This morning I went to an art/science workshop called "Scale Free Networks" where we used massively magnified slides to assemble and then interpret images and make collaborative artworks, and then spent about 45 minutes tooling around looking at random stuff (ribbon, stone, sponge, fungus, coin, moth wing etc) under stereo microscopes (20x and 40x magnification). The workship was led by an artist and a scientist (molecular biology) and they shared with us a very little about the history of microscopes and then some images, and we talked also about the freedom of working collaboratively across disciplines. It was all too short (2 hours) and stimulating to mix up the nuanced and emotive values of art with the tools and language of science.
I love the way so many things in nature - shapes but also really relationships scale up and down. Everyone has their own experiences of this - from the coastlines of Norway designed by Slartibartfast to the edges of grilled cheese, to the way skin peels when it is sun burnt and the spreading silt echos on a flood plain, veins in our arms and nerves in our eyes, or the gorgeous aching arch of a solar flare or a Lilly's gentle pitch to sensuous tip. Those of course are shapes, but they're relational in time and space - as we are.
The way we trust, or dance around trust, the way we share, or close down and step away, the way we cluster as individuals (and relate to ourselves) or with others - intimate groups on specific lines of interest or in masses - for the kick that comes from tens of thousands cheering together - be it at the ritual of a ball through posts or for the frisson of balls on balls. Highly codified clothing or no clothing at all. Meaning held in the action translated through the lenses of our own experiences. In art as in science so many things are taken as truth that would be so much more useful to our understanding of each other more broadly if they were understood as multiple frames of position and preference.
"Lost my muchness indeed!"
Showing posts with label coffee. Show all posts
Showing posts with label coffee. Show all posts
Saturday, March 06, 2010
Tuesday, December 01, 2009
13 Awesome Nanowrimo Tips from Someone Who Has (finally) Won
There's a few things you can do in preparation for your own Nanowrimo attempt next year, should you wish to join in the literary Running of the Bulls. I plan to use this list as a reminder next year to get my head in the game. So here's 13 of my hard won, best and hottest tips from 3 runs at Nanowrimo:
Before November
* Attend to the ergonomics or otherwise of where you write. My best time was about 1200 words in an hour, mostly it was less than that, so I spent over 50 hours sitting at the dining room table I have my computer on. Dining room tables are great for eating off, crap for typing at. Don't let your wrists/elbows/back take the pain - fix it up however you can.
* Don't be shy, lay in stores of staples. Why waste precious writing time queuing to buy coffee, loo paper, MREs, gin or chocolate? Exactly, too frustrating, so ensure sufficient supplies of these and other important items are procured in bulk in October. (A lesson I learnt on Day 2 of my first -failed- Nano.)
* Start saying 'NO, Thank You' early to anything that is not on your mission-critical social list. Sure you don't want to be a freaky hermit, but you need to find 50 or 60 hours of alert time in November and that is not as easy as it might sound like. I really needed a full day on each weekend just to catch up from the work flatline.
* Get a writing buddy if you can. Someone roughly in your timezone, or at least who is up hitting the keyboard when you are. The moral support is invaluable, especially in the difficult 3rd week.
* Align your timezones. I lost a day at the beginning because my machine was set to the wrong timezone and I didn't notice until on the 28th it gave me a one day countdown. Total Freakout! Save yourself the worry, and save yourself the indignity of having the comp end a day early for you.
* Start cutting down on TV or whatever other recreational narcotics you use to dull the passage of time. You will be needing that as alert time. If there is a particular type of tv, movie or documentary that inspires your planned story or the direction you'd like to write in, by all means lay in some dvds of shows you have already seen. This will be your comfort viewing. I chose Entourage, and a science doco series on SBS.
During November
* Write every day. Your goal is to produce 1 670 words per day. What the heck - why not round it up to 2gs? You're looking for a challenge right?
* Keep a scratch sheet for noting incidental characters names. You'll be in a fervour of creativity in the first week and during that lush 14 000 words you produce will be throw away characters who will rudely turn up later in your story and it can be annoying to have to trawl through your MS looking for their names. Especially when you make up silly names for them. I invented a manga series that I could later on not remember how to spell. Embarrassment.
* Don't watch tv until after you've done your words for the day. Even then think twice unless you've promised yourself the reward of a comfort episode. Likewise, I took the modem (yes I still have an external modem) off the computer to reduce the constant temptation to browse wiki or check emails until there was word count to upload. You may not be as weak willed as I am. More power to you.
* Keep saying no. This is your month goddammit, surely it can wait a few weeks? (My sister thoughtfully arranged the birth of her first child for December. That's teamwork!)
* Remember the rules are just a 50 000 word count. The need for a beginning middle and end that I mentioned last year was my own rule. Any expectations about quality are your own (excess) baggage.
* Write a bit more. Sneak in another paragraph or another scene. Take notes during boring meetings at work, or on the commute, or while you're on a boring phone call. Keep a whiteboard marker in the shower. Whatever. Momentum is your friend in the Kung Fu of writing. Skip bits that are sucking or dragging with a summary line eg "and then they fought. when things were better..." is a perfectly acceptable place keeper. Later, in week 3 for example, when you hit the plot doldrums these one liners are a brilliant place to revisit and flesh out and will give you another thousand words or two plus they give your story brain enough of a break to come up with something to move on with.
* Have fun. Why the hell else would you sign up for something like this if it wasn't fun? Write what you love to read, write for the joy of splashing words around, write for the sadistic pleasure of making your Main Character a total fuckup, whatever turns you on. Just stay in touch with the fun of it all.
So if you have ever said "I'd like to write a novel one day..." why not make November 1st 2010 the day you start that novel?
Go on, put it in your diary now. Of course there's no need to wait until them, but during November you'll join with 200andsomething thousand people worldwide who don't think you're crazy and who are going to applaud whatever you achieve and support whatever vision you have, because they're all doing it too. That's not something that happens any old day of the week, and with these 13 tips, you'll have an insider's edge on keeping your bar chart of word count growing.
Before November
* Attend to the ergonomics or otherwise of where you write. My best time was about 1200 words in an hour, mostly it was less than that, so I spent over 50 hours sitting at the dining room table I have my computer on. Dining room tables are great for eating off, crap for typing at. Don't let your wrists/elbows/back take the pain - fix it up however you can.
* Don't be shy, lay in stores of staples. Why waste precious writing time queuing to buy coffee, loo paper, MREs, gin or chocolate? Exactly, too frustrating, so ensure sufficient supplies of these and other important items are procured in bulk in October. (A lesson I learnt on Day 2 of my first -failed- Nano.)
* Start saying 'NO, Thank You' early to anything that is not on your mission-critical social list. Sure you don't want to be a freaky hermit, but you need to find 50 or 60 hours of alert time in November and that is not as easy as it might sound like. I really needed a full day on each weekend just to catch up from the work flatline.
* Get a writing buddy if you can. Someone roughly in your timezone, or at least who is up hitting the keyboard when you are. The moral support is invaluable, especially in the difficult 3rd week.
* Align your timezones. I lost a day at the beginning because my machine was set to the wrong timezone and I didn't notice until on the 28th it gave me a one day countdown. Total Freakout! Save yourself the worry, and save yourself the indignity of having the comp end a day early for you.
* Start cutting down on TV or whatever other recreational narcotics you use to dull the passage of time. You will be needing that as alert time. If there is a particular type of tv, movie or documentary that inspires your planned story or the direction you'd like to write in, by all means lay in some dvds of shows you have already seen. This will be your comfort viewing. I chose Entourage, and a science doco series on SBS.
During November
* Write every day. Your goal is to produce 1 670 words per day. What the heck - why not round it up to 2gs? You're looking for a challenge right?
* Keep a scratch sheet for noting incidental characters names. You'll be in a fervour of creativity in the first week and during that lush 14 000 words you produce will be throw away characters who will rudely turn up later in your story and it can be annoying to have to trawl through your MS looking for their names. Especially when you make up silly names for them. I invented a manga series that I could later on not remember how to spell. Embarrassment.
* Don't watch tv until after you've done your words for the day. Even then think twice unless you've promised yourself the reward of a comfort episode. Likewise, I took the modem (yes I still have an external modem) off the computer to reduce the constant temptation to browse wiki or check emails until there was word count to upload. You may not be as weak willed as I am. More power to you.
* Keep saying no. This is your month goddammit, surely it can wait a few weeks? (My sister thoughtfully arranged the birth of her first child for December. That's teamwork!)
* Remember the rules are just a 50 000 word count. The need for a beginning middle and end that I mentioned last year was my own rule. Any expectations about quality are your own (excess) baggage.
* Write a bit more. Sneak in another paragraph or another scene. Take notes during boring meetings at work, or on the commute, or while you're on a boring phone call. Keep a whiteboard marker in the shower. Whatever. Momentum is your friend in the Kung Fu of writing. Skip bits that are sucking or dragging with a summary line eg "and then they fought. when things were better..." is a perfectly acceptable place keeper. Later, in week 3 for example, when you hit the plot doldrums these one liners are a brilliant place to revisit and flesh out and will give you another thousand words or two plus they give your story brain enough of a break to come up with something to move on with.
* Have fun. Why the hell else would you sign up for something like this if it wasn't fun? Write what you love to read, write for the joy of splashing words around, write for the sadistic pleasure of making your Main Character a total fuckup, whatever turns you on. Just stay in touch with the fun of it all.
So if you have ever said "I'd like to write a novel one day..." why not make November 1st 2010 the day you start that novel?
Go on, put it in your diary now. Of course there's no need to wait until them, but during November you'll join with 200andsomething thousand people worldwide who don't think you're crazy and who are going to applaud whatever you achieve and support whatever vision you have, because they're all doing it too. That's not something that happens any old day of the week, and with these 13 tips, you'll have an insider's edge on keeping your bar chart of word count growing.
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
Checking In and Saying Hi
Hi. I know I was a lot more entertaining last year during Nano. This year I promised you I would not subject you to my Nano output but you will note how cunning I was to not offer anything in place! Ah-Ha!! Tricksy! You can learn a lot from Hobbits.
It is just that I have been pouring it all into getting this story across the finish line. I'm only allowed here now because ofter a truly horrific week, I pulled a miracle out of the hat over the weekend (10 000 words anybody? Anybody? I'm still shocked my own self) and am now ahead of the linear chart-of-requirement again. For now. So I thought I'd pop over and give you a distracted wave. Plus, I'm kinda stuck again. I just don't know what happens next. I just got a thousand words out of describing one of my characters make a cup of coffee, maybe I can get another thousand out of him drinking it... hmmmm... possible - but what then? Only the muse knows.
The most beguiling and addictive thing for me about Nano and about writing fiction generally is how abstractly collaborative it is. Once I spend more than 5 or 10 minutes properly concentrating on whatever I'm making, plots and characters and developments can start to come from somewhere that is not conscious. Even when I sit down with an outline or an idea I want to develop, it nearly always goes somewhere else. I have a concrete physical sense that I am working with someone who sometimes walks up behind me once I'm settled and who whispers "oooh! I know, What if ...!" into my ear at odd moments and I go "Genius! Wish I'd thought of that!" only there is no one else here.
It just happened now. I sat down to write about how much I love coffee and how close and dear to my heart it is right now, and instead I told you that I hear voices. See? Weird.
What I have taken more than ten years to learn is that when I trust the voice and follow those suggestions, things become more interesting, more layered, more likely to work in a pleasing way, and more likely to feel good.
There it is.
That's all the wisdom I'm able to impart at this point in the biggest writing challenge I've ever faced - listen to the voices because it feels good.
Ok. Good luck with parsing that. See you in a week or 8909 words - which ever comes first.
It is just that I have been pouring it all into getting this story across the finish line. I'm only allowed here now because ofter a truly horrific week, I pulled a miracle out of the hat over the weekend (10 000 words anybody? Anybody? I'm still shocked my own self) and am now ahead of the linear chart-of-requirement again. For now. So I thought I'd pop over and give you a distracted wave. Plus, I'm kinda stuck again. I just don't know what happens next. I just got a thousand words out of describing one of my characters make a cup of coffee, maybe I can get another thousand out of him drinking it... hmmmm... possible - but what then? Only the muse knows.
The most beguiling and addictive thing for me about Nano and about writing fiction generally is how abstractly collaborative it is. Once I spend more than 5 or 10 minutes properly concentrating on whatever I'm making, plots and characters and developments can start to come from somewhere that is not conscious. Even when I sit down with an outline or an idea I want to develop, it nearly always goes somewhere else. I have a concrete physical sense that I am working with someone who sometimes walks up behind me once I'm settled and who whispers "oooh! I know, What if ...!" into my ear at odd moments and I go "Genius! Wish I'd thought of that!" only there is no one else here.
It just happened now. I sat down to write about how much I love coffee and how close and dear to my heart it is right now, and instead I told you that I hear voices. See? Weird.
What I have taken more than ten years to learn is that when I trust the voice and follow those suggestions, things become more interesting, more layered, more likely to work in a pleasing way, and more likely to feel good.
There it is.
That's all the wisdom I'm able to impart at this point in the biggest writing challenge I've ever faced - listen to the voices because it feels good.
Ok. Good luck with parsing that. See you in a week or 8909 words - which ever comes first.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)