Month: April 2008

PRE-POST WARNING: This entry contains a large portion of unedited angst, and should be read only by those who have a sturdy constitution and are not easily moved to nausea. If you begin to experience dizziness, depression, irritation of the eyes or brain, fits of scoffing, flare-ups associated with offense-taken, a desire to whine back at the current whiner, or an uncontrollable urge to retort in defense of the below-mentioned subject, please immediately cease reading and consult your physician/therapist immediately. WordPress is completely absolved of any responsibility for injuries to oneself or others as a result of reading this angsty, b*tchy, moany, unfortunately very “English major”-y post.

I’m tired of English professors telling me “not to give up on my dreams” when I tell them I’m not going to pursue a graduate English degree. I don’t like the way they think they know what my dreams are, or the way they think I’m not following them by not getting a Masters or PhD in English. I blame myself for their lack of information which leads them to these conclusions. Continue reading “This is the stuff “dreams” are made of” →

As many times as I’ve told non-writers what it’s like to do this with any kind of aspirations for success, I keep coming back to the same phrase: “Writing is a bipolar profession.” When you sell something, you’re ecstatic and are on top of the world (even if you don’t get any money–doesn’t matter). When you get rejected (which is often), you feel like roadkill. There’s really no other way to describe it. I know I’ve read about some writers who can send in tons of stories and claim they don’t feel disappointed when they get that polite little “Thanks, but no thanks” note after a few days or a few months. It makes me wonder if they are at all invested in the stuff they write. I’m not saying they should think their stories are the best in the whole world, but when you send something out that you really like, doesn’t it hurt when someone says it’s no good, or, no good for them? One place, sure, you can shrug that off as just a “bad fit,” but more than three times on one story? More?

There was one professor out at UH that could say he had one story that had been rejected 63 or some odd times. At what point do you have to ask “Is the story just bad?” I’m starting to think that I lack that desperately important skill authors are supposed to have: a fail-proof shit detector. What if I just can’t tell if something I write is good or not? What if my detector is all messed up, like when you take a test and think you did well, only to get back the discouraging C-? How do you compensate for that? Is it possible?

I guess this is why you have to write for yourself as though no one else mattered. At least that way you’ll be writing stuff you like, even if everyone else thinks it sucks.

And I guess you just have to keep going. Keep subbing. Keep taking the punches. Keep telling yourself that you don’t completely suck, no matter what everyone else seems to think. They say success in writing is largely perseverance.

Uphill battle, all the way.

Well, you know what? Bring it.

So it’s been a little while since the last post. Things have just gotten so suddenly busy–well, at least they were, now they’re temporarily calming down a bit–all my down time was consumed. This all started last Sunday, when I realized I did not get enough research done to write my Faulkner and Mississippi paper. I’m a good B.S.er, don’t get me wrong, but B.S.ing research papers requires some kind of input of data which can then be digested and passed out as that A-grade B.S. In other words, I needed *something* to work with.

This leads me to Monday. After work and class (9.00am-8.30pm), I stopped by the library and checked out The Unvanquished, which several sources had suggested was a good place to start with Faulkner’s fictional Mississippi. It was also one of the shorter works, considering I only had a week to read it and write a ten page paper on it. I will say one thing about Faulkner, after wading through James Joyce’s Ulysses, he’s a piece of cake to read. It was actually almost enjoyable, perhaps only because every sentence wasn’t an allusion to something else.

After work on Wednesday, I went to the library and photocopied ~60-70 pages of reference material. It was a long and exhausting day. Then I returned and did some of the reading (but not much).

Thursday, I realized I was not going to be writing the paper before the weekend. I had been shooting to get it done by Friday because Andy and I were going home for Passover, but it just wasn’t going to happen. So I resolved myself to having to pull the paper together on Sunday morning, and left it at that. Packed up lightly that night, and on Friday, we went home. Continue reading “Breathing Time” →

Mondays are always long, but despite it being long, it was actually–overall–a good day!

Work started off a little odd. I don’t know if it was me or something in the air, but I just didn’t feel all that wanted. Like I was just irritating people, even I wasn’t doing anything wrong. But when I started working on the Author’s Page for the publicity manager, everything was great. I was nervous about what she’d think, because I know–truly–only very basic HTML, and when I’ve worked on web projects for other people (particularly people not doing the HTML themselves some) I’ve noticed that they seem to want the sky without realizing what is reasonably achievable with basic HTML. But she loved it! She was so excited about what I’d done so far, and she went to talk to a number of managers to see about finding an intern who could continue to do what I’ve been doing once I’ve graduated. (Personally, I wouldn’t mind if they outsourced the author pages to me, which I could probably do from wherever.) In her words, “I don’t want this to stop!” She was so happy, and that made me happy, and I do like what I’ve come up with, if I do say so myself. I really love working with HTML. Maybe someday I’ll learn CSS and Java.

So that made me feel good.

And now, I must go read!

So I was not nearly as productive today as I was hoping I might be. I was intending to finish my 10 page term paper for my Monday class (it’s due the 21st), because I’m going home this next weekend for Passover, but unfortunately, I flopped. I did get some research (minor) done, at least enough to realize that I needed to read something by Faulkner so I can at least B.S. a little smoother. I picked The Unvanquished because it actually has a lot to do with the subject I’m working on. I got that, and I also grabbed Essays, Speeches, and Public Letters by Faulkner, so I can get a little more grasp of his personal views on things outside of what he displays in his fiction. None the less, that means I’m going to have to REALLY scramble to get this paper done this week. Like, massive, uber scrambling. I’ve got to read the whole novel, figure out what angle I’m going to discuss this subject from, and then hammer it out sometime this week when I have no time. Should be fun. I’m hoping I don’t have to write it at home on Saturday, because that- that would not be fun. But I will if I have to.

Other than that, it’s been pretty uneventful. Did manage to get my laundry done, though, so that was at least a minor personal accomplishment. Have work and then class tomorrow until 8:30. Not looking forward to that at all.

Shoot. I need to write my weekly report for the Internship. Blast, I thought I had gotten everything generally done on time, but whatever. I guess I’ll turn in the hard-copy on Tuesday like I always do. At least I’ve been keeping up with my work log some. That’ll save me at least a little time. At work, I’ve got to start designing an author page for Susan.

But now! Time to read some Faulkner. G’night! ^_^

So I finally finished Harry Potter last night. It was good! I mean, it didn’t blow my mind, but it was a fun, enjoyable read. I do think it could have done without the epilogue, which seemed way too happy-go-lucky, but then again I do realize that she probably did it so that she wouldn’t be forced to write yet another sequel. If everything is all hunky-dory in nineteen years, likely there’s not much to talk about. But *anyhoo*! It was fun, and I did enjoy it, though I must say, I’m glad it’s all over and I can finally be finished with the series. I don’t know about you people, but I have far too short of an attention span for long series. Remember my massive failure at trying to read the Wheel of Time series? Yeah. I’m telling you, show me one book and tell me it’s the first of a 4+ series, and I pretty much guarantee I’ll put it down and not even bother. If it’s one book in a 4+ series of books with more than 500+ pages each, then I will definitely probably not bother. I always add the “probably” and “pretty much” because I do–call me naive, call me an idealist–believe that there must be some author out there who could write a 4+, 500+page/each series that I might actually enjoy and manage to get through. *Possibly.* Though I haven’t yet encountered one. I did finish the Harry Potter sequence, but you must also realize, I was in sixth-seventh grade when the first of those came out. I’ve been reading them as they came out, intermixed each year with many other books. It keeps me from losing my mind. I don’t think I’ve ever managed to get through a whole 4+/500+ series that I’ve had to start from the beginning when all the books were available.

Writing Stuff:

But speaking of series, or at least episodes, I finally posted a new chapter of The Thief Dilemma. Continue reading “Completion!” →

So we had a small fire in our apartment today. Just a small one, you know, the usual routine electric coil on the stove randomly bursting into flame. No biggie. It just scared the sh*t out of us and set the fire alarm off. YEAH! At least we managed to stop the fire pretty quick (it was actually out by the time I ran into the kitchen), turned off the stove, opened all the windows, and I stood flapping like an idiot beneath the fire alarm until it finally shut off. Thankfully, the building alarm (which would go off in all the other apartments) did not go off. Good thing, too, because it was rainy and gross out, and people would have been pretty pissed to have to stand out there until the fire department came. From past experiences with fire drills here, I get the unnerving impression that the fire department doesn’t really care if Freedom Quads burned down.

So that was exciting. ^_^

I was productive today, though! Besides almost burning the apartment down (I was boiling water at the time, believe it or not), I got my Legal Judgment assignment for Crime & Punishment in China done (hooray for me!!), which was pretty much the only thing I told myself I had to get done today. But I DID get it done, so I count that as productive. I could check it off my list.

I just deleted a whole paragraph in which I tried to be funny. You can thank me later.

The fire was pretty much the only thing of interest that happened today. My writing voice has somehow become very cynical in this entry. Interesting. I think I’ve been watching too much stand-up on Comedy Central.

Okay, so the return of The Office tonight was *fantastic*! ^_^ It was just pure, solid-gold Michael. I forgot how fun it is to squirm in social discomfort watching him and Jan’s messed up relationship. Just priceless.

Today was fairly routine. Got up, studied for a quiz in African Civilizations, and then went to class (yes, all of them). Everything went well as far as I can tell: felt capable of making comments in James Joyce, think I did pretty well on the quiz, and despite not having done any of the reading for Crime & Punishment, I actually made some hopefully helpful comments (at least I made comments, unlike some people). It was all just fine and boring, so that’s enough talk about that.

I’ve got a rough weekend ahead of me. Tomorrow, I’m hoping to finish my second Legal Judgment Assignment for Crime & Punishment (which shouldn’t be too bad), but then I start on the term paper. Normally, I wouldn’t freak out, but it’s been a while since I tried to whip off a ten page research paper, and I’m a little nervous, because I really don’t know much about my subject: Faulkner and Mississippi. I’m hoping JSTOR helps me out a lot with useful articles. I can’t imagine–after seeing how many books are on the subject in the library–that there isn’t going to be something there. But I guess I’ll just have to wait and see. Saturday is my day off, though, so I’ll probably get a chance to update then, if anything interesting happens (don’t count on it).

Writing Stuff:

Finally got around to making some of the changes to the DM-Zero Draft I’ve had humming around in my head for the last two days, or at least some of the changes. It’s been a very interesting learning process for me, doing this detailed summary draft. It has really made me examine my plotting skills and I think it’s actually working. Still trying to pin down an SF voice, and still not sure what that’s going to be. *shrugs*

In awesome news, though, my friend from Critters.org Hazel Ong has a story appearing in Sybil’s Garage right now! Go check it out, because she’s a fantastic writer and I’m so jealous of her l33t rh3t0r1c4l sk1llz. Her writing alone is worth the $5.

So today was wholly dominated by a panicked attempt to get my hands on the one reference book I needed to write my short James Joyce research paper. It’s complicated, because there’s just one book that we absolutely have to reference (as in, without it, the assignment doesn’t count), but every student in the class needs to use it. Obviously, this would be insane if the whole class needed it at once, but in fact we’re split into groups of 2-3 people. Still. Two or three people trying to get the same book sometime between Tuesday afternoon and Thursday morning is a little tight.

I got up around 7.00 this morning to try to get to the library early enough to get my hands on said book, only to arrive and discover that–as I’d feared–someone had checked it out. It’s on reserve, so it can only be gone for 24 hours, but still, that’s 24 hours I don’t have access to it. All I wanted to do was photocopy the pages. That’s it. Anyway, the librarian told me the book was supposed to be returned by 3.00 (which was when I got out of work), so I headed off to catch the bus downtown and figured I’d try to grab it after that.

I keep tabs on the status of said book all afternoon at work. See, I wouldn’t have worried, but I’m still not sure how many people are doing this particular section of James Joyce’s Ulysses. (Each group is assigned a “chapter” of Ulysses to do the in-depth reading/report on. I chose Nausicaa because I’m a Miyazaki fan, even though I knew perfectly well that this Nausicaa was not his Nausicaa. I was actually just curious about the history of the Odyssey character. Plus, I like pronouncing Nausicaa like Nah-oo-sh-ka like the king in the Miyazaki movie.) ANYWAY! So I was watching the status while I was at work, and right about 11.50, I see that the book has been returned. I think at first, “well, I can wait until I get out of work,” but then I start worrying that some other classmate is going to sweep in out of nowhere, and–thinking, because it’s there on the afternoon before the report is due, no one else could possibly want it–check the book out for 24 hours, which would leave me ultimately screwed.

So I call Andy and he agrees to go check the book out for me. He had class all afternoon, so then the challenge was getting the book to me so I could take it back to the library, copy the pages I needed, and then return it so that if there was another student who needed to access the book, they’d be able to. I felt a little bad checking it out, knowing how panicked I would have been to see it checked out again and out of my grasp, but I needed to make sure I took advantage of this opportunity. So we arranged for him to leave the book by his window (he’s on the first floor of Bleeker, so if he left his window open, I could reach in and grab the book). This worked like a charm. I got out of work around 3.00 and rode the bus back to campus, swung by his room, grabbed the book, hurried back to the library, copied the 20-odd pages I needed, and then returned the book. Hooray!

Then I came back, finished reading the chapter, read the first set of notes and then the notes I’d copied from the book, and finally–at long last and with a tremendous sigh of relief–I wrote the paper. Now it’s done, and I am no longer stressed. Have to study for a quiz tomorrow morning, and I really need to do laundry, plus I’m not going to finish my Crime & Punishment in China readings, but you know what? I did well today. It may have been crazy, and I may have had moments where I thought it wasn’t going to turn out OK, but it did, and now it’s all cool.

I cannot wait to graduate.

I am officially the worst class-cutter in the history of college. Seriously. It’s pathetic. First off, I almost never do this, so it’s not “no big deal” to me. It stirs up in me the exact same reaction as the kid, home alone, who decides to take a chance with the “after-dinner-only” cookie jar. I get giddy and nervous, and I say things like, “Should I?” with that whole “oh, I am SO BAD” grin on my face.

I told you it was pathetic.

Second, I always seem to run into the teacher whose class I’ve skipped earlier that day, and not just once, but multiple times. Just beyond that point where they could believe they’ve just had a trick of the eyes, or maybe mistook someone else for me. No. It’s blatant. I wasn’t in their class, AND I wasn’t out for any legitimate reason. I just cut their class, and I’m not even ashamed enough to try to avoid detection.

But I swear, it’s because of some conspiracy to keep the ordinarily good, rule-abiding students like myself in line, because the kids who skip all the time don’t get any crap, even when they’ve missed 3+ classes which is “apparently” when grades start dropping. Or so they say. This is a nasty trend I’ve noticed in the universities I’ve attended: hard-core scare-the-sh*t-out-of the students at the first class. Tell them you don’t take late papers, and that if anyone skips 3+ classes, they get an F forever and ever and ever. But when it really comes down to it, they do take late papers. They grade them without any point deduction. Kids skip 5+ classes and don’t seem to get any repercussions what-so-ever. The slacker kids know this. They know from the very minute they step into the class, that no matter how bad-ass any teacher sounds on the first day, it’s all a show. It’s an academic bluff, and a popular one. So popular, in fact, that the only people who forget it’s a bluff and are actually stupid enough to believe all the horror stories of how tough this class is going to be are the good kids, like myself, who actually do try to do the work and turn it in on time, or try not to miss class. I blame it on laziness, because usually I see it as too much work to skip class. Seriously. Again, I told you it was pathetic.

The truth is, I’m glad I skipped. It’s a beautiful day out. I’m a senior. This class is an elective (which makes this all the more pathetic, I think). I’ve never missed that class before.

I’ve earned it.

And if he gives me crap about it, because he saw me strolling around the humanities building all afternoon: I’ll tell him the truth. It was a rabid onset of senioritis with complications due to spring fever. I was just too happy to let class ruin it. ^_^