Its all about the he said she said

There are two things you should know about me.

Thing 1: I have an addiction to office supplies.

Thing 2: I have a limited short-term memory and go crazy if I think of something I might need to remember for later.

Thus, the avalanche of little notebooks I keep in my house, my purse, my car... To write down random stuff.

One of the things I did in one of them is write down a collection of words. Words I like, words I find most descriptive under a specific circumstance, words that describe other words.

In this post are the list of words I collected to be used in place of said. It is a list I both hate and worship (check out tomorrow's post to see why). I've found these words in books, online, by listening to people talk (TV, radio, humans).

My suggestion is not to take this list with a grain of salt, but to use it the way one would use salt.

There are a number of different salts to be used in cooking: sea salt, kosher salt, rock salt, celtic salt etc. They may all add a special something to a dish that plain old table can't quite achieve, but they all serve the same purpose - to make the food taste salty. The amount of salt added to a dish are not exponentially related to its deliciousness, regardless of the quality or variety.

Consider yourself warned ;)

contested cited discussed asked appeased

continued claimed disclosed replied approved

contradicted coaxed disrupted blinked argued

chimed contributed comforted divulged began

articulated cooed commanded echoed sputtered

assented counseled commented elaborated assumed

countered communicated emphasized assured coughed

crabbed cackled cajoled calculated called

caroled cautioned challenged craved cracked

cried criticized croaked cautioned crooned

cross-examined chanted cursed charged chattered

chided chipped in chimed in chirped choked

chortled complained conceded concluded concurred

confessed confided confirmed consented consoled

crowed drawled droned debated decided

declared decreed delivered defended demanded

demurred denied denounced described determined

dictated directed disclaimed enjoined enumerated

equivocated estimated enunciated exhorted exaggerated

exclaimed expiated explained exploded exposed

faltered foretold fumed gagged inquired

insinuated volunteered ventured prompted supplied

thundered hesitated added agreed corrected

whispered hesitated abjured accused acknowledged

added addressed admitted admonished advised

advocated affirmed agreed alleged allowed

alluded announced answered apologized appealed

asserted assured attested averted avouched

avowed blubbered blurted blustered boasted

boomed bragged breathed broke in brought forth

babbled baited bantered bargained barked

bawled began begged believed belittled

bellowed condescended

• I don't know how to put a table in blogger. If anyone knows how, I'd appreciate a heads up - I'll give this list a bit of a tidy (the OCD in me goes crazy that the list isn't alphabetical and perfectly lined up).

Hit me

I'm out of town so here is a little something I've jacked from my facebook page ;)

Original post date: Sep 22, 2008.

I had a list of things I wanted to do on our trip to Vegas (if you say Las Vegas, people will ask you if its your first time visiting. Saying Vegas is cooler). Some of the things were from my then-bucket list. Some are strictly Vegas-specific:

• See a Vegas wedding. (Didn't happen)

• Convince the happy couple to let my husband and I be witnesses. (Self-explanatory)

• See the Freemont Street Experience. (Pretty cool)

• Say, "Hit me," while gambling. (Still have no idea where this applies)

• Say, "Let it ride while gambling. (This phrase also escapes me)

• Wander through a CSI set. (No dice)

• Meet someone famous. (Actually happened - Alexis Bledel - Gilmore Girls, Hello, MY FAVORITE SHOW!)

• Go up the Eiffel Tower, see the Bellagio water show. (Did both at the same time)

• Have a daiquiri in one of those Eiffel tower drink bottles. (Stood in line for half an hour. Didn't have ID on me. Got my husband to buy it. Because I didn't have ID, the guy wouldn't sell to my husband. Had to go into the Paris casino and skulk around while he waited at the bar (on advice from the street vendor). Never did finish it. Had the world's worst headache the next day. Avoid at all costs!)

• Go to White Castle (have an adventure to do so if necessary). (Didn't go. Another trip to the States will be required for this purpose alone)

• Buy air. (The more I think about it, the shadier it seems - didn't do it, no regrets)

• Pull a crank on a slot machine. (Some of the older machines have cranks, but they don't pull. I suppose they're not fast enough to meet most people's gambling needs)

• Ride on a roller coaster (Did this. My first one. Pretty much forced my husband to go on it with me. As the man behind us yelled, "There's no time to be scared!" - As we crashed around and spun upside-down for no good reason, "Who's idea was this? That's right, it was yours; you big, dumb idiot," which I later shared with my husband. A passerby though I was verbally abusing him. My bad. I clung on so tight, I had bruises on my shoulders and shins. Still can't sleep on my side or cross my ankles)

• See someone being arrested. (While waiting in line to take the bus back to the hotel from Freemont Street, a man jaywalked in front of a cop car. The cop got out, started patting him down, wandered around writing things down, then handcuffed the guy. Thats when the state trooper showed up. There was a minor dispute between the two law-enforcers. Then another cop showed up. We got on the bus. A man asked the bus driver, "So, is it really an $1100 fine for jaywalking?" - The bus driver replied, "Oh yeah, Las Vegas drivers are crazy. We'll kill you," (WE'LL??!!!???), "Its a $200 fine. I hit a guy once. I paid it. He was here, then he was over there. Its your fault if you get run over. $200 is nothing. I paid it.")

• See Elvis. (I walked by him on the street. He was in street clothes, but it was obviously The King)

• See a pimp. (This wasn't on my list but I did see one wandering around a casino. It was either a pimp or Kid Rock. Hard to tell the difference.)

Thats all I can think of for now. Its such a funny city.

Eviction notice

Without a doubt, the current economic situation has lead to some terrible outcomes, the worst being lost jobs for people in Canada and the US.

There are a few (selfish) things I did not expect would come of it. For example:

• The bubble-bath section of the drug store has undergone a major downsize. I don't even know if my favorite bubble-bath is made anymore.

• Book publishing is down. If I am being realistic, my chances of ever having a book published are 0, or at least very poor (the last thing anyone should ever accuse me of is being realistic). ;)

• Skyrocketing hay prices. Prices are so high, the stable where I kept my equine pals (from now on referred to as The Lions - a pet name I gave them when we were young and wild) will no longer be operating. That's right folks, my boys are being evicted.

Thus begins my search for a new home for The Lions.

This new home should include some or all of the following:

• Minimal mud over extended periods of time.

• Room to run.

• Sturdy barricades to ensure The Lions will remain in their allocated "room to run."

• Shelter from wind, rain, sun.

• Delicious, dust-free hay.

• Experts on-site who will give friendly, helpful advice / drive me to the hospital if I fall off while riding and forget who I am.

• Absence of experts who give snotty quips that make me feel bad about my horses / myself (ex. "Well, you can tell your horses are used to getting their own way..." - Of course they are used to getting their way. I'm a student who has no time to ride and am not that great of a rider when I do. Some things are best left quietly ignored - like me lying in the dirt.)

• Sunshine and lollipops as accepted forms of payment.

Updates to follow :)

Fishies!

Meet my new friends - The Goldfish Quints! - stage left (I had 'stage right' earlier but my artistically inclined sister informed me stage left and right is based on where the actor is standing, not what the audience is seeing *insert vague memory of drama club here*).

What fun :)

If you never see a blog post on this site again, its because every time I sign in, I spend all my time feeding the fish.

What's that? You want in on the fun? Use your mouse and click anywhere in the box and feed will appear.

My tension has dropped 50%. Easily. I would display my tension level drop using a metrics bar but for the life of me, I can't figure out how to add the darn things. Tension levels rise when I try to add one. Again, this would be visible on the metrics bar ;).

Any suggestions for fish names?

All writing is good writing

All writing is good writing is good writing. It may not all be fit for human consumption, but I feel it has its place.

The fear of bad writing should not hold us back. It should propel us forward. How can we learn without trying?

How can we get better without trying?

We need to try.

Courage comes from the ability to face one's fears and to move onward in spite of them.

At times, I don't know what is more frightening, the fear that the writing will never be good enough or the fear that once the snarls and rough edges are cleared away, something shiny will emerge. Once you are holding this object in your shaking paw, what do you do with it?

But it doesn't matter if we don't try. If we won't practice flapping our wings, we will never learn to fly.

On Villains

Here is my thinking: Villains are not villains because they were born to be evil / forced to become evil. Or, at least, not all are.

Not all villains are even evil, but there is something about them we need to be the "bad guy."

People have different thought patterns, chemical makeup, etc. There are psychological disorders behind people doing terrible things. Control issues, products of one's childhood and so forth.

Thus, there is room for a villain who does terrible things because they have sadistic tendencies, but I don't think every villain should be so for this reason. There can be more than one villain in a story. There can be more than one type of story written.

As intriguing as the character arc of the hero / heroine can be the character arc of the villain. A villain who does a terrible thing because they feel they must can be more sinister than a villain doing a terrible thing because they think it is fun. There is that added sense of urgency. That feeling of desperation. It isn't the same as a villain embarking on our equivalent of an exciting trip to Vegas.

A trip to Vegas could be just as fun as a trip to Atlantic City. The villain doing something they must does not have the option of going to Atlantic City. They have their ticket to Vegas in hand. One way. Once they get there, they have no time for the strip. Strictly a business trip.

There is something about that emotional stake to up the level of depravity in a villain. I don't mean they have to do something absolutely crazy and insane to be a villain (I don't know who this villain is, they might be the quiet, sneaky type). I mean their intentions should be believable.

In some ways, there can be layers to who the villain is as well. Our hero could be someone else's villain. Mr. Rochester keeping his insane wife locked up in the attic is the one example that always pops in my mind. We love him. Jane Eyre loves him. I bet his insane wife is of a different opinion, even if he has her locked up for what he considers "her own good".

For all I know, I am someone's villain. You are someone's villain. Each person, trying to go through life the best they can is a villain to another.

Realistically, I am probably far too boring to be another person's villain, but how do I know? How do I know my trying to do good in my life isn't inadvertently harming another?

Personally, I have a bit of a flair for the dramatic, so my villains tend to be more outgoing with their evil-doing than the everyday inadvertent villain, but I still like to think about their motivation. They likely possess a general sense of what is right and wrong. They may feel bad about what they are doing. Would they feel worse if they did "the right thing"?

Why?

Every good story needs a ninja

I remember reading somewhere about the ninja cliche. I can't remember it verbatim, but it goes something along the lines of: unless you are writing a story about ninjas, don't toss one in just to make things exciting. Ninjas are exciting. Boring stories cannot be made so by the addition of a ninja.

Here is where I think every good story needs a ninja: during the writing process.

That's right folks, there are times when you must set aside the love your own writing to sharpen that katana.

How many of your adverbs actually need that -ly ending? How many adverbs are truly necessary? Slash away.

How many times does the first word of one of your sentences start with (verb)ing? Hit one with a blow dart.

Do you use the same word repeatedly? In the same passage? In the same paragraph? In the same sentence? Knock those spare words away with your nunchakus (numb-chuks to the Napoleon Dynamite fans in the crowd).

At first, it is difficult. Handling so many weapons with ease is not simple. Every now and then, there is a risk of getting cut and no one likes getting cut. No one likes the pain, but its like ripping off a band-aid. The longer you leave it on, the more gross, fuzzy, sticky stuff gets left behind (I am a firm believer in the fact that there is no painless way to remove a band-aid, with the exception of a public swimming pool).

Personally, I hate doing it. I especially like the -ly verbs. LOVE THEM! But I don't need them. Carving away the crutch verbs and words is a bit of work, but there is that wonderful sense of accomplishment once it is done.

Know it is possible.

After all, the most important weapon to the ninja is not a physical object at all. It is their mind.