Sometimes it doesn't pay to be too organised...
Woke early (even before Kai!), feeling positive and determined after not having much success in revising both the sample spreads and the Dreams book outline yesterday. Fed the menagerie, got the day's meals organised and settled down to boot up.
CPU fan speed too slow. Auto shut off in 5 seconds
AAARRRGGGHHH!!!
Tried several times, same result. Rang Special Reserve, who said yes, bring it in, they had two techies on today and should be able to look at it fairly quickly. But of course this entailed a taxi, so I had to get to a hole in the wall to get cash first. Had Kai stay home (first time ever alone) while I dived to Tesco (he was fine, of course, despite being nervous about it) to the ATM. Arrived back, got everything together to ring Ace Taxis (our preferred brand, never let us down yet) and thought I'd just try one last time...
Computer booted up just fine.
AAAARRRRGGGHHH!!!
Fingers crossed it was just a temporary glitch (or Butch throwing a tantrum. He does that sometimes when he's feeling unappreciated) because if it's an intermittent fault I really do have problems.
ANYway... Immediately backed up last night's work to CD - and the whole of Eudora: if we can't access the emails... [shudder]. Then got the revised sample spreads done and emailed. Then left Kai home while I went to Sainsbug's to pick up a little shopping (he was fine again. I'm pleased about this, he'll be OK for short spells in future). Watched a little more
Cowboy Bebop (neither of us find it as compelling as
Trigun, probably because there's far less gradually-unfolding story, and it's more disjointed, but we're still enjoying it. I adore the backgrounds...) - Kai absolutely loved
Toys in the Attic (
Jupiter Jazz 1 & 2 tomorrow. I never did write that Gren/Vicious ficlet: perhaps I'll be re-inspired).
And now I'm wrestling - again - with the damned outline. It's a matter of structure - how to group the various major themes, sub-themes and topics so they're as user-friendly as possible yet
not copy the way the competition has organised theirs. I'll get there. The problem is I don't have that much time.
Lutra has posted (with permission) the
Notice to fanfic writers from Prof. Severus Snape that I found and laughed over at AFF. The author has had to take it down because of the flaming.
I'm annoyed. It's a nice piece of writing (not perfect - I can't see Snape saying 'no-go area' or 'sappy', and I'm not wholly convinced by 'get over it'. The examples might be a little beyond the intellect of those wannabe writers at which the piece is aimed, as well...) Lutra says
The only thing that pisses me off more than fanficers who bugger a character concept is fanficers who refuse to improve the standard of their writing.
I'd agree, almost. I can cope with OOC characters, as long as they're done well and there's a reason for it - but there's
no excuse for the utter crap that can be found, nor for the attitude of those illiterates writing it. After all, it's hardly difficult to make improvements: use of a spellchecker (or beta) and a little simple
reading of the material (to learn how to structure sentences and paragraphs in the first instance: characterisation and dialogue can come later) make all the difference. And to throw a tantrum because someone points out the flaws - in a humorous manner and naming no names - simply displays the ignorance and immaturity of the flamers. They disgust me.
As a sidenote, the inability to distinguish between
definite (
gods I hate it when that's spelt 'definate'! It's hardly difficult: if you know what 'finish', 'finite' and 'infinite' are there's no excuse for getting 'definite' wrong - they're from the same bloody root! (Latin
finire, to limit or end) Where was I? Ah...) and
defiant really pisses me off. Completely different meanings, completely different words. [growl]
Enough ranting - back to work: I'd like to get this outline finished tonight, in case Butch decides to play silly buggers in the morning...
Heh, blogger's spellchecker gives 'ambae' as an alternative to 'wannabe'. Says it all, really...
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Joules *Dances with Haddock* Taylor
pontificated this at 10:41 pm
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