Friday, January 09, 2009

Because artists are lame too. . .

Good news! My qualifications for L.A.M.E. (see last post) took a nose-dive yesterday! Yay! I wrote about eight pages of a new scene. Well. . . okay, I may have written a couple of those the night before, in a desperate effort to recover from lameness and save the day. Still, eight pages is eight pages. The scene is a bit "edgier" than I had set out to write, a fact which my Facebook status yesterday can testify to: "Laini is. . . writing a scene about a naked person."

Huh. First a graverobber, then a naked person. What the heck kind of book am I writing? But don't worry: the naked person will get his comeuppance. I mean, I am not the sort to write books in which nakedness goes unpunished! Such prurience. . . I shudder.

THE NAKED SHALL SUFFER!

Wow, I sound really weird. Okay, this particular naked person might need some lesson-teaching, but that does not apply to nakedness in general. I have no agenda there. (Jim says that, speaking of nakedness, I should link you to this Sigur Ros video, wherein naked people frolic in the forest. View responsibly.)

Anyway: scene written, left at a place I'm anxious to get back to and continue. Yay! Oh, and one of my tricks for avoiding L.A.M.E.ness? Not reading fiction. Fiction exerts too powerful a pull sometimes, like a riptide. You have to swim diagonally against it to get out, and there's a good chance even that won't help. Nonfiction, even really good, parasitey nonfiction, it releases you, lets you swim safely ashore and write your own book. So, I'm holding out against fiction, at least for a few days. I have to do this sometimes, discipline myself. Especially after the bad-habit-forming and delicious last month of Cybils-reading where I basically excused myself of all other responsibilities and just read books. I must unform that habit! (Short stories are a good substitute for novels too. Their spell can be powerful, but it is cast in short little spurts.)

So, after the last post, I was sensing a need for a new L.A.M.E. seal, one for the illustrators of the world! So here it is, though I went with "artist" instead of "illustrator" to preserve the awesome acronym. The problem? There was no paintbrush icon! So I kept the quill, and added a few extras just in case: the "mad monkey," and the "zombie hunter's tools." I didn't see a cupcake icon, or maybe I'd have gone with that. You artists decide which one you like best. Oh, and this particular color scheme, it is important to note, is called "zombie hunter." I mean, what else could it be?



If you would like to play with your own seal, go HERE. It's funny how I'm still not used to the "everythingness" of the internet. I went to google images searching for a generic seal, before it occurred to me that such a thing as a "seal generator" might exist. I mean, of course someone would have made such a thing! It's like when I was wondering, as I am wont to do, how many miles away the star Betelgeuse is. I knew how many light years it was, but I didn't know how many miles were in a light year, you know? (I do know that a light year measures distance, not time, but that is the extent of the knowledge of one who was inexplicably allowed to opt out of taking physics in highschool. Why did they let me DO that? Young persons out there, learn from me. Some day you will be wondering how far away a star is, or pondering what kind of gravity other planets would have, and what factors of size or orbit might determine that, and you'll wish they had made you take physics!)

Anyway, long story short, I googled "light-speed converter" or something and found what I was looking for, and the answer is: Betelgeuse is many, many, many miles away from Earth.

That is all.

14 comments:

Kjersten said...

I join the LAME artist club. Hmmm... Maybe it says something that I am currently too "busy" reading fun blogs to get my work done! Thanks for the club, Laini.

cindy baldwin said...

Hi there! I have been a lurker on your blog for a bit, and thought I would leave a comment to tell you how much I have enjoyed both your book and your blog.

(And, for the record, right now I belong to several L.A.M.E. clubs, since I am still in my pajamas sitting on my couch curled up in a blanket and it is... nevermind, I'm not going to confess to what time it is.)

Laini Taylor said...

Hi Kjersten and Cindy! Cindy, thank you for reading my book! And I think that creative misapplication of energy is kind of an artform, but one we perfect at our own peril. . .

Years pass that way. I know.
:-)

Wyman Stewart said...

I wonder if the nudes in the forest are a splinter group? I find, even well-clothed, a forest has thorny points to make. So, if they wish to frolic nude in the woods, sounds brave to me.

Roughly speaking, light travels at 186,000 miles per second, if memory serves me well. I never got to take Physics. My high school would not let me, despite a great interest in Physics, Astronomy, and the like. My brain was dwarfed by something called Mathematics. All three are off and on hobbies. Not counting the many books out there on these subjects, you can find many websites as well. Thanks for trying to propagate some of my favorite subjects. Can't wait for you to get around to ants; they belong in your fairy world.

Okay, I am outta here before you declare me insane.

K. M. Walton said...

Sigur Ros - cool band!!

...and, I completely agree with your 'non-reading-fiction-while-writing-fiction' policy. I can't do it either.

Anonymous said...

Hi Laini! I, too, am inspired to de-lurk and proclaim my membership in the L.A.M.E. club (the author's chapter). Thanks for the nifty seal! (Although I probably shouldn't feel proud for displaying it).

I thoroughly enjoyed reading "Blackbringer", and plan to pass it on to my God-child next time we go to visit; I'm sure she'll love it!

Elizabeth O Dulemba said...

OMG Laini - I just made computer wallpaper out of these. Maybe they'll kick my bum into applying myself more...Hmmmm.
:)
e

Charlotte said...

congrats. on your eight pages!

"Prurience" is such a nice word, yet so seldom encountered.

Diandra Mae said...

I am so LAME, I spent a HUGE chunk of my time today on Facebook! argh...I'll be adopting that seal now. I'm all for the quill, since I use dip pens for my ink work. :)The monkey, I'm not sure about...is he supposed to be on my back? haha!

(I don't suppose you know the release of "Silksinger" yet? I've read a library copy of "Blackbringer", but woulf like to buy my own copy at the same time as "Silk" comes out. I LURVed your book!)

Diandra Mae said...

okay...I'm so lame, I apparently can't spell correctly.

I'd like to know the release DATE, and woulD like to buy...oy! I need to go to bed now.

Anonymous said...

Physics was my favorite science class. I took a really great anatomy/zoology class in high school too though.

Mostly I agree with you on the not reading fiction while writing fiction, but when I discipline myself to do that, reading a great work of fiction seems to recharge my creative batteries. I get great ideas from reading non-fiction, but it isn't the same. Reading fiction doesn't give me ideas. It sends me into another world, which makes it easier for me to travel in or create my own. The key, for me, is not to read fiction every day.

Laini Taylor said...

Hi Dee! I don't know the exact date for Silksinger yet, but I believe it is September. The paperback of Blackbringer is coming out in May :-)

And Myrna, I agree about fiction and nonfiction. I can never keep up the resolution not to read fiction for very long, but sometimes I must take a *little* bit of time off from it! Right now there are so many tantalizing books sitting on my nightstand, I don't think I'll be able to hold off for long!

tone almhjell said...

Sigh. Sign me up on the LAME list.

Carrie Harris said...

Of course that color scheme is Zombie Hunter. Because we zombie hunters have very specific dress codes. We're kinda like Catholic school, only different. :)