Tag Archives: life

Writer’s Blog 2025-03-25

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Have you ever come to a realisation that you should have come to a long time ago? This happened to me recently. It was so simple that it really should have occurred to me earlier. It is this: Writing this blog should be a three step process. As realisations go it is not exactly ground breaking but it is true.

The three steps are:

  • Write the words. (I am using a Freewrite Alpha for this.)
  • Edit the words. (I use Google docs)
  • Put the words on to the site and make them look pretty.

Before I always picked a picture before typing. Sometimes this works but often my words go in a different direction and the picture is no longer relevant.

The other thing I am going to do is to try and limit myself to around 500 words. It is a more manageable length for you and for me.

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As mentioned above I am using a Freewrite alpha (not pictured) for the drafting stage. Here is a link if you want to get one: https://getfreewrite.com/products/alpha (Not sponsored and all that)

I bought the Alpha after my Freewrite Traveller gave up the ghost. It is wonderful to type on. The click-clack of the keys is very satisfying.

If you’ve followed that link, and seen the price, you might feel it is ridiculous. I get that completely. I did have to think for a long time about it. For me it makes sense as distraction is very easy.

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Anyone who has used the internet for research knows this problem. The rabbit warren, as they say. If you’re a writer I am sure you have had this happen. It goes like this…

Let’s say you have a Spanish character in your story. (I am picking Spain at random.) The character just needs a name. You want to be different. You don’t want to put another Lopez or Gonzaras in your story. So you google for Spanish names – it should be a simple matter just to pick one…

Then before you know it you have spent half an hour reading about a Spanish guitar play and bought two of her albums! (This specific example didn’t happen but I am sure you get the general idea.)

Unfortunately, when it comes to my internet distractions, I have never found something so interesting as a new piece of music. For me it is much more likely to just be a YouTube video – and one that I will have forgotten all about by the end of the day.

The new plan is still a work in progress. This draft has been going on for over a month!

I just wanted to say that I have checked this post. I really have. Unfortunately my particular combination of dyslexia and dyspraxia makes it really hard for me to spot typos. Please enjoy and I’ll try not to make too many errors.

https://www.buymeacoffee.com/SDuKYJBkJm

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Writer’s Blog – 2024-01-19

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Have you ever heard about this silent room. Reportedly it is so quiet you can hear the blood moving in your head. I must admit I have often been curious what it might be like to be in such a room.

I find both silence and sound to be somewhat difficult to deal with – maybe it would be more accurate to say I am addicted to YouTube.

There is a tendency nowadays to fill all moments with sound. It could be music, the aforementioned YouTube, or even an audio book. I am aware that with the use of the word ‘nowadays’ I sound like an old man.

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As I am writing this now I have a YouTube video paused. When I finish this session I will unpause, listen for a little bit longer, and then pause again. Often that is how I operate over a day. I am sure it is not particularly effective.

Would silence be better?

I am not sure what it is about silence but it can be hard to deal with too. The funny thing is it is not even that I have too many thoughts. Mostly my mind is rather blank.

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It is said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing again and again and expecting different results. I think that I have been embodying that for a while.

Breaking out of a bad habit can be hard. I suppose I am thinking about that now, in particular, as we get towards the end of the year. (Now we’ve started a new year. I started this on 2024-12-11)

New habits can be embarked on at any point, obviously, but there is something about a new year that makes it seem like it is the right time to do it.

On the other hand, ‘New Year’s resolutions’ are doomed to failure. It is an often repeated fact that such resolutions rarely make it out of January.

They say that the better thing to do is to set a general intention. I am not sure how to do that. To be more accurate I need to find the discipline to do it.

What I have found is that there are always impediments. The parts of my life out of my control sometimes lead to not being able to stick to a routine. I have set an intention to wake up at 0700 each day. However I sometimes have trouble sleeping. On those nights, if I don’t have to be up in the morning, I cancel my alarm, wake up late, and then the whole day is thrown off and I am back to square one.

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It is now January and this post is only just being completed. Maybe I should work on doing these in one go. Each time I come to it I write just a little more. Therefore it is long past time to wrap it up.

Lately, to help with being productive, I have been using dice. I write out a list, select a dice, and roll it down a dice tower to decide what I will do next. It makes choosing just a little more fun. So far so good.

https://www.buymeacoffee.com/SDuKYJBkJm

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Writer’s Blog – 2024-09-09

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Sometimes, when writing, annoying questions come to my mind. I’ll be writing my story and everything seems to be going fine then, suddenly, I discover a plot hole.

Funnily enough this can come in the form of a character asking a question and then I have to deal with the question.

Plot holes are an almost inevitable part of writing. In the real world the unexplained can happen. In a story every part should have some value.

In 2008 my brother and I were in Paris. We saw an old man on the metro. He was a little scruffy looking and kept standing up, gesticulating, speaking quickly, and then sitting back down. I don’t speak French so I have no idea what he was saying. My impression, from the reactions of those around us, was that he was probably predicting the end of the world. (It could have be literally anything else.)

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In a film, or a book, including such an event would have to have some kind of point. Although I suppose, and I am defeating my own argument here, he could just be a curiosity in a wider adventure. I suppose it is more proper to say most things have to have a point.

The final episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer season 4, Restless, takes place in a dream world. Everything in it has a meaning with one exception. A bold man offering slices of cheese. The meaning of this is that it is meaningless. The idea being that all dreams have elements of meaningless.

As an aside I have never been a fan of this episode. I like it as a piece of art but not as an episode of television. I shouldn’t have to know philosophy and ancient Greek just to understand something of this sort. Perhaps I am just an uncultured so-and-so.

As another aside my dreams are, I am fairly sure, completely meaningless. I once had a dream that someone sent me a living baby in the post. The dream me didn’t seem altogether surprised with this development. I just made sure the tiny baby was taken care off.

In my novel a group of centaurs are rescued from slavery. My astute, intelligent, and kind protagonist is going to ask awkward questions about this. She will want to know why more slaves aren’t rescued in the story. I have some ideas of how to answer but not a complete one. I think I will go with plan B…write the story and let reviewers, if reviews there be, come up with lore to explain my shortcomings.

I hope you are doing well. Thank you for reading my blog.

I just wanted to say that I have checked this post. I really have. Unfortunately my particular combination of dyslexia and dyspraxia makes it really hard for me to spot typos. Please enjoy and I’ll try not to make too many errors.

https://www.buymeacoffee.com/SDuKYJBkJm

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500~Words on 2024-06-12

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Today I want to talk about distractions. The world today has so many distractions. Right now, as I type this (Ironically on my distraction free writing computer) I have a YouTube video playing. It is a video from the TV series The Orville.

[I am also distracting myself with the editing phase of this post.]

For those that do not know The Orville is a science fiction series created by Seth Macfarlane. I am not a fan of Family Guy, his most famous work, but The Orville is brilliant.

When you watch The Orville it is quite obviously a homage to Star Trek. It has humans and aliens working together, colour coded uniforms, a prime directive, and social commentary.

The first season is a little ropy. I think it was a comedy Trojan horse. Can I put it like that? Am I making any sense?

Let me explain. A science fiction story about exploring the galaxy is, obviously, going to bring Star Trek to mind. However that idea isn’t something Star Trek (specifically TNG) can claim rights too. Nevertheless I think there are those who would question it. It is my supposition that Macfarlane made the series a comedy as a way to make it different and get it green lit. Then, once that was done, he could slowly adjust it to something more serious. In my view each season has been better than the one before. Fingers crossed for a fourth season.

I don’t want to make this post all about The Orville. In order to achieve that I should stop letting myself get distracted.

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Technically, I suppose, I have done that as this is a new editing session from the last time I said that.

I saw something on Facebook the other day about life being better before social media and maybe the internet in general. I am inclined to think there might be something to that.

I remember dial-up internet and only having one computer for the whole family.

(This is funny. My grammar checker doesn’t like the phrase ‘dial-up internet. We have come so far even the computers don’t remember that time.)

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There is an episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, (I, Robot… You, Jane) that deals with the early internet. It is not one of their best episodes. It does, however, have a retrospectively funny line about being able to tell someone wasn’t online because the phone wasn’t busy.

They say that silence is very important. They say that our minds were not designed to be constantly stimulated. Yet that is what we have in this day and age.

104 words of this to go and then I can do something else. I am still distracted. I have had a long day today.

(Only true for the original writing. This edit is being done at 0756.)

104 words of this to go and then I can do something else. How do I keep from getting distracted?

Obviously I can shut off YouTube. For reasons I cannot understand I am not doing that.

(I didn’t then I am now.)

Do you ever have that battle with yourself? Where you are doing something that is annoying you? And you know your future self is going to be annoyed and yet you can’t seem to stop. I know that my future self is annoyed with me right now.

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It is now another day – and we are so far adrift from when the above draft was written it is almost completely meaningless. I will leave it be. It can be a monument to my deep personal stupidity.

I just wanted to say that I have checked this post. I really have. Unfortunately my particular combination of dyslexia and dyspraxia makes it really hard for me to spot typos. Please enjoy and I’ll try not to make too many errors.

https://www.buymeacoffee.com/SDuKYJBkJm



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Apple for A Job

Red Dwarf is in trouble (again)

I have dyslexia which is why ‘Apple for a job’ was on my to-do list. Incidentally who decided that dyslexia should be spelt that way. Why not dislexear – is that the correct phonetic spelling? I do not know I have dyslexia – and apparently I like to repeat myself – so I won’t be winning Just a Minute any time soon.

This show is always funny.

Well it is not ‘apple’ but apply for a job. And there is nothing more tedious than filling out an application form or bolstering a CV – especially when some places require you to submit a CV and then repeat the information on the application form!

The problem is that, aside from writing, I have no idea what it is that I want. This is bad because I am 32 and because without a clear idea it is difficult to go at it with any enthusiasms. So I am left with searching for jobs and seeing what sticks in my mind. Frankly I just want to write – and possibly live in a tiny house – and travel – and fall in love – and have lots of kisses – and banish my depression. Most of that shouldn’t be too much. If I can find a job that allows for those things I could do almost anything couldn’t I?

I do not know.

Just a short one this week. See you next time.

I just wanted to say that I have checked this post. I really have. Unfortunately my particular combination of dyslexia and dyspraxia makes it really hard for me to spot typos. Please enjoy and I’ll try not to make too many errors.

I have a Patreon page. I hope you will consider supporting this blog: https://www.patreon.com/unstableorbit

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17 Days

How is your year going?

For me, in those seventeen days, I have utterly failed to go to the gym. So that’s one thing that hasn’t changed.

Writing though is going well. My long worked on novel is finally all coming together. The key, it seems, was to have a narrator. She is able to pull the threads together and tell the story. Plus she can act as an author surrogate and speak in a more colloquial fashion.

Today is Sunday and I have the day off. Outside my window it’s so misty I can hardly see the tops of the mountains. It may be 1339 here but I haven’t been up long. Last night I didn’t sleep well and on waking it took a while to get out of bed.

This is ramble in case you hadn’t noticed.

I’ve set myself the task of reading 52 books this year. So far I’ve read: Gaslight Carnival, The Hobbit, and The Five Orange Pips. The Hobbit I actually listened to and the other two are short stories but I’m still counting them. 52 books should be doable.

The version of The Hobbit I listened to was read by Rob Inglis and it was excellent. I remember being bored by the book when I was younger but this time it was very good.

I’m keeping up with leaning Welsh though I’m not sure how much of it is sinking in. I can’t write it here as I only know how to say it. Also if I can’t handle English gamma and spelling do you really think I could handle it for Welsh?

Yesterday I didn’t leave the flat, and may not again today, that’s okay though. I will create worlds, play Mario Kart, and try and tidy up a bit.

This is a strange post I know. I’d make it a poem if I knew how. Maybe that is something to work on.

I received notification of not having won a short story competition the other day. It’s the taking part that counts though. Someone read it which is good. It means I have something to submit to another magazine.

Hope your year is going well and I’ll be back soon.

***

I just wanted to say that I have checked this post. I really have. Unfortunately my particular combination of dyslexia and dyspraxia makes it really hard for me to spot typos. Please enjoy and I’ll try not to make too many errors.

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