> Recent Entries
> Archive
> Friends
> User Info
> Baralier's Den

8th of November, 2008

01:41 pm - Saturday at Uni Unsurprisingly, it's rather quiet in the Library at Uni the week after classes have finished and on a Saturday :-) OK. Work time Current Mood: contemplative Tags: non-virtual life, uni, writing

(Leave a comment)

22nd of April, 2008

11:46 am - Pearls of the net There's a lot of chaff on the net but occasionally someone points you at some of the pearls. ceruleanst wrote a selection of pieces of William Shakespeare's screenplay for Pulp Fiction. This got metaquoted and Boing boinged. And as a result a Wiki has been set up for those who want to try and flesh out the rest of the screenplay at Pulb Bard. A lovely start to the morning :-) Current Mood: amused Tags: books, humour, movies, weird shit, writing

(Leave a comment)

9th of October, 2006

01:50 am - Weekend shennanigans Friday was MSFC's Trivia Night and I had been drafted in a Quiz Master at relatively short notice. However a large chunk of the questions had been sent inso my work was hugely difficult. I shall post the questions later. Winner on the night was king_espresso who is a big nerd. Saturday spent with the Jobhunt and sent off various "pick me" applications. Got tangentially into the idea of wanting make myself a diary/organiser for next year but to personalise it a little more. Started hunting the web figuring there should be some sort of template that could be customised to my heart's content. Alas no luck. Got an SMS at about 7:30 that jolted me out of my focus and made me realise how late it was. By this time I felt it rather late to be braving the PT system into the Eastern Suburbs to get to dcrip's party. So no party for me. Though the advice on the PT was something I should have kept in mind for today. The plan was to make my way out to the boonies raven_'s but after I: missed the train I wanted; had the next train cancelled; then discovered that buses were operating between Box Hill and Ringwood, I was beginning to wish I had stayed home and slept. I've become rather jaded with second-hand clothing. There's usually a tonne of blouses, dresses, skirts and bags but rarely much in the way of men's wear and even less that fits the *sturdier* gentleman. I was mainly going out for some socialising as I hadn't seen them in ages, so it was with much surprise that raven_ produced a vintage pair of trousers that not only fit round the middle but didn't need altering for length! Lovely dark grey/black with a shot light grey thread running through them. Nice heavy fabric with a button fly. Bargain! Special thanks also to bar_bar_ella and kits_the_dm for giving me a lift home and saving me from the PT return journey. I have a list of phone calls to make tomorrow so hopefully something will come from that. Current Mood: chipper Tags: books, costuming, job hunt, socialising, writing

(4 comments | Leave a comment)

3rd of October, 2006

03:48 pm - Tips for aspiring writers (via vashtan) ------------------------------------------ Some helpful rules for better writing: 1. Verbs HAS to agree with their subjects. 2. Prepositions are not words to end sentences with. 3. And don't start a sentence with a conjunction. 4. It is wrong to ever split an infinitive. 5. Avoid cliches like the plague. (They're old hat) 6. Comparisons are as bad as cliches. 7. Also, always avoid annoying alliteration. 8. Be more or less specific. 9. Parenthetical remarks (however relevant) are (usually) unnecessary. 10. Also too, never, ever use repetitive redundancies. 11. No sentence fragments. 12. Foreign words and phrases are not apropos. 13. Do not be redundant; do not use more words than necessary; it's highly superfluous. 14. One should NEVER generalize. 15. Don't use no double negatives. 16. One-word sentences? Eliminate. 17. Analogies in writing are like feathers on a snake. 18. The passive voice is to be ignored. 19. Never use a big word when a diminutive one would suffice. 20. Use words correctly, irregardless of how others use them. 21. Eliminate quotations. As Ralph Waldo Emerson said, "I hate quotations. Tell me what you know." 22. If you've heard it once, you've heard it a thousand times: Resist hyperbole; not one writer in a million can use it correctly. Current Mood: amused Tags: humour, writing

(5 comments | Leave a comment)

28th of September, 2006

01:01 am - Babb Chronicles update Ah. After an absence of many months, babb_chronicles has finally updated again. Now I can snark over the worst in Potter-fic without the actual pain of having to read most of it. Turn away if you value your grammar! Current Mood: amused Tags: books, writing

(3 comments | Leave a comment)

10th of June, 2006

11:22 pm - Weird things you discover on the net While trawling the net this evening looking for steampunk references I discovered something rather odd. If you've spent much time on the net you've probably heard of, if not seen, Hentai and tentacle porn. And while I'd never really thought about it's origins I'd assumed it was something fairly modern in line with Anime itself. Not so apparently. Katsushika Hokusai, best known for his painting The Wave and 36-picture set Mt Fuji Views also produced a variety of prints with women and octopi in intimate situations as far back as 1814. His [NSFW] Woman diver and Octopus is one of the few I could find on the net. There are even examples of [probably NSFW] ivory carvings from the 18th century. Current Mood: surprised Tags: history, weird shit, writing

(12 comments | Leave a comment)

5th of June, 2006

08:28 pm - Movie help I'm hunting for some movies set during the Victorian era that aren't rehashes of a Sherlock Holmes story (although I thought Without a Clue was very funny) or something similar. I know there are two recent remakes of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (neither of which I've seen yet) and an IMDB search shows me four versions of The Four Feathers since the advent of talkies. I've tracked down a copy of the David Nivin Around the World in 80 Days as well as the Pierce Brosnan version (the recent Jacki Chan on I'm not touching). Also found a copy of Island at the top of the World and Journey to the Centre of the Earth. I haven't had a chance to watch Steamboy but it's on my to-do list. Can anyone recommend other movies of a similar nature that are worth watching? Even if you think it's obvious that I'd have seen it tell me anyway. It may just jog a memory. Current Mood: busy Tags: dvds, movies, writing

(38 comments | Leave a comment)

10th of May, 2006

06:29 pm - Warnings While hunting around the net for some stuff I saw a warning for some Potter-fic. Warning: contains heterosexuality, which might frighten and confuse many readers of Harry Potter fanfiction. Heh. Current Mood: amused Tags: geek, writing

(9 comments | Leave a comment)

26th of April, 2006

12:00 am - Getting your book published alg (who I believe works for TOR) describes a hypothetical process on the dollars involved in getting a paperback book published. In which I explain how we figure out how much money to pay authors for their advance, and also in which I explain how sometimes books make money and sometimes they don't: Recommended reading for budding authors. Tags: writing

(Leave a comment)

5th of March, 2006

07:33 pm - Forced creativity Yesterday I spent working on background for my Steampunk story. I've been looking at what historical bits I want and what I needed to check. Knowing things like when the Savoy theatre was started can make a little bit of difference in the background. It's not essential, I know, but I'm the sort of person who cares. Today was sewing. Well more properly enlarging a pattern - something I hate. I can deal with the actual sewing but stuffing about taking an A5 drawing of a pattern and extrapolating it to a full size one, while reworking it to make the 80cm waist fit my 120cm one is something I'd much rather leave to some-one else. Sadly it's not an option and I've been cursing through it. Of course the obligatory computer distractions don't help. Now for the actual sewing. Current Mood: creative Tags: costuming, re-enacting, writing

(6 comments | Leave a comment)