Trends

The color purple has been on my mind lately. Not the book, the color. My new luggage is purple, and two of the four t-shirts I bought the other day are some shade of purple. For the longest time, it was only my mom's color, as if she owned it. Every day she wears something purple, and many days, her whole outfit is that color. She could definitely be described as "the purple lady." If you ever see her, you'll know why. Shoes, blazers, scarfs, you name it. For the longest time, I must have felt that wearing or using purple myself would seem like I'm copying her. I don't have too many purple things, and I've affirmed many times that my favorite color is blue. I'm pretty sure it still is. But now, I'm okay to use purple. Perhaps I'm seeing purple as an awesome color in its own right, no matter what my mom thinks of it. Or, perhaps I'm subconsciously realizing that soon I will be having my big move away from home, and I want to have reminders of her around me. Probably a combination of the two.

I don't really know why, but suddenly, three of my friends have started blogs! I feel like a trend-setter (but it's possible this coincidence has nothing to do with me). Bear with me, I want to give each of them a short introduction. From Aardvarks to Zygotes is a sort of opinionated blog, with entries that aim to spark conversation and argument about anything and everything, not without a bit of humor. Of Masks and Martians is a blog by a friend who is very interested in actors, movies, and British TV shows, which the entires will mostly be about. Last but not least, in love and war doesn't really have a theme, but is by a friend currently deciding between majoring in biology or English, and I expect it will be an interesting read. I send them all good wishes, because I know how hard it is to continue blogging after the coolness of beginning one wears off. I look forward to posts from all of them, but go check them out yourself!

Now, off to try to get more writing done today, alas without a coffee shop to put me in the right mood...

Happy Canada Day, and Happy July!

Photo: Between floats at the pride parade. Converse is another trend that I hope will never go out of style.

Character

These past couple weeks I came across a snag in my writing. At first, Shea was a Knight of the Guard. Boring, right? So I changed him into a Knight of Callaghan. I gave them a backstory, and it's not all nice things. I realized Shea is going to act differently around people because of this. This fact set me back to almost the beginning again, and I started feeling overwhelmed, like this rewrite would never get done. After meeting with my writing group last weekend, I started brainstorming a little more, understanding which questions I needed to be asking. Why does he join this group? What age is he when he joins? What role does the death of his father play in all this? What sort of tension does this create with his relationship with the main character? I realized some of my characters don't have enough depth, and that this whole thing isn't really a setback; it's a deepening of character. Which always makes a good story better.

Yesterday I was able to sit down for a couple of hours and decide on my answers to these questions. More questions came up as I wrote today, but it was much easier to work through them. I just have to realize these things take time, and be glad I'm not on some kind of deadline.

One last piece of news, related to Scotland: I bought my tickets today! I'm going. It's official. It's hard to think about anything else.

Photo: I went to the Seattle Pride Parade last weekend, in which there were many interesting characters. But I also found a pipe band! I couldn't stop grinning as they passed by...

Are We There Yet?

I've been steadily plugging away at revising my novel. It hasn't been a chapter a day like I'd hoped, more like one or two chapters a week, but I'm still getting stuff done. Yesterday I realized I didn't like the name of the wizard in my story so I went to my trusty name website and looked for a good one. I also didn't like the name of the magical door, so I tried looking for a name for that one, too. I've found a wizard name, but not one for the door yet, among other things that need new names. Names are difficult, in that I could spend hours deliberating over one. The best I can do is pick one that moderately works and keep it until someone says it sounds funny.

To get myself in the writing mood, lately my mom and I have gone to a local Starbucks. We split a French press and I have chocolate--I want to drink my coffee black, but I can't drink it without something sweet--and write for a couple of hours. My mom doesn't usually write, just does work-related things. I love the ambiance, I wish I could go there every day. We already go a couple times a week, and I honestly shouldn't be spending too much on coffee and chocolate...

I'm excited that soon, Starbucks will have free internet. I think July 1st is the date. It's true that not having internet on my computer while writing is better for my concentration, but sometimes I have things I want to look up, and really, it's about time. Tully's already does it.

Meanwhile, I've been continuing the search for inexpensive airplane tickets from Seattle to Glasgow. I've found a few, and been watching the prices for a few days. I'll probably buy them soon. I got a luggage set the other day, and it's been sitting in my room like a reminder. It feels a long way off to September, but in no time, my suitcases will be packed and I'll be on my way to Scotland.

Photo: The cover of a book I got at Half Price Books recently. Not the most recent version, but it has maps and a bit of interesting info about Scotland. Always fun to leaf through when I wish I was there already.

Cookies

There's something about baking cookies. Getting out your old favorite recipe. Buying fresh ingredients at the store. Turning up tunes you can sing along with--namely, the Beatles--while you work. Mashing the butter into little bits because you forgot to leave it out to soften. My favorite part: using a spoon to eat the rest of the dough after you put the cookies on a baking sheet. Waiting for them to bake, and smelling them when they're ready. Finding out you accidentally put them too close together, so you have to use a knife to cut them apart, and realizing that made them gooier. Which is good. Then, of course, the hot cookie with the melty chocolatey goodness. Mmhmm. Hopefully that made you want to bake some yourself. Everything seems better after a home-baked cookie.

Photo: The results of my baking today--a large plate of chocolate chip cookies!

Playing Tourist

Yesterday I took a trip to West Seattle to be a tourist for a while, with mom. On our wanderings around town, I came across a music shop called Easy Street Records. From the outside, it felt like one of those places you don't fit in unless you know someone or look and act a certain way. But the minute I went inside, it felt like I belonged there. It wasn't one of those new, shiny places, but a real haven for music lovers, a place that would have "regulars" but wouldn't cater to one particular crowd or another. A woman that worked there told me the used CDs were upstairs, and along with shelves upon shelves of some of the greatest rock and indie artists, there were all sorts of people, brought together by music. Everything from a mother and her kid to the music junkie from down the street. To top it all off, in the background they were playing my favorite CD by the Strokes, Is This It. They didn't end up having anything I was looking for, but they did have another album by the Strokes that I'd thought about getting, Room On Fire, so I bought it. Partly to help support a great local business.

You really should check it out. They even have a yummy coffee and cupcake shop across the street, Cupcake Royale, and at least two cute used bookstores up the road. My kind of neighborhood.

Photo: The view from a lookout by Alki Beach. I'm surprised I'd never been there--the views were incredible (and look at me, starting to take pictures again)!

Author Envy

I was going to blog about volunteering for my local PAWS animal shelter, but this was on my mind... I follow Patrick Rothfuss' blog, though I've never read his debut fantasy fiction novel, The Name of the Wind. It's next on my pile of things to read. Today I read his blog entry that contained a link to a video interview of him at a London convention (I stopped after about 25 minutes, when they started giving out spoilers about his new book). I got a serious case of author envy. It took him 14 years to complete his first book, and a lot of that time was world-building, which honestly I haven't done a lot of. From how it looked in the interview, from the first time he set out to write his story, he knew the main character. He knew that all the books in the series was a telling of his main character's life story, and he really knew who Kvothe was. Me, I'm not so sure I know Rain very well, even though I've completed my first draft. How did that happen? Feeling overwhelmed now...

I know this is going to be a very long process, I just get impatient and a little too hard on myself. Why do I have to get inspired at 12:00 in the morning? Maybe my dreams will help me keep the inspiring thoughts...

Photo: I don't have one this time. Too tired to sort through old ones.

Heating Up

I'm finally getting some short-term goals set for my novel. For the next two weeks I'm going to edit two chapters a day, with a red pen. Then, I'll use some program or poster board to map out the whole plot, and look at it and make any changes that are necessary. Then I'll start with the rewriting. If I don't make a plan like this, I get very easily overwhelmed and then get very little done. Never a good thing...

Otherwise, the job hunt's been challenging. I applied for volunteering at my local PAWS shelter, so that might be something I'll do. I've been working on my mindset about summer... I have to be okay with not being productive, and give myself a break... summer's all about having fun!

It's not quite summer weather here yet, but it sure feels like it sometimes. When it's the middle of the night and I have my window wide open, that's a sure sign summer's here. I have to admit though, I'm more of a fall/spring/winter person. I'm not a happy camper in too much heat.

Photo: From my trip to Hawaii last year. Summer-y thoughts to ya!