Are you ready?

Nanowrimo starts tomorrow. Are your pencils all sharpened, your notebooks at the ready, your laptop battery charged, your wordcount spreadsheets updated? Do you have snacks and coffee and chocolate to hand? Most importantly of all, do you have an outline?

Actually, skip that last one. You don't need to know where your story is going when you start writing; some of us only find out what the story is by writing it.

If you get stuck, Brian Klems has some suggestions for what to write next:

If you find yourself at a loss for what to write next, come up with a way to make things worse, let the characters respond naturally to what’s happening, write a scene that fulfills a promise you made earlier in the book, or work on a scene you know readers will expect based on your genre and the story you’ve told so far. 

 (from 6 Secrets of Writing a Novel Without an Outline)

Brian Klems suggests an organic way of working that I feel comfortable with but the article also gives you a lot of things to think of all at once when trying to write and I'm not sure I can do that. While I'm thinking up stories what seems to work best for me is trying to come up with the story I most want to read. Mind you, sometimes the characters just won't co-operate (I'm going to be editing a novel this month where the main character refused to fall for the attractive woman I'd set up for her and insisted on falling for a character who was supposed to be a minor annoyance).

For anyone doing Nano this year: I'm here to cheer you on. The purple bar is calling your name, just make sure you've got enough chocolate in to fuel your writing. Oh, is it only me that runs on chocolate then?

Stop!

After you've finished reading, stop! If you want to remember what you were reading, that is; apparently a ten minute break after reading allows your memory to consolidate and you remember what you've read much better - even a week later.

You can read about it on PsyBlog.

I wonder if eating chocolate enhances the effect. I'm willing to test out the theory - for the benefit of science, obviously. Does anyone else want to test the chocolate theory with me?

Pain relief internet-style

 

Yesterday My Beloved and I took our bikes for a wonderful ride in Surrey, and when we got too hot we stopped by a cricket match and bought diet Coke at their bar and sat and watched. It was an idyllic English scene.

Then we got back on our bikes. Only I had a basket on the back of mine making it top heavy, so while I was faffing about with putting stuff away the bike fell over. I was holding the bike and didn’t let go in time, so as it fell it pushed my ankle back and pulled me over and I fell on top of it. Ouch!
 
By evening, the scrape on my wrist was very sore. So, in the spirit of pure scientific research, I tried out pain relief as endorsed by friends on Twitter.

Test results for pain relief out of 5

Wine: 2
Chocolate: 0
Ibuprofen: 5

Either wine isn’t as good at pain relief as some people suggest, or I needed more of it. The trouble is, if I’d had any more I’d have fallen over again!

Better than chocolate?

Picture by Nakisha

So pretty!

I'm exhausted after too much driving the last two days; yesterday I had to take my son to the sleep apnoea clinic and back, and then I had to go back today to return the apparatus they'd strapped on him. He came home the first day all wired up and they even gave us a piece of paper with a police number on it to show that it was legitimate medical equipment and he isn't a terrorist! I'm so glad we weren't stopped.

So today I've been lolling around trying to recover (CFS really sucks) and I came across these wonderful pictures on Etsy and I treated myself. I also bought two ACEO cards with dear little rabbits huddled under quilts but those have to come by post.

Picture by Nakisha

Nakisha said I can use the images on my blog, so I may be posting more of them in the future. They're just so lovely. It's a less fattening way of cheering myself up than with chocolate.

What could be better...

...than a good book and chocolate to nibble on? I've just received a parcel from the wonderful Steph (aka maybegenius) who ran a competition a few weeks ago. I was lucky enough to be picked out of a hat (well, my name was, I didn't actually get into the hat myself) and she posted these goodies to me all the way from the States at great personal expense. (I'm not joking. International postage is dear!)

The Powerberries are chocolate-covered fruit juice pieces. They're super-delicious and they claim to be good for me because they're full of flavanol antioxidants and vitamin C. I choose to believe them. They are certainly moreish and I'm going to have to have trouble remembering that a sixth of a pack is a serving. You mean I can't count the whole pack as one serving? Oops!

Thank you so much, Steph!

Comfort reading

I've just finished the latest Kim Harrison book Black Magic Sanction which is pure escapism. I've read all eight books in the series now. They are definitely comfort reads - they pull me into another world where for a time I can forget about anything that's troubling me. A bit like alcohol but with no side effects and a much quicker recovery rate when real life calls.

Other authors I like for comfort reading are Diane Duane, Tanya Huff, and Terry Pratchett. What are your comfort books? Or do you prefer chocolate? (I like combining the two.)

Chocolate: food of the gods

Picture courtesy of NASA.
Slogan courtesy of fridge magnets everywhere.

Chocolate is of course the most precious substance known to humankind. I've had confirmation of this in the book I'm reading at the moment. It's Wizards at War by Diane Duane. Faced with mercenary soldiers who refuse to reveal their secrets, one of the characters holds up a slim black rectangle, golden at each end.

"I have here," she said, in very clear and New York-accented Speech, "a new bar of Valrhona Caraïbe Single-Estate Grand Cru."

Now there's a woman that knows her chocolate! And she uses it to bribe the alien race into giving her what she wants.

What I love about Duane's Young Wizard books is the gentle humour that runs all the way through. Even when the Wizards are saving the world they have time for a joke. It's pure escapism, which is what I like. That and a bar of chocolate.

Review

Not a book. Today I'm reviewing Boo! Halloween Chocolates from Hotel Chocolat. They came today, so thank you Nicola both for the prize and for getting it to me so quickly.

The chocolates are individually wrapped so you can hand them out to trick or treaters if you like. I won't. Let them eat Haribo, these are mine.

I usually eat very dark chocolate with a strong bittersweet taste. But this milk chocolate is unusually full of flavour. It's smooth, velvety and delicious. You put it in your mouth and it melts into... Oops. Now you know how I came to write my flash story. I'm not really a chocoholic. Really, I'm not.

The chocolates come in several shapes: my favourite is the cat. What could be better, cats and chocolate. They only needed to add a book and I'd be all set. Maybe they'll do that next year.

I won!

Oh my God! I was one of the ten winners in Nicola Morgan's chocolate competition! I'm in shock!

My story:

Lucy eased off the purple wrapper, savouring the moment. The silver foil was harsh against her fingers as she pulled it back to reveal the dark chocolate within. Snap! She broke off a single square and placed it in her mouth. Bitter flavours melted into sweet. She held it on her tongue, allowing the heavenly liquid to seep backwards and slip down her throat. Her eyes closed.

"Ahem!"

Her eyes flew open. Her heart raced as she saw the shopkeeper pointing to the sign: "Shoplifters will be prosecuted."

"Forty pence, please, and next time pay for it first."

Editing mode

Only one week now till Nanowrimo, and I'm in editing mode. I went in for Nicola Morgan's Chocolate Competition (now ended), and I've sent in an entry for Writtenwyrdd's Halloween Competition (there's still time to enter that one) and I'm editing a story I hope to submit to 365 tomorrows. I reckon I'd better get a move on because I need to be out of editing mode by next Sunday.

Oh, and all you UK people, we put the clocks back tonight. Thanks to Lee Wind for pointing me towards this timely reminder:



I think I need a bath now but not a hot one. Or maybe I'll just eat some chocolate.

The winner is...

This was very hard to judge because of all the brilliant ideas you came up with.

Honourable mentions to everyone who offered me any suggestions:

Writtenwyrdd
Scott from Oregon
Pjd
McKoala
Sylvia
Scarlet Blue
Jessi
JaneyV
Bevie

Special mentions to Sylvia for A view of the stars from the hedgerow and to Jessi for
A little bit of writing
A little bit of cats
A little bit of reading
And a whole lot of laughs!
and her jokes about hedgehog rhymes and to Pjd for his blatant flattery.

There were so many good ideas in there, some of them featuring hedgehogs and some of them not. To everyone who said that the tagline is fine as it is, thank you. To everyone who offered kind and flattering comments, thank you.

First place goes to Scarlet Blue for A Writer's PotPourri because that started the train of thought that led me to the new tagline. Scarlet, can you email me your address so I can post the chocolate to you?

Thanks, everyone, for your brilliant, funny and above all kind ideas! I'm sorry you can't all get the chocolate!

Competition

I need help.

You may have noticed that the tagline on my blog says Mostly about books and writing and a bit about cats, or maybe you haven't because you view in a reader. Anyway, books and writing were the initial impetus for this blog but I don't post much about published books because no one seems interested. Looking back, what I have posted about is: words, word games, gender issues, homophobia, various outings I've been on, and computer widgets that take my fancy. I also post photos I've taken of my area and of my cats. If you look over the blog or the Label cloud you may find other odds and ends that I've forgotten about.

I know what I want in this blog but I don't know how to label it so I this is where I would like your help.

The rules

• Write a tagline for this blog.


• You have until midnight EST on Thursday 16th 2009* to send me your entry.


• You can enter by commenting here or by email to anthingyoulike.fairyhedgehog@recursor.net (or to my main email address if you happen to have it). Please put Competition in the subject line so that I don't get confused.


• The winner is the one that I decide to use as my tagline. If none of them is exactly what I want, then the one I like best will win.

The Prize

is a minature selection of Green & Black's awesome chocolate. (If anyone wins who doesn't eat chocolate then we'll come to some sort of agreement. I'm sure there is something you'd like!)

*That's 5am BST on Friday 17th. I don't get up till at least 6.30 so there's a bit of leeway here.

Will Write for Chocolate

Will Write for Chocolate is always funny, just starting with the title itself. This one caught my attention as it landed in my RSS reader today. If you haven't checked out the website, then do!