Sunday, November 26, 2006
Learning a lesson the hard way... Well, almost
Whoa, I almost learned a lesson the hard way today when I found a third of my 'novel' missing when I opened my MS Word file - It reverted back to a copy I saved three days ago. Only God knows why that happened.
Luckily, I had a .txt (aka Wordpad) backup which I use for NaNoWriMo to validate my word count, and it's completely up to date. So here's a lesson for y'all, always remember to back up your magnum opuses!
Luckily, I had a .txt (aka Wordpad) backup which I use for NaNoWriMo to validate my word count, and it's completely up to date. So here's a lesson for y'all, always remember to back up your magnum opuses!
Zhen was here at 12:11 am,
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Friday, November 24, 2006
Public Service Announcement
This is a public service announcement, brought to you, in part, by Sinfest comics.
You'll have to click to view it in its full sized glory, though.
Zhen was here at 1:44 am,
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Sunday, November 19, 2006
I'm Cuckoo Batshit Crazy
It has been two weeks since I began my NaNoWriMo endeavours, and those of you who check back from time to time (bless your soul) must be wondering where did all the written words went.
Well, I kid you not: As of now I have actually written very close to nothing. I don't actually have very convincing excuses to fend off allegations of laziness, so I'll be frank and admit that I've been gaming too much, and whenever I'm not caught up with computer games (the devil!), I'm doing work (of the planning-a-year-end-camp kind, applications still open, hint, hint).
Oh wait, that's an excuse. Ha ha. And pretty much the rest of this post is an excuse, too: Justifications created by a person to fool himself into believing that there was an external force in making him fall short of his intended goal(s).
*Cough*
However, even with only 10 days remaining on the NaNoWriMo clock, I remain hilariously optimistic. You could say that I am the kind of fellow who would deliberate over what to have for lunch even as he discovers that his parachute is faulty while skydiving ("Who knows, I could fall into the sea and become comatose instead of dying, but the doctors had better wake me up before it's already time for tea"). Even when faced with seemingly insurmountable odds, I can still stare blankly at the circumstances and flash you a thumbs-up while proclaiming, in typical unflappable Malaysian fashion, "Can what..."
In this case, "what" specifically refers to writing upwards of 5,000 words a day. That's not an impossible feat, mind you, all you have to do is just throw quality out the window and engage in the verbal diarrhoea of wordcrap. That was the aim of NaNoWriMo anyway, quantity over quality; we can always edit later.
Besides, when I joined, I already told myself not to yield until the 50,000 mark is reached. When my mom heard that, she laughed, no thanks to my brilliant track record of always cheating myself with promises. So I thought, why not prove her (and myself, for once!) wrong?
Yet I wonder why I fool myself into thinking that this would all be so simple and would end happily with me drinking from the goblet of success and a 50,000 word tome - albeit a shitty one - under my arm. I thus came to the conjecture that I may have, by and large, turned cuckoo batshit crazy. Insane in the membrane, I have gone mental and lost my marbles. Claiming that my mind has gone unhinged is such a simple and ambiguous response that I should begin using it as an excuse for any kind of shit I throw myself at. Occam's razor: The simplest explanation is usually the best. And after that I emerge from the ruin absolutely guilt-free ("I was crazy back then")!
And people like me, who spend almost half their lives in front of computer monitors, take all the crazy we can get. Plus, the phrase sounds funny, so it justifies everything, eh?
In any case, expect updates on my progress to come much, much more often from now on. It'll be one hell of a wordcrap-ridden ride.
Well, I kid you not: As of now I have actually written very close to nothing. I don't actually have very convincing excuses to fend off allegations of laziness, so I'll be frank and admit that I've been gaming too much, and whenever I'm not caught up with computer games (the devil!), I'm doing work (of the planning-a-year-end-camp kind, applications still open, hint, hint).
Oh wait, that's an excuse. Ha ha. And pretty much the rest of this post is an excuse, too: Justifications created by a person to fool himself into believing that there was an external force in making him fall short of his intended goal(s).
*Cough*
However, even with only 10 days remaining on the NaNoWriMo clock, I remain hilariously optimistic. You could say that I am the kind of fellow who would deliberate over what to have for lunch even as he discovers that his parachute is faulty while skydiving ("Who knows, I could fall into the sea and become comatose instead of dying, but the doctors had better wake me up before it's already time for tea"). Even when faced with seemingly insurmountable odds, I can still stare blankly at the circumstances and flash you a thumbs-up while proclaiming, in typical unflappable Malaysian fashion, "Can what..."
In this case, "what" specifically refers to writing upwards of 5,000 words a day. That's not an impossible feat, mind you, all you have to do is just throw quality out the window and engage in the verbal diarrhoea of wordcrap. That was the aim of NaNoWriMo anyway, quantity over quality; we can always edit later.
Besides, when I joined, I already told myself not to yield until the 50,000 mark is reached. When my mom heard that, she laughed, no thanks to my brilliant track record of always cheating myself with promises. So I thought, why not prove her (and myself, for once!) wrong?
Yet I wonder why I fool myself into thinking that this would all be so simple and would end happily with me drinking from the goblet of success and a 50,000 word tome - albeit a shitty one - under my arm. I thus came to the conjecture that I may have, by and large, turned cuckoo batshit crazy. Insane in the membrane, I have gone mental and lost my marbles. Claiming that my mind has gone unhinged is such a simple and ambiguous response that I should begin using it as an excuse for any kind of shit I throw myself at. Occam's razor: The simplest explanation is usually the best. And after that I emerge from the ruin absolutely guilt-free ("I was crazy back then")!
And people like me, who spend almost half their lives in front of computer monitors, take all the crazy we can get. Plus, the phrase sounds funny, so it justifies everything, eh?
In any case, expect updates on my progress to come much, much more often from now on. It'll be one hell of a wordcrap-ridden ride.
Zhen was here at 7:46 pm,
1 comment(s)
Wednesday, November 15, 2006
What the hell, I'm still busy!
Like, what the hell, I'm still busy! Even during holidays! That is, like, so totally not supposed to happen.
Not to mention bimbotic.
Anyway, I've been caught up with stuff, as usual. Planning for YDC, mostly. I barely have time to write my story... From now on, I must write about 4,000 words a day to make up for the lost time.
Of course, that's not an impossible feat. The difficulty is in me abstaining from a game of Civilization IV every time I face the computer. Ugh.
How typical of me, just typical...
Not to mention bimbotic.
Anyway, I've been caught up with stuff, as usual. Planning for YDC, mostly. I barely have time to write my story... From now on, I must write about 4,000 words a day to make up for the lost time.
Of course, that's not an impossible feat. The difficulty is in me abstaining from a game of Civilization IV every time I face the computer. Ugh.
How typical of me, just typical...
Zhen was here at 12:50 am,
2 comment(s)
Sunday, November 05, 2006
Fur-ee-dum!
Examinations are over, and thus I now have the mandate to slack off without retribution! Happy happy, joy joy! But how does one fill a three-month-long holiday, you wonder? Me too. So I came up with a to-do list:
1. NaNoWriMo
Short for National Novel Writing Month, it's an international (yeah, the 'National' part is a tad misleading) initiative to get people to produce 50,000-word stories. It's all about the quantity, baby; the icon below my tagboard logs my updated wordcount. The premise of this 'contest' is kinda hard to digest at first, so I suggest those of you who are interested to check this out. Also, I'm keeping a separate blog to record the progress (or lack thereof) of my work.
Yeah, I know I'm inviting destructive criticism by advertising my subpar 1337 writing skillzorz, but who gives a shit these days, huh?
2. 'Charity' Work
Under the YKLS; we're commissioned to sing selections from our Malaysian Affair concert at an international bazaar that's to be held in Subang Parade on the 17th of this month. I'll get more details on that so maybe those of you who want to get a taste of the concert you missed can come over and check us out.
3. 15th SJBA Youth Dhamma Camp
Announcement: I'm actually technically a passport Buddhist. So that makes me just as atheistic as the next agnostic. Then again, most Buddhists are also technically atheistic... In any case, I refuse to allow religion to alienate me from other people, so I'll crash baptisms and Bar Mitzvahs whenever I have the urge to immerse myself in someone else's faith. I make an exception for Mormons, though.
Okay, I lost myself there. I'll cut to the chase: I'm helping out at a camp. It's gonna take up a lot of my December (cue Linkin Park song).
That could've been short, huh? But it's just unseemly to have a tiny entry, so I rambled on a bit to make myself look smarter.
4. Books!
I went on a spending spree earlier this year, and I still have five novels and one autobiography to go. Am currently devouring Neil Gaiman's American Gods, yum.
5. Gaming
The quintessential pastime of the urban male. Sue me.
Of course, this to-do list is a work in progress. There are a myriad other things too, but I think these five should be more than enough to keep me occupied. So until the next time, I hope you either enjoy your holidays or suffer your finals. Party on, dudes and dudettes!
1. NaNoWriMo
Short for National Novel Writing Month, it's an international (yeah, the 'National' part is a tad misleading) initiative to get people to produce 50,000-word stories. It's all about the quantity, baby; the icon below my tagboard logs my updated wordcount. The premise of this 'contest' is kinda hard to digest at first, so I suggest those of you who are interested to check this out. Also, I'm keeping a separate blog to record the progress (or lack thereof) of my work.
Yeah, I know I'm inviting destructive criticism by advertising my subpar 1337 writing skillzorz, but who gives a shit these days, huh?
2. 'Charity' Work
Under the YKLS; we're commissioned to sing selections from our Malaysian Affair concert at an international bazaar that's to be held in Subang Parade on the 17th of this month. I'll get more details on that so maybe those of you who want to get a taste of the concert you missed can come over and check us out.
3. 15th SJBA Youth Dhamma Camp
Announcement: I'm actually technically a passport Buddhist. So that makes me just as atheistic as the next agnostic. Then again, most Buddhists are also technically atheistic... In any case, I refuse to allow religion to alienate me from other people, so I'll crash baptisms and Bar Mitzvahs whenever I have the urge to immerse myself in someone else's faith. I make an exception for Mormons, though.
Okay, I lost myself there. I'll cut to the chase: I'm helping out at a camp. It's gonna take up a lot of my December (cue Linkin Park song).
That could've been short, huh? But it's just unseemly to have a tiny entry, so I rambled on a bit to make myself look smarter.
4. Books!
I went on a spending spree earlier this year, and I still have five novels and one autobiography to go. Am currently devouring Neil Gaiman's American Gods, yum.
5. Gaming
The quintessential pastime of the urban male. Sue me.
Of course, this to-do list is a work in progress. There are a myriad other things too, but I think these five should be more than enough to keep me occupied. So until the next time, I hope you either enjoy your holidays or suffer your finals. Party on, dudes and dudettes!