I Forgot the Fun!

Before I wander into the forest of my own blog, I take time to appreciate others who have gone before me. Today, that was the best thing I could have done.

After reading AmyBeth Inverness's offering, my eyes were caught by her "SyFy Question of the Day." Being a huge fan, I took another detour.

Wow! Now, keep in mind I did this at work. In a math class. With lots of students. Lots of suppressed chuckles and snorts coming from my desk. Lots of amazed glances coming from my students, who were just trying to get their work done in peace.

Oops. Sorry, all.

I'm posting a link here for everyone to enjoy. And, if you're at work, spread the love. If it's allowable, of course.

http://amybethinverness.com/2013/05/31/scifi-question-of-the-day-your-lightsaber-is-actually-a-sonic-screwdriver/

This reminds me that I'm free to have fun with my work. Indeed, for it to be successful, I've got to have fun with it.

A big shout-out to you, AmyBeth, for reminding me that this is a joy as well as a job.

See you all Sunday!

Why Negative Coffee Times Negative Coffee Equals Positive Evil

The end of the semester is winding down here at the college. I didn't have a lot of students Monday, and when afternoon rolled around, I was fading fast. I'd only slept a few hours on Sunday night, and not well. My  coffee addiction tried to send me to the coffee stand downstairs, but my logical mind prevailed, reminding me that if I had coffee in the middle of the afternoon, I'd face another sleepless night. Oh, bother.

So, Kris, who was in the lab with me and studying for a Calculus final, began sketching my babbling on the board, in the form of a graph with a cracked coffee mug. The mug was slowly dripping coffee into the negative quadrant of the graph (any value here will be negative). We all know that, in algebra, a negative multiplied with another negative will give you a positive; in physics, we'd need to determine how fast we'd have to drink the coffee. (A linear function -- f(x) = x -- was drawn through the graph, bisecting the coffee mug and giving us an arbitrary line from which to determine how much coffee we had available to drink. Once it dripped below the line, we'd be * outta luck.)

So, by extrapolation, here are the parameters of the graph:

coffee = good
-coffee = bad
(-coffee)(-coffee) = +evil.

Makes sense, right? (Yes, and I agree, we should have had more work to do that afternoon!)

Goals? Oh, right, let's talk about that.

Pages: Met, thanks to Nano.

Exercise: Nope. I've been tutoring or dealing with pre-Christmas stuff whenever I've not been working.

Planning: Yes. So much so that around 4:30 this morning I woke up, realizing that I needed to find out the age of the "death" of Akhenaten so I could reasonably determine whether he had grey hair or not. Nothing like obsessing, right?

Food: Managed to stay away from the fried chicken still. Pizza, though, I ordered some because the guys asked me to. And since there was a new pizza on the menu, I tried it. I didn't like it. Yay! I did order a vegetarian pizza with light cheese, just so I could feel a bit better about my bad behavior.

How's everyone else doing?

Welcome to December!

Before anything, I'd like to take a moment to say "Congratulations!" to all the winners of Nano 2012 - and that includes everyone who participated. Even if you didn't get to 50,000, it was an incredible effort. Nano provided the impetus to get more words out than may otherwise have been achieved. That's always a win!

I won Nano, but I sure didn't win on any other fronts over the past week.

Exercise was negligible at best. I worked late on Monday, so fried chicken ended up on the menu. Much to my shame, I indulged. The good news is that I didn't like it as much as I normally do. Maybe I'm getting over my addiction? I'm hopeful.

My very small writing group elected to keep going throughout December, too. So, I'm plowing ahead with the rough draft of Immortal Blood, hoping to make significant progress during the holidays. That should be kind of easy, because my college will be shut down for three weeks between semesters, so I have hope.

Is everyone else as wrung out at I am?

See everyone on Wednesday.

Potatoes??? And Death

I'm sitting here at work, on my lunch break, and I asked my associate what I should write about today. She looked at me, smiled, and said "potatoes". Okay...I can do that.

Potatoes. I love them. I could even be considered addicted to them. They are the bane of my existence, especially since I'm trying to lose weight. And they're really convenient for breakfast, baked in the microwave with a couple eggs, over easy, on top. Ah, well, I must find other things for breakfast...

But Death - I had a wonderful/terrible breakthrough for the climax of Immortal Blood. In order for the heroine/love interest to fulfull the heroic destiny of such characters, she's got to die. It's the only way she can get to the Hall of Two Truths to speak to the gods. Bummer, that. But, as the hero, she's got to step up to the plate.

Doing a lot of prep work still, and it's coming along well. I got the final scene of "Broken" the other day. It came out excellent, with room for a sequel if the possibility is acted upon.

This will be a short post, as I've got to get back to my students. Lunch is over, so I'll see everyone later!

It's Late and I've Got the Blahs

Let me clarify the heading: It's late for posting, but it's morning. Monday morning. I'm about 24 hours behind where I should be. It's my own fault - I took a day yesterday to mentally drift. Sort of like a jellyfish.

But I don't have much to report, unfortunately. Not much writing's been done.

Our new semester started, and I've got 8 classes - more than I've ever had, and I'm still settling into my rhythm. Hopefully, I'll make it up this week.

My plans are to really get into some in-depth characterization using Story Engineering as my guide still. I also have a plan for a specific scene that I might actually have a chance to write this afternoon. I'm going to give it a shot. I'll have the opportunity, because I don't have to actually teach today; I'm watching over a lab of students who are independent learners.

I've got the opportunity for fingers on the keyboard practically all day! Go me!

See everyone Wednesday, when I'll try to be on time with some good news for progress.

Taking A Deep Breath...

Hi everyone! Hope everything's going well. Here's the local news from Orlando.

I've finished Calculus. I think I got a decent grade - I'll find out tomorrow. I do know I got a 90 on the final, so that gives me hope.

I have nothing to concentrate on for the next three weeks except writing - because I'm off until the 24th of August. Wow! I'm not sure how it's going to feel without doing any math. This should be interesting.

I need a good kick in the butt. Anyone want to help me with that? I've got to get my head out of the math and into the writing. Changing my mindset is proving to be a bit harder than I anticipated.

I'll accept gratefully any ideas that may be out there.

See you all on Wednesday!

Lara

Epiphany!

Hi everyone,

It's been something of a slow writing week. My attention has been focused on my car. Instead of doing a second transmission rebuild (along with several other things that need to be fixed) I somehow ended up seriously looking at a new Subaru Outback. Huh. Who woulda thunk it?

I made up for it today, though. While I was waiting for a student, I had a whole cascade of information that took care of my problems with the protagonist. In the beginning, she's shown as weak, but after she gets back home she automatically becomes stronger. It didn't ring true, and THAT was what was leading to my problems with my middle.

So, she's going to be strong from the beginning, and resist, resist, resist going back home until someone's life is at stake.

Even though my next calculus class starts tomorrow, my fingers really want to dance on the keyboard.

See you on Wednesday!

(And this time I'll try to make it!!)

Lara

What Planet Am I On...?

It's been a bit crazy this week. I pulled a couple of muscles on the sides of each legs. You know, the ones that curve from your butt to the top of your legs? Wow, talk about pain!! I walked like someone who was about 120 and lame to boot. Yeah, the dreadmill stuff didn't work so much this week. Today was the first day I was able to walk without too much pain. (And I still don't know how it happened...)

Writing? Planning? With final exams upon us, my students are grabbing all my time. I haven't done a thing. Except one. I did have a new story idea slam into my head. So I wrote that down and put it away in my file.

Exam last two weeks - they start tomorrow - and for my students they end on the 24th. I'm not foreseeing a lot of work accomplished until then.

This week I plan on pushing through the mud and getting through the exams to the freedom of the page!