Winter Shinanigans - Slip'n'Slide

So, this afternoon, I decided to walk down to the dollar store while I waited for my mother’s hair to be done at the hairdresser. My mother needed a few things from the dollar store, and I knew that it was going to take a while, because Mom needed her hair cut, coloured, and styled.

It’s only a couple of blocks between the hairdresser and our local Dollarama, so I set out, glad that I had decided to wear my sneakers even though snow was sticking to the balls of my shoes. There’s a street, a parkinglot, an alley, and another parkinglot I have to walk across before I can reach the store.
I set out, confidant I would get there gracefully and compitantly and within a reasonable amount of time. But I hit trouble once I reached the boundaries between the alley and the last parkinglot.

This parkinglot runs up beside the Dollarama and serves to be the dollar store’s parkinglot. There is only one way to get into this parkinglot on foot if you don’t want to risk walking on the side of the road and go the long way around because there’s a metal pole fence that runs the parimeter of the parkinglot. The entrance to this parkinglot is barely wide enough to drive a super-duty pick-up truck through.

When I reach this entrance with its empty sign holder (it was probably a grocery store in the past), a pick-up truck backs out of its parking space within the parklinglot. And to my right a jeep pulls off the road and onto the alley Im standing in. Now I’m holding up two vehicles, which are waiting for me to get out of the way.

I look down at the entrance way, remembering that this parkinglot is notorious for having pool-sized potholes in the summer (though I don’t know why, but it being unpaved and covered in gravel may have something to do with it). I note that there are two potholes sitting side-by-side.

I realize I have to make a decision, and fast. The pothole on the left is a massive crater, and coated with black ice, giving it the appearance of a pit that leads to oblivion. Or death. And I can’t go around it because the little bit of snow between it and the fence is too narrow for my feet, and its the same before the little bit of ground between the potholes.

Now, the pothole on the right was just as wide as the one on the left but not as deep and was covered in snow, not ice. And the ledge between it and the fence on its right was big enough for my feet, so I decided to pass through there.

But as soon as I stepped on that ledge, it was like I was standing on a finely polished skating rink, and I began to slip. I’m pretty sure that the show I gave the passengers and drivers of the two vehicles turned out to be something like this:

I was so embarressed! But then I started to smile after I walked into the store. Yay, for winter shinanigans! lol!
(Didn't go down, though. Never slipped like that in my life.)

The Time of the Doctor

The Time of the Doctor. Christmas Special 2013. Original Airdate: December 25 2015.

I guess this could count as a movie for the Christmas Spirit Challenge I'm participating in this Christmas. Note to self: add "The Time of the Doctor" to 'Films I've Watched So Far' on my Christmas Spirit Challenge post.

Anyway, I have mixed feelings with this episode - not because it wasn't good. It was great, even! But "The Time of the Doctor" is the episode where we say goodbye to the 11th Doctor and say hello to the 12th (though we only see Peter Capaldi's Doctor for less than a minute before the episode cuts to credits).

Now, as a reminder, if you haven't watched "The Time of the Doctor" yet, I suggest you read no further. I don't want to spoil it for you!

This is a curious episode/movie/thing, whatever you want to call it. It opens with Clara Oswald (my favourite companion to date) ringing the doctor on his phone (which is located outside the TARDIS, in space) Apparently, her mother, father, and grandmother are coming over for Christmas dinner - and somehow, some way, Clara let it slip that she had a boyfriend (which she doesn't).

So in her panic, she calls up the Doctor, who's in space hovering above a strange planet surrounded by almost every alien the Doctor has had to face. (Okay, this makes this the second 2016 Sci-Fi Experiance appreciation post about a ton of aliens over a planet involving the Doctor in some way, lol).

The Doctor abandons his spot amongst all the alien ships and his TARDIS appears in the field next to Clara's apartment building.

And guess what? Clara's apartment building doesn't posess an elevator, meaning that whoever wants to visit her, or if she wants to go anywhere, they have to climb an almost never-ending staircase. And Clara's apartment is halfway up the building! I can just imagine the dread she must feel after every long school-day. Her feet may be sore and she is faced with having to climb all those stairs before she can have a chance to relax! I makes me grateful that I only have eight stairs to climb before I get to the back door of the house I'm in now.

This episode induced a lot of bittersweet feelings inside of me. There was humor and there was war. We learned that the planet he had been hovering over before Clara called him was, in fact, Trenzalore, the planet where Clara jumped into the Doctor's time stream and scattered herself all over time and space in order to protect him from the Inteligence, but way back in time before it was converted into a planet-sized graveyard.

And because the Doctor was there, defending the town called Christmas, Trenzalore probably never became that graveyard.

Points I liked about this episode:
- We got to see an almost fatherly-side of the Doctor because all the children in Christmas looked up to him.
- I got a chuckle out of the wooden cyberman with the flame-thrower strapped it its forearm. Well, that was smart - not. lol
- It tied up a lot of mysteries - we found out why the TARDIS suddenly exploded in "The Pandorica Opens"/"The Big Bang", where the Silence came from, and why Trenzalore was so important.
- I liked Handles, the cyberman head. Handles was the Doctor's closest "friend" for three hundred of the years he was on Trenzalore. He got to see one last sunrise and reminded the Doctor to patch the phone through the TARDIS' console before he finally died.

Points I didn't like about this episode:
- Seeing the 11th Doctor so close to death from old age. He was the first Doctor I was introduced to, so he was my favourite. Props to the makeup department for making the character's age look so real on the actor!
- The fact that the "Church of the Papal Mainframe" considered itself a church when all it seemed to be was a nudist colony ship that was militaristic in nature and used religious-themed codewords. They are also the Silence, and I never really liked the Silence anyway (since they were trying to kill the Doctor, caused Time to explode, and terrorised practically everyone since no one could see them and remember them once they looked away).

Other than that, is was a pretty good episode/movie. Now I can finally watch the escapades of the 12th Doctor!

The Pandorica Opens & The Big Bang

Last night, my family and I figured out how to hook up my Wii U to our netflix account, and we spent some time watching Doctor Who before my brother had to go to bed.

This is a short appreciation post for the two episodes I watched in the light of the 2016 Sci-Fi Experiance.

For the longest, longest time I wondered what was up with the episode "The Pandorica Opens". And for the longest time, I wondered why the Doctor kept calling Rory Williams "Rory the Roman". I finally got my answer last night.

Now, before you read any further, if you don't want to read any spoilers or if you haven't watched anything to do with the 11th Doctor yet, I would suggest you don't read any farther. After all, it's spoilers, sweetie.

"The Pandorica Opens" opens with Vincent Van Gogh writhing on the floor of his room, on death's door, screaming. Turns out, he had a dream where he saw the TARDIS exploding, heralding the end of reality. It both terrifies and confuses him. And he paints it as what seems to be his last painting. (I don't know very much about Van Gogh's role in the Whoniverse, honestly).

This episode was facinating, and together with "The Big Bang", paints a story of how they got Rory back after he fell out of the universe in a previous episode (which I must have skipped, because I have no recollection of Rory being erased from reality). One day, when me and my family have unlimited internet again, I am going to rewatch 11th's era again. Or, at least, I will watch the episodes I haven't watched yet.

"The Big Bang" explains how they fix reality after the TARDIS explodes. In "The Pandorica Opens", it showed how the Pandorica (I think it was the Pandorica) controled the numerous Roman soldiers which Rory had brought under Stonehenge (where the Pandorica was) and Rory as well, revealing that Rory and the Romans were actually plastic replicas of themselves and that they have guns in their hands. Guns in their hands.

The Pandorica manages to gain control of Rory and makes him shoot her with his hand-gun, so she dies. The Doctor's been locked in the Pandorica because, as it turns out, it was built to lock him away. But...well...if you've watched the episodes, you know how it turns out, and if you haven't...well - spoilers. If I told you the whole story, then you wouldn't want to watch it then, hmmm?

Points I liked about these two episodes:
- River Song managed to convince a whole leigon of Roman soldiers that she was Cleopatra (even though Cleopatra was dead by the time the majority of the first episode took place).
- The oldest words in the universe turned out to have been written by River Song. "Hello Sweetie".
- Turns out River Song and the Doctor can ride horses at a full-on gallop. Amy - not so much.
- I loved, loved, loved, loved the fact that Rory waited for Amy for 2000 years! The mythos built around him and the Pandorica was practically romantic!

Points I didn't like about these two episodes:
- The promotion of the Big Bang.
- How lonely Earth seemed without stars in the sky.

The Pigpen Cipher

As I have heard - and have been told many, many times, research is a good thing when you want to write a novel. Most of the time, I go, "Pfft, yeah right," and plung right into building my story and writing it.

Recently, I have been sucked into the Sherlock fandom, though I've only watched the first three episodes and don't have the money to buy any more through the Google Play store on my phone. The only reason I think I caved and started watching the show was because I kept hearing that it was very well done, and that I heard that Steven Moffat had something to do with it. I like what Moffat did to Doctor Who, another one of my favourite shows, so curiosity eventually got the better of me, especially after I saw production photos of Sherlock and John Watson dressed up as their Victorian counterparts.

Anyway, I'm getting to my point. On Sherlock's website, http://www.thescienceofdeduction.co.uk/, based on the website Sherlock has on the show, the world's only consulting detective has been being plauged with hidden messages, two of which I couldn't even hope to answer despite the hints that were hidden in the message.

I was finally able to solve the third message, the most current one, which was comprised of a series of shapes and dots. This is where the Pigpen Cipher legend I have displayed on this post comes in.

"SHERLOCK I HAVE FOUND YOU."

 

Talk about ominous, or what? Makes me wonder if Mr. Anonymous is after Sherlock for more than amusement through bugging him...

 

Anyway, I've come to alert you to the wonders of a cipher I've never heard before! If I can ever get my behind in gear, I might just get to use this cipher in a mystery novel before I die. :P

Introducing: The Mysteries of Eldûr - Adelle Baker and the Missing Title

"The important thing is to not stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existence. One cannot help but be in awe when he contemplates the mysteries of eternity, of life, of the marvelous structure of reality. It is enough if one tries merely to comprehend a little of this mystery each day."

~ Albert Einstein

 

So, I come to you with the news of a new idea for a novel - one borne of my sudden re-obsession with The Hobbit, and Middle-Earth in general. Inspiration hit me like a tsunami while I was watching The Hobbit: the Unexpected Journey.

 

Suddenly, I found myself sucked into the deep recesses of my mind, where I was walking down the street of a town like Bree - but it was decidedly not Bree. I remember wondering what it would be like if there was a mystery to solve in a fantasy world, one without help from magic...

 

And just like that, I was back in reality with a new idea that's slowly been growing. Let me introduce you to a few characters that have come knocking to my mental door:

 

Adelle Baker - protagonist - age: 24 - denizen of Earth. Adelle somehow finds herself in the world of Eldûr, a world similar to Earth and bound by nearly all the same laws of physics. She has a Bachelor's Degree in creative writing and has training in office administration, and is down in her luck in her search for a job.

 

Côlter Dénéde - deuterotagonist - age: undetermined - denizen of Eldûr. Pronounciation: (call-ter day-nay-de). Occupation: undetermined, hovering over the choice of 'ranger'. Côlter is half elf, half man from a settlement called Eldain, which was somehow destroyed when he was twenty (still contemplating how it was destroyed).

 

Thorain Xildûrn - extra character - age: undetermined - denizen of Eldûr. Pronounciation: (Thor-rain Zeel-dern). Occupation: undetermined. Thorain is a dwarf from the dwarf kingdom of Unaline in the north, and the trusted welder of Moljnir, the hammer of the line of Xiline.

Note: Thorain popped into my head when I contemplated the silliness of what monkeywrench would be thrown into my story if a character with 'Thor' in his name had a hammer named 'Moljnir'. lol

 

King [name yet to be found] - extra character/unsure that he's going to be in book/might be mentioned - king of kingdom-yet-to-be-named, which is where the novel takes place. He may be mentioned... but for some reason he looks like Benedict Cumberbatch in my head.

 

The plot of the mystery is still under development, but it might have something to do with a large diamond roughly shaped like an apple, or maybe a crown that was stolen... yep. Still in development.

 

I'll provide frequent updates if this idea gets off the ground. And I hope it will because I really like the idea.

Guilt

Have you ever encountered one of those moments where you realized you've realized that you have made a terrible mistake?

I have. I experienced this less than hour ago when I stepped into a gas station and attempted to purchase a Google Play card and found that I had already depleted most of the money I had earned while Christmas shopping in the city. I didnt realize that they couldn't take the card back when my debit card declined the purchase.

Now the woman behind the counter had to pay for a card she probably can't use! I'm asking myself over and over about wht I had to go and try and buy that card. I can inlt pray for forgiveness and that the woman knows someone who can use the card!

I felt I had to write this down in order to get this off my chest. I feel like such a horrible person. What would you do if you were in my situation, where you have no cash, no credit card, and only a debit card that doesn't have enough money on it?

2016 Sci-Fi Experiance

Art by Chris Goff

 

 

Sci-Fi Experiance

Host: Stainless Steel Droppings (sign up) (review site)

Duration: December 2015 - January 2016

Number of books: I hope to read at least five! Sci-Fi is my favourite genre of novel to read, and I have a ton waiting to be read!

 

Books I hope to read:

Edn by Greg Bear

Doctor Who: Apollo 23 by Justin Richards

The Daystar Voyages: The Frozen Space Pilot by Gilbert Morris & Dan Meeks

Star Trek: From History's Shadow by Dayton Ward

 

I'm sure I have many more books I want to read, I just can't choose the fifth book yet!

 

Movies/TV I hope to see:

Star Wars: The Force Awakens

A few episodes of Star Trek (Voyager, Deep Space Nine, and maybe the one Enterprise episode I've got on iTunes)

Do Not Let the Distractions Win!

It's that time of NaNoWriMo again where we're down to the crunch and some of us are running out of things to write, and/or unsure of what to write next.

For me, this year, I had planned my novel almost to months in advance while battling through Math 30 - which I was upgrading my math with (thank goodness I'm done with that). I thought I was ready to go and that I could handle a 40/50 year old protagonist who is also a captain and has family troubles concerning his daughter.

When I began to write, I quickly realized how unprepared I was for the story that was The Infinity Machine. I've struggled through the novel all month while juggling driving my brother to school - it's his first year in the private school since he was in Grade 1, and Mom's on painkillers for her knee so she isn't supposed to be driving - and helping around the house. I also promised myself that I would spend more time with my family, which means sitting down in the living room while writing (which is nigh impossible since the TV is almost constantly on with the news blaring about terrorist attacks and terrorist sightings. Do you know how distracting that is?), playing video games with my mother and brother (Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze with Mom, Disney Infinity 3.0 with my brother), helping out with meals, and watching Dancing With the Stars (yayy! Bindi Irwin won!!!)

And it doesn't help that I've gotten hooked on BBC's Sherlock! Woe is me!

But I managed to write a total of 3,517 words, which, most of it, I did in the evening. I hope I can do so again tonight.

If anyone doing NaNoWriMo is reading this, I wish you Godspeed. Because if anyone is lagging like me, we need it. Time is obviously not on our side.

Christmas Spirit Reading Challenge [edited]

I've signed up for another reading challenge, but this time it's Christmas themed!

It is hosted by The Christmas Spirit, and it runs from November 23rd to January 6 2016. Sign up here: http://truexmasspirit.blogspot.ca/2015/11/the-6th-annual-christmas-spirit-reading.html

The levels I'm going to compete in are:
Mistletoe and Fa La La La Films.

Books read so far:
1)
2)
3)
4)

Books I will read:
1) An Appalachian Christmas by Irene Brand
2) Once Upon A Christmas Eve by Anita Higman
3) Pending
4) Pending

Films watched so far:
Will You Merry Me?
Ice Sculpture Christmas
The Time of the Doctor

College Contemplations

The day before yesterday, I finally entered in to that moment in life where you realize you're on the cusp of freedom and the only thing standing between you and that freedom is the fact that you need to get a job to save for the move and life you'll enter into once you leave home.

Yes, I've finally gotten excited about college.

I began to research how the college I've chosen is run, and found out that, until I'm 22, I'd be forced to live on residence and share a room with a total stranger (at least, until I got to know them, then they wouldn't be a total stranger, lol).

I was okay with it, a little excited about it, and I had found the most awesome little mini-fridge that I could have in the dorm. I'd need the fridge, since the way I eat is really different from how most people around me and my family eat, and in the residence "guide book" it said I could have a fridge in case I "didn't want to get up for breakfast in the cafeteria". It sounded so interesting, and fun, even though I knew that I wouldn't be happy in the long run because I wouldn't be able to have as much as privacy as I want.

But then, last night, I realized one thing: the only pets the dorms would allow us to have is a fish in a tiny aquarium. That means that I wouldn't be able to bring Pebbles, even if I netted a private dorm for medical reasons.

I can't do that! Pebbles is my baby! She'd probably be ruined forever if I left her for the majority of two years! Two years is 14 years in the way a cat's body ages. If I left her behind with my parents, it'd be like I came back to vist relatives for short bursts every few years. To Pebbles it would be years between visits instead of weeks.

When I left to go visit family in BC back in 2012, I was gone for only just over a week, but Pebbles sat at my door and cried for most of the time I was gone. It broke my heart.

But since I can live off-campus with my grandmother as my "legal guardian", I bring Pebbles. I'm pretty sure Grandma is going to do just fine there, she'll probably make plenty of friends and my aunt, uncle, and cousin only live a few hours north.

I'm so excited!

Victorian-Era, Here I Come!

 

Yesterday, I decided to sign up for a book reading challenge that runs from the beginning of January 2016 to the end of December 2016. It's set up like bingo, and I have to cross off five boxes in a row if I want to "win", so to speak.

 

I won't win anything but the satisfaction of reading more books in what has to be one of my favourite genres ever. I have at least two books that fit the bill - The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Refining Fire by Tracie Peterson - which would allow me to stamp out "British Male Author" or "Mystery, Suspense, Sensation" and either "American Female Author" or "Book About Courtship or Marriage" on the chart.

 

Also, if you finish a book before January, you can review it and put it in the que for January 1st so it can still count (it says so in the rules). If you don't believe me, check out the sign up post for it on Becky's Book Reviews here! (http://blbooks.blogspot.ca/)

 

I'll be doing that with Ruby by Lauraine Snelling, a book I really am not enjoying all that much (it's also keeping me from reading Star Trek: From History's Shadow by Dayton Ward, lol).

 

I can't wait to start reading again! :D

Will I Ever Stop Running?

It's halfway through the month of November and I'm still desperately rushing to keep up the wordcount-you-should-have. I've just been so busy, life hasn't been easy. And my inspiration for the novel I decided to write this month has all but dried up.

What can I do? Well, I've decided to star rewriting By Diadem's Light between when I write bits for The Infinity Machine. I'm not going to let that Years Won/Done dot for this year stay blue this year. I want it to be purple! lol

Dewey: The Small-Town Library Cat Who Touched the World

Dewey: The Small Town Library Cat Who Touched the World. Vicki Myron with Bret Witter. 2008. Pages: 224. [Source: I borrowed it from the library]

Now, I read this one before I went and read The Rings of Time, but it wasn't until now that I realised that it wouldn't be all that bad if I reviewed this one. I mean, its about a cat! A lovable, adorable, personable cat! When I saw someone on a blog was going to read it, I knew I had to go and find a copy. I had relatively given up finding it (actually, it was more like I had forgotten about it), but then I found it when I was looking for books about ducks, which my brother needed for a project. It was in the section filled with non-fiction books about cats.

I read the reviews on the back-side of the jacket, and I knew that the ending was going to be sad, but I borrowed it anyway.

The story of Dewey starts out on a cold winter's morning in 1988. Vicki, the author, heard something in the book drop in the staff room and went to investigate. And there she found a tiny, orange and white kitten, buried under a pile of books. After Vicki pulled him from that cold, metal box, she let him soak up her warmth, and then she let him meet the rest of the staff. After that meeting, Dewey fell in love with everyone and became one of the most people-loving cats I have have heard or read about.

I love cats. I love cats so much and everyone knows it. I have three cats to my name - Pebbles, Domino, and Marcelle - my Nintendo Network ID is 'CatCrazyAuthor', and next spring I plan to start a cat-exclusive kennel for northern- and central-Alberta. So, when I read about Dewey, I instantly connect to him and fell in love with him. It made me wonder why I had never heard about him - he died in 2006, when I was 11 years old. I love cats so much, have all my life (I grew up with one named Muffy until I was 9. She ran away one morning and I never saw her again).

According to this lovely memoir to a lovely cat, he got quite famous. So why had never heard of him before I read this book? I'll have to ask about it.

Some people in the small town of Spencer, Iowa (small? Spencer had 10,000 people during Dewey's lifetime. Does that mean that my hometown is small too? We only have 8,000 or something residents), had a problem with Dewey being in the library, which I find rediculous. I don't know why some people don't cats. It's a mystery that will never be discovered I guess. People worried if he would pose as an allergy problem to some. Dewey loved boxes, etc. You'd have to read the book in order to learn everything about the 'Dewkster' (or 'Dewey Deedamore Booksa' - I think. I may be wrong).

Throughout the book there are chapters about Vicki and how she came to be the head librarian at the Spencer Library. I kind of found it strange since the book was supposed to be about Dewey, but helped to explain how much Dewey meant to Vicki and how much Dewey saw Vicki as 'Mommy'.

I'd give this book the rating of 'A Good Uplifting Read For Someone Who Needs a Good Pick-Me-Up'. Make sure you are alone when you read the ending, though, if you don't want someone to overhear you crying, lol. My mother asked me why my eyes were glassy and red-rimmed when I emerged from my room to find and cuddle my cat after I was done.

I don't like crying because it makes my face blotchy and my head ache, but Dewey's story was worth it. I don't think I've cried over something in a book since I read the beginning of the first Mandy story, but oh well.

Star Trek: The Rings of Time by Greg Cox

The Rings of Time. (Star Trek: The Original Series). Greg Cox. Based on the TV series created by Gene Roddenberry. 2012. Pocket Books. Pages: 304. [Source: Bought.]

 

This was rather interesting. I liked it, and I got to learn about some of Star Trek history.

 

In this adventure, you're introduced to a crew of four original characters - Colonel Shaun Christopher, son of US Force Captain John Christopher (which we've met in the The Original Series episode "Tomorrow is Yesterday"), Alice Fontana, Dr. Marcus O'Herlihy, and Zoe Querez . Throughout the novel, you switch back and forth between Shaun's point of view and Kirk's.

 

It was an engaging read, and it had quite a few laugh-worthy moments. But there are a few things I didn't like about it.

 

In the 23rd Century, it seems the need to swear has disappeared almost entirely. There's only a few times where words that have been said have ever jumped to the PG-13 level (such as in the movies, and books). In The Rings of Time, because it jumps between the 23rd and 21st Centuries, you go from having calm waters (in terms of expletives), to an almost raging river in 2020. Fontana is definitely the most vocal in that respect, but thankfully she never uttered (or the author never revealed) anything that would have made me flinch if I was watching it on TV.

 

The second thing that got me was the fact that Kirk gave into temptation when he was locked in an airlock with Zoe. As you can suspect, they got a little handsy, so I skipped the scene. Thankfully, it wasn't very long. Really, Greg?! We didn't need to see that!

 

In the end, all I could do was facepalm with a sigh, because its Kirk we're talking about. The most notorious ladies man of the Star Trek franchise. This is why I prefer Picard over Kirk.

 

I enjoyed the novel because of the suspense most of all. I love a good tense adventure. There was certainly a lot of Spock in the novel, which I liked because, you know, I'm a big Spock fangirl. Again, I wished it was a little longer, but it can't be helped - I didn't write it! lol.

 

The Rings of Time gives a brief peek into the life of Earthlings and how the societies of Earth were functioning before the Vulcans arrived on the scene. Oh, and before World War III decimated most of the planet. 







Another November

"But in reading literature I become a thousand [people] and yet remain myself."

~ C.S. Lewis

 

Another November is on its way, and yet it seems like I just blinked and left June in the dust. This will be my second November NaNoWriMo, and I will be writing a novel called The Infinity Machine. I'm so psyched because I thought of the idea for this story back when I was writing By Diadem's Light, and the title came to me not long after. And the title makes sense.

 

With By Diadem's Light, it was more of a production name than an offical name. I had no idea what to call a novel that was basically a re-try of a novel I wanted to call "Terra Nova". But with The Infinity Machine, the name holds wonder and suspense for what I will put in the novel. I am really excited, and the yummy icing on the cake is that I found a really great way on how to structure my story, and I'm getting how the author who made it has explained it. I can't wait to finish planning.

 

Now, let's see how many words I'll be able to write when I try to not hide in my room all day and be more sociable with my family this November, lol.

Wait...Seduction?

That's one thing that makes me crinkle my nose in disgust more often than not - the fact that if a mystery show has a female detective on the hunt in the case, she has to use her feminine wiles in order to get by something one couldn't get by if they tried to just talk through it.

This came to mind when I was watching an episode of Remington Steele - "Steele Away With Me" I think - (warning: spoilers if you haven't watched the show yet!) where the female protagonist show took on the role of a rich, snobby party girl in order to get to a drug dealer/smuggler (can't remember which) in order to get the information she needed. She goes, in one scene, from wearing a dress that only goes to mid-thigh, to wearing a super-skin-tight bathing suit that bears all (!) basically in the next scene! I mean, the bathing suit had a high-collar, but it was see-through and it showed every curve.

This show is old, not really old, but not something you'd see a re-run of. Which brings up the question in my mind, "How will the world view my Private Investigator if she doesn't sleuth with sex and seduction in her repertoire???" I want to provide a clean mystery where my protagonist, Estelle Evans (no longer De Sauveterre), doesn't have to be immoral in order to get the information she wants. I want her to be the Nancy Drew for adults and older teenagers. But how?

Well, unfortunately, this is where I'll just have to test the waters, see where interests lie. Because I'm pretty sure that people will read a good story if its interesting enough. Not everything has to be a part of today's sex-culture.

I Has Done It!!!!

I have done it. Wow. I have reached and passed 50 000 words, finishing at 50 100 words. But that didn't mean that the story is done. Now, I will focus on rewriting "By Diadem's Light" - and maybe find a different title so that the title may go from "Chapel P.I.: By Diadem's Light" to something starting with "Chapel P.I. and..."

I'm so thrilled to have finished my manuscript!

Just a Quick Word-Count Update

"Maybe I think too much for my own good."

~ Paul Simon

 

Current Word Count: 37 120

Word Count I Should Have Today: 41 935

How Many Words I have Until I'm Done: 12 880

 

I can so totally do this!

Proverbs 11:19

"As righteousness leads to life,

So he who persues evil pursues it to his own death."

~ Proverbs 11:19, NKJV

 

I was doing a Bible study with my brother and mother the other day, and I was asked to read Proverbs Chapter 11. When I read this verse, it struck me as profound, because, no matter what year it is, what age it is, no matter how it's done, evilness is the same.

 

Being the geek that I am, I can think of plenty of instances where the second half of this verse, the "So he who persues evil pursues it to his own death" part, has happened in fiction.

 

The Clairvoyant, Agent Grant Ward's former-CO and Ward's own older brother ended up dying, one in the pursuit of his evil, twisted dreams and the other having his evil come back to kill him in the form of Ward, his brother, in the first and second season of the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.

 

Megatron, the evil leader of the Decepticons, seemed to 'die' at the hands of the Autobot Bumblebee before he was subsequently ressurected by evil-incarnet in Transformers: Prime and Transformers: Prime - Predacons Rising.

 

General Zod in Man of Steel, ended up having to be killed by Superman/Clark Kent when he proved unwilling to turn away from his plans of mass-genocide.

 

Praetor (i.e. Emperor) Shinzon ended up dying during his battle against Picard because he hoped to (also) cause mass genocide on the Federation/human race in Star Trek: Nemesis.

 

Captain Nero of the mining ship Narada destroyed Vulcan and then tried to destroy Earth because he blamed Spock, and probably the Federation in extention, for the death of Romulus, his homeworld. He ended up dying when his ship was crushed in a black hole in Star Trek: 2009.

 

Every one of those villians died after their evil plans, seeming to echo that verse. I really want to work into one of my stories someday.

 

~ Mikaela

Nail Polish Continents

Today, I looked at my nails and decided that they need to be redone before me and my family go camping the day after tomorrow. I still haven't painted my nails, and I probably won't until tomorrow.

But today, when I looked at my nails, what was left of the old white paint on my left middle finger instantly reminded me of a continent, and I suddenly found myself picking up my small sketch tablet so I could scribble it down, never wanting to forget it. (I'll have to take a picture of the boring outline of the continent and its island when I have the time.) This was one of the first times I had ever gained inspiration from my own person when I was examining how much nail polish I would have to remove before I could put some more on!

This little continent I've just invented will have to be stored for future reference, probably to be used in some sort of fantasy I might get to write in the future where the world it is on has scattered continents that look more like islands. I'm afraid I'll not be able to use it in this month's Camp NaNoWriMo. Ha.

Speaking of NaNoWriMo, here's my word count.

Word Count: 18 327
The Word Count I'm supposed to Have Today: 22 580 or higher

I can do this! I can ignore all distractions and plow ahead. I have another story calling my name, but I'm trying to resist its call, and my mother was filling my head with ideas of writing a novel to tie all the loose ends of The Pretender (a show my parents have gotten me hooked on that I'm nowhere near done watching) together, since the channel it was being aired on abruptly shut it down without giving the producers any chance to finish it so that they could go on to air JAG.

(Though, I can't be mad at the existence of JAG, though, because if there was no JAG, there would be no NCIS or NCIS:LA.)

There's a bunch of other things trying to pull my attention away from NaNoWriMo, but I will not let them! (lol)

~ Mikaela

It's Too Hot...

The heat of summer has finally reached north-western Alberta, but thankfully the inside of my house feels cool.

Right now, I'm trying to write while also watching Stargate SG-1. I really shouldn't be distracting myself with watching TV. Ugh...

Current Word Count: 12 769

Word Count I Should Have Today: 16 129

A So-So Day

Such is the story of my life (thanks for the visual aid, Toothless).

I woke up this morning at 7:59, a minute before the time I had set my alarm to wake me up at. And for a while before that, I had been aware of my surroundings, even as my body slept on, meaning my brain was ready to go, ready to write, long before my body was.

And even when I managed to surface from the depths of sleep, it took me at least thirty minutes to keep my eyes from closing shut on me - thus, I didn't manage to leave my bed until almost nine in the morning. I was mad at that, but I wasn't allowed to dwell on it as I rushed to get my morning routine finished.

I searched through my closet for a light sweater, since mornings can still be a little chill here with the breeze and the almost dried-up dew on the grass (which reminds me, I really need to stop going on those walks without socks on - the grass and clover is long enough to cut at my ankles). On my walk it felt like there were lead weights tied to my arms and legs, and I ended up dragging my feet most of the way as I peered through the fog that clouded my mind. I really need to start going to bed earlier so that I can wake up earlier.

I didn't get to start writing today until it was after three in the afternoon, and thus have only written a few hundred words for my NaNoWriMo novel today. My current wordcount is 5,225, and according to my stats I need to reach 6,451 before midnight if I want to be able to finish the novel by the end of the month.

By the way, the novel is called "By Diadem's Light", and it's the first in a series of Science Fiction/Mystery novels I plan on writing. Right now, it feels like I'm rushing the story along, making the mistake of making my protagonist, Estelle Emperatriz Gael De Sauveterre (there is a reason why she has two middle names - the answer? her mother was a bit eccentric) start searching for answers to the mystery in chapter two - and chapter one wasn't very long! I my-as-well have started the mystery with the very first word of the first chapter! :P

But there are alway's rewrites!

Well, this post was meant to be a little update for whoever comes across this blog. I really should be getting back to writing.

~ Mikaela

Post Numero Uno

Well, the first post of a new blog...

The purpose of this blog is to talk about my books, review other's books and stories (I like to do that), and share things about my life, my likes and dislikes, and the recipies that I managed to create for all those Trim Healthy Mamas out there. I tend to be quite the social butterfly when I want to with those I know over the net, but I would like to just warn you that I am an INTROVERT and that means I'll be prone to "dropping off the face of the Earth" and not replying to messages until days after I get it.

Now that that's out of the way, I would like to just say welcome. Welcome to my blog. Thank you for finding it!

(and sorry! this post kind of turned into an introduction/biography of the blogger!)

I'm a inspiring writer who has participated in one November NaNoWriMo, tried to do a Camp NaNoWriMo this last April, but couldn't because I had to be rushed to the city for emergancy appendix removal - which ended up causing me to be stuck recovering all that month, and am currently participating in Camp NaNoWriMo July. :D I'm keeping up fairly well this time, thank goodness!

I'm an INFP (and sometimes a INFJ or a INTP) who lives in Canada and wishes to move to New Zealand where the Hobbits, wizards, Elves, and Dwarves live. Since the age of 12 I have written stories, becoming lost in worlds I created to the point that my mother had to, and continues to try to, pry me away from them. My genre interests in writing have slowly shifted from fantasy to science fiction, but that's only because a good fantasy book is hard to come by and I've been given a severe dose of something horrid called "reality". I'm considering writing fantasy thanks to fantastical elements like dragons and elves. Yes, Elrond, I'm coming.

My reading tastes have varied over the years, but I haven't read as much as I would have liked over the last few years. In the beginning, it was fantasies such as J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit and C.S. Lewis' The Chronicles of Narnia (which my father gifted to me when I was in either grades 1, 2, or 3). I used to write about Hobbits and talking animals thanks to Tolkien and Lewis, and they still make me grin when I think about it (especially when I think about how I wrote about a girl named Jonquil who woke up on a Hobbit bed with her legs from the knee down hanging off the bed!).

This summer, after NaNoWriMo, I'm going to make myself devour books like I once did once more. I have the second book of the Realm Walkers trilogy (Two Renegade Realms by Donita K. Paul) waiting for me to read it as it sits on my shelf. Thankfully, I'm going camping the middle of this month, so I will have time to read. The Hobbit is also waiting to be read. It's almost like it 'calls' to me, whispering "Read me, Mikaela...read me! I miss you so much!" Well, I miss you too, you old book - even though I think I've read you at least seven times already.

Other books need to be read, as well, and I'm sure to visit Chapters/Indigo again in the near future. Such is the life of a writer/bookivore - lol.

Stay tuned for new updates! There are sure to be many!

~ Mikaela