My Writingness Is Going Insane

Dear Wal,

Over everything except blog posts. Sorry guys. How long has it been? Let me explain. I got a really bad case of poison ivy/bug thing off a thorn bush on my leg and then it got infected. I had never had poison ivy before, so naturally I was seriously freaked out. My leg was turning red and oozing all over everywhere, not to mention the itching. Anyway, I had to go to the doctor and they gave me an antibiotic and something for the itching. This something for the itching happens to make you crazy. I've been on it before. It was a very amusing experience. But this time it hasn't effected me hardly at all, other than my writing. And now we come to the subject at hand.
Remember what I said before about having multiple stories at once? Well, they've multiplied. A lot. To the point that it's not physically possible for me to write all of them down and still sleep and eat, let alone everything else I do. (I'm sorry. This rant keeps getting interrupted by Plants VS. Zombies.) It's been a trial. I don't quite know what to do with myself. I'm running out of ram in my head to handle all of them. Here's the running list as of right now:

Torchwood Fanfic
Three stories-two of which I wisely scribbled everything I had down in rant form so I wouldn't have to keep track of it in my head. The third I came up with yesterday. They end up on this planet where there's this huge racial conflict between humans and aliens. (Two kinds of aliens, actually. Fishy aliens and another kind I haven't come up with yet.) They are going to help them not fight each other or something, not sure yet.

Batman/DC in General Fanfic
Ugh, where do I start? Not to mention the huge well of ideas I haven't written anyway, this is a story that gets added to every day. I have bits of scenes hanging around in my head-Jason visiting the Kents (He makes friends with Shelby. He ends up talking to him the entire time.), a super cool mechanical beetle (?!) spying on a JLA falling to pieces, a story where the JLA loses their powers and in the process gets trapped in these caves-Jason ends up using a piece of plywood as a surf board through the mud-a story where Jason's telepathy messes up J'on's telepathy and the JLA gets trapped in what was supposed to be a training exercise turned lethal, and the entire first chapter of my JLA storyline. That last one I'm quite proud of. I've been struggling with it for a while. It's entirely from Hood's (My version of the Green Arrow.) point of view. Go puny female human superhero! (BTW she's Oliver's daughter. Haven't figured that out yet so don't ask.)
The whole idea of this fanfic is that it's a parallel universe where I either changed everything that annoyed me or made it funny. Like Batman (Jason Todd-one of the robins) is perky and happy, Clark's glasses failed as a disguise and Bruce had to get over it. Dick is Nightwing and never Robin, and Tim is his sidekick, Robin. It's pretty epic.

(At this point in the post I just sort of stopped and stared at the screen. I couldn't decide which one to pick next. This is a serious problem, people.)

Horse Thing
This one I just came up with today. It's about a character like me who understands how to read horses really well and spends a lot of her life going back and forth from barns/trainers etc. being frustrated with people. I kinda stole this idea from my friend Katie. She's always writing horse stories. Anyway, this gives me an outlet to vent through when I'm frustrated with people and horses and can't explain what the problem is without going into a gigantic lecture. Or I just can't do anything about it. That's the worst bit. Anyway, I have the first half a page or so waiting in my head and it's probably going to be written next after this post.

Virus Thing
I came up with this a few days ago and actually wrote it right after I came up with it. It's about this kid who's sick, but it's from her point of view so you can't tell if she's really sick and going to die or just thinks she's going to die. Once again, it's just the first half page or so of story.

Something You Would Call Evil
Ongoing Elliot project, like my DC fanfic. That is the actual title by the way. I would like to think that it and the story is pretty good at the moment. This story is in a constant state of flux. Mostly I've just been working out the plot. For instance, the first thirty pages or so is a journal that Elliot writes after the end of the world and sends back in time. After that I didn't have a clue what happens next, other than it's very exciting and very timey whimey wibly wobly. Meaning Elliot ends up fighting a future/past (I don't know which yet.) version of himself. So he's the good guy and the bad guy, literally fighting himself. Naaah. 8D

Araucania
Again, ongoing project thingy. This is my fantasy story. I have most of what I came up with written down at the moment, but I just can't seem to get around to finishing up this one scene. Katan wakes up from a bad dream about the last battle she was in. She's shell-shocked from it, so she jumps at everything and she's really cautious. She wakes up and Ratanger tries to calm her telepathically. Ratanger is blind (from what I have no idea yet) and obviously a telepath (I seem to have a lot of those...). He's also my Chosen One in this story. Haven't worked that bit out yet either. Anyway, his telepathy only freaks her out more, of course. Then they get attacked by some people they ticked off the night before. She has to maintain shields against them while still shaking with fear from her dream. This is where we discover that Ratanger can actually defend himself. They manage to escape and then run away to the mountains (Really their only option. It was either up into the cold, dangerous mountains or back through the evil forest.) and then they get captured by the winter people. Their skin is blue-black and their eyes are blue. They're either ice or wind elementals, haven't decided yet. And they have machines. Primitive machines, but machines none-the-less. 
Beyond that I have no idea what happens.


Weird Dream Thing
Another story born from a weird dream. I remember it vividly. I was this Jason Bourne type character and I was injured or something-but not to the point that I was unconscious yet. My buddy dragged me down the slope of this gully that I know in real life is right next to my house. But at the top of the hill in the dream my house wasn't there. All I remember seeing were all these bright yellow search lights and a bunch of ragged kids running around laughing. They followed us down the slope. We didn't reach the bottom and safety, because my buddy was seriously worn out. Somehow the kids drove him out from cover and he was shot down by the people up at the top looking for us. I managed to drag myself up to lean on a tree where I couldn't be seen. But the kids knew where I was, and they started to wrap a rope around me and the tree with the intent of choking me or squeezing me hard enough that I made a sound and attracted the attention of my pursuers. Nasty kids. Anyway, I grabbed the rope and jerked it out of their hands. At this point this dream faded out into another one and I don't remember anything else. The one thing I do remember was being petrified the entire time that they would find me. It was real fear, the kind that freezes you stiff and rips you apart with desperation. I kept thinking about the eye, how I couldn't let it see me. I don't know what the eye was. But it wasn't the eye of Sauron. 


1984 Scene Thing
O'Brian VS Elliot. Oh yes. Do I need to continue? It was amazing. I actually wrote this one too.

So you see the interior of my mind is pretty insane at the moment. I've started on the JLA stuff, written a bit of SYWCE (Something You Would Call Evil) and chipped away at Torchwood. Aaag. It's very annoying. At least it's not writer's block. Anyway, I apologize if this post didn't make much sense. I did it mostly to have a place to put down and vaguely order all the stories/characters flying around in my head.

/endrant

P.S. I WIN ZOMBIES!!! I WIN!!!

Me And Superheroes

Dear Wal,

I don't just start reading the comics all of a sudden when I find a new superhero I like. I have a process. It's necessary when faced with the sheer amount of superhero content out there.

I become inspired. Somehow I here the name-maybe it's a guest appearance in another comic, a movie, or just in one of my many and frequent Wikipedia safaris, or I just decide it's finally time for me to go find out stuff about a character-and then I go straight to Wikipedea. I usually just skim the article, just to get a feel for where I should start, and then I head off to watch all movies/TV shows featuring the character. Even the old crappy ones. (Although as I've said before, I just can't take Adam West Batman. Just. Can't. Take. It.) Usually movies/TV shows with superheroes are a good place to start because then you can get the gist of a character's storyline. Then, when faced with the sheer amount of comic books, you'll be able to judge where everything's supposed to fit better. At least that's how it works for me.

POOR WARREN D8

After I've done that then I spend ages on Amazon wandering around looking for a good place to start in the comics. With DC this usually isn't a very difficult process, since I have a vast general knowledge of their trades, but for Marvel this can take hours. I usually just end up picking something and running with it. Anything that comes up continuity wise that I don't understand I'll just go look up. And this continues until i either get bored or know the storyline of that character backwards.

This post came to me because yesterday I got Superman: For All Seasons in the mail. My first Superman book. What can I say? Loeb/Sale is usually a good place to start. It's a good book. Superman is pretty easy. (I'm sure I won't say that if I continue to read more books.) Other things, however, like the X-Men, are not. I just gave up and closed my eyes and pointed. I ended up with X-Force and Wolverine and the X-Men on my kindle. I understand...most of it. But that's okay. Deadpool is hilarious. Logan as a principle is hilarious.

/endrant

P.S. I just cleaned the house. Woot.

The Dark Knight Rises

Dear Wal,

I can no longer use TDKR in reference to the Dark Knight Returns. Ah well. Did anyone see the guy dressed like the Shadow in the stands? His bandana was yellow. I think it would've been cool if the game was against the Sharks.
Let me start off by saying that I just got up so most of this probably won't make very much sense. I guess, since this is the third and final installment, I should start with my experience went I went to see the Dark Knight. Blown. Away. I had seen the previews before and wanted to see it, practically begged my parents to see it, and they finally agreed once they were sure it was PG-13 and not R rated. I was 12...technically, but oh well. Anyway, when I got back from the movie theater I knew I absolutely had to get into this Batman stuff. Yeah, I jumped on the bandwagon, but I actually went and read the comics unlike some people. Anyway, that movie was the beginning of my Batman obsession, and will forever hold a special place in my heart. And since this is the sequel, it had a lot to live up to.
On the way to the movie, I had to cram in the back seat with Watson, her brother and our friend Adam. We were all stuffed back there, but not as stuffed as another movie experience I had with a group of friends. I didn't mind so much. But that sort of thing drives Watson crazy, and we made the mistake of putting her and her brother next to each other. Which meant that they were bickering the whole way there. Which annoys me to no end. Needless to say, they sat on the outside on the way back.
Anyway, I'm getting distracted. Back to the movie. It was awesome. It didn't attempt to redo what TDK did, and told a different story with a different ultimate aim. Let me say as to the rumors of Jean-Paul Valley being in this movie that they are way off. But it still had a good ending and storyline without him. At least Bane finally got his chance to shine. It was hard for me to understand what he was saying, but then again we were right in front of the screen in the front row so watching and hearing everything was really weird. I'm probably going to end up buying the movie, and then watching it like sixty times anyway so it doesn't matter. Anyway, Bane was menacing and a powerful advisory, everything I hoped he'd been in a movie. I've only read the first volume of Knightfall (I was a noob back then. I chickened out after the last scene.) but that was all I really needed to read to see where The Dark Knight Rises storyline was pulled from. There was also a No Man's Land element in there, but I won't say what. In any case, great movie. Loved it.
Oh and, the Batwing was AWESOME.

My Writing Habits

Dear Wal,

A few things have started to assemble themselves out of the random madness that is my writing. My mind has been completely scrambled to day, so forgive me if my train of thought seems a little scrambled. It's been a long, weird day. (Which is saying something, since I got up at 11. You might think that would be part of the reason for the weirdness, but I always get up at 11.)


Binge Writing
I tend to explode all over the paper and anything else within reach. These are the times when I write 10-20 pages at a time and murder at least two pens in the process. The poor things. I get an idea, and they start dropping like flies. Many of my stories have had the majority of them written this way. What happens is: I write a massive chunk of story and then I don't pick it up for the next two weeks, or I just chip away at it. These episodes of mega-writing have been some of the most wonderful experiences I've ever had, and some of the most terrible. When I get going, it doesn't matter what music I'm listening to or what's going on in the room; I don't see or hear anything else for the next X hours. Sometimes these things can last for just an hour or so, and other times they can last all day. The ones I hate are when I write a huge chunk of story and then end up scrapping it because I figured something out that makes it void or it's just crap.
I tend to get wrapped up in the moment, and I have to be really careful to pick a good place to stop. I have to make sure that I haven't left anything unsaid, but also that I'm not about to go spirally off into a massive plot snare because I refused to stop.

Endurance
I have none. Only one story that I can remember have I been able to stick out to the end without doubting myself or throwing it out in disgust or whatever else. Most of my stories go through several versions before I will accept them as complete. That in itself is a frustraitingly slow process. I just want to finish it, transplant my ideas instantly to the pages and never have to go through the agonizing hours it takes to type or write out my thoughts. My brain works so fast sometimes I can't even keep up with typing, and I type fast.
Needless to say, I have little patience with my stories. They're all fairly short: five or six pages at the minimum and twenty to forty at the max. The longer ones I have to do in segments, essentially several stories within a story or at least several distinctive sectors of the same story, in order to make it through. My Batman fanfiction, naturally, is done in 24 page issues. Elliot's story is in three parts.
I've been trying to gain a little more patience, but it isn't easy. I'm not the kind of person who can just sit around and wait for inspiration. My writing is like a switch in my head, only the wiring's not so good so it doesn't always work.

Revising
I get myself into some of the biggest tangles in revision. As I said before, it's a process that I can't stand, but it's a necessary process. I can't plan out every step of my story carefully in my mind so that when it goes down on paper that is the finished product, other than spelling and grammar. My friend Watson can do that. She always plans her stories very carefully. I don't. I start with an idea, I see the shape of the story, and I run with it. I don't stop to figure out whether or not it makes sense along the way. That's a habit from NaNo. It can be a blessing and a curse. It means I don't get stuck; I just take the characters out of whatever weird situation and get them moving again. But it also means that it's almost impossible to tell when to stop, so I don't have a huge mess to clean up later in revision.
For me, revising is never very satisfying. When I write a story and I know it's good the first time, that gives me an incredible sense of accomplishment. I did it. I got it down. And it's awesome. But when I have to fiddle with a story to make it good I never feel nearly as accomplished. It feels...forced, almost. It's strange, I know.

Sudden Inspiration
I very rarely forget an idea if it pops into my head and I have to save it for later for some reason. I guess it's like this special place in my mind I can open up and reach into and find that scene I came up with ages ago and then write it down. Sometimes it comes up exactly how it was meant to be, sometimes better, other times it just sucks. I've gotten into the habit of 'saving' these ideas in my head, and they're starting to build up and get annoying. It's a good thing that I can remember these things, but I never get around to writing them down. This happens most often with my Batman fanfic, because there is so much that I haven't written. The sheer volume of information about characters, backstories, epic story arcs and small moments is daunting. It's something I've had to chip away at, one of the many reasons why it still hasn't been finished yet.
What happens is: I get an idea. I'm busy or lazy or whatever, and I decide to write it down later. So it sits there. And sits there. And gets put off, and put off, until eventually it's just another thing eternally nagging at me. Reminding me of something I didn't do.
Mom explained it the other day as a weight that sits there and drags on you, even if you don't notice it. It's not like a fact or a date or something you know from somewhere else, because if you forget something like that you can always go back and look it up later. You can't with things you've invented. If you forget it, it's gone, and in the void left behind is the feeling that you've forgotten something incredibly important but you just can't remember what.
I've been able to replicate whole stories from memory before. One time I trashed a story because it scared me, there were all kinds of things happening I could never have seen coming. As soon as I deleted it I realized how much of an idiot I was for doing so. It was one of the best things I ever wrote, however insane it was. So I sat down and I wrote the whole thing over again and continued. I actually almost finished it. It didn't survive revision, sadly.

Multiple Stories
I'm always writing more than one thing at once. Right now, I have two fanfictions, a science fiction and a fantasy going. I have to write more than one thing or else I get bored, and then I get frustrated, and then bad things happen. It's a strange way to write, though, because there are places where the stories overlap and run together and if I'm not careful the lines between them start to blur. My fantasy character, for instance, might start acting like Jason. Or I might suddenly conjure up an alternate story line where my fantasy characters get transported into the DC universe, adrift in time and space. That actually happened. I had a whole story line going for them. It wasn't half bad, except that it dug the story line deeper into deep you-know-what. Other times I'll come up with something in the middle of one story, and then have to switch over to another because I can't let it sit in case I forget it.

Tells
There are little things in my writing I can use to tell me if my story is about to tank or keep flying on the straight and narrow. There's a certain feeling when I know what I'm writing is good, but when it starts to fade I tend to start floundering around. Things like poorly or just excessively used cliches will start popping up more and more, or I'll have trouble illustrating that a character is walking across the room in my narrative. That's the time when I usually realize it's time to stop. Sometimes, however, I just keep going. Many of my stories have had to be rewritten because of that.
If I'm switching my music too much, or listening in on a conversation instead of thinking about my story, then I know I'm just out of ideas. Concentration isn't difficult for me. I can drown myself in whatever it is I'm doing, and never see or hear anything else. It drives Watson crazy.
If elements of another story I'm currently working on start seeping into another story where they don't belong, then I know I need to go write the story that's seeping. This one I only figured out recently. Poor Jason has been so abused because of this particular tell. All kinds of things have happened to him. I still haven't sorted everything out.

And finally...

Blog Posts
I hope you all realize by now that every story I tell on here is usually written a day or more after the actual event. Mostly because I'm too lazy to sit down and write it that day, but sometimes it's because I'm legitimately too busy to write this blog. It sucks. I like blogging. It's the only kind of writing I've ever done on something of a schedule outside of schoolwork outside of NaNo. Other times, I'll go for days without any idea of what I should write. Or I';ll have so many ideas it's impossible to get them all down. One time I came up with four or five blog posts in one day. I just gave up.
Those posts that randomly spring into being in bunches like that I usually end up trashing, because posts are something I absolutely must do the moment I get the idea or else they never get written. I have seven drafted posts I never finished, most of them titles without even a sentence, and countless others I just tossed because I didn't write them in the moment. I'm getting better at it though. As I hope this post has demonstrated, I'm not used to writing creatively on a schedule at all.

/endrant

P.S. I wrote this the last hour and a half without stopping. I would consider this a binge blog post.

P.P.S. I GOT A SUBSCRIPTION TO DETECTIVE COMICS. OH YEAH.

Flyfishing and The Nascar Hall of Fame

Dear Wal,

I've been busy. On Monday I went flyfishing, and on Tuesday I went to the Nascar Hall of Fame.
First of all, let me establish that before this I had been fishing maybe once, and it wasn't flyfishing. And it was in a pond, not in a river. We went to this little fishing shop (don't remember what the name was-sorry guys) and I had to put on this giant pair of waders. It was weird, I didn't think the booties would keep my feet dry but they did. The boots were really heavy full of water. It was really bizarre walking through a river and not getting wet. I'm used to fumbling around barefoot.
I only got the line stuck in a tree once. It got stuck in things in the river like six times though. I sucked pretty badly. I only caught one fish, and what felt like a thousand got away. It was surprise when I actually caught the one fish. It was a very small fish. I didn't get to hold it. I think our guide thought I would catch a bigger one that I could hold. Not so. Either that or he thought I would scream or something. I wouldn't have. I probably would have dropped it, though.
Anyway, we were fishing in a river where you're not allowed to keep the fish, so I don't have any proof. Heather (My friend's sister from Florida. She's awesome. She kicks butt at sports of all kinds.) caught six or seven fish, one of which was this really big rainbow trout. Unfortunately we didn't have a camera, so you'll have to take my word for it. She was saying that since she didn't have a picture she could say whatever she wanted about it's size. Sarah, Heather's friend, also caught a bunch of fish but she kept getting her line stuck in trees.
But it was fun. I wore my Skillet hat (signed, by the way. By the guy who plays the violin...it's sad that I don't know his name.) and our guide asked us about what music we all liked. Sarah and Heather both said they liked country, and I said I liked rock and metal and alternative. Well, pretty much everything but country. I listen to a lot of different stuff.
Anyway, we got home really tired. I was super car sick from riding in their giant Suburban. Riding in the back seat and getting bounced around everywhere really sucks. I went to bed at around eight, but didn't get to sleep until midnight. It sucked. German was really weighing on me that day. As I said the other day, it's a seriously intense course.
Onward! The next morning we got up and bundled into the Suburban again (This time I was armed with anti-motion sickness pills.) and headed off to Charlotte to go visit the Nascar Hall of Fame. I came up with a story for my Batman fanfic on the way, which was encouraging. Jason has been sorely neglected. When we got there we meandered around in the Hall for a while before we got lunch and went on a bus tour to Earnhardt-Ganassi and the super speedway. It was awesome. We got to go in the winner's circle.
At the museum we went in the simulator like four times. It was just way too much fun. Once I got the hang of it and I wasn't crashing anymore, I had a lap time of 1:02.6. Seeing all the old cars in the museum was really cool. I had only seen the new car up close once before that. The Hall itself had a really nice feel to it-it wasn't boring at all. And this is me we're talking about. I abhor walking around in museums. It usually drives me completely up the wall. The food was good too.
Earnhardt-Ganassi was really cool. I got to listen to our tour guide ramble about engines and chassis and all kinds of things. The track was really, really hot. I have a higher appreciation for those poor people who have to stand out there in the heat in fire suites.
Throughout the entire thing they were all talking about how nice it was to see kids interested in Nascar, because the sport needed the younger demographic to survive. I didn't say it, but I couldn't help thinking that if the races were shorter and more exciting, then they would definitely draw in more young people. I mean, we've been a Nascar family forever and I still have trouble sitting there for four hours watching them go around in circles. The main complaint from most of my friends when I ask them if they like Nascar is that it's too boring, because all they do is drive in circles. My dad, who is 69, thinks the same thing. He always just watches the first 60 laps and the last 60 laps of all the long races except the shootout.
Just my thoughts, anyway.

/endrant

P.S. Sorry for the lack of pictures. It's either post this now, or three days later when I finally get the pictures from Dad.

Weird German Helps

Dear Wal,

As some of you may or may not already know, I'm taking German III over the summer. And let me tell you, it is intense. Only the brave or the foolish or the seriously genius would attempt what I'm doing right now. Very hardcore course to take over the summer, about three or more hours of work every day. We listened to a radio play in German, read a few articles in German and now we're reading a book in German. In the next unit, I have to write poems in German. That's going to be fun. The quality of the course is fantastic (I'm taking it through Oklahoma State University.) it's just that the whole thing is super concentrated into 40 days of work. It's been a trail to keep up with, along with all the other things I've been doing over the summer.
Anyway, I have some funny memory helps for some words I have trouble with. It's rather amusing. All I ever have to do is associate a word with superheroes, the Doctor or one of my original characters and I'm good.

traurig-sad I think of the Doctor's trainers, since the word starts with tra-. I mean the Tenth Doctor, because he is sad and amazing at the same time.
nur-only This one is a bit complicated. Nur makes me think of never, which makes me thing of the Onceler from The Lorax for some reason. And that makes me think of Jason, for reasons which will be revealed if I ever finish that fanfic and post it somewhere. And then Jason makes me think of only. Very long and convoluted train of thought, but it works.
die Freude-the joy I think of Sigmund Freud, and it's highly ironic that Freude means joy. In my opinion.

Those are just a few of many. Most of the time I hear a German word and it's meaning and it becomes seared into my brain. I like German a lot. I may or may not take German IV, considering how intense this course has been so far.

/endrant

P.S. I'm going fly fishing tomorrow.

Guess What My Dog Did Yesterday

Dear Wal,

She killed a raccoon. It was slightly traumatizing.
I was running along, doing my semi-daily two-mile run (semi-daily meaning my running is less neglected than this blog) and-beating my previous fastest time by two minutes if I do say so myself-all of a sudden the dog came barreling down the hill out of no where and grabbed this raccoon. I don't know exactly what happened. The raccoon must have tried to make a run for it when it saw her coming. Bad idea. My dog is fast. And coupled with the momentum she had from rocketing down a steep hill like that, the poor raccoon had no chance.

My Dog, Cinderella

It didn't even get the opportunity to fight. She flailed it to death and snapped it's neck before it could do anything more than make panicked squealing noises. I went and told Dad and he said to go put her in the house to get her away from it. So I went and got the leash, all the while thinking This is never going to work. She's going to twist out of her collar. I was seriously considering going on a hunt for her choke chain (which vanished into the void of lost things along with my iPod Shuffle and about five hundred hair bows and pencils) but decided against it. The most important thing was to get her inside as quickly as possible.
I walked up to where she'd killed the raccoon and very carefully aproached it and her. I didn't want to make her feel like her territory was being invaded. She can be very possessive. And I didn't want the raccoon to suddenly not actually be dead and start flailing around with me within range. That didn't happen, thankfully. I clipped the leash to her collar and had to literally drag her away from it. I know just how to hold the leash so she can't twist out. She realized this pretty quickly, and got up and walked with me down to the house.
It was extremely exciting. The raccoon is still laying in the road. I don't know what to do with it.

/endrant

P.S. That entire time I was weazing and groaning and babbling nonsense because I was so tired. Two miles in 21 minutes, oh yeah.

If Clark Was My Big Brother

Dear Wal,

First of all, I want to make sure you all know which Clark I'm talking about. I have never read a Superman book in my entire life.

This Clark

Secondly, I would probably slap him a lot. For failing at girls, and friendships, and generally being an idiot. (Although, he does improve post-Lana. Mostly.) And then I would take away that ridiculous trench coat. Superman (even pre-tights Superman) isn't meant for black, and he doesn't wear it well at all. I can understand him running around in that pre-costume if Superman was a vigilante-type character, but he's not.
I'm getting sidetracked.
The thing about Clark is that he would be incredibly useful on a farm. Having his spacecraft crash in a corn field was a stroke of genius. He wouldn't have been Clark if he had crashed in, say, a Metropolis suburb (Parallel universe opportunity here guys!), but he also wouldn't have anything to do. The occasional broken pipe or blown light bulb, but not the sheer amount of work he has to do living on a farm. If you don't live on one, you don't understand the amount of work that has to be done. There's the establishing of the farm building of a barn(s) and fencing and piping water out to the aforementioned barn and then making sure your animals in aforementioned fencing have water as well. (And if you live in a cold climate, this has to be water that doesn't freeze during the winter. I can't count how many mornings I've spent breaking ice in water buckets and water troughs.) Then you have to maintain all of it, which is not such a big deal for the barn but for the fencing it is. 
I know I've ranted about all the stuff I have to do before so I won't go into that. But Clark could fix our electric fence in two minutes flat, while that task alone for me usually takes an hour before, and he could paint the barn and build a proper wall for the tack room so Buzzy couldn't get in and fix the stall doors that Zanzibar ruined...etc. etc. in one evening. He would probably do a better job with the fence than I ever do. 
Think about it. All those snapped, stretched out wires he could just melt together with his heat vision, and he wouldn't have to worry about getting spontaniously shocked when the charger glitches out. He could just drive a new post into the ground with one hand. And if you ever needed anything carried from one place to another (Such as a really heavy box of yarn. I will get to that in a moment.) then you could just ask him. And if you got the tractor or the truck or the horse trailer stuck...there would just be a whole host of things.
Now I really want to write a parallel universe Clark with a younger sibling. I actually think it would have helped him not fail so badly.
Where did all this come from? Well, I'm always saying...If I was a Kryptonian, I could totally lift that. Or...If I was a Kryptonian, I could totally just fly to Bilo and get us some ice cream. But the other day I had to carry a box of yarn out to the office for Mom. It was really heavy. Yarn is surprising substantial. Anyway, we both had to carry it because it was so heavy, which got me thinking about having Clark around to carry/fix things. Which lead to the whole rant above.

If you were Kryptonian, what would you do? (And don't say take over the world Austin. D<)

/endrant

P.S. My hair survived three hours of behind in a helmet and getting snagged on things while four-wheeling with only minimal fuzz. I win, hair. I win.

So I Went to See Spiderman

Dear Wal,

It was awesome. I'm being serious. The other movies (You notice how I call them the other movies. They don't deserve to be named.) were terrible. The first one was alright, but after that they just tanked. I've only seen the second and third movies once, and this is someone who has seen Daredevil three times that we're talking about here. The thing about superhero movies is that they should be good enough to drag you into not only the sequel but maybe even the comics if you're desperate enough, and the Amazing Spiderman does just that, whereas its predecessors did not. Not for me anyway.
The first part was a little tedious, considering it was just a retelling of the origin. Yes, they did do that but it honestly wasn't a turn off for me. I thought that it was handled much better. The flow of the story was much smoother, and more believable while still being ridiculous in a superhero kind of way. (We all know a lizard man couldn't really, happen? Right?) Andrew Garfield is a great Peter Parker, much better than Tobey Maguire. I'm not an expert on actors and the movies they've been in etc., so forgive me if I haven't seen Maguire at his best.
Peter's character was rendered so much better. He's actually funny! Finally! I haven't read any spidey comics, I have to admit, but I know from his appearance in one of my Daredevil books and from the Spectacular Spiderman TV show that he's hysterical. Or at least, he's supposed to be hysterical. I don't think he cracked one joke mid-battle in the old movies. There were funny parts, but he got serious in places he needed to be. All his acrobatics and uses of webbing were fantastic. Oh and by the way, the new suite was flipping awesome.
The movie was extremely predictable and completely classic as far as plot goes-but that's just fine with me. I've gotten used to superhero stories that get repeated over and over, and besides the classic defeat-the-evil-monster-and-save-the-girl plot was handled very well. Best of all, there was very little drama, and that drama surrounded a huge event, not just Peter having girl issues. I like Gwen much better than MJ, by the way. She was kinda useless in some bits, though.

I like the Lizard as a first villain better than Gobbie. It seems more relevant to the origin story to have the Lizard as a villian, considering Peter was bitten by a mutant spider and Dr. Conners injected himself with a lizard mutagen. There were some places where the Lizard's tail looked a little overdone and fake, but for the most part the CGI for him was awesome. Osborn was just a background presence in this movie, I won't say anything else. Other than you have to wait until the end of the credits if you go see this movie. I think at this point we as Marvel movie goers should just do this automatically, but most of the theater still left right when the movie ended. Amateurs.

/endrant

P.S. The Lizard could actually talk. O: I expected him to be all: RAAARARAAAAMAAAA D<

Which One?

Dear Wal,

I've been struggling with a very important question for the past week or two. Which Doctor do I like best, the Tenth or the Eleventh? Now don't come after me with teeth bared and claws unsheathed over this one, this is just my honest opinion. I know how wild you crazy fans can get. First of all, let me tell you the story of how I was introduced to Doctor Who.
My mother used to watch Doctor Who when she was in college. She watched mostly episodes with the Fourth Doctor (The guy with the giant scarf. He is the fourth, isn't he? I'm such a noob.) Every once and a while she would start talking about it, and I didn't really understand what this whole business of Doctor Who was. One day Dad was flipping channels and he came to a channel with an add on for the new Doctor Who with Matt Smith, and she got super excited. I thought it looked pretty cool too. So I decided to find this show for her on Netflix for Mother's Day (One of my few great ideas for gifts. But that's a rant for another date.) and so we started watching it. Unfortunately, I didn't understand how the whole regeneration business worked and we ended up starting with the Ninth Doctor. Ew. It took me a while, but I finally figured out that season five was the one we needed to be watching. It was awesome. A great place to start watching Doctor Who. Matt Smith was ridiculously brilliant as the Doctor.
A while later, just before season six came out on Netflix, I met someone at school who was completely obsessed with the Tenth Doctor. I was a little bit more informed about how Doctor Who works at that point, so I decided to go back and watch all the episodes with David Tennant. I was obsessed enough to watch all the Ninth Doctor episodes as well, which meant I wasn't completely in the dark as to who Jack and Rose were. It wasn't half bad, but by the end I was glad it was over.
Let me tell you something about me and obsessions with fictional characters. When I start to like a character or a series of books or a TV show or whatever I go all out. I don't just watch all the super popular stuff. I watch absolutely everything I can get my hands on. I've seen all the Batman movies from the ninties. Twice. I've seen Batman: The Animated Series at least twice all the way through, Batman Beyond at least twice and Justice League and Justice League Unlimited at least three times. Not to mention the comic books, most of which that I own I've read at least three times or more depending on the book. I couldn't bring myself to watch the Adam West show though. Anyway, the point is that naturally I was going to watch or read everything Doctor Who I could get my hands on. Hence why my reading list of late has been dominated by Doctor Who books.
I'm getting sidetracked. After I got deeper into the David Tennant episodes, I started to like him as the Doctor almost more than I like Matt Smith. I tried to get Mom into those episodes as well but it didn't work. Partly because she has a job now and partly because she considers him a decent Doctor but not nearly as good as Matt Smith. I do have to agree that Matt Smith is a much better actor, but there are other factors. For one thing, the Tenth Doctor seems so much easier to connect with. I know that this isn't how I should be describing the Doctor, but he seems so much more human. I think we see a lot more of how the Doctor feels about what he does, and about the Time War in particular, with David Tennant as the Doctor. The episodes with the Tenth Doctor were much more concerned with his personal conflict and focused more on Earth. With the Eleventh you see a lot more of other civilizations and less of just saving Earth from aliens, and all of the highly complicated wibbly wobbly timey whimey stuff is completely brilliant. I have composed a chart comparing the two so I don't ramble on for another three hours. Here:

	Tenth	Eleventh
Story	Tends to repeat-a lot of saving Earth from aliens (but it’s still pretty good). Much more focus on the lives of companions-hence the parallel universe where Rose’s dad wasn’t dead, Dona’s and Martha’s families. There are a couple of episodes that were just fantastic, like the one with the Weeping Angels, the one with a world without the Doctor, and the one where he visited Midnight.	Tons of paradoxes, complicated storylines and more concerned with preserving the flow of time than with saving the world from aliens. I still can’t wrap my head around how the Doctor and River are moving in opposite directions. He’s a Time Lord with a machine that can go anywhere in time and space, you can do so much more with that than just save the world from aliens.
Companions	Deeper characters, definitely. We never see anything about Amy and Rory’s families (Although that’s not necessarily the focus with those two.) They just ran off with the Doctor, they don’t even seem to miss home or consider ever going home.	Amy and Rory are brilliant, though. They don’t have complicated love lives, and Amy never really honestly fell for the Doctor (As Rose and Martha and Jack did. *sigh*) which, in my opinion, is a plus. He doesn’t even think on the same level as a human. It just doesn’t work. Another thing, just two companions is much easier to keep track of than the five the Tenth Doctor had, not to mention their families.
Doctor	As I said before, much easier to connect with than the Eleventh. He’s more serious at times, which can be a relief after the Eleventh’s silliness, but he seems contradictory at others. He destroys more than he saves, and he knows it and it deeply affects him. I don’t see as much of that in the Eleventh Doctor.	Matt Smith is undoubtedly a better actor, and a very believable Doctor, but as I said before we don’t get as much insight into what he thinks. However, I like that he spends more like fixing time than screwing it up as the Tenth did several times (Mars). When he’s saving the Earth or any civilization, he honestly tries to do it without destroying lives. (With the exception of the Daleks and the space whale.) The Eleventh Doctor is also completely hysterical. Much more funny and more memorable (as far as quirky moments go) than the Tenth.

Tada.

/endrant

P.S. I wrote this yesterday. Aren't I efficient.

My Family and Holidays

Dear Wal,

I seem to be slipping. There's this thing in the name of this blog, called daily, that is apparently a concept I can't grasp. A bit of news: My old and new rebooted fantasy story is still going strong, still in the dark on where it's heading. That's four days now. This rewrite might actually last. At this point I still have hope.
Now, on this great American occasion, I will tell you about my family and holidays. We're a very strange family, I have a half-sister who is ten years older than me and a half-brother in his forties, and a niece. They're all awesome. We have lots of fun together as a family. But for some reason, holidays have never really stuck or meant anything to us.
Last year we didn't even have a Christmas tree. Dad's present, a new pair of slippers (which Mom and I spent an hour picking out) wasn't even wrapped. I got an iTunes gift card. It wasn't wrapped or contained in a card either. We're not very festive people anymore now that I'm older (I'm the youngest, obviously, and I've kind of grown out of Christmas.) and since we moved away from most of the family.

Pitiful rose. D:

Father's Day, Mother's Day and Valentine's Day are all also very uneventful. They usually consist of funny cards and maybe a family dinner out. On Valetine's Day Dad got Mom some flowers, though, and he got me this little rose. It's been limping along ever since. I don't know what's wrong with it or what I should be doing to help it live, so it's just been sitting out on the porch struggling along. It makes me sad. It was a pleasant surprise and I feel kind of guilty letting it die like that. Help?
Tangent: My brother thought my process of taking a picture of my rose was hilarious. I was too lazy to get an official camera so I used my webcam, which meant that I had to do some maneuvering in order to not be in the picture with the rose and still be able to click the button that took the picture. Wireless mice (Is it mice? Does that rule apply to electronics?) are extremely useful.
Anyway, the biggest holiday at our house is Thanksgiving. It's a family occasion, so we all gather round for lots of food and even on the china, which almost never happens. Last year our Thanksgiving was spent at my Aunt's house, and everyone came. Even my sister, who has a tendency to not return her emails or ever ever phone (*cough* Yes, I'm talking to you.) It was awesome. We all had a great time. I think I gained five pounds.
For this Independence Day we actually went to see fireworks for once because my niece was here. She's eight, so she's still into that sort of thing. I liked seeing the fireworks too, and my brother tells me that for a small town it was a pretty good show. He lives in what we would consider a big city but it really isn't compared to other, larger cities around where he lives.
So happy Independence Day everybody!

/endrant

P.S. My Nano is dying. D: