tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20229935685331824602024-03-21T22:21:24.158-05:00MordaciusJust me rambling, at the moment.Mordaciushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13149284329493760598noreply@blogger.comBlogger16125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2022993568533182460.post-83021381561364928892013-02-24T00:01:00.000-06:002013-02-24T14:24:16.221-06:00AttackedSo, last Tuesday sucked. I was trying to get some work done when the power went out. I thought maybe we'd just missed the bill... except that Kat has that on autopay, and her account's not dry. After digging out a paper phone book, like in the olden days, we got hold of the power company and got an automated message indicating that they expected to have power up in a few hours.<br />
<br />
I'm diabetic, and it went out about half an hour before I was supposed to eat... and there was basically nothing to eat in the house that didn't require a stove or microwave. My car isn't in the best of shape right now, and I can't afford to have it looked at, so I only felt safe traveling on foot.<br />
<br />
I thought about walking to a nearby store, but our entire zip code was down. The whole thing was quite the spectacle: the news covered it in this <a href="http://www.yakimaherald.com/home/852664-8/videophotos-selah-power-forecast-to-be-back-by" target="_blank">article.</a>. (We were in the very special zone that didn't have power back for good 'til after 9 PM.)<br />
<br />
So I dug out the old phone handset and called my friend Mike. I asked to just go over there and play board games for the afternoon. Figured a power outage was as good an excuse as any to be sociable.<br />
<br />
I hadn't been to his house for a while. His dad Mac's got this big dog Sadie who... she used to just bark and bark and bark ceaselessly. The last time I came over to his house though, she tried to bite me. They promised to keep her on a leash whenever company was by, but I didn't feel comfortable going there much anyway. <br />
<br />
So it'd been a while. <br />
<br />
We went to the store first to make sure I had something for lunch, what with the low blood sugar. Then we went to his place.Mike went on ahead so they could get her secured. Tied, I imagined. He came out and waved me inside. As I got to the door, Sadie got loose and charged me on the porch. Mike got knocked down physically, and he's not a small guy. She's a <i>large </i>animal. She bit my leg on the thigh, then got past me. She bit me again on the calf, wrecking my pants.<br />
<br />
<br />
My hands were full of grocery bags, and even if they'd been empty? I don't carry a gun or a knife or anything. All I could do was kick her. So I kicked her square on the nose a few times. She ran further into the yard.<br />
<br />
<br />
At this point, I was ready to kill. I yelled at the stupid mutt. I tried to think about what I could use to fight back in the yard - all I could come up with was finding a loose brick or rock to bash her head in. I was good with that. My pants were coming down, though. She tore the right leg on 'em wide open, and they didn't want to stay up.<br />
<br />
It's been my observation that action in real life is rarely dignified, but chasing a mad dog in my underpants without any real plan was a little much without even having lunch. So when Mac said to go inside so he could secure her, I went in. <br />
<br />
It came out I was the third or fourth guy Sadie had tried to attack - nobody was quite sure. I'm the first one she'd actually drawn blood on, but she went after the UPS guy every chance she could get, and nearly took a chunk out of a moving guy recently. There was a lot of speculation as to why: it wasn't as simple as 'brown men,' because apparently one of the others had been white. <br />
<br />
I said that I only wanted one thing. Not money. Not a trip to the ER. Not new pants. I didn't want to make financial trouble for them because Mike and I have been friends since middle school, and I didn't want to saddle them with a big hit over what I thought was just an accident. They're better off than I am, but even a brief hop into the medical system can be very bad.<br />
<br />
Besides which, Mac's also very, very ill. As someone who is also pretty sick, I just... didn't want to cause him undue emotional stress. <br />
<br />
So I said all they had to do was get rid of the dog. It was clear Mac couldn't control her at all: I was bleeding, Mike was literally bowled over, and we were only lucky Kat wasn't hurt. The situation was plainly not handled, and all I really wanted to know was that neither I nor anybody else would get hurt again.<br />
<br />
The best fix for an accident isn't payback or revenge, but to make sure it doesn't happen twice. <br />
<br />
I explained that, or did the best I could to. I suppose words like, "I will kill the dog if I see her again" were mentioned. I was shocked and hurt. I did make it absolutely clear that I didn't blame anybody for it. My take was that the dog was obviously more dangerous than they'd realized.<br />
<br />
Honest mistake, I figured.<br />
<br />
Then we all noted it was lucky that I was the one who got hurt, because I had the presence of mind to defend myself and wasn't going to sue them into the Dark Ages.<br />
<br />
The cuts on my leg are not scratches. If I'd gotten knocked down and Sadie had done similar things to my neck, I could've been killed. I shudder to think what might've happened to my hands if they had not been full. <br />
<br />
*sighs*<br />
<br />
They agreed what I asked for was completely reasonable. The words, "There's no coming back from that," were said to me.<br />
<br />
Mac and Merri - Mike's mom - took Sadie to the vet to have her put down. When they came back, it turned out that there's a mandatory 10 day watch on any dog who bites a person to make sure they don't have rabies. We all knew the dog didn't have rabies, but given what that illness can do to people, I guess it's good there's zero tolerance there.<br />
<br />
I was in pain, but I figured it was water under the bridge... and I am, unfortunately, no stranger to pain. Simple enough to downplay it with my prior experience. So I sat and played board games and had dinner and generally tried to talk about anything else to let everyone get past it. <br />
<br />
We'd all done the right thing, or so I thought.<br />
<br />
... then I found out, a few days later, that it wasn't. Mac's been all over Facebook talking about how awful it is that he has to give up his dog, and finally settled on some crazy scheme to take her to dog school for a few weeks. There was also a lot of talk about how the dog wouldn't hurt anybody innocent, of course. Not children. Nobody who didn't have it coming. Someone in his extended family had the nerve to say I had it coming, something about how 'dogs have great instincts, and it's the idiots who need training.'<br />
<br />
Sadie needed to be restrained in the company of guests, not held on a leash by a frail and irresponsible old man, but <i>I'm</i> the one who made a mistake.<br />
<br />
Of course.<br />
<br />
And I'm no longer welcome in their home. I made it very clear it was me or the dog. He didn't have the nerve to come out and tell <i>me</i>. The matter is just implied. I dropped him a very, very upset e-mail demanding to know how he could do something like that last night, but he didn't even have the good grace to be ashamed for what he did, or what he allowed to happen under his roof.<br />
<br />
I also feel horrible knowing that while I can write Mac off - and the last I intend to worry about this is right after I file a police report on Monday morning - a lot of people in his life can't. Mike's stuck there until he can get another job and flee..<br />
<br />
And that's really the worst part.<br />
<br />
My leg hurts, but it's hurt worse.<br />
<br />
It hurts knowing there are people I have known since middle school who can say, without any shame, "It's lucky only John got hurt." I've had worse betrayals.<br />
<br />
The thing that hurts the worst is knowing there isn't a thing I can do to keep someone <i>else</i> from getting hurt because Mac Knight can't train, restrain or - in the end - dispose of an animal.<br />
<br />
_____________________<br />
After edit:<br />
Merri should in no way be construed as participating in this. She insisted on paying to replace the pants anyway, and was pretty clearly distraught that something rotten happened to me. Mike's stuck in the middle, with the unwelcome news that a dangerous dog will be returning to his home regardless of what she might do to him or his guests.<br />
<br />
This one's all Mac.<br />
<br />
Just wanted to clarify that.<br />
______________________<br />
A final update:<br />
<br />
Mac did write to respond to my e-mail this morning. I'm reproducing a it here without permission because it was decent, and I wanted to try to be fair:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
I'm so sorry this ever happened. I did not decide to try to bring her
back until I consulted with several behavior experts. She will be
getting extensive retraining, perhaps as long as two years. I will have
the responsibility of ensuring she is never put in a position again
where she could hurt someone.<br />
I know this is not acceptable to you. She is also a member of my family
and I had to look into the possibility of behavior modification before
condemning her to death.<br />
This dog has been my baby for nearly five
years. She has kept me going when I felt like giving up due to my
disease. I owed her a non-hasty decision, even according to the vet at
the clinic.<br />
I know this is not acceptable to you. I was bit by my back neighbor's dog last winter and I know how it hurts. <br />
I
would expect you will stay away while I have Sadie and I understand
that. Again, I offer to cover you if you feel a need to see a doctor.<br />
I don't believe there us anything I can say that will make this better, so I'm done trying.</blockquote>
I disagree with this decision because the situation was allowed to get so bad to begin with. I think she's too large and aggressive to handle this way, and that even if it is possible, it should've happened after a close call, rather than an incident.<br />
<br />
For what it's worth, if she stays, I hope it works out. I don't want to be 'proved right' or anything else horrible. I don't trust that it'll work out, but I hope it does.<br />
<br />
Anyway, I think I'm done talking about it. We've all decided what we have to do for our own peace of mind. Nothing else to do but do it.Mordaciushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13149284329493760598noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2022993568533182460.post-89252256696133393702012-07-20T23:35:00.002-05:002012-07-21T00:48:08.142-05:00LabelsI'm not feeling very well tonight. The AC iced over, and there's no hair dryer. So, I'm taking a break from my regularly scheduled Friday night goofing off to offer a public service announcement. Figure it'll keep me distracted from my troubles.<br />
<br />
We've all seen one of these, I'm guessing:<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.blogger.com/goog_1745207878" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdQEBCNkIX18Or2xhzARrPO__WQ4SPRahNGLSM5MlNanzD5W9eV77j6Mx9-9WM7Jk6JI_kjR1QmhiMBbOuakzyFXNsxloBjjyy-zX0ptwm_uDKVRJdBpG5XjmVQ6h4K5kmVF41w6SZZNjq/s320/nutrition-and-food-label.jpg" width="232" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://totallyhowto.com/jonis-cuisine/2011/02/how-to-read-food-labels/">Would you like to know more?</a></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
The majority of Americans probably skip right past these. They're a little complicated, and... really, who cares?<br />
<br />
Except that a lot of people need this information to live. Diabetics have to read everything, count their carbs, check for bleached white flour. Rice. Potato. According to <a href="http://www.diabetes.org/diabetes-basics/diabetes-statistics/">a casual Google search</a>, diabetes affects about 8.3% of Americans, and diabetics need to know what's in every meal they eat. Forever.<br />
<br />
It's possible to have allergies to all sorts of things. Another <a href="http://features.parents.com/the-most-deadly-allergies.html">casual Google search </a>suggests that many of the most dangerous allergies are food related, including peanuts, shellfish, dairy, soy, wheat and eggs. Consequences of eating the wrong thing can range from discomfort to death. Someone with a peanut allergy can be in for some real hard times, if they eat some.<br />
<br />
People with heart conditions have to watch their salt, their cholesterol...<br />
<br />
A lot of people <i>need </i>these things, even though the majority of people never do more than glance at them.<br />
<br />
The only reason that we have them is government regulation. See, gathering and distributing this information is not free - it's a cost on businesses. Successful businesses are about minimizing costs. This is also information that a business may prefer to keep quiet, because people might choose to avoid their product for a competitor's with <a href="http://eatthis.menshealth.com/home">a little less sugar or a little less fat</a>. <br />
<br />
If you don't believe me, take a look at booze the next time you're at the store. Alcoholic beverages get a pass on labeling, and as a result? <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/food/2011-01-23-alcohol-labels_N.htm">They don't do it</a>. I can immediately know what's in a can of Coke or Pepsi or even Fred's Choice, but I don't have that same information when I pick up a can of beer or a bottle of rum.<br />
<br />
The only difference is the law. <br />
<br />
This whole thing has a long history, too. The FDA <a href="http://www.fda.gov/AboutFDA/WhatWeDo/History/FOrgsHistory/CFSAN/ucm083863.htm">didn't happen overnight</a>. People died before we got the rules we have now. Things were, in fact, <a href="http://www.pagebypagebooks.com/Upton_Sinclair/The_Jungle/">pretty gross</a> in the time of small government *.<br />
<br />
<br />
I've heard a lot of talk about how efficient businesses are. How we should 'run government like a business.' I was recently forwarded an e-mail talking about 'taxmageddon,' and how government was 'strangling' business and 'crushing' taxpayers, and...<br />
<br />
Well, it was all very colorful. But here's the thing:<br />
<br />
When a business succeeds, it's visible. We know Coke is doing very well. They have a ton of money, and they spend a lot of it telling us how great they are. The success of a business is readily quantifiable and spread around.<br />
<br />
When a business fails, that's when things are quiet. Some guy opens a restaurant down the road and it flops? You probably never even heard of it. That's part of why it failed. And they do fail all the time.<br />
<br />
Government doesn't work like that. When a government program flops, you can bet someone is going to tell you. And the truth is, government screws up a lot. It's a human institution, and humans are all about mistakes. <br />
<br />
When government works, though? Good government is pretty invisible, apart from <a href="http://www.xkcd.com/1074/">going to the Moon</a> or something. Part of the fun is that we can take it for granted. The good the FDA does is preventative: there's no way to tell how many people <i>would've</i> gotten sick or died without them. I couldn't tell you that.<br />
<br />
All I can say is that I'd be one of the bodies.<br />
<br />
The next time someone talks about small government for the sake of small government - rather than offering a nuanced critique of a specific policy? Try to remember food labels, and take a minute to think about all the other things government does that we don't talk about, because we're free to take them for granted.<br />
<br />
Then maybe think about how to fix what's specifically wrong with government, instead of just forgetting the whole thing and returning to a veritable <a href="http://www.pagebypagebooks.com/Upton_Sinclair/The_Jungle/">jungle</a> **.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
------------------------------------<br />
* <i>The Jungle</i> is an amazing read. It's a novelization, but it's based on Upton Sinclair's own experiences, and is held to be a major contributing factor in the FDA existing at all.<br />
<br />
People really lived like that in this country.<br />
<br />
** No, seriously, read it.<br />
<br />Mordaciushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13149284329493760598noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2022993568533182460.post-78212355176948444782012-07-08T14:02:00.004-05:002012-07-08T14:10:37.279-05:00Out of Sync<br />
*dusts off the old blog*<br />
<br />
I spend a lot of time thinking about this place. It's part of why I update so irregularly - I want the things I say to be accessible to the people who are, (at least hypothetically), reading them.<br />
<br />
It's a bad habit for a writer to be in, even an amateur like me.<br />
<br />
I come by it honestly, though. I've spent most of my life having difficulty communicating what I think and what I know.<br />
<br />
<br />
Part of that is simply that I'm very bright. A favorite story of mine about my teen years was the time I skipped from 2nd to 4th year Japanese, while teaching myself Latin. I kept my Japanese notes in Latin for a while, just to maximize study time for both. All this, while managing a full International Baccalaureate course load. I held a B+ average for that program, despite being a very brooding and depressed teenager, and piling on extra things like that.<br />
<br />
*pauses*<br />
<br />
And I know how that sounds: "I'm super smart, and everyone else is too dumb to understand me!"<br />
<br />
I don't mean that at all.<br />
<br />
My point is that most people learn to socialize as children. They play with other kids, learn how to get along together. They get a sense for acceptable behavior, figure out how to read unspoken social cues and other very important skills for interacting with people and sharing ideas.<br />
<br />
If you're smart enough, you lack a proper peer group at that critical age. Other children are too slow and limited to be interesting. Adults are better, and when I was very young, I mostly leaned on them for human contact... but they're a different species. A smart child is not a miniature adult. The gulf of experience is too wide. When you're that age, you can't even map the differences.<br />
<br />
So if you're smart enough, you miss out in a vital skill set.<br />
<br />
I know: I did.<br />
<br />
Worse, being smart can be an obstacle to learning what to do. When you're smart, you're used to being right. You go to school, and you know the answers. You solve problems more quickly than everybody else. You remember things better. You correct people a lot. It's easy to get caught up in the notion that everyone else should be doing things your way, rather than accepting some need to change yourself. The whole 'everyone else is stupid' thing?<br />
<br />
It's <b>seductive</b>.<br />
<br />
I know about this one too. I felt like that as a kid. Indeed, I only escaped it because of an epiphany in the 8th grade. I didn't talk to the other students at my middle school much. They were mostly nice kids, and looking around FB, I think they mostly grew up to be very fine people.<br />
<br />
*waves*<br />
<br />
We just... didn't have anything to talk about at the time.<br />
<br />
Well, one day? I realized that by the time I was grown up, all the people I actually spoke to would be old. My classmates would be running the show. You know, like they are today. I also realized that they would have no real incentive to bridge the gap. It didn't matter what a special snowflake I was, they would never even know. The rest of them had each other. There was no pressing need for them to tease me out of my shell. (I should note that a few did try. The problem was not that I was surrounded by jerks. They were good kids.)<br />
<br />
I realized that if I wanted to be a part of the world, a world that would belong to them, I'd have to figure it out myself.<br />
<br />
I'm still working on that. I always feel like I'm about a half step out of sync with the whole world, forever bumping into things nobody else would stumble on. Indeed, I mostly see my life as a struggle to solve this. The language thing I mentioned above isn't just idle boasting: I was trying to get a handle on this at the time. I wondered what you could learn about societies from how they used language*. Latin and Japanese weren't the only ones I took a stab at, either - I learned that Greek has irregular nouns, Czech has sounds I didn't know existed and cannot replicate, and Gaelic is just an all around pain. :)<br />
<br />
That has gotten easier with age. Life experience helps. Time helps. However, it's still hard to know how to navigate this, some days.<br />
<br />
... and so sometimes, I don't talk at all. Particularly if I regard it as important.<br />
<br />
I'm going to talk about some other problems with this a different time. Maybe soon, maybe in a year - whenever I settle on an approach I'm happy with. In the meantime, if anybody is still reading this, thanks.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
-----<br />
As an aside: language differences really are fascinating. Just learning how and when to be formal in different cultures offers a lot of insight into what people value or fear, I think.<br />
<br />
<br />Mordaciushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13149284329493760598noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2022993568533182460.post-71013973652008287192011-08-24T12:59:00.004-05:002011-08-24T14:11:58.326-05:00Letting GoHello to my loyal and patient handful of readers. On the writing front, the novel <span style="font-style: italic;">Of Questionable Veracity</span> is almost ready to start gathering rejection letters. Kat's made a huge editorial pass, and a loyal circle of readers have made other contributions about the plot, tone, characterization and so forth. Everyone has been tremendously supportive.
<br />
<br />*waves to his friends*
<br />
<br />I'm terrified anyway, of course. Particularly because the story arc stands incomplete: I have rough drafts for two sequels awaiting similar editing, but I need one final book to finish the whole thing. I know how it all needs to wrap up, but not having the draft in hand makes me so very nervous.
<br />
<br />*deep breath*
<br />
<br />With all that fear, I'm doing what any reasonable person would do in the 21st century: I'm blogging about something else.
<br />
<br />As <a href="http://mordacius.blogspot.com/2010/08/gremlins.html">previously discussed</a>, I'm agnostic. Once upon a time though, I was Catholic. I went to a school with real live nuns from 5th to 8th grade. I was an altar boy too, one of only two in the church. Rang the big bell, carried the big cross up in the procession. Got to swing the incense. How I left is a story for another day, I suppose. At the rate I update this blog, 'never' is a distinct possibility. ;)
<br />
<br />What's on my mind today was a story that I heard there, though. I apologize for not having all the details, as this was over twenty years ago:
<br />
<br />Once upon a time, there was a man who loved Texas. It was his home all his life. He had a ranch and cattle, and really? Nobody could blame him. Upon his deathbed, all he asked for was to have a handful of soil from his ranch to take with him, wherever he was headed. His family obliged.
<br />
<br />When he died, he found himself at the Pearly Gates, facing Saint Peter. Peter told him that he'd been a good man: gone to church, done right by his family and neighbors. He hadn't lied in any terrible way, he hadn't stolen anything. Peter said that all he had to do to step into Heaven was to let go of the handful of soil in his hand, as nothing of Earth could be taken inside.
<br />
<br />The man said that it couldn't truly be paradise without a piece of home, and politely refused. He had a seat on the cloud outside, and... time passed. Eventually, his children lived and died, and they passed on to Heaven too. His daughter took a moment at the gate to plead with him to come with her, but he refused.
<br />
<br />And so the man sat, forgotten and alone. He would've stayed that way forever, but one day, his hand slipped. The soil fell from his fingertips. He looked down in shock, and Peter swept him into Heaven.
<br />
<br />Inside, the man found Texas, just as he'd left it. I forget if the storyteller mentioned him crying or not, but I imagine he probably did.
<br />
<br />*pauses*
<br />
<br />As linked to above, I don't believe in Heaven. I'm not concerned about all of that in the least. I like the message here, though: holding onto something that's broken can keep you from finding it again.
<br />
<br />This has been on my mind because I lost a friend about three weeks ago. We'd known each other ten years. Been through thick and thin. But the past couple years were very bad, and I knew we couldn't be in touch forever. I stayed as long as I could stand anyway. Held on for dear life, like I do sometimes.
<br />
<br />It only made stuff worse. Walking away has been good enough that I almost feel guilty. Despite our differences, I hope that my former friend feels the same.
<br />
<br />Just wanted to share that, in case anyone else has a burden that they're not sure how to handle.
<br />Mordaciushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13149284329493760598noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2022993568533182460.post-49049287631589157462011-03-10T10:15:00.006-06:002011-03-11T11:28:45.846-06:00LoveLove.<br /><br />I meant to write about this on or about Valentine's Day. You know, be all timely. As it turns out, I was busy doing the most romantic thing I could think of for my girlfriend instead, (Hi, Kat!). Then, I was busy finishing up a complete rewrite of a novel that's been stuck in my head. The first rule of novels is that if you're not finished, <span style="font-style: italic;">keep writing</span>. Darned thing won't write itself.<br /><br />So I finished the novel earlier this week. One little sentence is still bugging me, with many implications, but it actually has to do with this blog I meant to write. I can justify a pause here as sorting some stuff out in my head.<br /><br />If there's one thing that the 21st century seems to be pushing, it's the notion that everything's better with an audience. :)<br /><br />So. Like the subject line and the Valentine's Day lead-in indicate, this is about love. There's a lot of confusion about love in our culture. It's a vague, vague word, you know. Normally, we're not supposed to be so ambiguous in our meaning. Like, if you asked me to describe the Atlantic Ocean, a cactus and your mom, I could say, "Well, they're all mostly water."<br /><br />It'd be technically correct, but it's a ridiculous thing to say.<br /><br />Despite that, I can say: "I love chocolate," "I love a good book," "I love my girlfriend," "I love my family," and nobody seems to think that it's odd. We all take it on faith that we understand each others' underlying nuances when making those statements, and then we wonder how we fail. :)<br /><br />In the name of clearing that up for myself... a few thoughts:<br /><br />The first is that I love <span style="font-style: italic;">Dune</span>, and I love Kat, and on the one hand, those feelings have about as much in common as a cactus and the sea, (I'll leave your mom out of this, from here on out).<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Dune </span>is a jaunt away from real life. You get to spend a little while somewhere <span style="font-style: italic;">else</span>. Someplace where interesting things happen, and maybe you learn a valuable lesson about something-or-other. (For instance, <span style="font-style: italic;">Dune</span> taught a lot of us that if you <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMZwZiU0kKs">walk without rhythm, you won't attract the worm</a>.)<br /><br />Kat is someone I spend ungodly amounts of time with: we talk, we do stuff. We help each other. We're building a life together.<br /><br />In either case, I appreciate them for what they <span style="font-style: italic;">are<span style="font-style: italic;"></span></span>. I don't wish they were something else. I don't read <span style="font-style: italic;">Dune</span> and think to myself, "This is fine, except that there aren't any giant robots." I don't look at Kat and think to myself, "Man, if only she had red hair."<br /><br />I like them. Just as I found 'em. To me, that's the basic, water like commonality inherent to all love, whether it's for a friend or a piece of chocolate.<br /><br />Of course, this leads to the second big problem, here:<br /><br />In aggregate, people are meant to be together. We are social animals. The greatest man or woman in the world still couldn't accomplish what they do without the help and support of others. We all get lonely, and none of us could do everything needed to sustain ourselves with a decent standard of living, (although that's a blog for another day).<br /><br />In the specific, though... no pair of human beings were actually meant for each other, no matter how well they get along. No married couple was 'born to be together.' We come with different desires and baggage and a million barriers to getting along, especially in a space as close as 'the same bed every night.'<br /><br />Kat and I had a brief fight about something stupid yesterday. Didn't last and it didn't matter, but it did happen, and we're so sweet that I'm pretty sure we disgust casual passers-by.<br /><br />The whole thing takes work.<br /><br />Of course, we don't like to talk about it in those terms because it sounds sort of horrible. Like, if I say, "Baby, I love you, I just have to really put my back into being around you," well...<br /><br />Doubt there's anybody here reading this who doesn't know me, but that's one of <span style="font-style: italic;">my</span> problems getting along with people: I almost always tell the truth, but I have a gift for making it sound a lot worse than it is. It's why becoming an economics major was such a good fit for me: I'm sure I could make 'profits rose,' sound like an excuse to jump off of something. (That's the great thing about economics: it probably still is.)<br /><br />I don't mean this in a bad way, though, so I'm going to stretch a little and try resorting to a metaphor, here:<br /><br />Having a relationship with someone, whether it's sexual or friendly, close or distant, is a lot like sharing a garden with them. You have this shared space, and it's, you know, <span style="font-style: italic;">nice</span>. At the minimum, you can come in and smell the flowers. If it's a really nice one, maybe you can pick some fruit.<br /><br />In one manner of speaking, the whole thing is free. There's no charge for admission. You don't pay a dollar to pick an apple. That would make the whole arrangement something unsavory instead.<br /><br />However, that doesn't mean that a garden bears no cost or responsibility: gardens need to be tended. You have to weed and water and plant and make sure there's enough sunshine, or the whole thing will be ruined. More than that, if one person does too much of the work, they'll get bitter and kick their partner out. People have different strengths and weaknesses, too: maybe one person likes to dig, and one person likes to weed.<br /><br />More than that, you have to agree about what goes in it: there's no one flower bed that would work for every two people, and the only way to figure it out is to ask.<br /><br />So that's why I wasn't here with bloggy things to say on Valentine's Day: I was gardening, so to speak. Kat had a new video card, but she doesn't really know how to install them. I do, but I hate mucking around inside of computer cases, and I'll admit that I was putting it off. So I took her computer apart, and that's what we did: we figured out how to get the stupid thing working together, and now she has it.<br /><br />Another girl might've wanted flowers and dinner, or a movie. If I were with a girl like that, that's what I would've done. This is what Kat actually wanted, though, and she's still all tickled about it.<br /><br />It was a good day.<br /><br />Oh, one final thought, while I'm on the topic of 'things I love and why:'<br /><br />My dear friend Denise plugged my blog just recently, and I wanted to <a href="http://jterwilliger.blogspot.com/">do the same</a>. Not as a quid pro quo, but because I really love what she's done with the place. It's funny and honest, which are my two favorite things. :)Mordaciushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13149284329493760598noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2022993568533182460.post-89900593077814082732011-01-21T20:21:00.008-06:002011-01-21T21:22:15.528-06:00R-dy R RHey, all.<br /><br />So, I haven't been by in some time. Sorry 'bout that - you know, to my four loyal readers. :)<br /><br />I spent winter break taking a class on a scripting language called <a href="http://www.r-project.org/">R</a>. That was a kick: two weeks to try and learn the language, the basics of <a href="http://miktex.org/2.8/setup">LaTeX</a> (a typesetting system), and how to get the two to talk to each other via a process called '<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweave">Sweaving</a>.'<br /><br />Also, as 8 days are such a long time: introductory spatial statistics.<br /><br />Needless to say, this didn't go as planned. We all tried very hard: I pulled a lot of sessions staying up 'til midnight, and I was far from alone. The instructor's wife had a nightmare that he was cheating on her with a woman named 'R,' from what I heard. Part of the trouble was that everyone was deficient somewhere:<ul><li>Poor Professor Rogers had never even taken a computer programming course before</li></ul>As a result, he wasn't expecting all the difficulties with different machines. We had Macs, Windows XP through 7, etc. Not everything worked the same on every platform, naturally. I warned him this would never get better, with systems constantly changing. (One poor guy had a tiny little Asus machine that couldn't run the regressions for our final project.) We could use the school computers for R, but not LaTeX/Sweave.<br /><ul><li>The class only required entry level <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Econometrics">econometrics </a>to get into, so all the students were unprepared in some required area.</li></ul>For most of them, it was computer programming experience. I actually had the <span style="font-style: italic;">most</span> experience in that area, which is a scary thought. Nobody else really knew anything at all, and I used to doodle games on my TI-85, way back when. (I did get the little thing playing Tetris, but I'm not exactly a code monkey. Never really did anything with C++ or anything, and all my exploits are over a decade old.)<br /><br />In my case, the weak spot was econometrics: I hadn't even <span style="font-style: italic;">heard</span> of most of the techniques we were supposed to be expanding on, while most of them were comfortable there. Lots of Criminology PhD students. I guess they do that stuff a lot.<br /><br />...<br /><br />Needless to say, I had a blast. It was just like old times: obsessive focus on a single subject, no time for anything else. Didn't write. Barely remembered to eat. Loved it. I think I was the only one who did. I have some fellow students in the current term who are all treating it like a traumatic experience.<br /><br />Now that it's over, I'm continuing to try and learn about all this on my own, and just wanted to post about it here, (partly as a reminder to myself to actually come here and post more).<br /><br />I'm trying to learn some of the basics of social network analysis, just for kicks. I found an online <a href="http://faculty.ucr.edu/%7Ehanneman/nettext/">textbook</a>, and my beginning project has been to try and map out the connections between the people who play on my girlfriend's favorite MUSH. They maintain a wiki for it <a href="http://www.masq.org/index.php/Main_Page">here</a>.<br /><br />So far, I have learned enough to construct a simple adjacency matrix and run some plots of it. I haven't had time to make them pretty, but here are a few samples of what I've done just to peek:<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgs2b2b9i2-rP05IDNH2OcVNmLiGzlBElwINDiLM6vN52DG_KdeT06WVI4kM9K6emLgptEyS3NdTs_9JY9X_JAFVchadxELQsBPhJ4K2Cly2fDU70sg60bL7IVZ4lJnU6oWQCFfkxjNAqFE/s1600/starry+03.jpg"><img style="float: left; margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 189px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgs2b2b9i2-rP05IDNH2OcVNmLiGzlBElwINDiLM6vN52DG_KdeT06WVI4kM9K6emLgptEyS3NdTs_9JY9X_JAFVchadxELQsBPhJ4K2Cly2fDU70sg60bL7IVZ4lJnU6oWQCFfkxjNAqFE/s320/starry+03.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5564838301418966722" border="0" /></a><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXQ6LHvTakdkW4Vh7nUmA6WhCggb-Rfhg0hVWBMEOuKOBMbdnzU4qFpGCYjvU2Y0DerumTJj67MNnsXK3FZXLyIeU9U3OJdxNs5P2lXslksysDEs1IgrJjD1E1tnLB7X6HI6Zos4l_fDAo/s1600/starry+04.jpg"><img style="float: left; margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 194px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXQ6LHvTakdkW4Vh7nUmA6WhCggb-Rfhg0hVWBMEOuKOBMbdnzU4qFpGCYjvU2Y0DerumTJj67MNnsXK3FZXLyIeU9U3OJdxNs5P2lXslksysDEs1IgrJjD1E1tnLB7X6HI6Zos4l_fDAo/s320/starry+04.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5564838303493685314" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />For the more technically inclined, I stripped out vertexes that didn't have at least one two-way connection to another vertex, just to keep the scale manageable. Looks worse with isolates included, and it's hard to zoom properly in the <a href="http://rgl.neoscientists.org/about.shtml">rgl</a> window.<br /><br />The end goal is to try and embed the 3d object in a pdf, but that appears to be dishearteningly complex with the tools at hand. I have created an R script to just peel the links out of any arbitrary html page, though, so that's something. I could maybe create the crayon version of a spidering/pagerank system, between the two elements. (I'm not sure if it's obvious there, but I scaled the node size by the number of edges connecting to it.)<br /><br />Anyway, I hope to be back with more stuff soon. I've been writing, too, now that I'm free. :)Mordaciushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13149284329493760598noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2022993568533182460.post-20441119547890508242010-09-14T17:32:00.005-05:002010-09-14T22:37:24.192-05:00ChoicesSo, I was talking to a dear friend of mine about... well, you know, random friend stuff, when this exchange came up:<br /><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); padding-left: 1ex; font-style: italic;"><div><blockquote dir="ltr" style="margin-right: 0px;"><p dir="ltr" style="margin-right: 0px;">I guess you can't really put a price on the love of a child (though I'm sure Futurama made a reference to it.)<br /></p></blockquote></div></blockquote><span style="font-style: italic;">... Actually, you totally could. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">The way you do it experimentally?</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">You would have to determine what people are willing to give up for the love of a child. For instance: a promotion? A car? Etc.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">That puts a dollar value on a child's love the same way it does on a Big Mac - you can completely quantify it. Of course, each child's love is a highly differentiated product due to physical, locative and branding concerns along with the unique preference sets of each adult, so it would be hard to make, like, predictive models. But on a small scale, it totally holds up.</span><br /><span style="font-style: italic;"><br /></span><br />Probably all four people reading this blog already know that I'm very close to a Bachelor's of Science in Economics, having jumped ship from Accounting.<br /><br />Here's the funny thing about it, though:<br /><br />Nobody seems to really understand what economists actually <span style="font-style: italic;">do</span>. We get lumped in with business guys, because, hey, we all wear suits and talk about money a lot.<br /><br />It's a whole different thing, though.<br /><br />Economics is the formal study of choice: that is, how people should allocate resources when they want more than they have. Money's a useful way of comparing two unrelated things, (in fact, this is one of the required properties of anything to <span style="font-style: italic;">be</span> money), but it's really not the point.<br /><br />Anyway, one of the most fundamental concepts in the whole field is that of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opportunity_cost">opportunity cost</a>.<br /><br />You can always tell what something is worth to a person by what they're willing to sacrifice in order to have it.<br /><br />Anyway, I'd better get back to the grind, but I wanted to share that thought while it was fresh in my head. I'll try to share more detailed thoughts about economics later. Oh, and do the other blog entries I promised about narrative. :)Mordaciushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13149284329493760598noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2022993568533182460.post-53113116364333380372010-09-01T15:04:00.002-05:002010-09-01T15:06:32.742-05:00Boards & PiecesThis'll be a short one. I'm heading off to Dragon Con in a couple of days, and I have a million things to do. Just wanted to sneak this in before I left town, because it's been bothering me.<br /><br />Last time, I wrote about how to combat <a href="http://mordacius.blogspot.com/2010/08/writers-block.html">writer's block</a> if you're already underway. I stand by that advice: it's precisely the method I used to get over my problem that day. However, I may have been getting a little ahead of myself. The first hurdle anyone faces when they're writing or telling a story is the <span style="font-style: italic;">first </span>line, not somewhere in the middle. I'm sure you've all been there: just you and a blank page, either on paper or a computer screen, and... it's very intimidating. You're probably armed with a dim idea of what you'd like the finished product to look like, but you don't have any idea of how to get from here to there.<br /><br />Getting over that is, well, the difference between telling your story and not, so I'm going to devote a series of posts to the whole thing, hopefully offer some things to think about.<br /><br />Now, the classic method is to have a pretty good idea of what you're after before you ever start writing: get yourself an outline, profile your characters... get a skeletal version done and fill in the details. As with <a href="http://mordacius.blogspot.com/2010/08/organic-character-development.html">my last advice about writing</a>, I'm going to go ahead and advise you to Google if you're interested in hearing more about doing things that way. Lots of people have already covered that ground better than I could ever hope to.<br /><br />Instead, I'm going to focus on my method of improvisation, informed by experience with collaborative storytelling in games. Just to get the whole thing going, that's exactly what I'm doing when I write: I imagine that I'm playing a game, like in the <a href="http://mordacius.blogspot.com/2010/08/solitaire.html">Solitaire</a> example, and I narrate the various twists and turns. Except it's more like solo chess than cards. You need everything a board game would:<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Some Pieces: </span><br /><br />That is, characters and other large plot elements (MacGuffins, etc.) that are 'movable.' They can make or affect decisions, and their capabilities and ranges of motion will differ from piece to piece.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">The Board: </span><br /><br />That is, the space that the characters and other important plot elements occupy. This can range from the simplicity of a single room to elaborate stellar empires.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">The Rules:</span><br /><br />Basically, how these elements interact with each other. How can the pieces move around the board? Are there shortcuts, like transporters on Star Trek? How can the characters influence each other? By what reasoning will you solve the problem of two characters who come into verbal or physical conflict?<br /><br /><br />Of course, I don't write all this stuff down. That'd be... well, horribly silly. But this is my personal metaphor for what I'm doing: I really think about storytelling in terms of a series of discrete plot elements and how they interact with each other in a particular space, then try to reason out what happens next given that information. This is why the whole exercise is fun for me: I can't know how it'll turn out until I've done it, except in the broadest terms.<br /><br />I'll get into how to construct each of these tools later. After the con, catching up on school from the con, and getting in a little of the latest book, anyway. :)Mordaciushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13149284329493760598noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2022993568533182460.post-66575852069556093102010-08-27T14:00:00.001-05:002010-08-27T14:20:39.756-05:00Writer's BlockIt's been a couple of days since I've added to my book. Some of it's school: this was my first week back, and I spent five hours on homework yesterday, without even finishing what needs doing.<br /><br />Some of it's this blog: I'm really enjoying writing these little posts, but there are only so many hours in the day - an hour here is an hour <span style="font-style: italic;">not</span> spent there.<br /><br />The last factor, though? Writer's block. Just a wee little bit.<br /><br />I'm going to handle it shortly, but before I do, I thought this would be an appropriate moment to share my thoughts about the subject with all of you. For example, what to do when you realize you've bumped into it.<br /><br />*clears throat, prepares index cards*<br /><br />Writer's block is something probably <span style="font-style: italic;">everyone</span> has felt at some point, if only while doing a creative writing assignment for school. I'm pretty sure it's happened to all of you. It happens to me periodically. More often than most, I'd imagine, since I'm writing every day now. It's frustrating. It puts people off writing entirely, sometimes.<br /><br />Here's the thing:<br /><br />The natural state of the human mind is to imagine things. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: people imagine things <span style="font-style: italic;">all the time</span>. Indeed, this is what makes us special: humans can conceive of things that do not, in fact, exist. We can think past what is, to what we'd like to see.<br /><br />Imagination is why we've gone from mud huts to space shuttles over a scant few thousand years, while the rest of the animal kingdom mostly just reacts to us.<br /><br />Writer's block is the aberration. That's why it feels unpleasant: that's not how things are supposed to work.<br /><br />Fortunately, the root of it is simple, at least for me. I've likened writing to <a href="http://mordacius.blogspot.com/2010/08/solitaire.html">Solitaire</a> before. Well, when you're playing Solitaire, it is possible to select your cards in such a way that you cannot proceed. You have cards left, but you can't clear them: there are no valid moves left.<br /><br />In my experience, writer's block is like that. It's the culmination of a series of missteps during earlier parts of the story that prevent me from accomplishing whatever I need to do in the scene I'm working on right now. Sometimes, the problem is huge: I have, on two separate occasions, scrapped 50000+ word drafts because I just couldn't fix them, and started the entire book over.<br /><br />Most of the time, though, things are simpler than that. I just look back at what I'm working on and figure out where I went wrong. I isolate whatever earlier elements have now proven incorrect, carefully remove or adjust them, then get on with my work. That's all I'm going to have to do once I'm done here: I can feel that the problem is smallish. My week's just been tiring.<br /><br />If it ever happens to you, try to think about it that way: consider where you <span style="font-style: italic;">want </span>your story to go, and think about why it can't. Then, adjust the work you've done accordingly. Not everything you put down is going to be right the first time. That's natural.<br /><br />As a further bit of trivia: this is why sequels take longer and tend to be harder than original works. Every sequel has a little more baggage than any book that came before it: more details to keep track of, more little discrepancies, more potential plot holes to navigate around.<br /><br />Both times I've started a series, the whole thing has slowed down for me immensely at the third volume. Indeed, book 3 of my first series is where I threw up my hands and started writing the current one - that volume remains unfinished. Just something to think about, when you're waiting for the next book by your favorite author, wondering when they'll get off their behind and actually get it done.<br /><br />Anyway, I'm going to go fix my problem here so that I can enjoy my weekend. Hope you all have a good one, too.Mordaciushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13149284329493760598noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2022993568533182460.post-92024108527913495172010-08-25T19:37:00.000-05:002010-08-25T19:39:35.458-05:00GremlinsI'm going to mix stuff up a little, this evening. Instead of talking about stories, I want to talk about religion. No reason, really. Just been nagging at me lately. S'pose I feel underrepresented, and all that.<br /><br />To begin with, I'm agnostic. I know the knee-jerk reaction is to do one of two things with that:<br /><br />1) Assume that's a funny word for atheist.<br /><br />2) Assume I'm wishy-washy, and simply have yet to choose a side with regard to theism/atheism.<br /><br />I can't speak for other agnostics - it's sort of a broad brush to paint people with - but I'm neither*, and this is about why.<br /><br />The whole thing makes a lot of sense through the lens of technical support. See, I used to be a senior rep for a major ISP, ages ago. Got all sorts of stories about it. Heard everything. People threatened to sue me. A family once wisely put their ten year old kid on the line, and we fixed their computer in five minutes. A lady once got indignant with me because I was shocked she hadn't thought to plug her computer into the wall. "We're not all <span style="font-style: italic;">technical</span>," she protested. Oh, I even trained with a guy who got fired for surfing porn websites in the break room in front of everybody. <br /><br />That job was... well, everything you'd probably imagine, but with smaller, more depressing cubicles. I'm sure there's a joke in there about how phone room work would beat the religion out of anybody.<br /><br />The thing that really struck me about it, though - the thing that always <span style="font-style: italic;">stayed </span>with me - wasn't about it being an awful experience. The fact is, I actually enjoyed it once I made enough money to live on. I still resent that it got shipped overseas. No, it was that after I'd heroically restored someone's ability to, you know, screw around on the Internet, they almost always asked the same question:<br /><br />"Why did this happen?"<br /><br />Oh, they'd ask it sooner than that - a lot of people came at me with it from the first sentence. But once I'd actually <span style="font-style: italic;">fixed</span> the problem, many of them honestly expected a real answer. This wasn't my job, of course. I was supposed to keep my call times down - if their problem was fixed, my official duty was to escape gracefully so I could help the next person without making them feel put off.<br /><br />However, I was not unsympathetic. It's an understandable question: if you know why something happened, you have a little power over it. You could try to prevent it from happening again. Initially, I made an effort to answer. In fact, sometimes? Sometimes, the whole thing was so obvious that I could simply oblige. For instance, if you let your mailbox fill up so mail starts bouncing, well, that should take a tech about 30 seconds to notice, and another 30 to fix. It's inarguable.<br /><br />More often than that, though, I had to deal with <span style="font-style: italic;">probable</span> causes. Modem error codes, for instance, are associated with various sorts of problems that might or might not be traceable with a little effort on the customer's end. Like, there's one for 'no dial tone,' which suggests either a hardware failure in the device, line trouble, or someone plain forgetting to plug their line <span style="font-style: italic;">in</span>. No way to know from just the code, but other causes are improbable enough not to worry about initially.<br /><br />Many problems didn't have an answer at all. "Why'd we need to reinstall TCP/IP on my box?" Well... there's just no way I could know that. After all, I was solving problems without even looking at the computer itself, relying solely on responses from a customer who was almost invariably not trained in how to give the correct responses. <br /><br />There could've been possums living in their machine, for all I knew.<br /><br />Worse, even if I'd had access to it, some causes are just too ephemeral to trace. What corrupted a .dll? Which .dll, for that matter? I don't know. I'm not sure I could figure it out with all the resources in the world at my fingertips.<br /><br />People didn't like hearing that. Most people do <span style="font-style: italic;">not</span> want to be confronted with, "I don't know why something bad happened to you, and I can't figure it out, either. Sorry." It's a good way to leave someone unhappy even if you've helped them.<br /><br />I didn't want to lie, either. I mean, greater moral concerns aside, fear for my job aside, it's just not how I like to operate.<br /><br />Instead of doing either, I learned a cheat: I just told them it was gremlins.<br /><br />Oh, not seriously. I didn't want to get fired. But I made a joke about gremlins, explained it might as well be, and sent them on their way. Most people could accept that: it put a face on their problem, even if it wasn't the real face. <br /><br />The thing I left unsaid to avoid an argument or a lecture on company time was this: I didn't <span style="font-style: italic;">need </span>to know. I was able to fix the problem even though I was flailing around in the dark sometimes.<br /><br />More than that, drawing an incorrect conclusion early and sticking to it was death in that line of work: if someone had the aforementioned 'no dial tone' error and I just decided that their modem was broken, I wouldn't have them check their phone cord, or vice versa. Unyielding certainty is bad for troubleshooting.<br /><br />This is, of course, an analogy for the world at large: everywhere I turn, people are preoccupied with certainty. Being <span style="font-style: italic;">right</span>. The truth about life, the universe and everything is something concrete and knowable, something you can find in a book, hear on the radio. Something that can be circumscribed and understood by anyone, if they'd just look. <br /><br />Backing down, doubting things, making mistakes? Not only are people supposed to avoid doing them, they're not supposed to admit it if they do. That's all weakness.<br /><br />I think it's all about fear: the universe is big, we're small. Better to tell each other stories about gremlins than to admit that a lot of things will probably always be beyond our prediction or control.<br /><br />For me, when I say I'm agnostic, I mean that I've let go of that as best I can. Permanently. It's about my acceptance of the likelihood that we'll never fully understand the world, tempered with the comfort that we don't need to in order to improve our lives. <br /><br /><br />There's more, but it gets a little abstract. <br /><br />Anyway, I just wanted to throw that out there. Hope it's of interest to anyone. I'm a little nervous talking about this, but really wanted to put it, well, somewhere. I'll get back to talking about my secret, unpublished books again next time.<br /><br /><br />---<br />* (I'm not an atheist, but I do subscribe to <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apatheism">apatheism</a> for philosophical reasons that go beyond the scope of this blog post. It's one of the 'big questions' that doesn't interest me in the slightest, anymore. If anybody's curious, I may try to get into it at some point.)Mordaciushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13149284329493760598noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2022993568533182460.post-31001764166816551872010-08-21T22:28:00.003-05:002010-08-25T09:31:29.569-05:00Organic Character DevelopmentThere are a lot of resources about how to design a character available on the Internet. Conventional wisdom is that you should have an extremely clear idea of who your character is before you sit down to put the story to paper: figure out what they look like, how they talk, what they want, etc.<br /><br />If you're interested in that, I'd recommend googling "20 questions." It's good advice, in general. A story thrives on details: the more you know about what's going on, the better a picture you can paint and the more smoothly getting it out is liable to be. Details are fundamental to consistency, and consistency is fundamental to the suspension of disbelief. If you're generating a major character, I'd recommend doing it the old fashioned way.<br /><br />However, I'm not going to talk about that today because, frankly, <span style="font-style: italic;">everyone</span> talks about that. You don't need me for it.<br /><br />I'm going to talk about a less discussed alternative technique which I learned from running roleplaying games. These were situations where I didn't have the luxury of time. When you're running a game, you often need a minor character <span style="font-style: italic;">right now</span>, it's important to be able to do that. It's also good for bit parts in novels, and I have, in fact, even used it for major characters in my stories. I call it 'organic character development.'<br /><br />The way this works is simple: form a dim picture of a character in your head. Enough that you could say <span style="font-style: italic;">something</span> about them. Are they male or female? Can you tell me one sentence about them?<br /><br />For example, I'm thinking about a private eye. His name is Jones. He's got... oh, brown hair. Thin, but not gaunt.<br /><br />I don't know anything else about this guy yet. I don't let it worry me, though. Instead, I just run with what I <span style="font-style: italic;">do </span>know.<br /><br />As soon as I need another detail because it would be relevant in the story, I do two things:<br /><br />1) Make up something that sounds good.<br /><br />For instance, a leggy dame comes into Jones' office with a problem - a classic story hook for old timey detective stories. I need to know how he reacts. Is he a lech, or professional? Is he maybe gay? Does he banter, or is he businesslike?<br /><br />Whatever you pick, it should be interesting enough to be worth mentioning at all, and it should serve the story at large. Never pick something that <span style="font-style: italic;">you</span> think is boring.<br /><br />In this case, I think Jones is all a bit of a wise guy who likes to flirt. I mean, that's a classic, and why would I be writing a detective story if I didn't enjoy the classics? <br /><br />2) Write down what you've made up, keep it straight.<br /><br />This would be the real trick to organic character development: things are fluid until you make a decision, but once you <span style="font-style: italic;">have</span> decided, you need to stick to it. For the rest of his appearances, Jones needs to be a flirty snarker.<br /><br />Moreover, later decisions that I make about Jones should support this conclusion generally: it's now too late to give him a hook for a hand or other serious physical impairment that would impact his romantic prospects, because if he had one, it should have come up in his initial scene flirting with someone.<br /><br />The more decisions like this you make, the more a character goes from blurry to very focused and specific. If Jones keeps popping up, my audience will get to know him at the very same pace that I, the author do. Which is actually pretty cool when you're doing it.<br /><br />And... that's actually all there is to it. Step (2) is where most people run into trouble, which is why I recommend making notes as you go. Start a traditional character profile - 20 questions style - and fill it in as you work.<br /><br />Several major characters in my first series actually came about like this. If I ever get around to sharing it online, I'll talk about which ones and what that was like, but no promises - still a little disorganized on the point of, "What do I do with rough drafts of four books in the drawer, and another in process?"<br /><br /><br />Anyway, I better get to school. Time to learn about taxation and government organizational structures in detail, and I'm excited. Yes, really. Maybe I'll talk about economics sometime, too. :)Mordaciushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13149284329493760598noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2022993568533182460.post-31878151949905867872010-08-21T09:22:00.004-05:002010-08-21T20:41:07.607-05:00SolitaireWhen I talk to people who play games about writing, and why they should write, the most common complaint seems to be this:<br /><br />There's no random element.<br /><br />When you play D&D, you have a table full of people. Hopefully, they'll behave in interesting and unpredictable ways: they do unexpected things when it's their turn to choose actions. They say funny things at the table. <br /><br />This is why most people get out and do it, after all. The fun is in not knowing what comes next, and having a story to tell people afterward. Or, well, it would be if anybody wanted to hear stories about D&D. :)<br /><br />Even if you've never played D&D, most social activities work the same way: you get together with friends, and hopefully something interesting happens. Something you could talk about later.<br /><br />A lot of people who haven't written think that writing lacks that element of chaos and fun. They don't seem to believe me when I tell them that it's still there, that writing a story is random and strange and surprising. They don't understand that I write so fast mostly because I'm eager to see what happens next.<br /><br />Rather than just repeat myself about this, here's an analogy to consider:<br /><br />I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that everyone reading this, (all four of you), have played Solitaire. It comes free on Windows. It's right there. If you missed it somehow, you should really try it*. People like Solitaire. On road trips, I've seen a version that you play holding the deck in one hand so that you don't even need a table. <br /><br />What's interesting about this game is that every element in it is fixed, once play begins: it's just you and a set arrangement of cards. There's nobody to outwit. You don't shuffle the cards again, once they're dealt.<br /><br />The outcome <span style="font-weight: bold;">should</span> be predetermined. There ought to be no reason to play it in the first place. <br /><br />Except, as we all know, there's a little more to it than that. You can be surprised by the game. You can still lose, even though there's nobody to lose to.<br /><br />The reason it can be fun is that even though the cards are dealt, you still have to make choices without seeing all of them at once. You can't track the whole deck and say with absolute certainty whether or not taking out any given card is going to help you or hurt you in the long run. <br /><br />Writing's like <span style="font-style: italic;">that</span>. You have to make choices about dialogue, actions and plot without understanding all of their potential implications. You can paint yourself into a corner or strike genius accidentally. Small choices sprawl and grow.<br /><br />This allows something that looks static from the outside to be full of delightful surprises when you really get going. I think most people would enjoy what that feels like, if they just gave it a try. About the only thing <span style="font-style: italic;">I</span> can compare it to is falling in love.<br /><br /><br />* (Disclaimer: I'm more of a Freecell man, myself.)Mordaciushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13149284329493760598noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2022993568533182460.post-79974421283992589952010-08-19T00:41:00.008-05:002010-08-21T09:56:44.930-05:00NamesA dear friend recently linked me a trailer for the third season of the Star Wars cartoon series The Clone Wars. She asked me to see if I could guess where she'd stopped enjoying it. So I watched, and the whole thing seemed to be going pretty well: space ships, lightsaber fights. There was corny dialogue, but nothing <font style="font-style: italic;">too</font> embarrassing... That is, until they introduced their new bad guy for the season.<br /><br />His name was Savage Oppress.<br /><br />No, really. I <a href="http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Savage_Oppress">checked</a>, just to make sure our ears were all right.<br /><br />I watched a few episodes last season because they had a particularly cool bad guy... but even he had the unfortunate name of Cad Bane. I guess maybe they were worried that people would forget who to cheer for.<br /><br />Anyway, this got me thinking about names today. Names aren't an afterthought. Most of how an audience imagines a story is guided by hints, rather than full blown descriptions. A name is a subtle but powerful way of helping people picture what you want to convey. For instance, picture someone named Melvin. Maybe Herbert or Bartholomew.<br /><br />Go on, do it.<br /><br />It's different than naming someone maybe Gregor or Jason, which is different than going for Ezekiel or Jedediah. All these names have baggage attached, cultural expectations we mostly share if we're from the same time and place. <br /><br />They're like a spice: used lightly, they enhance your work. If you overdo it, your audience won't notice anything else. The parts you've gotten right will be drowned in it. <br /><br />More than that, <span style="font-style:italic;">inconsistent </span>naming conventions can <a href="http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AerithAndBob">hurt a story</a>, pulling a reader out of the moment and straining their suspension of disbelief. A town that produces both 'Joe Smith' and 'Ilana the Grey, Slayer of the Moon-Beast' strains credulity without a very good explanation.<br /><br />The trouble is, names are also <font>hard</font>. Most people, myself included, aren't very good at coming up with names on the spot. There's nothing magical about this deficiency, it's just not something that most of us do very often. <br /><br />This is where research helps. There are tons of resources out there, if you look. I thought I'd share some with all of you, in case anybody else was toying with writing.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.behindthename.com/">Behind the Name</a>: This one is first names only, but it's really neat in that it lets you search for names by meaning. So if you want a name for a girl that means lucky, it would return a list like <a href="http://www.behindthename.com/php/search.php?terms=lucky&nmd=m&gender=f&operator=or">this</a>.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.kleimo.com/random/name.cfm">The Random Name Generator</a>: This one generates lists of first and last names. The gimmick here is that you can decide how obscure you would like the names to be, based on how many people had that name according to US Census Bureau data. The down side is that the generator doesn't match the ethnicity of the first name to the last name, so you can get silly results like "Conchita Keobaunleuang." I fix that by mixing and matching.<br /><br />Of course, the subject of culture and names, we come to:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.gaminggeeks.org/Resources/KateMonk/">The Onomastikon</a>: An enormous list of names from various cultures, often with meanings included. I use this a couple of different ways. First, I love it for significant characters because it's fun to browse through.<br /><br />Second, I like to give all the members of a fictional culture names from a single Earth culture to offer a little cohesion to their descriptions - a simple, unobtrusive shorthand. (I also really like <a href="http://www.gaminggeeks.org/Resources/KateMonk/Ancient-World/Eastern/Assyria.shtml">Assyrian </a>ones for things that need to feel ancient and mysterious. Those guys knew how to sound awesome.)<br /><br />The only down side is that some of the links in the Onomastikon are broken, and were like that when I first stumbled across it. <br /><br />Of course, sometimes stuff shouldn't sound like anything you'd find on Earth at all. For that, there's this:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.rinkworks.com/namegen/">Fantasy Name Generator</a>: This is a very flexible random name generator. I leaned on this one heavily, the last time I actually ran a game of D&D. A lot of the results are noise, but there's generally a handful of really fun entries per page. It's also good in that it can easily be used for places as well. Almost all the names in <a href="http://sites.google.com/site/mordacius/campaignlog">Ton-Vorash</a>, including the titular city, came from this generator.<br /><br />And, finally, I have one dedicated to place names now. I really have a hard time with those. It's:<br /><br /><a href="http://nine.frenchboys.net/country.php">Serendipity</a>: This one isn't so different from the one right above it, just specifically intended for places.<br /><br /><br />I think that's it for today. I'm trying to get back into making this a habit, though.Mordaciushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13149284329493760598noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2022993568533182460.post-10192567388887591172010-08-10T20:32:00.006-05:002010-08-21T09:58:15.313-05:00Shorthand*dusts off the old blog*<br /><br />So, guess I haven't done this in ages. School got busy. Writing got busy. I will admit that I sort of forgot. But, here I am again, at least for now. :)<br /><br />The new series is into its third book already, even though I've slowed *way* down. The three works form a single story, with no more than hours between each section. What's funny about this is that my original goal here was to write something episodic. Like, set up some characters and a situation in which short stories would be viable. I still want to do that, but I have yet to finish setting up the pieces: the nature of the protagonists and the space they're exploring. I expect to finish setting up the premise with the current story.<br /><br />Between all three books, I'm already over 184,000 words altogether.<br /><br />This has given me a new appreciation for why some people who want to write fantasy books just drop in elves or vampires and call it good*. The easy answer is that it's a lack of imagination, but I don't really believe that. As I said in an earlier post, imagination is part of what being human is all about: everybody's got one.<br /><br />I think it's mostly about time and energy.<br /><br />If you introduce something your audience already understands, you can just drop it in and offer a brief explanation of how your <a href="http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/OurVampiresAreDifferent">vampires aren't quite like Hollywood says</a>. It only takes a minute, then you can race off to the plot.<br /><br />Setting up something brand new means losing the advantage that shorthand offers: you have to explain it, and you have to sell your audience on it enough that they care in the first place.<br /><br />It's riskier. It takes longer. It requires more skill overall, to avoid the dreaded infodump.<br /><br />This isn't the <i>only</i> reason you see a lot of vampire/werewolf romances or fantasy books full of elves, but I don't remember seeing it talked about anywhere else, so I wanted to throw it out there.<br /><br />Anyway, hope to post again soon.<br /><br />(*Disclaimer: that's not to say I never use these props at all. I appreciate stock tropes too. It's just that I hate stopping there and calling it good. It's more fun to go further afield.)Mordaciushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13149284329493760598noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2022993568533182460.post-13166351924313964362009-12-14T01:51:00.001-06:002010-08-21T09:58:54.468-05:00More writing about writing...Well, I'm still slacking off with regard to finals. I hate my accounting class with a fiery, burning passion for reasons...well, I could go on all day, but I suppose the upshot is that I do not feel that I got what I paid for, there. It would've been smart to drop it when I had the chance.<br /><br />I was too proud. Accounting's always been easy for me. Of course, that's only when the instructor does their job...<br /><br />*mutters*<br /><br />Everything else was fascinating, but it's just been a tiring term. I spent five hours on <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_theory">game theory</a> with a study group today, and feel no better prepared than I was for that final at the start of the day. <br /><br />If there was ever anything in this world that made me feel inadequate, it's that particular application of logic. Don't remember the last time something was so hard to wrap my head around.<br /><br />So here I am again. Taking a break from taking a break from...well, you get the idea. Anyway, I promised to talk about how I've been going about writing last time, in case anybody was interested. So, here goes...<br /><br />A lot of people complain about not being able to write because they don't have any ideas. This simply isn't true. The human brain is a magnificent thing that is constantly offering us all sorts of scenarios:<br /><br />'What if I could get Monday off from work?'<br /><br />'What if I could date a supermodel?'<br /><br />'What if there are zombies in the basement?'<br /><br />Everybody does this, basically all the time. We even do it when we're sleeping. <br /><br />So the trouble isn't having an idea in the first place, the trouble is that we feel our ideas aren't worth the trouble to develop. That they aren't good enough, that they're too boring, that they aren't special.<br /><br />The thing is that almost every story, from horrible scrawl to enduring classic, had a humble beginning. Just to pick on one that was mentioned to me tonight, take Star Wars. It's assembled from what amount to stock pieces: a young man who learns he's the Chosen One and gets a magic sword. A mysterious teacher and a beautiful princess. An evil wizard and a black knight.<br /><br />That's all very forgettable, and yet here I am, mentioning it decades later. I suppose you could argue that the special effects bought it a place in the history books, but many stories without that edge have had a similarly lasting appeal.<br /><br />The truth is that an idea doesn't have to be new and unique to be worthwhile. Not the beginning of it, and not the pieces. It isn't necessary to wait until you have a notion that will set the world on fire. Almost any idea can be the seed of something decent, or even something genuinely good, depending on the execution. <br /><br />The thing that's needed to finish it is, simply, discipline.<br /><br />Every time I write, I see something wrong with what I'm doing. Something that could be better. As a result, I'm tempted to second guess myself at every turn. To rework a piece over and over in search of that one, perfect moment where it becomes something beautiful. Something people will remember.<br /><br />I want, very much, for the things I say to be remembered.<br /><br />The trouble with that is that I can't get more than half a page without feeling like that. I'm doing it now: this blog post could definitely be organized with more elegance. It could be less choppy. It's hard not to do something about it.<br /><br />I believe that most people feel this when they write. Happens a lot with people I talk to about why they're not doing it. I think a lot of them think the behavior is helpful, that it polishes what they're doing...and that they simply do not have the endurance to see it through to the end.<br /><br />That's not true, though. Basic editing is good. Endless revision is not. Nothing's perfect, and no amount of tweaking can change that. All it can do is keep a person tied up so that they never finish what they were doing.<br /><br />In this, I've been lucky because of my background of not-writing. My understanding of the narrative process is derived largely from interactive activities, rather than solitary ones. Like I said last time, I never kept a notebook and wrote in it or anything. <br /><br />Instead, I learned how to spin a yarn mostly over D&D books. Well, and a host of other games that most of you have probably never heard of. Ones I like much better for a variety of nerdy, nerdy reasons that I will spare you all.<br /><br />This is good because of the pressure it applies. <br /><br />If you have a live audience, you can't say, "Well, I'll tell you what happens in six hours, after I've had some time to think about it." You're on the spot for the whole day, and you have to be able to react to the unexpected at almost every turn. You're forced to roll with ideas that you might discard if you had a whole minute to consider why they're bad.<br /><br />Eventually, this can become natural if you let it. I'm used to working with ideas that are not necessarily the best and trying to rapidly cobble up something that people won't immediately reject. To take something familiar and twist it just enough that it's interesting again.<br /><br />It gets a lot easier with practice.<br /><br />The only down side to this is that I'm used to a lot of feedback. When you're playing a game like that, your audience is <span style="font-style:italic;">right there</span>. You have the opportunity to constantly read them and adjust what you're doing if it's not working. You also get instant gratification when it is.<br /><br />That's heady, and I'm a little hooked on it. I'll admit that even now, I have a small circle of readers that I constantly poke about what they think of every little thing I've written, pretty much daily.<br /><br />I think I'm bothering at least some of them, and I'm not sure what to do about that. <br /><br />It still beats not telling a story in the first place, though, I think.<br /><br />*sigh*<br /><br />Getting back to what I hope might be useful, the other thing I've done is to develop a multiple document system for writing. I use:<br /><br />* A primary document which contains the bulk of my rough draft. <br /><br />* A separate document for the scene I am currently working on. <br /><br />* A document for material I've scrapped, in case it had a turn of phrase I decide I wanted after all.<br /><br />* A document to brainstorm in, stream of consciousness style.<br /><br />The rule is that I can do anything I want to the scene I'm working on. I can play with it, throw it away, anything. However, once I'm mostly satisfied, it must be cut and pasted into the rough draft. I've done some simple spreadsheets to look at how fast I write, and I have some rules of thumb concerning how long material should generally be left there.<br /><br />The primary rough draft is to be left as untouched as possible. I don't alter it for content, only typos and the rare continuity glitch. At first, I tried not to look at it much at all.<br /><br />This keeps my eyes away from things I'd want to nitpick most of the time, but leaves everything where I can easily find it.<br /><br />I think that's probably enough for tonight, since it's almost 2AM. Hope this was of any use to anyone.Mordaciushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13149284329493760598noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2022993568533182460.post-21520279443897103582009-12-06T01:59:00.001-06:002010-08-21T09:59:05.760-05:00First postI'm supposed to be getting schoolwork done, but the truth is, there's only two weeks left of that and my heart just isn't in it.<br /><br />So, here I am, taking a break from writing with...yet more writing.<br /><br />It's funny. I've spent the better part of my adult life trying to <span style="font-style: italic;">avoid</span> becoming a writer of any kind. The lure was always there. I love stories. I think narrative is how people understand the world, and that you can learn all sorts of things about people by the stories they choose to hear and tell.<br /><br />Thing was, though, that my grandmother was a professional author. As in, able to pay at least some of the bills by selling her work. What I've read of it wasn't really my genre, but it was beautifully crafted.<br /><br />She was very good.<br /><br />She died a paranoid shut-in, though, and I've always felt that her occupation was a contributing factor. That by turning her attention so far into worlds she built, she lost touch with the real one in some profound and irretrievable way.<br /><br />So I always, always found something else to do when I was younger. I spent a lot of that energy on roleplaying games like D&D, just to have that creative energy going somewhere harmless. Say what you will about sitting around a table with dice and Mountain Dew, it still gets you out of the house and interacting with real human beings.<br /><br />Last May, though, I was really depressed about finals. They were harder than I could ever remember school being. My most recent gaming group had collapsed due to a variety of factors. My best friends were all very busy, and I didn't want to be a downer. My girlfriend was in worse shape than I was.<br /><br />I decided that, to feel better about life, I ought to Do Something.<br /><br />So I sat down and wrote my first novel. Took roughly five weeks, and I completely shot from the hip. No outline, nothing, just sat down and typed every day. (We're not talking a NaNoWriMo novella, either. It's about 100,000 words.)<br /><br />Then I went to Washington to visit my family and friends for a couple of weeks, came home, and cranked out the sequel.<br /><br />(The two are sort of...me playing with the Hero's Journey. They coincide with me reading volumes of <a href="http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HomePage">TVTropes</a>. I'm not ready to post them online, at least not whole - I'm still holding out hope that I'll find some time to edit them properly, and maybe find an agent. Sell them. Become wealthy and famous and all that other stuff that'll never happen. But I'll post excerpts at some point.)<br /><br />The whole deal was very cathartic, honestly. It was better than playing roleplaying games. It was better than watching TV or movies. It was better than reading books. My record was 19 hours out of 24 spent just writing - got in over 8700 words just that day, and I nearly forgot to eat. It was glorious, and I was hooked.<br /><br />I took it for proof that I'd been wrong when I was younger. That I should've done this a long time ago.<br /><br />Then school started back up, and...that's about where I first ran into trouble. I scrapped a 62000+ word partial draft of the third novel because it wasn't gelling. Wrote some short stories to sort of set the scene, and started the third novel over from scratch.<br /><br />The second time around with that book is going better: it's more focused, and I have a better idea of what to do with a number of the characters. It's still a little labyrinthine though, due to the number of characters and plots I need to make sure to address. As a result, I'm worried about coming in at a reasonable length.<br /><br />I most emphatically don't want to push the story past a trilogy. I really want to write about other characters soon, give these ones a rest.<br /><br />So...since I was feeling stuck, I started another project that is tangentially connected. A distant spinoff that shares the rules of the original series, but none of the characters or specific situations.<br /><br />This evening, I'm feeling a little tired to keep <span style="font-style: italic;">that </span>on the rails, so here I am: writing a blog post to take a break from writing a novella that is a break from my novel that is a break from my work.<br /><br />Looking back at<span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-style: italic;"> </span></span>what's gone on tonight, I think maybe I made the right call when I was younger. This really <span style="font-style: italic;">is</span> looking like a trap, now.<br /><br />Since I'm already a junkie, though, I'll spend some time talking about how I went about this. Probably next time.Mordaciushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13149284329493760598noreply@blogger.com5