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shadowkatMother: I've nothing to say.
Me (in my snarky tone of voice): Well, I've things to say, whether you find any of them interesting or not...
Mother cackles with laughter.
***
Thoughts on Writing
I've managed to slice away over 200 pages from the novel that I'm revising. It was 890 pages, it is now 670 pages. It's actually not as hard as I expected.
Meanwhile, I've decided to write a prelude novel to the science-fiction novel that I was working on prior to the pandemic. The hardest bit about writing science fiction and fantasy (for me, your mileage may vary on this) is the world-building. Too much, you turn folks off, too little, you turn folks off, don't get it right, you turn folks off. Science fiction and fantasy fans are unfortunately insanely detail oriented, so that's the other problem.
Some people love world-building. They actually prefer it to developing character, story, plot, or anything else. Which is a problem with a lot of sci-fantasy novels - there's no real plot or character development, and you kind of get bogged down in the world building.
Anyhow, we'll see where it goes. Since I'm writing it in first person - I may be able to handwave a few things.
***
Thoughts on Dungeons and Dragons and role playing games.
Dungeons & Dragons is a fantasy role-playing game that was originally created by American game designers Ernest Gary Gygax and David Arneson and published by by Tactical Studies Rules, Inc. (TSR) in 1974. Before D&D was the game as we know it, it grew out of a medieval war game called Chainmail.
Book Riot - when was dungeons and dragons invented
Interesting, I thought it was much later than that? I didn't see it until the 1980s. But I was also only eight in 1974, and we weren't really playing board games like that back then. We did play adventure and role playing games - but not with costumes as such, and usually made them up ourselves. There was no book. No rules. It was spontaneous. We'd make up stories, and play them out. Like kidnapped. Or there was a natural disaster and we had to survive it. We'd climb through tunnels - once I explored the entire tunnel system below the apartments near where we lived with my best friend at the time. I lived in rural/suburban Pennsylvania - we had animals run through, flooded creeks, and all sorts of fun things. I spent most of my time as a kid outside with mud pies, and bombardment, and red light green light, and tag, and all sorts of active games.
In the 1980s, it popped up for my brother - girls did not play D&D in the 1980s (see Stranger Things on Netflix - it was like that, and that's rather accurate in regards to how boys viewed D&D as their sole territory, no girls allowed). I know, I tried. I was told to play with Barbies, or do something else. Not that it went well for my brother either - he was kicked out of the game, according to my mother or shut out. And retreated to basketball, soccer, and athletics which were weirdly less exclusive?
Tried again in college - no, I was allowed to watch, but not play. It's an insanely boring game to watch - basically it's just throwing dice, and then someone tells you what your skill level is, and how many steps to take, and that you encounter such and such monster, and either die or live. (I'm sure it would have been more interesting if the people playing it were more imaginative and inventive. They weren't.)
I finally gave up - and read comics with my girlfriends instead, and we'd discuss the character arcs and analyze where the characters would go next.
And I wrote stories on my own, and did theater, lots of theater, playing various roles, art - tye dye and pottery, dance - ballet and modern, and
read poetry at coffee houses and ran open mic nights.
I think, I could be wrong about this of course? But I think folks born in the 80s and later, probably enjoyed this game and played it more? And I think if you were female and born in the 1990s or later, you'd be more likely to get involved with role playing games than those of us born in the 1950s-1970s? There are exceptions of course. As always.
I doubt I'd have enjoyed D&D that much:
1) I'm not a medievalist. I slant towards science fiction and low fantasy, over high fantasy.
More Harry Potter, Game of Thrones, and Urban Fantasy, also possibly the Hobbit, than Lord of the Rings or Wheel of Time. I was more of a Dune fan, then Lord of the Rings. Plus there's the whole counting, rolling the dice, and math aspect of D&D that put me off of it. And? I don't like role playing games - mainly because I don't like improv. It's the oddest thing, but I can tell stories in my head, I can do it orally, and I can act out each character, and I can write them down, but I cannot do it in front of other people? I can write it - and they can read it without my knowledge or me anywhere in the vicinity.
2.) I think in order to do role-playing games - you have to enjoy improvisational theater on some level? I do not. I've noticed that people who love improv do very well in the acting, stand-up comedy, role playing games, cosplay, and teaching.
3.) The math component. Or the board game component. Throwing dice. Counting. Doing skill levels and doing the math.
Most games have a math component.
I do like solo games - like Redecor and Wordl. I also loved Tetris. Dominoes. Anything with matching of patterns or matching colors, words, pictures, tiles. I'd probably be good at Mai-john. I also like strategy games, such as chess or backgammon or Clue.
But anything with an embarrassment or humiliation quotient - no.
***
Shen Yun
They've been advertising the heck out of Shen Yun. I considered going once, but a friend explained to me that it was cult. Stepping into the Uncanny Unsettling World of Shen-Yun.
But you do get inundated with the advertising in New York City around January through April. It's on subways, shopkeepers doors, and on television ads. They certainly know how to market themselves - which alone gives me pause.
***
Thoughts on Books
I'm reading "Magic Tides" by Ilona Andrews - which is told in two points of view for a change, Curran's and Kate's. It's a sequel to the previous series.
The good news? It sparked my own imagination and story - the post-apocalyptic science fiction I was writing pre-pandemic. So I may continue.
Anything that sparks the creative juices.
The Magic Series by Andrews isn't for everyone. If militaristic post-apocalyptic fiction doesn't work for you - best to skip. I like the world-building, and how the writer does it without going into too much detail, but enough to make it feel real and interesting. Also how she manages to skirt around issues like linguistics, and utilizes lesser known mythologies like the Babylonian, Asian, Egyptian and Russian. Too many fantasy novels fall into Judeo-Christian mythos or Grecian, this goes in a different direction. But the protagonist is snarky, and married to a lion shape-shifter. There's no yearning. No angst. They are married - so no, oh, I want him but can I? I like the exploration of a marriage for a change. It's a nice change of pace and kind of innovative. No will they or won't they, and less emphasis on sex. I like their banter, but both are super-powerful, so? Not for everyone. Then again, is anything?
Bride by Alix Harrow - isn't working for me. The sex is basically: licking, sucking, and drinking blood, and ew? Also a touch too graphic? And way too much emphasis on sappy romance, and angst, not enough banter/snark. The mystery such as it is - and what was interesting me? Has been shoved into the background as has the plot, in favor of sex scenes and sappy romantic banter.
I'm thinking I'm the wrong demographic? This skews young to me.
Yellowface by RF. Kuang - I'm kind of bored? Still pushing through. And it does help with sleeping. Lots of rants though. The character is annoying. Actually everyone in the novel is incredibly annoying. I don't care about anybody. And the narrative tone is kind of self-righteous and angry? At any rate - it does the opposite from Magic Tides - in that it blocks my creative juices and makes me insanely self-conscious. It gave me writer's block and made me want to never write again. So I may just give it to Wales and never look at it again.
X-men by Gerry Dugan - I think the difficulty I have with this writer's take on the series and the other current ones is a lack of focus? In some respects, I like it. But in others - a twenty page comic is not a lot of space for multiple stories and action. It feels a bit scattered. Also far too many characters.
Thoughts on the boat-load of articles on Narcissism via Internet Web Browsers
There a lot of articles on narcissism online. Microsoft Edge, my workplace internet browser, keeps throwing them at me. I must be doing something that is making it pull those? That and lists of horror films. There are at least three films coming out that focus on spiders. All science fiction. Only one is a horror film. The horror film entitled STING is about a little girl who secretly decides to raise an extraterrestial spider that hatched from a meteor. It grows to enormous size and eats people. Much chaos ensues. It's by an Australian director. I'll skip. Also reminds me of a Night Gallery episode in the 1970s, where a man flushes a spider down the sink, it comes back bigger, flushes it again, bigger and so on. That was traumatizing.
They are all films about huge alien or extraterrestial spiders. Uhm no. If there are aliens out there - please don't look like spiders or insects. And if they do? Can I die without making contact with them? Why do we decide aliens look like things we are afraid of? Are we demonizing them on purpose? (Yes, I know, not everyone is afraid of spiders. I've friends, a brother, and a niece that have no issues with them, nor do my family members. Although they are all aware of my fear. My brother used to warn me off of movies that had them in them.)
But the "narcissism" (I struggle spelling that word. Can one be a narcissist if they can't spell narcissism? It's the number of s's that throws me off. I either want to add another s or subtract one) articles are annoying (note they aren't journal studies or the medical articles, but cheap journalistic ones thrown at me by a work web browser). Apparently every psychologist out there has an opinion on this? Today, I saw an article that listed ten signs of a narcissist. And I thought...wait everyone does these things. What the hell? The psychologist did state that it is a spectrum and a little narcissism is healthy? I think they are confusing narcissism with egotism or egocentric?
The problem with these articles is I begin to wonder things like: am I a narcissist? (No, narcissists don't ask themselves if they are narcissist's. That's apparently the clue that you aren't.) Is my mother? are my friends? Etc. I've pretty much decided BYT is. But honestly? Who knows? I miss the days in which this stuff was not available online. I remember being told once that in psychology courses, students are advise not to diagnose themselves, or anyone, upon reading these texts. Because literally anyone can fit these definitions or we can make them fit, without realizing it. Which is kind of true? People have a tendency to make generalizations or assumptions based on a limited amount of information. Human's like placing labels and name tags on things, I think. Putting things in categories. Makes life easier - if you can index and catalogue it, and organize it. But I've learned that human beings cannot be indexed, catalogued, or neatly labeled. Nor can animals really.
We're distinct organisms, with a lot of variances, and unique irregularities. We are not one size fits all. And we aren't easily definable. But that doesn't keep people from doing it anyhow?
Here's two somewhat reliable articles, that don't list generalized behaviors that most of us exhibit.
Mental disorders - Narcissitic Personality Disorder
Narcissism driven by insecurity not a grandiose sense of self - NYU did a study and isn't sure about its own results.
The second article appears to contradict the first? So maybe not that reliable.
Oh well.
Me (in my snarky tone of voice): Well, I've things to say, whether you find any of them interesting or not...
Mother cackles with laughter.
***
Thoughts on Writing
I've managed to slice away over 200 pages from the novel that I'm revising. It was 890 pages, it is now 670 pages. It's actually not as hard as I expected.
Meanwhile, I've decided to write a prelude novel to the science-fiction novel that I was working on prior to the pandemic. The hardest bit about writing science fiction and fantasy (for me, your mileage may vary on this) is the world-building. Too much, you turn folks off, too little, you turn folks off, don't get it right, you turn folks off. Science fiction and fantasy fans are unfortunately insanely detail oriented, so that's the other problem.
Some people love world-building. They actually prefer it to developing character, story, plot, or anything else. Which is a problem with a lot of sci-fantasy novels - there's no real plot or character development, and you kind of get bogged down in the world building.
Anyhow, we'll see where it goes. Since I'm writing it in first person - I may be able to handwave a few things.
***
Thoughts on Dungeons and Dragons and role playing games.
Dungeons & Dragons is a fantasy role-playing game that was originally created by American game designers Ernest Gary Gygax and David Arneson and published by by Tactical Studies Rules, Inc. (TSR) in 1974. Before D&D was the game as we know it, it grew out of a medieval war game called Chainmail.
Book Riot - when was dungeons and dragons invented
Interesting, I thought it was much later than that? I didn't see it until the 1980s. But I was also only eight in 1974, and we weren't really playing board games like that back then. We did play adventure and role playing games - but not with costumes as such, and usually made them up ourselves. There was no book. No rules. It was spontaneous. We'd make up stories, and play them out. Like kidnapped. Or there was a natural disaster and we had to survive it. We'd climb through tunnels - once I explored the entire tunnel system below the apartments near where we lived with my best friend at the time. I lived in rural/suburban Pennsylvania - we had animals run through, flooded creeks, and all sorts of fun things. I spent most of my time as a kid outside with mud pies, and bombardment, and red light green light, and tag, and all sorts of active games.
In the 1980s, it popped up for my brother - girls did not play D&D in the 1980s (see Stranger Things on Netflix - it was like that, and that's rather accurate in regards to how boys viewed D&D as their sole territory, no girls allowed). I know, I tried. I was told to play with Barbies, or do something else. Not that it went well for my brother either - he was kicked out of the game, according to my mother or shut out. And retreated to basketball, soccer, and athletics which were weirdly less exclusive?
Tried again in college - no, I was allowed to watch, but not play. It's an insanely boring game to watch - basically it's just throwing dice, and then someone tells you what your skill level is, and how many steps to take, and that you encounter such and such monster, and either die or live. (I'm sure it would have been more interesting if the people playing it were more imaginative and inventive. They weren't.)
I finally gave up - and read comics with my girlfriends instead, and we'd discuss the character arcs and analyze where the characters would go next.
And I wrote stories on my own, and did theater, lots of theater, playing various roles, art - tye dye and pottery, dance - ballet and modern, and
read poetry at coffee houses and ran open mic nights.
I think, I could be wrong about this of course? But I think folks born in the 80s and later, probably enjoyed this game and played it more? And I think if you were female and born in the 1990s or later, you'd be more likely to get involved with role playing games than those of us born in the 1950s-1970s? There are exceptions of course. As always.
I doubt I'd have enjoyed D&D that much:
1) I'm not a medievalist. I slant towards science fiction and low fantasy, over high fantasy.
More Harry Potter, Game of Thrones, and Urban Fantasy, also possibly the Hobbit, than Lord of the Rings or Wheel of Time. I was more of a Dune fan, then Lord of the Rings. Plus there's the whole counting, rolling the dice, and math aspect of D&D that put me off of it. And? I don't like role playing games - mainly because I don't like improv. It's the oddest thing, but I can tell stories in my head, I can do it orally, and I can act out each character, and I can write them down, but I cannot do it in front of other people? I can write it - and they can read it without my knowledge or me anywhere in the vicinity.
2.) I think in order to do role-playing games - you have to enjoy improvisational theater on some level? I do not. I've noticed that people who love improv do very well in the acting, stand-up comedy, role playing games, cosplay, and teaching.
3.) The math component. Or the board game component. Throwing dice. Counting. Doing skill levels and doing the math.
Most games have a math component.
I do like solo games - like Redecor and Wordl. I also loved Tetris. Dominoes. Anything with matching of patterns or matching colors, words, pictures, tiles. I'd probably be good at Mai-john. I also like strategy games, such as chess or backgammon or Clue.
But anything with an embarrassment or humiliation quotient - no.
***
Shen Yun
They've been advertising the heck out of Shen Yun. I considered going once, but a friend explained to me that it was cult. Stepping into the Uncanny Unsettling World of Shen-Yun.
But you do get inundated with the advertising in New York City around January through April. It's on subways, shopkeepers doors, and on television ads. They certainly know how to market themselves - which alone gives me pause.
***
Thoughts on Books
I'm reading "Magic Tides" by Ilona Andrews - which is told in two points of view for a change, Curran's and Kate's. It's a sequel to the previous series.
The good news? It sparked my own imagination and story - the post-apocalyptic science fiction I was writing pre-pandemic. So I may continue.
Anything that sparks the creative juices.
The Magic Series by Andrews isn't for everyone. If militaristic post-apocalyptic fiction doesn't work for you - best to skip. I like the world-building, and how the writer does it without going into too much detail, but enough to make it feel real and interesting. Also how she manages to skirt around issues like linguistics, and utilizes lesser known mythologies like the Babylonian, Asian, Egyptian and Russian. Too many fantasy novels fall into Judeo-Christian mythos or Grecian, this goes in a different direction. But the protagonist is snarky, and married to a lion shape-shifter. There's no yearning. No angst. They are married - so no, oh, I want him but can I? I like the exploration of a marriage for a change. It's a nice change of pace and kind of innovative. No will they or won't they, and less emphasis on sex. I like their banter, but both are super-powerful, so? Not for everyone. Then again, is anything?
Bride by Alix Harrow - isn't working for me. The sex is basically: licking, sucking, and drinking blood, and ew? Also a touch too graphic? And way too much emphasis on sappy romance, and angst, not enough banter/snark. The mystery such as it is - and what was interesting me? Has been shoved into the background as has the plot, in favor of sex scenes and sappy romantic banter.
I'm thinking I'm the wrong demographic? This skews young to me.
Yellowface by RF. Kuang - I'm kind of bored? Still pushing through. And it does help with sleeping. Lots of rants though. The character is annoying. Actually everyone in the novel is incredibly annoying. I don't care about anybody. And the narrative tone is kind of self-righteous and angry? At any rate - it does the opposite from Magic Tides - in that it blocks my creative juices and makes me insanely self-conscious. It gave me writer's block and made me want to never write again. So I may just give it to Wales and never look at it again.
X-men by Gerry Dugan - I think the difficulty I have with this writer's take on the series and the other current ones is a lack of focus? In some respects, I like it. But in others - a twenty page comic is not a lot of space for multiple stories and action. It feels a bit scattered. Also far too many characters.
Thoughts on the boat-load of articles on Narcissism via Internet Web Browsers
There a lot of articles on narcissism online. Microsoft Edge, my workplace internet browser, keeps throwing them at me. I must be doing something that is making it pull those? That and lists of horror films. There are at least three films coming out that focus on spiders. All science fiction. Only one is a horror film. The horror film entitled STING is about a little girl who secretly decides to raise an extraterrestial spider that hatched from a meteor. It grows to enormous size and eats people. Much chaos ensues. It's by an Australian director. I'll skip. Also reminds me of a Night Gallery episode in the 1970s, where a man flushes a spider down the sink, it comes back bigger, flushes it again, bigger and so on. That was traumatizing.
They are all films about huge alien or extraterrestial spiders. Uhm no. If there are aliens out there - please don't look like spiders or insects. And if they do? Can I die without making contact with them? Why do we decide aliens look like things we are afraid of? Are we demonizing them on purpose? (Yes, I know, not everyone is afraid of spiders. I've friends, a brother, and a niece that have no issues with them, nor do my family members. Although they are all aware of my fear. My brother used to warn me off of movies that had them in them.)
But the "narcissism" (I struggle spelling that word. Can one be a narcissist if they can't spell narcissism? It's the number of s's that throws me off. I either want to add another s or subtract one) articles are annoying (note they aren't journal studies or the medical articles, but cheap journalistic ones thrown at me by a work web browser). Apparently every psychologist out there has an opinion on this? Today, I saw an article that listed ten signs of a narcissist. And I thought...wait everyone does these things. What the hell? The psychologist did state that it is a spectrum and a little narcissism is healthy? I think they are confusing narcissism with egotism or egocentric?
The problem with these articles is I begin to wonder things like: am I a narcissist? (No, narcissists don't ask themselves if they are narcissist's. That's apparently the clue that you aren't.) Is my mother? are my friends? Etc. I've pretty much decided BYT is. But honestly? Who knows? I miss the days in which this stuff was not available online. I remember being told once that in psychology courses, students are advise not to diagnose themselves, or anyone, upon reading these texts. Because literally anyone can fit these definitions or we can make them fit, without realizing it. Which is kind of true? People have a tendency to make generalizations or assumptions based on a limited amount of information. Human's like placing labels and name tags on things, I think. Putting things in categories. Makes life easier - if you can index and catalogue it, and organize it. But I've learned that human beings cannot be indexed, catalogued, or neatly labeled. Nor can animals really.
We're distinct organisms, with a lot of variances, and unique irregularities. We are not one size fits all. And we aren't easily definable. But that doesn't keep people from doing it anyhow?
Here's two somewhat reliable articles, that don't list generalized behaviors that most of us exhibit.
Mental disorders - Narcissitic Personality Disorder
Narcissism driven by insecurity not a grandiose sense of self - NYU did a study and isn't sure about its own results.
The second article appears to contradict the first? So maybe not that reliable.
Oh well.
no subject
Date: 2024-04-05 09:07 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-04-05 12:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-04-05 01:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-04-05 03:24 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-04-06 12:09 am (UTC)I have seen ads for Shen Yun for ages and I only recently found out who was behind it. It always looked interesting, but I had never really thought about going before and now definitely not. You are right about them being good at marketing.
no subject
Date: 2024-04-06 01:20 am (UTC)ME: Hey, have you ever thought of seeing Shen Yun - looks really cool?
Friend: It's a creepy cult, and the dancers are abused.
ME: Really?
Friend: don't believe me? Look it up.
I did. They are right.