Disbanded

I had something to post about, but I forgot it. I'll talk about writing class instead.

Today was a wonderful writing class after a string of terrible ones. Terrible in that I was the only regular showing up. Once was due to all the rain scarring everybody off (even though I was coming from the furthest away). Two weeks later, I was once again the only one showing up. And the class before this, same deal.

Apparently what has happened it one of the regulars never got one of his pieces back from the writing group - we have lives, people lose papers; that's how it is. However, he's convinced that they stole it. Why? I don't know. So he's not showing up because he thinks his work will get stolen, and the other two regulars aren't showing because they've been accused of stealing, and I've been sitting in the classroom wondering what the hell happened to everybody.

All this came out today's session because Jen had been saying that something had happened but wasn't spilling any details until I kept pressing. The upside to this is that around the time everyone started dropping, some new writers decided to show up and we effectively have a new group of people.

The new group is very open to criticism and learning, and today was more about how to give critique than an actual workshop as is usual the second meeting of the month. Both are older ladies who are kinda novices at writing - one writes poems with that painfully sing-songy end rhyme and the other writes prose though I've not had a chance to read anything from her yet.

So yeah. The old group had a good run I guess, but it looks like it's gone. I can't figure out why he thinks his work has been stolen. If I can put everything I have online without worrying about copyright, he shouldn't have such a big issue =/ None of us in the group are/were anywhere close to publishing level or anything, so it's not like that's a factor.

At the end of the day, all of my stuff goes online because I would only be depriving myself of learning opportunities by hoarding it. If I want to get to publishing level, I have to put it out there. That's just how it works.



Note to Self: Minnick recommends Joe Meno. Look him up later. Second note to Self: catch up on Approaches to Lit. journal this weekend.

My Sleeping Schedule is Shot

I was hanging out in the English department (surprise) last week. I think it was on Wednesday. In fact, I know it was Wednesday because film was cancelled and that's why I was up there so late. No one expects me home before nine on Wednesdays.

As usual, Minnick is the last person to leave, grumbling about his 17 hour day, which is how I learned he wakes up at 5AM every morning. But that's not the point of my story.

Last night/ today, I went to bed at 7AM in this morning.

I'm pretty sure that's the latest I've ever stayed up, but I could be wrong. This hasn't happened in a while. I got caught up reading. I pulled away long enough to wonder why it had gotten so much brighter in my room and realized the sun was coming up. It seems like the later I stay up, the less sleepy I get. If I can make it to about 4AM, I can keep going indefinitely. I've never tried to test how far I can go. I don't know if my body just starts pumping adrenaline or what, but I've always found it odd.

I woke up about six hours later, laid in for another hour, then finally got up around 2:00 (about six hours ago). Thankfully, I don't have to get up before noon tomorrow; tutoring isn't until the afternoon.

But that's still not the point of my story. The point is, the last thing I remember thinking before going to bed was that Minnick had already been up two hours getting shit done XD

Morning people baffle me.

This is Pretty Cool

Got this in the mail today, from DrippingWords:

The outside

The inside

It's a collection of most of the color poems from myself and people around dA. And will possibly expand to include the people of Goodreads where the form has apparently taken off as well =D 

I knew she was making me something for my birthday, but I didn't see this coming at all. I also have a new penpal (assuming I can manage full letters on a regular basis anyway).

Meanwhile, Minnick has been encouraging me to take pictures or keep notes of my Postcard Fiction project, so here's what that looks like as well:

I try to make the story and picture match when I can, with varied levels of success. The latest batch of pieces I wrote were directly inspired by some of the cards I've bought online which turned out pretty nicely. I'm glad he seems to like reading them because I really enjoy writing them <3 I like the extra dimension the card gives to the story.

Breakable

First my laptop crashes. Okay, I get it fixed. Then *I* take a crash. Not so quickly fixed.

I've talked about my laptop enough on dA, so here's the other half. Went to drop off the office laundry today. It's been raining, but I'm wearing flip flops because it feels nice outside. A guy with a broken leg is holding the door for me, so I try to speed it up a little bit. That's when I take a spill. Flip flops have no traction and I guess even the sidewalk can be slick in the rain.

The right side of my right foot is rather swollen, but I have tutoring at 2:00, and I'll have to make it up anyway if I don't go. One of the office ladies gets me an ice pack, and off I go. I think that's helped keep it down for the most part. I can walk on it, but veeeeery slowly. Tomorrow is going to suck, but it can't be helped.

Suddenly, a Knock on the Door

Etgar Keret is my new favorite author and I'll never again doubt any book recommendations Minnick sends my way.

I've been reading and writing flash fiction for years, but never realized there were people who did it professionally. I've seen authors write flash fic of course, but it was usually a one off thing on the side, for a magazine or something. This is exactly the kind of thing I've always wanted to find in a brick-and-mortar bookstore.

I picked up Suddenly a Knock on the Door about a week ago and read the entire thing in a few hours. Partly because I hated to put it down, but also because it isn't very long - I think the longest story in there was maybe five or six pages, if that. I was kinda reminded of Harris Burdick stories; you just kinda go with a lot of the logic and don't really question it. Of course there's a magic gumball machine buried under a stone in that guy's childhood backyard and he found out about it through a dream. Why wouldn't there be? It almost borders on magical realism at times. I really enjoyed the nonchalant tone that even the strangest events were treated with.

It's kinda neat to realize there are people out there doing what I've been doing and being successful at it. I didn't realize there was an audience for flash fiction outside of the Internet.

Writing Letters

I think anyone who reads my stuff with any regularity knows I send mail like it's going out of style (well, it is, but that's beside the point). But as often as I talk about postcards, I don't really talk about my letters so much.

Basically, if you aren't related to me and you matter to me in some important way, you get a letter. It's that simple. I've written them to friends, teachers, veterans, and even complete strangers when I felt like striking up a penpal relationship. And not some short one page nonsense - I write long letters. At least three or four pages usually.

So when Letters-To-Myself put up a challenge to write a letter to a teacher, I think it was inevitable that I would ending up writing one for Minnick. Everyone important gets a letter. That's how I operate.

I don't really know how or why I began doing that, but I think it's a good habit to cultivate. People deserve to know when they're making a difference, even if it's only to one person. Letters are the best way I've found to say what you need to say to someone, when you need to get all the thoughts organized, or even when you don't know what to say at all.

One of the reasons I wasn't going to write it was because I wasn't sure what I could say that he didn't already know. But once I started, I found it. I knew I had something to say, but I had to find it first and that's when that old essay popped up and I guess a few things just clicked for me.

Anyway, I was really writing to say I did give it to him this afternoon, because I know someone will ask me that and I may as well get it out of the way. Apparently, you get those sorts of letters when you need them.

Epic Postcard Post

Finally found a way to take decent photos of these things. I've had trouble getting the stupid lighting right because my room is a weird place that eats bright light. Turns out all I have to do is balance them on top of the lamp.

I said I was going to try and post them all, but I don't feel like posting 34 pictures. But here's a general look at my collection thus far. As always, click to make them bigger.

Top and clockwise; cards from Russia, Netherlands, Finland, and Denmark.

Left to right; from Brazil, Finland, Turkey, Croatia, and Ukraine.

This one is fairly large. Russian

The card ID is Denmark, with a Romanian stamp, and the sender is from Germany.

From a 13 year old in Belarus. The backside had an Olympics marker on it.

This batch here is from people I actually know, mostly through dA. From top left going clockwise we have cards from Cassildra, Bill/Phaldus, Xlntwtch, DrippingWords, and DoodlerTM.

My love of Autumn is well documented. Denmark

I think this is my favorite card so far. Click to see all the lovely details.

May post more later, but probably not XD

Twenty-Two

Another birthday, come and gone. I still don't feel any older, and haven't really since, like, thirteen or something I dunno.

No party, just chicken spaghetti at my parents place. A Barnes & Noble gift card and an origami set. A whiteboard decal that was ruined when I tried to put it up because my brother is too lazy to get out of the chair and help someone, even on their birthday.

School goes and I'm trying to play catch-up now that I finally have my books (save the MathLab packet). All I have to do for that one is pass - as in, make 60% or higher. I'm not setting the bar very high here. Especially since I can't even understand the guy's accent.

Anyway, on Thursday I got out of my language history class early, so I'm waiting for the current Algebra class to leave. Class starts at 1:40 - I got there about 1:25. I'm standing outside the room with five or six other people until about 2:00. Slowly, it begins to dawn on us that our class has already started, and he's been teaching for the past 30 minutes.

I repeat - class doesn't even start until 1:40. He was already teaching at least 15 minutes before anyone was even supposed to be there. Those of us outside made a decision - if he's going to teach early, then we'll be leaving early thank you very much.

So I guess I got the day off from Algebra for my birthday, because even if we had gone in, we would have been counted absent for missing more than 15 minutes of class. Because HE doesn't know how to read a damn clock. That doesn't inspire any confidence in my supposed math teacher.

Community: A Rant

I try not to rant in my journal at dA, partly because more people are likely to read whatever I write there, but mainly because I spend forever on my normal journal entries and hunting down features, and they're getting a week of screentime dammit. So ranting goes here instead.

Though a thread at EL was the straw that broke the camels back as it were, this is a rant that has been building from the very first day I joined deviantART. I'm tired of having this argument over and over in group threads and chatrooms.

I can't go anywhere online without tripping over something fantastic that blows my mind and challenges my preconceptions and makes me think in new ways. And given that the Internet is lousy with great art, this leads me to believe that maybe great art isn't what makes deviantART special. Yeah, the art IS great and all, but great art is fucking everywhere. And all I have to do is pull up a tab. But nowhere - NOWHERE else has such a varied, spastic, insane, supportive, encouraging, enraging, engaging, hilarious, and AWESOME community as dA.

I never expected anything of myself. I was another kid who liked art and decided to give writing a try. But some kind souls out there did expect something, because they took the time to point out what a crap writer I was and how I could be better. I took their advice and I'm still taking it every day. You are never too good to stop improving. You are never too good not to take criticism, no matter who gives it.

I don't want faves. I don't want silence. I want artists to get out there with their art and meet people and teach them what you know and let them teach you in return. I want artists to offer support and don't offer compliments if they don't mean them and tell someone when they're doing it wrong but don't be a dick about it either and keep improving and never fucking stop.

dA is an art community. We've all got the first part down pat - how about promoting the other half a little more?

Autumn Brontide

It rained today. Buckets and buckets of the stuff. I stood outside for nearly an hour, just watching the world come crashing down on my roof. The wind was crazy erratic, blowing the rain horizontal down the street one second and right into me hiding under the awning the next.

It would pour and then it would kind of stop for a while and things would go back to that overcast sharpness, that kind of new, dusty quality the atmosphere takes on after a good rain. Then it would pick up again and get really loud and dark and I was honestly wondering if I should be making sure none of the clouds were getting a green tinge (for those unaware, green skies are a tornado warning sign).

Anyway, it does this all afternoon and finally lets up around 7:00ish and I know - know that I should really hop in my car and go for a drive. I don't know why except maybe that the sky and the light quality looks kinda cool, but you don't have time to waste when it's that close to sunset. So off I go.

There are two places that come to mind - the lake and the bridge. I head for the lake first, as that's where I usually go. Unfortunately, said lake is in a sort of valley that obscures what I'm looking for, especially with this many clouds. Nothing worth getting my camera out for; though that hazy orange color overlaying everything is neat, it wouldn't really show up on film.

The bridge then. I wasn't able to take any pictures, but I'm glad I went. It was all blue-grey clouds and lightning on one side, and sherbert wisps on the other. Nothing but forest and pasture down below, and a small river running along, and some of the cows are out grazing and everything just looks very sharp to my vision in all the extreme contrast.

I took that backroad all the way to a nearby exit and got back on the highway towards home. I stopped for frappes at Hastings because it was happy hour, and why waste a good thing? By the time I get there, it's almost completely nightfall, but the storming hasn't stopped yet; there's no rain and no thunder, but the lighting is still giving its all. I barely went into Hastings. Just long enough to get my drinks then I sat out in the parking lot for a while, just watching.

Then I went home and gave the other frappe to my grandmother and pulled up this tab to tel you all why I named this blog what I named this blog and I can still hear the thunder but I've got a journal entry to finish.