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Feb. 28th, 2013 05:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lenora_rose- Today is the day the second of Colin's best friends (And his roommate, another good friend if not quite as close) leaves town within the last half year. I wish Nathaniel (and P.) well, but I suspect that there are going to be some gaps ion our world in the next while. One or both of us did get to see them four out of the last five days, so we managed a lot of goodbyes. They're going to be living in BC, not too close to Colin's parents, but near enough that when we visit, we will be able to make a trip out to see them.
- We have a kitchen sink again! (Actually, we had it in working order yesterday) This after over a week of not having one. It would have been less but Colin was sick this last weekend. In other words, kitchen cupboard installations continue only slightly behind schedule, and it will look good when it's through. Naturally, on the days my father in law can't do quite as much because Colin is gone, he's found other side projects, or we've had other things break down, or in one case, the attempt to fix a minor issue lead to discovering it's a bit more intensive a repair than first thought (That would be the main floor toilet, alas.) So he's stayed busy. And the results are decidedly worthwhile, even if we ahve had to occasionally do interesting things like figure out how to wash dishes in a pair of pots and a bathroom sink, or sort the dishes from the tools.
- JoJo managed to be green again yesterday. I turned my back while getting his breakfast ready, even though he'd made it into the kitchen (Not a place he's usually allowed, and never unaccompanied, during the reno), turned back to him, and there it was around and in his mouth. I do NOT know for sure what he got into; I scoured the kitchen for every possible source (and most of the main floor for every possible greenish substance) and found nothing at all that could turn him green, never mind nothing poisonous. (Everything dangerous that was under the kitchen sink is in the bathroom he is NOT allowed into).
Right now my best theory is that he found some small fragment of his green crayon (Most of which is up here), and it's just that, like with his first encounter with it, the colour spreads amazingly once dissolved.
In any case, he didn't appear to suffer ill effects - after I'd cleaned his mouth as best I could, I fed him breakfast, on the reasoning that if it was dangerous, diluting it was a good first step, and watched him all day for anything out of the ordinary. He was fine, though his diapers got interesting later. He's been fine today, too. But wow, it really does take no time at all...
- One of the first things I did upon getting the e-reader was to look through my own book. It's ... an interesting experience. I did find three typos, only one of which (Free reign instead of free rein, because it's a personal peeve) did I manage to report to Raechel, so if you spot the other two, which are places two words run together, let her know!
BUt the part that interested me is seeing something I wrote in 2004 but have no chance to edit or amend. Normally, there's a difference between reading my prose and someone else's. When I spot something I would want to edit in someone else's work (This happened a lot reading Tamora Pierce recently - more than it did in Illusion of Steel, and no, I am not saying I am a better writer than someone so oft-published, though it does give me a kind of hope -- we're writing for different audiences with different expectations), I know it's hands-off. When it's my own, I can simply tap a few keys and voila. Fixed. So reading a work of my own that's about nine years old, knowing I can't tweak it, gives me a little bit of an itch.
It could have used the edit. I've improved as a writer. I can see a number of ways I would tidy the prose. Mostly, as ever, tightening it up. Shaking out some of the formalities in the dialogue, so that people sound a little more natural, (or at least if they don't it's obviously on purpose).
At the same time, I'm relieved that to my eye, the plot hangs together, and overall it works as a story (Someone else can of course disagree and pick it apart. I'd be curious.) I like the dealing with the souls in the sword, and the multi-generational complexities, and the past not being left behind. I like Kanna, and her wariness and her refusal to dwell on nasty stuff, and I hope it came across to others as it does to me that it's a character trait, not a failure on the writer's part to account for the traumatic nature of trauma. I was kind of sad I hadn't been able to flesh out Daemon a bit more, but there's no room. There's no saving it from the "He's evil, I say EVIL!" of the villain, it doesn't work if he's not.
It was, as one says, the best I could do at the time I did it. It's not bad, just not ideal. I'm not ashamed of its flaws. A little chagrined longing to take it back in and see what I could make of it now is reasonable, as long as I don't actually do so. It would be stupid to refuse to forgive my younger self for being younger.
I have other stories to tell in the now.
- We have a kitchen sink again! (Actually, we had it in working order yesterday) This after over a week of not having one. It would have been less but Colin was sick this last weekend. In other words, kitchen cupboard installations continue only slightly behind schedule, and it will look good when it's through. Naturally, on the days my father in law can't do quite as much because Colin is gone, he's found other side projects, or we've had other things break down, or in one case, the attempt to fix a minor issue lead to discovering it's a bit more intensive a repair than first thought (That would be the main floor toilet, alas.) So he's stayed busy. And the results are decidedly worthwhile, even if we ahve had to occasionally do interesting things like figure out how to wash dishes in a pair of pots and a bathroom sink, or sort the dishes from the tools.
- JoJo managed to be green again yesterday. I turned my back while getting his breakfast ready, even though he'd made it into the kitchen (Not a place he's usually allowed, and never unaccompanied, during the reno), turned back to him, and there it was around and in his mouth. I do NOT know for sure what he got into; I scoured the kitchen for every possible source (and most of the main floor for every possible greenish substance) and found nothing at all that could turn him green, never mind nothing poisonous. (Everything dangerous that was under the kitchen sink is in the bathroom he is NOT allowed into).
Right now my best theory is that he found some small fragment of his green crayon (Most of which is up here), and it's just that, like with his first encounter with it, the colour spreads amazingly once dissolved.
In any case, he didn't appear to suffer ill effects - after I'd cleaned his mouth as best I could, I fed him breakfast, on the reasoning that if it was dangerous, diluting it was a good first step, and watched him all day for anything out of the ordinary. He was fine, though his diapers got interesting later. He's been fine today, too. But wow, it really does take no time at all...
- One of the first things I did upon getting the e-reader was to look through my own book. It's ... an interesting experience. I did find three typos, only one of which (Free reign instead of free rein, because it's a personal peeve) did I manage to report to Raechel, so if you spot the other two, which are places two words run together, let her know!
BUt the part that interested me is seeing something I wrote in 2004 but have no chance to edit or amend. Normally, there's a difference between reading my prose and someone else's. When I spot something I would want to edit in someone else's work (This happened a lot reading Tamora Pierce recently - more than it did in Illusion of Steel, and no, I am not saying I am a better writer than someone so oft-published, though it does give me a kind of hope -- we're writing for different audiences with different expectations), I know it's hands-off. When it's my own, I can simply tap a few keys and voila. Fixed. So reading a work of my own that's about nine years old, knowing I can't tweak it, gives me a little bit of an itch.
It could have used the edit. I've improved as a writer. I can see a number of ways I would tidy the prose. Mostly, as ever, tightening it up. Shaking out some of the formalities in the dialogue, so that people sound a little more natural, (or at least if they don't it's obviously on purpose).
At the same time, I'm relieved that to my eye, the plot hangs together, and overall it works as a story (Someone else can of course disagree and pick it apart. I'd be curious.) I like the dealing with the souls in the sword, and the multi-generational complexities, and the past not being left behind. I like Kanna, and her wariness and her refusal to dwell on nasty stuff, and I hope it came across to others as it does to me that it's a character trait, not a failure on the writer's part to account for the traumatic nature of trauma. I was kind of sad I hadn't been able to flesh out Daemon a bit more, but there's no room. There's no saving it from the "He's evil, I say EVIL!" of the villain, it doesn't work if he's not.
It was, as one says, the best I could do at the time I did it. It's not bad, just not ideal. I'm not ashamed of its flaws. A little chagrined longing to take it back in and see what I could make of it now is reasonable, as long as I don't actually do so. It would be stupid to refuse to forgive my younger self for being younger.
I have other stories to tell in the now.
