A bit behind.

Yeah, I haven't posted in a while. As I'm sure some might be disappointed to find, this was not because I'm dead. No, it was because of stuff and things.
Anyway. It's been awhile. There were a lot of things, things done and left undone, and I'm behind on a lot of things—especially, I feel, blogging. Thus this post has sprang forth from the mysterious nebulae of my creativity, which of late has been rather in the mood to not shine.

I am doing NaNoWrimo (As I am wont to do.), and—also as I am wont to do—I'm not doing so well. (Seriously, I'm beginning to think 2010 was a fluke, beginners luck.)
The first two days were good—not stellar, mind you, but still good. I got to 4k relatively quickly, but then came to the realization that the words I'd been chasing were a false thread. (Inner editor, not inner haggler. The latter is an evil adversary, but I actually advocate listening to the former, even when walking in NaNoLand. But maybe that's why I fail so much…) So I stopped, fleshed out the characters a little, defining them better, and an outline appeared in my mind like developing film. Then I started writing, using only the opening scene from the original.
Now my problem is that I'm torn between following the outline and not. Mind you, I know the outline has holes, it's imperfect. My vision of the story at the time I made it was, and still is, incomplete. Some things are wrong, some things will change. Some characters might be cut, some will be adapted. Even so, I pushed forward in spite of the doubt.
That's when the Evil Inner-Haggler hit me, striking through said doubt. Crafty he was, but his tactics are known (now). Disguised as Trusty Inner-Editor, he insults and tears down. "This is terrible," he says, without ever offering a reason why or how to fix it. "You're ruining the story," he says, no matter which path I try to go down. In listening to him, my word count has been severely slowed.
Still, now that I'm aware, surely it should be easy to move on? Oh, I wish. You see, knowing he's there, lurking, has made it even more difficult to trust myself. How do I know if this is the right path? How do I know if what I've already written is the right path? To top it off, I've been sharing my words as I type them up, adding pressure I—foolish me—thought would help.
It took me awhile, but I think I've been given the solution: continue from a latter thread, then connect things afterwords and fix whatever problems arise when I'm holding an entire manuscript. Miss Inner-Editor's advice. It's something that occurred to me before, but got shouted down by Evil Inner-Haggler telling me: it doesn't matter, it'll sill be terrible. The fact that I listened is just another example of me cowardly giving in to the course of inaction.
I have yet to fully silence my doubts, but I'll work through them with skill and tenacity, which is what being a writer is all about. After all words have been said, writing is still work.
So that's been my highly stressful last couple of weeks, but it could've been worse. A bit of prayer, a bit of critical thinking, and I'm back on two feet. Thanks, and here's praying that I want fall down again:

Lord be with me as I write,

Guide my pen and be my light.

Grant to me the faith to trust,

To do what I must.

In writing as in life,

Help me to use my gifts

For You.

Go mbeannaí Dia duit,
M. S.

A night to remember...

(Warning, this post was written while very sleep deprived, and is completely unedited. There, now you may proceed with all due caution.)

It all started at the beginning of last week. Well, before that actually. But the awesome started last night. All the crazy awesome extravaganza I could ever wish for...

VGHS season 2 premiere. Awesome.

But first there was a work shift, then marshal arts—karate, german longsword, and a bit of parkour wall spin practice just for fun. We got out after ten, picked up the Bishop, and picked up a third brother for good measure. So our party was four.

But one does not simply gather people for a party. We armed ourselves with energy drinks and provisions. And, I must admit, some small amount of alcohal. Don't worry, we drank responsibly, and none of us got drunk.)

The party started sometime after eleven? I'm not really sure—it doesn't really matter. Much beverage was consumed (cider, mostly monster, red bull, jack, jager, water...) sausages were put in the oven to roast, chips were poured into a bowl, and we sat down to re-watch the first season of VGHS. And it was just as good as I remembered it from my last re-watch two days ago. Yes, a bit campy, but that's part of the fun.

It ended sometime around 1:30am, I think. After which we went looking for season two first ep. But it wasn't out yet, despite promises that it would come on the 25th.

(Yes, I know my sentence structure is haphazard. Lazy. It's gonna get worse. But give me I break, I've been up for almost 24 hours)

Delays. Hardrive problems. Noooooo!!! So ensued shenanigans with Halo split-screen. Much fun. Much frustration. That sorta died off, though, so we moved on to other things. Like stalking Freddie Wong's twitter, the Rocket Jump site, and finally youtube where the video was processing. For ages. I was there from about the time there were six hundred likes (yes, before the video had finished processing. I think we got up to around 3k? don't really remember clearly.) I was part of the comment frenzy, reaching something like 5k comments? Before the upload. (New top comments every ten seconds or so. About a comment every second—atleast.)And I was there watching Jimmy Wong's live feed. Monster and jager were my fuel, working with red bull and anticipation.

It was awesome. Most fun I've had in ages.

Finally, around 6am, the episode launched. Hurrah! It was just as good as I thought it would be. Better, even. (Hat is off to any and all involved.)

By that time, we'd lost one of our number to sleep, and the other had to get ready for work. (Speaking of which, I go into work at 11:30am. Nope, won't be sleeping till after I get out at 8. That's 36h. Not my record, but close. (I know, I'm a lightweight when it comes to sleep dep)) :)

But two remained, and it was still much fun. And it's still much fun now, living in the calm before I have to go to work. I'm the only one here who's awake now, but everything's a-okay. I'm blessed. Thank you God. And thank you to everyone involved in the show and the comment frenzy. It was one wile-of-a-time.

See ya, space cowboy (or cowgirl, as the case may be.) Have fun out there, with lots of sunshine and cool. Yeah. Stuff.... I'm a bit lost right now, just rambling... I should probably end this post about now. Yep.

Go mbeannaí Dia duit, (I hope I spelt that right...)

M. S.

Heralding the Night

Western skies at dusk. (I should really invest in an actual camera)

...

M. S.