This post is brought to you by Somebody Was Grammatically Wrong On The Internet. I’m gonna try to keep this short <– this is my caveat emptor concerning the fact that I am not going to cover all the bases in this little essay. Essaylet. Whatevs. Anyway, I’m warning you, Gentle Constant Reader, not to …
Okay, y’all’re gonna think the title is extra corny once you figure it out. In related news, it just occurred to me that we’re only a few months out from the 40th anniversary of the movie The Outsiders. And if you’re of my generation (again, I plan to write a longer post about that sometime …
Lots going on the past few weeks, y’all. The kid was sick. I was sick.We started collectively preparing for the summer to end and the new school year to commence.My mom took the kiddo and me on a last-minute weekend trip to Bartlesville, OK, where we visited Woolaroc, went antiquing (I bought my first piece …
Sometimes, I have trouble integrating my German experiences with my American ones. This is one of those times. Let me show you it.
The title pretty much says it all, but I’ll give you a hint: There were snails.
Anybody else out there a compulsive doodler? Me, I can’t listen well without a pen in my hand. Here’s a great video on learning through doodling, as well as some shots of my own random doodles!
So, in case you haven’t seen it yet on Facebook or Twitter, I have the dubious honor of immersing myself in a jury pool this week. I grew up in Germany and attended German schools, so I’ve had little to nil exposure to the ins and outs of the American judicial system. Thus, I learned things today! Let me show you them! 3 Lessons from Jury Duty…
1. The court selects its jury pool from DMV records — not from voter registration or homeowner records, as I thought it did.
2. In a room full of 200 strangers, it’s rather inappropriate to voice your opinion that “all Middle-Easterners are inbred, and we should just let them all kill each other.” (The voicer of said opinion was a 60-something white man who, I gathered from his conversation, hasn’t spent a whole lot of time observing any Easterners, Middle or otherwise.)
3. If you don’t speak English, they still won’t send you home. (Instead, you get to sit there with the rest of us until someone figures out whether or not you’re really a U.S. citizen.)
We novelists slam headfirst into this particular wall all the time: Finish first draft, sit back with sigh of contentment. Languidly reach for mouse or mousepad, click “wordcount” in the dropdown menu of whatever word processor suits our fancy. Sit back once more. This time with the horrid sensation of paralyzing shock. As far …
Smee: I’ve just had an apostrophe. Hook: I think you mean an epiphany. Smee: Lightning has just struck my brain. Sometimes, my darlingest readers, lightning-esque is exactly how apostrophes happen. They’re pretty cramazing when they happen, but I must admit they do leave one somewhat stupefied with shock. In Pt. 1 of my Confessions, I …
Which side of my brain do I access during which parts of the writing process? Left side for outlines, character description, plot arcs, planning chapters scene-by-scene? Right side for writing the rough draft and letting the story flow? Writing the first draft requires me to follow my heart and let my characters get into trouble…