ANALize this!

I have Google Analytics installed on this here blog. It's not like I get a lot of traffic on it, and most of the traffic I do get I'm convinced happens along by accident. But it's kind of neat to see the countries that the hits come from. (So far I have hits from Canada, Australia, the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, Romania, and Brazil.) I also get a kick out of seeing the search terms that send people to my neck of the woods. My favorite so far is 'ass liking'. Seriously. The scary part is that seven people have found their way here by searching it. And I know my blog only comes up because of the title a few posts back - "Getting my ass kicked. And liking it" - but still. I can't wait for the first time I turn up a hit for the word 'discipline'. Yeah, baby!

We were talking about writing, I swear...

Things that, when taken out of context, sound so much worse...
Me to T.Max: Discipline, baby. Let me show you it.

Inspirational Writing Quote of the Day

Me to T.Max: Don't sell yourself short. Or I'll kick your ass.

Yup. I got my ass kicked. And other news.

So... yeah. I got up to page 47, with four days left, and then I got the flu.

I probably wouldn't have finished anyway.

I am happy to say, though, that I got my first ever short story accepted to an online magazine called New Voices in Horror. I'll post the link when it goes up at the end of June.

Getting my ass kicked. And liking it.

Yup. Script Frenzy is kicking my ass, although not nearly as bad as I thought it would. The first couple of days were absolute hell. I have a bunch of different books on screenwriting, and they all seemed to have something different to say on the subject of formatting. The left margin starts at 1 inch from the left edge. The left margin starts at 1.5. Dialog starts at 2.6 inches from the left edge. Dialog starts at 3.1 inches. Character names go at 3.2 inches. Character names go at 4.1. And that's only the differences between 2 of the books. Oh yeah, and let's not forget the fact that certain lines can only be so many characters long, and some books say to put in some camera directions, while others say you shouldn't direct the director, and to keep sluglines down to the bare bones. Aaagh.

Then some kind soul came along and told me about a wonderful program called CeltX. It's a program designed specifically for writers of plays - screenplays, stage plays, radio plays, whatever kind your little writing heart desires - and it does all the formatting for you. It also exports to .pdf files, which is sweet. Oh yeah, and the best part is, it's totally free, unlike Final Draft, which requires you to part with over $200 of your hard-earned money. No, wait... actually that's not the best part. That's the second-best part. The best part is that I'm on page 19 so far, and although, yes, I am behind, I have a pretty good idea where I'm going with the plot, and now that I'm used to the software, I think I might actually have a shot at finishing within the allotted time. Woohoo.

I am lost for words...

Maybe not. This is absolutely ridiculous. The article, over on writersweekly.com, has the full details, but the basic jist of it is that Amazon.com is about to make a whole bunch of authors eat some serious shit just so their books can remain available to order. As far as I'm concerned it's a complete load of bullshit, and I will never buy anything from them again.

"So bad it's brilliant..."

That was Tiffany's assessment of my Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest entry, so I thought I would share it:

Dick’s face paled – like the face of a corpse that has lain on its back for hours and is well into the first stages of rigor, and the blood, having stopped circulating a good while before, has now settled to the bottom, the way the pulp settles to the bottom in a carton of extra-pulp orange juice – as the woman he'd been wooing for most of the evening smiled, revealing what, on closer inspection, turned out to be fangs, and he had just enough time to hear her say, “I want to suck your– ” before he passed out cold.

I don't suffer from insanity...

Yeah, right. Who am I kidding?

Every year since 2004 I have tortured myself with, and failed miserably at, NaNoWriMo, and yet, every year, I keep right on doing it. The challenge is to write 50,000 words in 30 days. The idea behind the challenge is that in order to make that word count, you have to turn off your inner editor and give yourself permission to write crap (the theory being that it may be crap, but at least it's finished crap and you can always edit it later). I know it's doable. I have friends who've done it. But no matter how detailed my plan of attack, no matter how revved up I am beforehand, I can never turn off my inner editor enough to churn out the amount of words per day that are required to win. And when it gets right down to it, I'm okay with that. Because at least a part of me believes that if you start with crap, then crap is what you're going to end up with. So, I torture myself strictly for the fun of it.

This year I'll be torturing myself twice. Not only will I be participating in NaNo in November, but starting April 1st I will also be taking part in Script Frenzy. I find there's something vaguely suspect about a contest that begins on April Fool's Day, but whatever. The challenge here is to write a 100-page script (your choice of movie screenplay, television script, or stage play) in 30 days. So far I have a main character and a vague idea of what I'm going to do with him. That's it. But somehow 100 pages seems a lot more doable than 50,000 words, and it can't hurt to give it a shot. What the hell. Even if I don't win, insanity can still fun.

I challenge YOU, and you and you and you...

I don't think there are actually that many yous reading this, but I've always believed that it's the thought that counts, so here goes...

Go here and you will find The Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest. It is named for Edward George Bulwer-Lytton, the dude responsible for writing the now infamous words, "It was a dark and stormy night...", and the challenge is to see who can come up with the best worst first line to an imaginary novel. The official contest deadline is April 15, and you may submit as many entries as you'd like.

So I have a new blog...

And I have absolutely nothing to say.