How Do I Know What I Think Until I See What I Say?

Recently on the Upstart Crow blog , Chris asked about inspiration, and how writers keep track of their ideas. Chris seems to have a series of making notes where ever he is, which would drive me crazy. I'm a bit of an organizational nerd, so I have to have a system, and I experiment from time to time with changing up my system for keeping track of my ideas. At the moment, this is how I keep track of my ideas. 1. The Daily Notebook. I have a notebook on my person virtually all the time. Not a variety of notebooks, one notebook. I keep it it my purse* and I write down everything in that notebook. Grocery lists, to do lists, story ideas, daily journaling, everything. Once it's full, it goes on a shelf in my office organized in chronological order and a new one goes in my purse.** Then, from time to time, I look through the notebooks to see if anything captures my fancy. 2. If an idea really sticks with me, I start making notes on it. These notes start in the Daily Noteb...

1. I've been watching old episodes of The West Wing on Bravo lately, and have come to the conclusion that I love the character of Sam Seaborn. He's smart, he's earnest, he's a good writer, and he's played by Rob Lowe. What's not to love?* 2. I just bought the cutest jacket at Ann Taylor Loft. I know you care, but it's not every day that one can find a white denim jacket with styling reminiscent of Michael Jackson and a tailored waist. I'm just saying. 3. NaNoWriMo proceeds apace. There is no way that I'm going to be able to keep writing at this pace after this month is over, but I'm on track to finish. It's an interesting project...in some ways the speed is freeing and in other ways it's extremely limited, as to make the word count I have no time to go back and revise. 4. Alien and Aliens are amazing movies. Alien 3 and Alien Resurrection ? Not so much. 5. This week's Glee characterization inconsistency watch: Rache...

Nostalgia - it's delicate, but potent. Teddy told me that in Greek, "nostalgia" literally means "the pain from an old wound." It's a twinge in your heart far more powerful than memory alone. Don Draper "The Wheel" Mad Men Like a lot of writers, I suspect, many of the things I write come from memory. Not memories, per se--but from memory , using bits and pieces of things I've seen and heard and lived to create whole new places that, I hope, are just as real. And I've discovered, recently, that there are things I shouldn't do in order to preserve my memory. Like, for example, Facebook. Don't get me wrong--I'm on Facebook, and I've reconnected with people from my past and all that--but there are people who I don't look up, because they have become fantasies. And there are questions I don't ask of the people who I have reconnected with because I've already made up the answers. And when I go home, there are str...

see more Lolcats and funny pictures Via LOLcat, of course. NaNoWriMo Word Count: 32,668

Recently, there's been a bit of controversy in the blogging world* ensuing from The Rejectionist's review of Maggie Stiefvater's latest book Shiver .** The Rejectionist's primary objection to Shiver is that she feels that the protagonist doesn't do anything but live for her man.*** The Rejectionist uses Shiver as a springboard to talk about the weak nature of female characters in YA fiction. Since I haven't read Maggie's book yet, I don't have an opinion about whether The Rejectionist is right or wrong on the issue of Shiver 's protagonist.**** But I agree with her whole heartedly on being tired of what The Rejectionist calls "feeble and inept teenage-girl main characters." And that's why I didn't like 2012 . Because the women in it (no teenagers, actually, but grown women) were both feeble AND inept. One of them was more feeble and inept than a ten year old boy, in fact. For real. Normally, I love disaster movies. I love...

see more Lolcats and funny pictures Via LOLcat, of course. NaNoWriMo Word Count: 28,114

1. I saw 2012 this weekend. It was...not good. Not even for people like me, who love disaster movies . More on why it wasn't a good movie for me, personally, later this week, but really, save your money. All the best destruction happens in the previews. 2. Last week I failed to buy a car. Or, rather, I should say that the dealership I wanted to buy a car from failed to sell me a car. My official explanation for their failure is this: they failed to engage in a serious discussion about price. I know! A used car dealership decided that, instead of trying to talk me into buying a car I (a) really wanted (b) already had financing for and (c) had already had inspected by my mechanic, they would rather let me walk away than engage in a serious discussion about price.* I guess the economy is recovering after all. :) 3. I find that watching old episodes of The West Wing helps me with my snappy banter. 4. I went to the local Nanowrimo write-in on Thursday, which was fun. Wr...