I’m going to be working on this for a little while; if the blog vanishes on you, sorry about that. It’ll be back!
A move to my own domain
After some thought, I decided to move my blog to my domain. I’ve had heatherdudley.com for quite some time, but mostly just had it parked, so that no one else could get it. I figured… it’s utterly ridiculous for someone of my web design background to have a parked domain.
I thought about which service I’d like to use, and figured that a wordpress site would be good; it’s often cited as a requirement in job listings these days, and I’ve heard nothing but good things about it, so I figured what the hey. So here I am; I even imported the last five years of blogging.
So I’ll be working on moving my subscriber list (pitiful though it may be) soon, so if you end up here, you’re not crazy, it’s still me, I’ve just shifted things over.
Now, to find a good temporary theme until I can design my own.
>Progress and ruminations
>I’ve been working steadily on Hacker Dragon. I’m up to 21,667 words as of this very moment. I feel like that’s a truly respectable total, since this time last week, I only had about 13,000 or so. I’m finding it’s hard to get back into Drakan’s head; I’m not sure what the magic mix was when I first wrote her. She’s there, I can *feel* her, but I haven’t quite reconnected with her.
>Picking up an old WIP
>Mom cancelled on us, so I’ve got the whole day to myself. I’ve made two positive steps towards being actually productive.
2) Just now, I opened Scrivener. I will follow this action by stopping to tweet about the action I just took, then make a blog post about it.
Hey, it’s forward motion, right?
I think after that, I will move all of the text from the word doc I’ve got this saved on into Scrivener.
I’ve been trying to think of a new title, though. This piece is about a genetically enhanced computer geek who takes over a corporate network (think Shadowrun, but without most of the magical stuff.) just before another hostile organization takes over. This is literal hostility, including guns. She lets them take over, makes an arrangement with the leader of that organization, and is now playing cat-and-mouse with him. Romance ensues.
Quick bit of worldbuilding: Post apocalyptic thing, now humanity has a dual animal nature. Some are naturally more strong than others. Corporations rule the world (nah, I wasn’t influenced by anything cyberpunk. I PROMISE.) Most people are regular animals of various sorts, some are myths. MC is a dragon, leader of organization is tiger (smilodon fatalis, to be exact.) It comes off less cheesy than it sounds, I promise.
Anyway, It’s a sci-fantasy thing, heavier on the sci than the fantasy.
Current working title REALLY sucks: Hacker Dragon. Not the kind of thing I’d be proud to show off in public. So I have to figure out something different. I’d like this to be my CreateSpace submission, so I need a non-shitty title.
Now to figure one OUT. Any suggestions?
But I think I’ll start working on my scrivener file first, so that I’m making more progress towards actually writing, rather than procrastinating with minutiae.
>Brace yourself…
>I just turned off comment moderation. Blogger finally added some kind of spam detection; I generally like Google’s spam algorithms, so I’m going to give it a try.
>Revising and Procrastination
>So I still haven’t started writing yet. I think I’ve learned to take procrastination to all new heights, these days. I’ll pick strawberries with the kids, play farmville, warhammer, go to the grocery store, but write? Heck no.
>Clever spammers
>While checking the spam filter on the Script Frenzy forums, I came across the strangest thing.
It was a polite, nicely formatted response to the spam filter feedback form:
Kindly post my comment I’m not posting spam.
Thank you very much and more power..God bless..
Respectively Yours,
Gaile Seive
This isn’t unusual; I often get confused, amused, or even angry feedback from users whose posts have been erroneous flagged as spam. This one struck me as odd though, because of the content of the post. It was responding to a question about asbestos and heat… this person posted the following on the thread:
“Asbestos is said to be carcinogenic and it contains variety ofchemicals that enhance cancer cells.They may also come in differentforms and as they have said this may be the result of potential toxinsthrough inhalation,ingestion and even through food intake andcigarette smoking.That’s why this is very dangerous for mostmen.Prostate cancer may be one of the outcome cause of this asbestoschemicals.There’s a new review that suggests screening and catchingprostate cancer early will not stop fatalities from the disease. Theresearch culled data from 2 decades of records, and it found thatindividuals who got regular screenings for cancer of the prostate werediagnosed with and perished from the disease at the same rate as thosewho did not get regular cancer of the prostate screenings. This mighthelp you decide what method is best for you when you sign up for apersonal unsecured loan for professional medical costs.”
Notice that last line? Yeah. It WAS spam. For a loan! How strange that the spammer took the time to politely tell me they weren’t spamming!
Clever, clever spammers. You are no match for my spam stomping powers! And for those who are curious, yes, I banned this very polite spammer. With prejudice.
>Spanish Engrish
>On the recommendation of a friend, I went and picked up some real Mexican hot chocolate… more specifically, handmade salvadoran chocolate tablets.
The short of it: milk, chocolate, and a cinnamon stick… boil and serve.
That’s not the fun part. The best part were the directions. This is a direct transcription:
1) Dissolve one tablet of Salvadoran chocolate in two cups of milk or water.
2) Cook moderate fire. Constantly revolve.
3) Boil for one minute and retire of fire.
4) Serve hot
How awesome is that. You couldn’t make this up if you tried.
>Spanish Engrish
>On the recommendation of a friend, I went and picked up some real Mexican hot chocolate… more specifically, handmade salvadoran chocolate tablets.
The short of it: milk, chocolate, and a cinnamon stick… boil and serve.
That’s not the fun part. The best part were the directions. This is a direct transcription:
1) Dissolve one tablet of Salvadoran chocolate in two cups of milk or water.
2) Cook moderate fire. Constantly revolve.
3) Boil for one minute and retire of fire.
4) Serve hot
How awesome is that. You couldn’t make this up if you tried.
>Teeny tiny notebooks
>
While shopping for party supplies today for my 3 year old’s birthday part tomorrow, I discovered something that quite literally made me squee in the store.