Category Archives: Personal

NaNoWriMo – First update

Well four days in and after a marathon writing session that lasted in to the early hours of the morning – I found my muse and wasn’t giving up until my shoulder, wrist and hand hurt – I have managed to get myself ahead of my schedule. I was going for 2000 words a day, meaning I would be up to 8000 words today. Instead I have written 9412. I already know that the first couple of thousand words will go in the first edit. They were just my starting point and everything in that bit can be worked in with more subtlety later. I now have all my main characters where I want them, and now I shall let them get on with it.

Well, I’d best be off, more writing to do, among other things.

I’ll be back next Sunday with another update. Good luck everyone,

Rose

xXx

NaNoWriMo – I’m trying again this year

I had planned to post this on Thursday, when I wrote it, but the WordPress App on my phone wouldn’t play nicely, so I’m posting it now, while I have access to the internet on my laptop.

‘Last year I participated in NaNoWriMo but didn’t make much progress, so this year I’m trying again. I think the problem last year was that I didn’t prepare well enough. Or at all actually, so this year I have. I’m going to use the month to work on the idea that first arose in my short story ‘Summer Wine’. I have made some plans, plotted it out, made notes of ideas as they’ve come to me, and so this month I will finally be putting it all together to get the first draft written.

I normally write short stories; I start longer works but don’t seem to finish them, so that’s the goal – get it finished.

Wish me luck. And good luck to everyone who is taking part in NaNoWriMo, and any of the other writing challenges taking place this month.’

I’d like to add that I will be updating about my progress every Sunday.

Bye,

Rose

xXx

And something else I remembered I had to do

Add to the previous list

7. Transfer some of my short stories from here to Live Journal Done, just now.

8. Finish typing up a short story I wrote at the beginning of the month. Done, just now. Interrupted multiple times by having a conversation with friends. All these social media sites are very distracting 😀

Time to go and do the rest of the things on my list.

Today’s plans

Due to the nature of my current employment I have a day free, so I’m actually going to do something vaguely writing related.

Today’s plans

  1. Check freelanced.com for any suitable freelance work Done – nothing doing
  2. Check my Suite101.com profile, try to think of a new article to write Done – still thinking about the second part – maybe a new book review?
  3. Read through and edit a fanfic a couple of friends sent me last night Done by 6pm – YAY – I’m considering asking for cake in payment 😀
  4. Write some more of the short story I started last night but have no idea what I’m going to do with or where it’s going. Yeah, that’s not happening today.
  5. Read more of ‘Falcons of Fire and Ice’ so I can get the review written and online as soon as possible. Neither is this. Tomorrow maybe, at work or something.
  6. Check Twitter, Facebook and Tumblr – yes, I’m slightly addicted to social media! They are on pretty much all day, so we can call that one done.

So busy day then, since I still need to eat at some point and walk the dog. Done – I was out walking for an hour. It was very bracing.

Going now, since, you know, I can lose a day on the internet given the opportunity,

Bye

Rose

My review has gone missing.

Drat it!

I started writing a review of Blackout, by Mira Grant on my break today at work (WordPress for Blackberry, brilliant app), tried to find it to finish writing it this evening, and its gone walkies.

I could have sworn I’d saved it on my phone.

Oh well, I’d better re-write it. Thank goodness I always write everything down in my notebook.

A visit to the library

I went to the library yesterday morning and had a look at the new books they’d got available. I picked up three, two from authors I’ve read before and one from an author I’ve not read at all, although I have seen her books on the library shelves.
The books were
1. ‘Kiss the dead’ Laurell K Hamilton
2. ‘Forge of Darkness’ Steven Erikson
3. ‘The falcons of fire and ice’ Karen Maitland

So that’s three more books I shall be reviewing in the next few weeks.

Bye

The myth of the double negative?

Good morning.

Something on Facebook caught my attention yesterday. It was a joke about language, something along the lines of a lecturer saying in English a double negative become a positive, in some languages a double negative is still a negative but in no language does a double positive become a negative. And then the punch line is someone says ‘Yeah, right.’

Well that got me thinking. And yes, before anyone says anything, I do know its a joke, but that’s doesn’t stop me thinking these things. Imagine going to the cinema with me, its hell I’m told.

Its a fairly common statement that two negative words make a positive statement, but that makes no sense. You don’t write or say ‘No never’ and mean ‘Yes’, it emphasises the negative meaning. And I’m certain I’ve seen somewhere, in one of the books I have about Old English that the double negative is used to emphasise the negative point, in Old English.

So why, if logically this idea makes no sense, do people continue to perpetuate it?

I have two hypotheses as to why this is.
The first involves maths and science; in these subjects it is the case that a negative number added to a negative number gives a positive number. Thus the idea is drilled in to young minds that this is the case in ALL things.
But language and maths are the same things and they don’t have the same rules, so the rules of mathematics are irrelevant when it comes to language.

My second hypothesis involves people who think that there is only one ‘correct’ way to speak/write English. Perhaps, some years ago, when mass education arrived in England, some people got sick of others saying ‘aint nowt’ or similar phrases. These are perfectly correct dialect ways negate a sentence, but they aren’t standard English. And so began the myth of the double negative. Snobbery is responsible, not logic.

I have absolutely no proof that either of theses ideas are relevant, except personal experience – I had a strong
regional accent as a child and was repeatedly told I must lose my accent and speak out of dialect (to borrow a phrase) or I’d never get anywhere in
life; the reasoning behind this? The person who told me so had been told the same thing by his teachers seventy years ago so it must be true – and logic.

So is it true that a double negative in English makes a statement positive? No, not at all. As far I am aware. Let me know if I’m wrong, I’d love to see the sources. Seriously, I would. I’m a bit strange like that.

Bye,

Rose

Local libraries

I know, two posts in a day, how unexpected!

After I finished writing my last post I had a few jobs to do before I could go to the library. I had to take a book back. Well, I just made it, they were closing the blinds, a minute more and I’d have missed them entirely.

We’re fairly lucky, I suppose, that despite the threats to close local library’s we’ve managed to keep ours, if at reduced hours. Until late last year the library was open until half seven three nights a week and until 5.30pm the other two nights, plus 9 – 2 on a saturday. It is now open 9 – 5.30 everyday and 9 – 2 on a saturday. And the next nearest is only a half hour bus ride away. So, fairly lucky.

Many communities have not been so lucky. This is terrible. I know from a lifetimes acquaintance with the local library that it is not just a place to borrow books. Its a community centre and meeting place, local notice board for clubs and societies, access to the internet, a safe place for children to do their homework, an extension to the local schools and somewhere those who might other wise be isolated can feel welcomed and included. Staffed by members of the community (mostly, here at least) and provided for the community, they are essential, especially in isolated areas.

Not long ago the library got flooded and was shut for the best part of a month. The staff put on a skeleton service in the civil hall next door and tried to carry on, but everyone was pleased when it re-opened. The building is a dodgy sixties prefab, too small for the community, which has grown so much since then. There are only two computers, constantly in demand and booked. We could do with a new, bigger and more comfortable building to house what is essentially our community centre.

But we won’t get it.

Cuts in council budgets mean that when other libraries are closing the local county council won’t spend money improving an old one, and the town council can’t afford to.

And the provincial in me wants to say that the county council has no love for my little town, despite it making significant contributions to the council’s budget, so we won’t get anything even if we need it. Yes, that feeling is fairly common, although not necessarily justified.

So, value your library, its not just a building full of books.

Bye.

Rose

Local paper

Our local paper does this section called ‘First Person’ and recently the asked for submissions to it. I’ve been thinking about what I’d write about. And then, because they are awesome, my niece and nephew provided the inspiration.

I’m going to write a 400 word article about the importance of youth groups to primary school children, email it in and hope to get it published. Wish me luck.

Rosemarie

xXx