So a year ago today I posted this.. and well... after a year of stewing over the homework thing and being my normal voracious reading self. I have come to the conclusion that Mike's way of analyzing reading is shit. Sorry boys and girls, it is. While it might work for someone with the cognitive ability of a house fly, that would not be me.
Something that I have discovered in the last two hundred plus books that I have read?
I'm a literature and creative snob. An art whore. Nobody should be telling a creative type how to be an artist. I really cant stand educational books about writing. But I love writing blogs.. not just my own, but reading blogs on writing methods.
Ever great method I have picked up in the last little while has come to me from another blogger, or pinterest board that has referred me to said blogger.
I really want an office space, a room where I can shut the door and write, I'm jealous of people who have them. I have my desk in the corner of the living room, and no-one intrudes when I am using it. But I have started using some of these other tools. I use a plot board now. I have a white board where I can play, a poster board for presentations that I put post it notes on to help walk me through things when I am stuck connecting bullet points.
I have started journaling again, I bought a notebook and have been using it as a inner-space monologue of memories, thoughts on the events I recall most often, the people in my life. I have my inspiration journal (a thing I put off putting together for years). I picked up on the idea of a Story Bible from another Blog, which I have started utilizing to hold my characters, timelines, world building etc. A Story Bible is a hard copy of this important data, a ready physical reference. Another blog got me started with an inspiration board, because we all need to look away from the computer once in a while, so I also have a couple large pieces of card board I have started taping images on to, things story relevant, star charts, mountains, something connected to what gave me the idea, for example a picture of the bar my mom use to frequent.
Additionally, I don't know if I shared this, but the last few years I have used OneNote for collecting scrap ideas when I am on the go, in March I purchased Scrivener and I love it. I know a few bloggers that use it, and quite a few others who say the learning curve is too steep, and honestly I admit that I feel it to be extremely straight forward and intuitive. I didn't complete the tutorial, but I am overly tech savvy. So my advise to Scriv newbies, click on all the menus, read all the options in the menus. Then the options on the left side "Right Click" on those, and read all the options. When starting a new Scriv file, as a newb, don't start with Blank, choose Fiction or Non-Fiction. And you are ready to rock and roll.
This week I started making use of an online tool called Pacemaker, I know that I could use excel, but the idea that someone else could check up on my daily word counts has actually helped keep me writing, keep me honest. It can be found HERE.
I also love keeping a variety of books close to hand, First I keep a Blank Journal / Sketchbook. This is for all the words never written, all the stories never told. Second I keep my Inspiration Book. This is a journal, but in my case a sketchbook because I prefer non-ruled paper, I have filled its pages with words that I love, ideas that speak to me, poems and quotes of course.. and the occasional doodle. Sun Tzu's The Art of War (hard bound because its applicable uses are never ending), Miyamoto Musashi's Book of Five Rings (hard bound not the best book on strategy but useful philosophy), Fairy Tales by The Brother's Grimm (hard bound because everyone should own it), The Complete Works of Shakespeare (hard bound because everyone should own it) Peter Pan By J.M. Barry (hard bound it is what made me fall in love with becoming a writer)... Drop Something? By JAEDL (Hard Cover... because my grandmother wrote it) and there are a few books that I want to add to this shelf, for nostalgia, first is The Greg Luganis Story, the first book I ever read on my own, and a couple that I don't know exist, but will always be looking for. My maternal grandmother JAEDL was friends with J. Robert Oppenheimer, while she attended the University of California, she was also friends with Frank Herbert and Jean Auel, while she lived in Oregon. If I can twist my siblings and cousins arms, I really want the inscribed books Oppenheimer gave her, which included a dictionary and a collection of Marxist literature. My family was comfortable with the Scientific community around WWII as my Dad's aunt taught Mathematics at Berkeley, and my paternal grandfather was a rocket engineer. So I would love books surrounding that time.
I digress. Chat more later.
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