Blowing Through The Windchimes

I thought I’d give you some poetry this evening. I’m not really in the mood to write a long journal post right now because I know it will turn into some pathetic mush that you probably won’t want to hear about. I wouldn’t blame you. I don’t want to hear about it either. So I found a poem I wrote some time ago and hoped that you’d like to hear it. So here goes:

Man Doth Hurt Man

Wrap it up in chicken wire, 
Check it beats with bullets and fire.
Hold your head high
Still reach up for the sky
Don’t think of the pain
Ripping through your skin again.
Don’t stumble – “Your heart!
Don’t fall apart!
Just keep marching to this drum!
Keep singing, don’t hum!”
This tuneless tune
As you shoot for the moon
And miss entirely on purpose.
They don’t make a fuss –
“Keep marching! Don’t cuss!
Back straight! Head tall!
You’re aiming for the fall!”
This is the battle to lose.
This is the life we didn’t choose.
It beats beneath the chicken wire.
It’s writhing but with some inner fire…
For all is lost now…
For all is lost…
We don’t know how…
Imagine the cost…
And with a steady flow,
The blood still burns.
On and on the soldiers go,
Though nothing in them yearns.
Now they only know to fight
Despite this endless night
That seeps in all around their tired forms
And empty, silenced, inner storms. 
Man doth hurt man
As only he can
That way they both understand
As they both march in the same band
And if man doth hurt woman?
And with that the soldiers ran…
When the new site goes up properly, I hope to transfer all of my poetry there. I’m hoping to put it in order relative to when I wrote it so that people can see how much my command of language and form has improved. That’s what I hope, anyway, but it may not be the case. You may end up wishing I’d never continued writing such twaddle, but I sincerely hope not.
I’ll probably write a proper journal entry tomorrow. I just don’t feel like I’m in the proper frame of mind tonight. When I am, I’ll let you know… unless somebody wants to mail me a large slab of chocolate. No? Didn’t think so, but it was worth a try. I hope you enjoy the poem. I think it’s about a year and a half or maybe two years old. 

But You. But You Write Such Pretty Words…

Huzzah!

Which is code for: I finished the last chapter and I’m eating a victory ham sandwich.

Although, if I’m honest, I think the bread has gone off. So, I’ll stop eating. How disgusting. I may have to eat a victory chocolate bar instead. I’m not a calorie counter, but going on size, I’m going to say that it’s healthier for me. Eventually, I’ll figure out that there is something drastically wrong with this theory and that over the course of being victorious I have, indeed, outgrown my house. There are various problems involved with outgrowing one’s house. The first problem is that you then have to wear the house as a form of clothing because until you start wasting away… there’s no way that house is going to let you wriggle out of the biggest window or door. In fact, you may need to take the roof off and live in a circus tent until you’ve dieted… a lot. Secondly, you won’t be able to reach your computer. This means that you’ll have to drag your sorry arse (house attached) to the nearest library and lean in through the window to type. Of course, you won’t be able to press the keys properly and therefore be unable to type any sense whatsoever. If you choose to read to while your time away, you will sadly be unable to turn the pages in your book as your hands will be absolutely massive. You might as well just give up on everything… unless you’re a prankster. In which case, your only use is to pretend that you are actually a house and creep up on groups of people. When they least expect it, attack!

This is guaranteed to terrify everybody you jump out at to death.

I don’t know about you, but if a house-sized, house-wearing person jumped out at me… I’d be pretty damn scared. You also have to make sure that you don’t accidentally jump out onto the people you’re trying to scare. A nice little prank on various family members could turn into a trip to the hospital for your elderly relatives and a trip to the morgue for that hated aunty you stepped in. Stepping in aunts, no matter how hateful, may cause tension with parents and is thus not advised.

I think I must be tired. I only write such bizarre drivel when I’m tired. Don’t let me put you off eating, though. Nothing should put you off eating.

Just don’t become house-sized.

This has to be my most random entry yet. I should probably crack on with talking about something that is actually news. I guess one thing is that I’ve been helping my friend sort out the navigation bar etc for the new site. He’s also successfully iframed this in, which you’ll get to see when he’s completed the site. My formspring has been iframed in as well. The link is still at the side if you want to ask me anything there. Really, I don’t mind. I get bizarre questions anyway.

Something that has annoyed me, however, was my younger brother. He always annoys me. I may blog about how much quite a lot so please feel free to ignore me when I do so. It’s just because I need a release. Anyway, he irritated me this morning because I went to use the bathroom next to my room. I couldn’t. He’d stuffed loads of loo roll in it again and just left it. So I went to use the other one, not realising he was in there faffing about with his hair or whatever he does. I got yelled at about how I was everywhere and he hated me. On the upside, that meant he left and I actually got to use the toilet (I know. This is just thrilling stuff, isn’t it? Be thankful I didn’t go into too much detail). On the downside, he went to his room, cranked up the volume on his stupid screamo music (that was loud anyway) and started singing along. Also loud. So by the time I’d barely been awake five minutes, I’d been yelled at and had a headache. The bit that made me really angry, however, was when I went to get a shower and there was no hot water. So yes, I’ve spent most of the day looking even more like a hobo than usual. Men annoy me. If I knew how to change my internal preferences to women, I would… though I suspect we may be just as problematic.

Also, I may write another piece of flash fiction when I’ve finished writing the Epilogue of Secrets (I bet you’re sick of hearing about it now). This means that, if you have any random sentences you want me to make a piece of flash fiction out of, you should comment below. Thanks and don’t outgrow your house!

(Lyrics in the title are from Lover I Don’t Have To Love by Bright Eyes)

I Found A Boy Who Had A Dream Making Everyone Smile

Today, every attempt to write more of Chapter 23 of Secrets has been thwarted by interruptions.

Firstly (which was not so much an interruption as I said hello to Andrew and discovered he was editing the book cover design he had created me), I helped with my opinions and image searching to edit the book cover of Dark Side of the Moon that my friend designed. It looks even better than it did and I think he’s even more of a genius with graphics. He’s going to be designing the graphics for my new site. Personally, I reckon that this will make the site even more fantastic than I could have originally designed. He has a knack of being able to figure out exactly what I want from the mass of congealed matter that makes up my brain. Anyway, results of today’s editing are below so you can tell me what you think of his lovely design:

Secondly, I’ve had lots of people trying to talk to me about various things… which is fine… but I don’t need the distractions right now. I want to get Secrets finished instead of getting sidetracked (you could probably argue that this is sidetracking me, but I wanted to mention all the stuff I needed to mention so I could continue on with Secrets). I know people don’t mean to distract me, but they always seem to know when I’m on a roll with whatever I’m writing and they just barge in with their hellos. I’m maybe being a little dramatic, but you have to admit that it is frustrating. Other people might say that I should just ignore whoever they are. I would do, but then I feel inordinately mean by not speaking to them. Dreadful, isn’t it?

Nevertheless, a friend instant messaged me and he’s started doing some writing of his own. His introduction to his piece can be found here and I’m sure that if any of you can provide him with feedback, then he’d be really appreciative. Personally, I think it’s an excellent start. His narrative voice is really strong and it draws you in and interests you straight away. To say that it’s not something I would normally pick to read, I’m glad I did. The title doesn’t really make me jump at it, but the actual writing of the piece is engaging and does make me want to read more. The writing is humorous, too, as if you’re listening to your friend describe something that has happened to him or her whilst you wait for the bus to arrive. My point is, I enjoyed it.

He’s also told me that he uses some freeware especially for writers to type in. I’m reliably informed that it’s a useful tool… and also that, if you want it to, you can set it so that it makes typewriter noises whilst you write. I think he finds this particular feature the best. Personally, I wouldn’t use it, but that’s because I’m rather set in the system I have for my writing. Nevertheless, it seems like something that could work for a lot of people so I thought I’d give it a quick mention. It’s called Q10. At first, I thought Didrik was trying to say I needed some skin care for wrinkles (I should hope I don’t have wrinkles. I’m only twenty!), but I had a look for it on the ‘net and it seems to have a number of good features. Despite this, I still don’t want to swap MS Word for it, but everybody is comfortable with different things. I’ve linked to it, anyway, so you can have a gander for yourself. It may or may not suit you. If you’re like my friend Didrik, though, you’ll love it just for the typewriter noises. It seems to work for him anyway.

Something else that I want to mention is my friend’s online magazine. I’ve mentioned it before, but this is Greyson’s second issue of OverByte and it still seems to be doing really well. It looks a lot more professional now and he’s had a lot more support getting the latest issue sorted. It’s primary audience are independent game makers on the internet. I’m not a game maker but I did skim it for the jokes and the ending comic, which were all thoroughly enjoyable. Plus, it’s nice to see how far he’s come along with it. On a private note, I think it’s helped build his confidence a lot too. In a weird way that makes me really proud of him. So, in support of my friend, you can find OverByte at its own site and, if you’re an indie game maker and you’d like to write articles for the next issue, you can register to audition.

(Lyrics in the title are from Oxygen by Colbie Caillat)

Emerging from the Gentle Grip of Night’s Unfolding Arms

I’m considering writing some flash fiction on here in the future. If you’re unaware as to what that entails, then listen up, please:

Flash fiction is where you write a piece of fiction based on an idea or a statement that you are given. You go with whatever you think of when you get the statement, phrase, question or idea etc. Then, you complete a writing piece on it in either a set number of words or a set time.

Because it’s so quick and spontaneous (hence the name flash fiction) it’s supposed to be a really good way to build up your writing skills (as well as padding those portfolios!), which is why I’m going to start writing pieces. I’m going to add them here and each piece will be titled with ‘Flash Fiction No.#’ so that they will be easier for you to find. Not only that, but I will be tagging them with ‘flash fiction 500’ and ‘flash fiction 1000’ according to how many words I write of each. Pieces may not end up complete as these are literally just quick writing exercises, but hopefully you will enjoy reading through them. I don’t want to write just anything, though, so, if you have a suggestion for a statement that I can base a piece of flash fiction on, please comment below and I will write a piece based on it. These pieces may not be terribly long, but it will help me to improve my writing and for you to see what I can do.

Your flash fiction statement will probably end up being written about, so please comment with one!

Another thing to mention is my formspring account. I know that I keep going on about it, but I’d really like to hear if you have any questions. They can be about my writing or even just something you generally want help with. I’ll try my best to satisfactorily answer the questions that you pose. More questions, however, mean that I get to expand more of them on here if I think I can give you more information and, let’s face it, I clearly love rambling on here.

IMPORTANTLY, (yes I had to caps lock to make sure I got your attention) the poll finishes tomorrow so if you want to get your vote heard then please click on your favourite title on the right.

I thought I would show you the book cover for the first book in the JLM Series, Dark Side of the Moon, which has been designed by Andrew McCluskey (NALGames). This is the current design, but he’s said he’d like to edit it further. I’m not sure when he’ll get around to this, so you can have a look at it’s current state. Personally, I really like it, which is great as Andrew is the one in charge of the graphical content of my new site. He’s also going to be in charge of the flash content. Sean Buller (UnknownGamer), my lovely Canadian friend, is the one in charge of the coding. When they’ve finished my site and set up one of their own to promote their website building skills, I’ll give you a link so that you can take a long hard look at what they can do. What they can do is brilliant, though, and they’re willing to learn new skills to get you what you want. The design of the book cover below, for example, was taken from an amalgamation of ideas that I gave Andrew. None of them were very set because I wasn’t quite sure what I wanted, but he’s managed to come up with something I adore and, when he has a moment, he intends to edit it a little more to make it just that bit more awesome.

I’m still editing Dark Side of the Moon. Nevertheless, I am getting closer to the end of that. The last scenes of Secrets/Spilling Secrets are looking good, even if I say so myself. I’m taking it slowly, though, to make sure that I hammer out every minute detail and get it as perfect as I possibly can. If it’s not perfect, then it just won’t do. Lots happens in it and there are some tense and emotional moments. Furthermore, I think it will beautifully illustrate how much some of the characters have developed since Dark Side of the Moon and how they’ve grown up from the stroppy teens they were, amongst other things.

Anyway, please remember to comment with statements for flash fiction pieces and don’t forget to leave me some formspring questions. Thanks!

(Lyrics in the title are from You Are The Moon by The Hush Sound)