VP debate was considered a ‘draw’ with a good showing from all was something of a disappointment.

I heard Biden being praised for being “aggressive and energetic” which rallied the democrats. Where is the value in that? The debates are not the verbal equivalent of cage matches, and accomplished nothing more than further polarizing of the parties is nothing to celebrate.

But no, the soundbites are in fact substituted for actual discourse, real conversations. Holding a so-called debate ought to be educational, for the voters by definition. Voters have the responsibility to not arbitrarily accept what they’re told, but to question. Have you ever heard the phrase “vote principle, not party”? It’s hardly a new idea, yet clearly it has to be reiterated. Not one television commentator mentioned the distraction for what it was. While that may be the nature of TV, that’s still the place where most people are getting any information at all. I still think reporters have some responsibility, even if they refuse to actually practice journalism.