tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-264000502011-07-29T01:17:11.679-05:00On Life as a Sarcastic Fringeheadfringesnoreply@blogger.comBlogger841100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-32910172850885405932009-11-12T09:36:00.001-06:002009-11-12T09:37:22.316-06:00And now another new blogfreefringes.comfringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-31138111160650595552008-02-01T16:18:00.000-06:002008-02-01T16:25:09.573-06:00new bloghttp://www.650miles.comfringesnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1149541975625286562006-06-05T16:08:00.000-05:002006-06-05T16:12:55.650-05:00Alrighty!New blog hereNew story blog hereBoth of them at sarcasticfringe.comWhat a weekend for this wee little writer.fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1149444424443007362006-06-04T12:55:00.000-05:002006-06-04T14:12:57.756-05:00Hey! I'm still unpacking in the new space, trying to get the links and icons to work well in all browsers. Kind of like waiting for the cable or satellite guy. Except I'm waiting on the Firefox guy. My neighbors are friendly. A few have stopped by with special brownies and a case of Mike's Hard Lemonade. My view of the hills is spectacular. Come on over. No need to call first or anything. My fringesnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1149394211140508262006-06-03T23:02:00.001-05:002006-06-03T23:36:44.460-05:00Now posting at my new blog space . I'll figure out this redirect process before the week is out. Maybe. Until then, please change your bookmarks to sarcasticfringe.com/fringehead and click on the provided link. Thanks!fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1149343057066620442006-06-03T08:50:00.000-05:002006-06-03T08:57:37.083-05:00Thanks to Tribe for including me in his flash fiction gallery Flashing in the Gutters. The Serenade was published on his site today. What an exciting Saturday morning.fringesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1149260570637001142006-06-02T09:56:00.000-05:002006-06-02T10:04:44.003-05:00I'm writing in my sleep now. I was over-sleeping this morning and I saw in my dream-lite the opening couple of sentences of a new 500 word short short. I liked those sentences and I was asking myself if the introduction was my usual style when I finally opened my eyes. By the time I sat up in bed, the story was gone. I have no idea what the sentences were or what the story was to be. I do fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1149195349947131752006-06-01T15:49:00.000-05:002006-06-01T20:02:53.763-05:00499 words. It took about an hour to write, so maybe this break is doing some good. Rambling in my blog may be therapeutic. Or it may just be rambling in my blog. History will judge.The SerenadeFingers in his lap, nervously touching, tip to tip. His head is down, yet he can see her with a secret sideways glance, three seats back in the row next to his. His hair sports no neat cut and his jeans arefringesnoreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1149182789642907652006-06-01T11:23:00.000-05:002006-06-01T12:26:29.823-05:00For whatever reason, I am feeling nostalgic today. In that spirit, I am listing all the jobs I've held (and the ones that held me hostage) over the years. My first job, I was 10 years old and kept it until I was no longer age-appropriate for the gig at 15. I didn't keep another job for five years until much later in life. I'm a bit of a vagabond and I get bored easily. I'm much better suited for fringesnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1149136864123591072006-06-01T00:46:00.000-05:002006-05-31T23:41:37.783-05:00Writing everyday is a difficult process especially when I have nothing to say or I can't pull away in my own story. I have great quotes floating in my head about the compulsion of writers and how insane we are if we're not writing and how unstable we show ourselves to be when we are. Yes, we live in our heads most of the time and, ironically, we are not the best communicators. It's confusing. We fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1149115649232846632006-05-31T17:40:00.000-05:002006-05-31T17:47:29.233-05:00I found both the short story and the poem on the author's website with this very straightforward note:This work is copyright M.A. Mohanraj 1995, all rights reserved. Please don't repost this or make it publically accessible via FTP, mail server, or archive site without my explicit permission.I'm sure if I keep looking, I'll find a similar note dated 2006, so I'll just go with the 1995 annotation.fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1149099653986032762006-05-31T13:15:00.000-05:002006-05-31T14:27:21.303-05:00I'm being quite mean and partially illegal by posting the poem and short story in their entirety without first asking permission, so they may not be on my site much longer. As soon as I find an active link, I'll remove the text and post the link. I'm too excited to wait, though, and if the author finds her work on my blog before I have a chance to do it the right way and she's pissed off, I'll fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1149099294512242562006-05-31T13:07:00.000-05:002006-05-31T22:22:23.913-05:00Good lord, I'm in love. I'm feeling kind of knocked over, maybe even knocked up, right now. No more words...Feather by M.A. Mohanrajfringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1149098130289032492006-05-31T12:31:00.000-05:002006-05-31T17:39:58.746-05:00You know how, one night, you self-google out of boredom, then you do it again the next night because, well, it just happens that way, then next thing you know, you've got a bit of a habit going there until you say "Stop! This is getting pathetic!" but then, one night after that, you stumble into some accidental lovin' that makes everything good and washes over you like clear creek water?Found fringesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1149045475729687252006-05-31T00:15:00.000-05:002006-05-31T08:48:46.026-05:00More self-googling, I found Stillwater. Well, I found his blog mention, anyway.I get no love from Yahoo.fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1149010843194518252006-05-30T12:25:00.001-05:002006-05-30T12:51:11.013-05:00Self-Googling again, I Google the name Stillwater Crowe who is my slightly lost, finding-his-way, if-only-his-writer-would-get-her-shit-together protagonist. Many hits for Cameron Crowe. That makes sense. And lots of hits referring to Cameron Crowe's movie Almost Famous and the fictitious band Stillwater, an amalgam of the various bands Crowe covered while writing for Rolling Stone. Maybe Cam sawfringesnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1149002555469119342006-05-30T10:12:00.000-05:002006-05-30T10:24:26.083-05:00I've decided that I'll try to maybe make the 500-word-or-less short shorts a regular thing to do in this space as I'm drifting back to Stillwater. Lots of qualifiers and modifiers in that sentence. Trying not to commit in case I change my mind or get swept up by other things or people. Does commit have two t's? That's one of those words that just doesn't look right when I spell it.Hey, new fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1148917921681999282006-05-29T10:34:00.000-05:002006-05-30T11:46:57.346-05:00Writer's blog surfing again. I like the writer's tone in this blog ink on my fingers. A link to Susannah's space is in my sidebar.My friend Flood started her blogger interviews today. A rainy Memorial Day here but it's never too rainy to eat at my dad's house.fringesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1148690577173611032006-05-26T19:39:00.000-05:002006-05-26T19:42:57.173-05:00462 words after a mini-edit. I'm not obsessed with numbers. Just wanted to get it right for those who may be counting.fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1148674493629467402006-05-26T15:06:00.001-05:002006-05-26T19:33:24.466-05:00I decided on a 500-word maximum. So this is more of an exercise, but I truly hope, at 456 words, it's still a story. Thoughts and comments welcome.blue girlThe weirdest dreams I’ve been having lately. When I’m in the dreams, I know I’m in a dream and, in the dream, I’m okay with that. Lots of boxes. Fabric stretched over box-shaped frames. I’m standing in the middle of them, looking around. fringesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1148659296009831082006-05-26T10:28:00.000-05:002006-05-26T15:53:55.336-05:00Blue Girl. Great working title. Even better: blue girl. Do not ask how the lower case letters change the meaning. I'm not sure, but I like it, so there it is.Wouldn't you love to get your hands on the blog musings of your favorite authors? Why, God, why were we so late with this wonderful supplementary writing tool? Then we'd know for a fact the great ones suffered from the same dibilitating fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1148591249751212572006-05-25T15:59:00.000-05:002006-05-25T20:13:56.206-05:00As usual, my friend Flood was right. I do need working titles for my fragments. It might be confusing, now that I have more than one going on at the same time, to refer to the fragments as this fragment and that other fragment. Until she rescues me by comment and suggestion, in this post is "a new fragment that has nothing to do with the Stillwater/Parker fragment". I'll work on it more later.Thefringesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1148580765270326632006-05-25T12:53:00.000-05:002006-05-25T13:14:16.193-05:00Confession. Not a confession. Just something I forgot to mention before now. The hold up is not that I cannot gets these cats out of the tub. It is, in fact, that it's time to focus on Parker, it's past time to focus on Parker, and I gots nothing. I don't know if that's because I'm so in tune with Stillwater or if it's because I'm detached from Parker. I know nothing about her. How she works on fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1148574941513601252006-05-25T11:31:00.000-05:002006-05-25T11:35:41.520-05:00Too funny, too well-written for me not to share in this space. I would have sacrificed my life under the same circumstances.Passengers Bravely Take Down Plane Showing Big Momma's House 2fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1148566823645853262006-05-25T09:16:00.000-05:002006-05-25T09:20:23.646-05:00Words I never thought I'd Google:fake shamanFound this entry on this really interesting blog.fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1148566569632087382006-05-25T08:43:00.000-05:002006-05-25T09:16:10.533-05:00I'm stepping back from the work for a while. That's not uncommon. I need a little space between me and whatever life force I'm channeling to help write the piece. I can always change my mind about certain things I've decided. In the original work, the destination for the characters' journey was the geographic middle of the world or of their country, I can't remember which. It may have not been fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1148497440493915342006-05-24T14:00:00.000-05:002006-05-24T14:04:00.503-05:00Silly me. I've already got a plot. Waiting for the plot mechanism fairy to visit my pillow and me. Tonight. Bring a friend, plot mechanism fairy. Bring a friend and something to drink.fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1148494064576909832006-05-24T12:51:00.000-05:002006-05-24T13:21:59.710-05:00Somebody call roadside assistance, I'm stuck. I cannot get Stillwater and Parker on the road. They are still in the bathtub, actually. Pruning. Waiting. For me. To get them out. And onto the yellow brick road, so to speak. Except this yellow brick road is Interstate Highway 29 that connects with I-90 through towns called Le Mars, Yankton and Kadoka. I should call the good people of Le Mars and fringesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1148418945910002072006-05-23T15:47:00.000-05:002006-05-23T18:05:02.846-05:00On my daily writer's blog stroll, I found a fun challenge on Mr. Schprock's blog. Mind you, I don't know Mr. Schprock personally. He seems like good people, though, and he's a very smart, very funny regular-life writing kind of guy. So the challenge is this: he assigned me a letter as a prompt for thinking of ten things that I associate with that letter. Somehow, as I'm writing about it, I can fringesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1148415549774759662006-05-23T15:14:00.000-05:002006-05-23T16:40:53.553-05:0042. That was my longest post ever.43. I will resist the temptation to edit any part of the post or the list.44. Even though I have already noticed several things that should be changed before the Earth can continue spinning correctly on its axis.fringesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1148412369247089332006-05-23T13:08:00.000-05:002006-05-24T11:22:29.773-05:00Two separate incidents, both happened at a party. Two separate incidents, both happened at a party and made people say to me "That was you?" for years afterwards upon meeting me for a second time in a different place.Here's what happened. At these parties. The music is going and people are talking and dancing. I do not dance. I have danced, but people have laughed at me, so I do not dance, okay? fringesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1148347544596952362006-05-22T20:21:00.000-05:002006-05-22T20:31:41.330-05:00I'm going to move on from this part of the draft. I think I have enough questions answered for now. I really think it's time for Stillwater and Parker to hit the road. They would have left Kansas City today, but I had the worst allergy attack and I didn't get anything done, writing or otherwise. So, tomorrow, the journey continues, if I feel better.fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1148242042554611342006-05-21T14:56:00.000-05:002006-05-21T18:25:34.816-05:00The rewrite:The aunt touched my hand. Then touched my shoulder. Put two hands to my face. There is barely space between us by the time she speaks to me again. “Not all of my life, Stillwater, but all of yours.”Close to me, in one ear, she whispers in mystical tongues. Words that soothe, compassionate words that demand, chants of praise and of calling. I knew her name to be Magnificent as she heldfringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1148051267950659402006-05-19T09:49:00.000-05:002006-05-19T11:55:27.900-05:00The Jacksons' Victory Tour. 1984. Houston. I was there as I had been for every other time Michael Jackson performed within 50 miles of my childhood home. Mike waved to me that night. I'm not a screamer. Never have I been an overly demonstrative person. If I get loud, it's because I'm excited not because I'm obnoxious. So that night, in my excited yet not overly demonstrative way, I got Michael fringesnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1147894586588043232006-05-17T13:34:00.000-05:002006-05-17T15:18:44.433-05:00This is one of those days I should be scribbling on scraps of paper and talking out loud to myself, but instead, I am choosing to post my insanity for all the world (est. pop. 5) to see. I've mentioned before that this story is based on a book that has enjoyed/suffered many variations and adaptations. The story I am trying to finish is yet another, but it's mine and I'm excited about it. I've fringesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1147890299282396012006-05-17T13:01:00.000-05:002006-05-17T13:24:59.303-05:00Oooh, look! A task from last Friday's to-do list.4. ...Map the route, grow the characters. Introduce Freddie Mercury and Tim Woodman (and change that name) at a couple of intervals along the way. Get them all to Castle Rock together to meet Parker's father English Osbourn. What the hell was I thinking? This is going to take a while. I have no idea how to read a map. A road trip for me is a run tofringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1147879741578040982006-05-17T10:18:00.000-05:002006-05-17T10:29:01.596-05:00Hey, it's Charlie Kaufman Day here at the Sarcastic FringeHead. Cheap popcorn and free wine.fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1147876352115157182006-05-17T09:20:00.000-05:002006-05-17T11:50:06.353-05:00Charlie Kaufman...my other writing god. Thanks to the blog at Bookslut for the L.A. Times article alert. Registration may be required to read the article. Do it, man. Register. Or not. Whatever. But, dude, it's Charlie Kaufman.fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1147804017436393232006-05-16T13:08:00.000-05:002006-05-16T13:52:47.956-05:00Don't be so hasty, I told myself before picking up my Pilot Precise V5 rolling ball extra fine pen. Maybe it's not the digital writing, but the music playlist. I use my jukebox to create my environment and, apparently, I was in need of a revamp. I won't say in this space which two songs I looped so I could concentrate on the rewrite, but today's draft is better than yesterday's, so the change in fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1147790740315733542006-05-16T09:30:00.000-05:002006-05-16T09:45:40.330-05:00I have homework. I can't really move forward on the draft without addressing the missing pieces from yesterday's post. So I get to write and rewrite until I get it right. My writing environment is completely wrong for the supernatural feel I am trying to create. While I'm not looking for quills and ink as I toil in a 17th century castle turret bathed in candlelight, I'm still in the wrong place. fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1147726050319510952006-05-15T15:16:00.000-05:002006-05-15T19:03:10.736-05:00I'm so behind on South Park this season. But I'm always behind on South Park. I watch entire seasons at a time on TiVo, that's my habit. This weekend, I watched three hours of it so I could see what happened to Chef/Isaac Hayes. That one was funny. But the one about the smug from the hybrid car drivers colliding with the smug from George Clooney's Oscar acceptance speech was my favorite. I could fringesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1147449538559879792006-05-12T10:27:00.000-05:002006-05-13T12:53:05.046-05:00Okay...next steps. Probably in no particular order. Notes to self:1. Figure out what's going on between the aunt and Stillwater. They both have supernatural abilities, but Stillwater's are limited when compared to hers. He has no idea who she is or why she thinks he's a threat. Does she think he's a threat? Don't know yet. Gotta write and find out. Avoiding movie clichés at all times. No need forfringesnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1147400720298750802006-05-12T00:01:00.000-05:002006-05-24T12:03:58.983-05:00This is all the frags from this week posted as one large fragment. I need to get a handle on it all. The way I used to do that in my sketch book journal was to write out each fragment by hand until I had the composite. I would write the composite over and over until I was able to stop editing as I wrote. I would always find something to change or something to improve while re-writing. In this fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1147373462485643432006-05-11T13:48:00.000-05:002006-05-11T14:59:15.730-05:00Writing myself into a corner...We pulled into her aunt’s driveway around eleven, midnight, whenever—about two hours off-schedule due to my old man’s afternoon crawl along the interstate. No need for a quiet entry from the dark of night: every light in the house seemed to be on. We went in through the kitchen, Parker’s knock being more of a gentle announcer than of one seeking permission.Standing fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1147359913942077862006-05-11T09:19:00.000-05:002006-05-13T10:22:23.813-05:00I ran across a blog called shitty first draft yesterday. There was a quote by writer Anne Lamott saying that everybody has shitty first drafts...that's how you get to the good second, third and fourth drafts. I lifted from 43 Folders an excerpt from Lamott's Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life:"For me and most of the other writers I know, writing is not rapturous. In fact, the fringesnoreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1147281884382873512006-05-10T11:57:00.000-05:002006-05-10T13:20:50.000-05:00Lots of phone calls and mental interruptions today. Also, I've changed from Maroon 5 back to Morcheeba. I tried Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell yesterday and that was a disaster. Not sure why. I just couldn't write to it.Parker is one of those people who thinks silence in a conversation is a sign of personal weakness, but, three hours in, she’s been unusually quiet while driving, and I haven’t saidfringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1147212287121870782006-05-09T16:57:00.000-05:002006-05-09T17:05:24.623-05:00Please visit with Bookslut and read this interview with A.M. Homes. I have no idea how to ask you to do such a thing. I am not a literature resource--we've had that discussion. This space is, like, me and you time, and I'm sending you away. But only for a moment. Please indulge me. Then come back. Don't make my abandonment issues come looking for you.fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1147209203456520222006-05-09T15:55:00.000-05:002006-05-11T10:07:49.440-05:00Speaking of college...It occurs to me now that, back then, I had a good shot of becoming a TV writer/TV writer's intern for the Lifetime Channel. My stories were always centered on characters who were perfect and beautiful, hooked up with someone perfectly beautiful, and dying of some exotic cause. But I instead held out for high art and here I am: a worker drone by day and a drunk [ed: Mom, not fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1147192291375652102006-05-09T11:15:00.000-05:002006-05-09T11:33:53.720-05:00Not getting too bogged down in details in the first draft. That's what subsequent drafts are for, I've learned. I have no idea where these people live. Naming the city would prompt a need for research. I don't mind researching, but then the story doesn't get written. So I'm leaving clues in the first draft narrative telling me where one character may live in relation to another character. I can fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1147118708504832202006-05-08T15:00:00.000-05:002006-05-08T20:57:13.330-05:00A mini-frag.Parker has an aunt, one of her mother’s four sisters, who lives about 500 miles north. I’m digging that in the days of almost instant transport, we are driving there. Unannounced. Like in the days before the telephone and shit. Parker insists this is the way of her family. No need to call first and be invited or anything. And, hey, if you drive for ten hours and you get there and thisfringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1147109862586525652006-05-08T12:25:00.000-05:002006-05-08T15:59:42.420-05:00Argh. Disregard Sunday's post. My workaround solution was no solution at all (as is 99% of all workaround solutions). My personal advisor advised me to put it back the way it was with the story frags staying on the main page available for everyone to see and enjoy. Okay, he didn't say it exactly that way, but that's how I choose to interpret it. My laundry went undone this weekend for no valid fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1147027185093688342006-05-07T13:26:00.000-05:002006-05-08T13:39:03.286-05:00[Update: Ignore this post.]Doing a little blog reorganization today. Instead of reading the entire fragment on the main page, you can now click on a hyperlink that will send you to a particular frag, or you can use the "extended fragment here" link next to the date at the bottom of each post. Sometimes, there is no extended fragment, but I've placed hyperlinks in the post text for posts that havefringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1146972265404139652006-05-06T21:57:00.000-05:002006-05-07T20:57:36.890-05:00I've spent the day surfing writers' blogs. There are so many ambitious literature sites out there. Quite the humbling experience. I decided that I, too, had to have extensive and hyperlinked lists of my favorite writers and books running down my sidebar. I, too, wanted to be the go-to reference for readers and writers. Then, I poured myself another vodka rocks and got over it. If you need a fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1146947519577353352006-05-06T15:27:00.000-05:002006-05-12T11:49:13.116-05:00I've discovered, quite by accident, that I am a weekday writer. Which is okay. Nothing good ever happens in my story on the weekends, anyway. Gabriel Garcia Marquez, my writing god, said once that he writes eight hours every day, even if he has nothing to say. I choose to interpret his "every day" as Monday through Friday.fringesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1146867611300054732006-05-05T17:07:00.001-05:002006-05-07T13:51:01.713-05:00That Wopner at 3 o'clock line in the disposable frag reminds me of this guy I used to hate date. He was always so self-satisfied when he knew the easiest of the easy shit and that drove me crazy. He needed a pat on the back for displaying his extremely limited wealth of knowledge every. single. time. I hate that guy. Note to self: No more writing before eating for the day. You were obviously fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1146861299631465822006-05-05T15:27:00.000-05:002006-05-07T12:30:20.923-05:00Both of us should delete the previous post from our memories. Please replace it with this one. Thanks, dude. Your fabulousness continues.Her first question to me was a legitimate one. If she doesn’t know what she’s missing, how will she know where to look for it? Whatever the fuck it is, Parker added in frustration. Two days she’s known me and already uses fuck 300 times a day. Some people are fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1146845820631743942006-05-05T11:06:00.000-05:002006-05-07T12:39:07.733-05:00A light exchange that probably will not make the final draft. I'm posting right after writing to create a sense of permanence.That way, I don't get stuck by being overly dissatisfied with what I have so far. If I keep my habit of excising huge chunks without giving them a chance, I'll be back where I started. So I post the frags and I take a second look at them later. I'll maybe keep parts, not fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1146767775521643732006-05-04T13:32:00.000-05:002006-05-04T13:41:07.166-05:00Anybody else notice how I weenied out on beginning Parker's story? I can't let a backstory impasse become an impasse for the entire thing. I have to keep going, almost no matter what. I've used the word "thing" twice in the past few days. My 12th grade English teacher hated that word, and I'm always conscious of its use, especially my own use of it. But sometimes, Mrs. Pecsenye, thing is what fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1146766568775898742006-05-04T12:52:00.000-05:002006-05-08T12:21:02.406-05:00This need for dialogue is killing me, but I understand the purpose. Exposition should be done through at least one other method besides the narration. I think dialogue breaks up what could be a monotonous process and it allows us to get to know even the minor characters in their own voices.Here's something fun: originally, Stillwater and Parker were scheduled to begin a journey, a trip, sometime fringesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1146704236745242342006-05-03T19:26:00.000-05:002006-05-03T19:57:16.753-05:00It will take a while to tell Parker's story. I am cheating a little bit by allowing Stillwater's character to create kind of a first-person omniscient vibration. It's very difficult for me to switch from one character narrating in first person to another. I've seen that method work in one book that I loved in junior high--I can't remember the name of the book (was a pig one of the characters?) fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1146686448671335602006-05-03T14:54:00.000-05:002006-05-07T13:05:44.250-05:00Posting this without edits. I'll rewrite it later. Just wanted to get it up before getting back to work on the next development.I am completely unused to actually having to listen to someone’s life story. I am nearly always faking it in one way or another and, here with Parker over super nachos and pitchers of margaritas, I don’t know when to laugh or when to hang myself by stringing together fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1146596869488323892006-05-02T13:48:00.000-05:002006-05-02T17:16:23.096-05:00Visiting the rewrite process for a second. With the first drafts no longer taking place in my journal, I'll have no real record of changes. I recovered the first draft of this paragraph through the undo feature in Word.In duress, my memory always bails and I have no idea if I have any money. I know I’ve been at Ellery’s for a decent time, but for all I knew, he could have been paying me in fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1146588116942745352006-05-02T11:41:00.000-05:002006-05-02T11:41:56.950-05:00I forgot: I'm supposed to be writing.fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1146540028009165302006-05-01T21:59:00.000-05:002006-05-08T12:23:32.983-05:00One day soon, when I post this type of fragment fusion, the link will be over on the sidebar somewhere and a separate page will open for those who are following only the story and not the writing process. Until then, as in right now, the whole what-I've-got-so-far will be posted right down the middle of my rambling notes and commentary. Much cyberlove to my sexy HTML tutor when he and I get fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1146514232444572512006-05-01T14:35:00.000-05:002006-05-01T15:57:23.623-05:00I will say that I am unused to writing dialogue or any type of transitory text that gets my characters from one place to another. They usually just end up in the next place I need them to be with no real expository methods. But that lack of explanation was a main criticism of my earlier work and I'm trying to work through that now. My main fear is that the characters begin to ring false as they fringesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1146505525786856912006-05-01T12:37:00.000-05:002006-05-01T12:49:46.200-05:00The shop closes after sunset in the moment its customers find what they're looking for or when they give up the search for the day. That moment finally arrives for Parker at six minutes past midnight and I grab my keys before she finds another tangent to explore. Her energy is infectious, so although I’m ready to walk away from the shop, I’m not yet ready to let her walk away from me. I can't go fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1146457105176772392006-04-30T23:11:00.000-05:002006-05-07T13:25:01.310-05:00I can’t help her, but she walks in, light and breezy and pretty and determined to misunderstand nearly every word that comes out of my mouth. She thinks flirting with me will help as she moves with a purposeful fluidity from bin to bin overflowing with cheap shit that will never at all advance her cause. I follow her because she attracts people that way. They—we—can’t stop ourselves. With a half fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1146425628691714602006-04-30T14:26:00.000-05:002006-05-07T13:19:51.663-05:00My writing day is being chopped into small pieces. Once I get started, it's time to run and do something else. I'm posting the frag as it is in this moment. Then, I'll pick up dinner ingredients and the Starbucks vanilla frappucino which should keep me awake the rest of the night. I can write in silence and get some work done after my day is over.Nose first, a massive dog peeks into the shop, fringesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1146338861839279732006-04-29T14:11:00.000-05:002006-04-30T18:22:24.373-05:00I'm not writing today. I've spent the day watching the NFL draft either from Reliant Stadium or from home. Back to my literary pursuits tomorrow.This entry is more of a placeholder for my own future purposes. Not like anyone is running to his computer on a Saturday looking for my frag updates. But if you are here looking, this entry is for you, too.fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1146237381043724912006-04-28T09:19:00.000-05:002006-04-30T18:22:46.123-05:00I completely enjoyed the movie Drumline that came out a few years ago. It used a college show-style marching band for the underdog/fish-out-of-water-turned-hero metaphor that we love so much. In one scene, the band was on the football field at halftime for its performance. Devin, the film's fish out of water, swaggered and bragged his way into an unplanned drumline solo, and the crowd went wild, fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1146080855392591492006-04-26T14:27:00.000-05:002006-04-30T19:16:51.883-05:00This is like imposing a deadline on myself. As long as I know this space is here waiting for me, I have to post something everyday and that makes me work work work on the story. I don't really want to post something like: "I'm trying, but nothing is coming out." Which is what I started to do many times today. My two readers and 1000 spambots might get tired of posts like that very quickly. fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1145987988636717042006-04-25T12:44:00.000-05:002006-04-30T18:57:21.216-05:00I know it gets confusing trying to keep up with the developing story as the frags are deposited in separate posts. So, occasionally, I'll gather the frags into one post so the story can be read from the beginning to where I've written so far.What I've got so far...maybe more tomorrow.Walking away, behind me my mother standing in the doorway in her unwashed housedress, hair sticking out in all fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1145972349608508562006-04-25T08:19:00.000-05:002006-04-30T17:49:01.256-05:00Originally, I thought Stillwater would "know" the lives and events of each person he met or even passed on the street, but that's too great of a burden for his character. So his gift has been downgraded, so to speak. He'll know the lives of only certain people and those people may be random. I'm not sure yet if there is a common thread sewing together each of those people. I do know this, though:fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1145906206120664322006-04-24T13:46:00.000-05:002006-04-30T19:17:47.000-05:00I am the queen of complete reversal. Forget my plan of drafting in my journal. I discovered it's easier to just type directly into Word, blue screens of death be damned. So it looks like this space will be the only permanent record of the drafts and edits of the piece, and I guess that's okay, just something else for me to get used to.Back in the day, it was impossible for me to write in the fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1145833782831966762006-04-23T17:56:00.000-05:002006-04-30T18:26:10.810-05:00The only things missing from the photo of my workstation are a bottle of vodka and a box of Crunch n'Munch. The vodka was in the freezer, unavailable for the shoot. I'm out of Crunch n' Munch, but that's only for very late night writing, anyway. Mike's Hard Lemonade is for morning/afternoon writing. The workstation is in my kitchen and my chair is eighteen inches from the refrigerator. I don't fringesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1145676185795168282006-04-21T22:06:00.000-05:002006-04-30T21:25:34.180-05:00It's hard to copyright ideas because someone has always already thought of it first. Take the name of this space which was lifted from my never-written collection of short stories. I've always been a sarcastic little one; it's probably my most noted trademark. Being a mixed bag of introversion/extroversion and thinking that I know everything, yet having a healthy dose of humility thrown in from fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1145629486041459832006-04-21T08:53:00.000-05:002006-04-30T17:50:40.430-05:00Well, here it is. A fork in my road of procrastination. I read through each journal last night and confirmed that I don't have enough decent story frags to post in this space. I found rejection letters from university fiction journals taped to some pages, so there are works of mine that, by this time, have been recycled into those Earth-friendly gift bags at the dollar store. I don't even fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1145557948527014282006-04-20T13:32:00.000-05:002006-05-12T14:30:49.390-05:00It is extremely difficult not to edit my 10-year-ago self as I'm typing these entries. I am now taking the step to censure myself as well. I think I have about five more handwritten pages of this story, but I don't like where it was going. Eric, the lead, turns out to be a very weak character. Normally, I wouldn't care. Some characters are weaker or stronger than others. They are very much like fringesnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1145544730763944832006-04-20T09:44:00.000-05:002006-04-30T19:03:40.113-05:00Reading more of the dated entries surrounding this frag, I see now and can partially remember that I considered this to be my sell-out piece of work. My writing has always been a little on the underbelly. Shady, questionable characters doing shady and questionable things. I never think there is an exact right or exact wrong and I try not to speak in absolutes unless I'm being ironic. Headlights, fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1145542733764124742006-04-20T09:03:00.000-05:002006-04-30T19:22:12.093-05:00Eric Ellisor. I don't even know who this guy is. I opened one journal last night and this is the first thing I found written in it. My handwriting was extremely neat and there were no edits. This means that this version was probably version #106 or something like that. I can tell it was written during a time in my life when I thought every decision was a moral one that cemented my character. fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1145492873992655522006-04-19T19:17:00.000-05:002006-04-30T19:05:19.006-05:00Summer Love & Teasing Trees...sounds like two porn stars accepting their award for best money shot together. Now we all know why I should leave titles to the phantom editor.This is the paragraph that accompanied the title. Alas, no porn, but I can't promise that some of my postings won't be X-rated. I went through an erotica phase for a while. I just haven't come across that particular journal, fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1145491358328151632006-04-19T18:48:00.000-05:002006-04-30T19:06:51.440-05:00Now that I have my journals out of storage, I have discovered two things: I am a much better writer, thank God, than I was in 1993, and I do believe I only matured into an adult about five years ago. When I was in my twenties, unbeknownst to me (I have always loved that word unbeknownst), I was a child. I am positive that everybody around me knew it, though. They were certainly beknownst about fringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1145457399295468622006-04-19T09:01:00.000-05:002006-04-30T19:20:39.723-05:00I went through my current journal last night so I could post yesterday's story fragment. I don't write daily in my journal. I write in it when I can locate it. I use only a Pilot Precise V5 rolling ball extra fine pen. Usually blue. Sometimes purple. Occasionally green. If I can't find a Pilot Precise V5 rolling ball extra fine pen, and I just have to write down what's in me, I'll use what I havefringesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26400050.post-1145373583674115212006-04-18T10:18:00.000-05:002006-04-30T19:08:54.790-05:00I start things and don't finish them. I have no follow-through. I pay very little attention to end-phase detail. That kind of detail is for suckers people who have no other eventually unfinished projects to start. None of this has ever been printed on any of my resumes or been referenced in a job interview unless I just did not want that particular paying gig. But I am saying it here for the fringesnoreply@blogger.com1