NaNo... NaNa.. NaNot Gonna Write This No More!
Dec 1, 2010 in Writing Practice
For some reason, I thought it would be a clever idea to write a novel this November. I’d been thinking about it for years, actually, since a very good friend… Read on…
Scene 2
Feb 11, 2008 in Writing Practice
The grid of white Quonset huts and geodetic domes receded into a brown that matched Elon’s coveralls as the Lieutenant piloted his shuttle up - straight up - from the settlement; the lakes were last to go, slipping away as the planet turned and the shuttle lined up in front of the dark blue Corvette orbiting above. He sat in a reclined seat in a half-clear bubble suspended above the empty cylindrical hold, pushed a series of buttons, watched one after the next turn amber, then green; matched velocity, matched altitude, backed slowly into a short protruding cylinder on the front of the boxy orbiting ship. The green light that came from below showed a tight seal, and he climbed down, ducked his head through the hatch, and, three doors later, was in his ship. Read on…
An Exercise in Fiction
Jan 13, 2008 in Writing Practice
It’s enjoyable enough to write essay-style stuff here, but I do miss when I used to actually write fiction. So, in a new feature here, I’m going to write monthly entries on a continuing story. Now, this isn’t quite the way I usually write: no outlines, no character studies; in fact, I really know virtually nothing about this story other than what I’ve written already. So, you’ll learn it at the same time I do. Also, I’m not spending much time on editing, so quality may be, let’s say variable. So, without further ado: a bit of ongoing storytelling, in the sci-fi genre. Read on…
Blues
Feb 18, 2007 in Otherwise Uncategorized, Writing Practice
I need new clothes for the new season coming up. To be frank, I needed new clothes for the last season, but, in true LA fashion, summer seems to have come already and obviated the need for sweaters and layering. Nonetheless, I need new clothes for the new season. And I’d like it if some weren’t blue, although most often that’s the color I end up wearing. Read on…
The Sky I Was Born Under
Jan 28, 2007 in True Life Stories, Writing Practice
I am from Baltimore, a place where the blackness of the night is obscured and turned pink by the city lights. Some people bemoan our loss of the night stars — astronomers with the most justification — but this soft blanket of three quarters of a million people’s porch lights and bedside lamps and flickering tvs in the den is something that is particularly, authentically, of our era. It holds in the sirens and car engines and chattering neighbors that provide the background for our reality, reflects them back at us, confines and radiates the atmosphere of the city. Perhaps I love this sky because I was born under it, perhaps I love it because it enveloped me every night. But I do love it. Read on…
Days
Jan 23, 2007 in Meta, Writing Practice
I’ve been writing this thing for three and a half years now. I started blogging because everything I wrote sounded like a business memo, and that just wasn’t a good way to make date plans; now, I can write things that are occasionally amusing. And have long run-on sentences and snarky footnotes.1 Yep, things are moving along. Read on…