I should not be allowed to have Pixy Stix...

...especially when I mix like ten into a can of Sprite. Sooo gooood, and yet soooo baaaaad... Let's just say that I didn't know that I could get this hyper through legal means. Anyway, so what have I been doing with this newfound energy? (Why certainly not doing schoolwork or planning my NaNo...) What I do every night, of course. Do crazy crap on the internet. Recently, I have come across this site called Have a Slogan. Basically, it randomly pairs terrible things with really life slogans for products and whatnot, often with incredibly amusing results, such as:

Or:

And of course, there are some *ahem* less... tasteful ones...

*headdesk*

Yes, I know. I'm stupid and/or insane. Every year I try this and every year I fail (well except for that first year), and yet here I am again doing this to myself. I'm such a masochist. Anyway, so what's different about this year? I'm doing fanfiction. It's actually a fic that I've already started but I can see being ridiculously long. To reconcile my conscience with the fact that it's a story that I've already started, I'm not counting what I've already written in with the word count. I would start something new and/or original, but I just don't have the mental energy for it. Seriously I have absolutely zero orignal plots in my brain, so I'm just going to add on 50,000 more words to a story that already has a clear and planned plot. Yay, me. *headdesk*

Because Iran is being stupid...

I've changed the time settings for this blog, and to quote Scott Westerfeld, here's the reason why:

"Censors in Iran are currently searching for blogs with Tehran local settings as a way of finding and shutting down sites that are protesting Iran’s recent (probably stolen) election. The more blogs in the world that are set to Tehran time, the harder the job is for these censors to do their job."

So join in on the protest and set your site settings to GMT +3:30!!!!! Yay, freedom of speech!!!



-Mary

New website and Licentious Child

Woot! I has a website! I've had other websites in the past, but none of which have looked half as good as this new one. I used wix.com, which lets you make free flash websites, and I am incredibly pleased. You can access this new uber-site of mine here, and it's also listed in the sidebar under "Lovely Links".

Anyway, so I mentioned in a very brief entry back in January that I'm continuing Licentious Child. Well I had put that on hold due to school work and another idea that I was pursuing (*cough*Scarlett*cough*), but I'm back to working on LC now! I'm very concerned about the cohesiveness of the book, to be honest. See, I wrote the first part (the original novella) is first person, and now the second part I've written in third. It works really well in third person, and it brings the story out of Dahlia's head, but I'm unsure of how well the story flows with the POV switching and whatnot.

On the bright side, Dahlia is learning to cope with her new powers quite well. She still has issues with the whole werewolf thing, but she meets a certain someone who shows her that being a mythological creature is not as bad as she makes it out to be. The novella didn't have a happy ending, but the full-length novel seems to be on the road towards a happily ever after (or close enough, anyway).

I'm also considering a penname, perhaps something with "Sinclair" in it. Opinions, anyone? I'm just concerned that people from my church will read my book, and suffice it to say, there is certainly some non-church friendly stuff going on in my book. Nothing graphic, but still...

-Mary

Screnzy fail + boredom at work...

So yeah, by no means did I finish my Screnzy, but on the bright side, I was able to further develop the story idea and characters. Like I actually drew most of the main characters, which helped so much in the writing part- it's just so much easier to write about them when you know exactly what they look like.



I really like how Scarlett's hair color came out. Oh, colored pencils... I had to mix several to get the right shade. FYI, crossbows are really hard to draw.

Script Frenzy

Ah, it's that time again. I have no clue why I'm going to attempt this, because I am quite certain that I won't win, especially since my life will progressively become more hectic as it gets closer to exam time. But alas, I am anyway. Script Frenzy, from the makers of NaNoWriMo, gives its participants the goal of writing one hundred pages of some type of script over the month of April.

Remember the novel that I'm working on called Scarlett? Well I'm adapting it into a manga, of all things. So if by some chance I finish it, the book will be more complete in manga form than in the intended novel. Weird. Not that it would be completed in the manga, heavens no. It would be at least a trilogy, if not a full length series. I mean, it would be very easy for me to serialize the story concept, and from what I've written so far on my Screnzy, it's working quite well as a manga. I may even (just for laughs) try to draw it myself when I'm through, however, if I ever got it picked up by Tokyopop or someplace like that, they would definately have to find me an artist (I'm not that great).

Anyway, Screnzy on!

-Mary

Plagiarism Sucks

So what fresh drama has entered my life? Plagiarism. Seriously- some fourteen-year-old on fanfiction.net lifted a Twilight fanfic that I had posted two years ago. Needless to say, I was quite miffed. Naturally, I sent an e-mail to the admin, and upon further investigation, I discovered that this chick had stolen another author's story as well.

Unfortunately, I couldn't resist posting a snarky review of the story that jacked, which must have tipped her off. She deleted my story, the other person's, as well as two others that I guess she stole as well. As it is, this chick has screwed with the wrong writer, and I'm keeping an eye out for any new stories that she posts. If I get so much as a whiff of plagiarism, her ass is getting banned. This time, with no prior warning.

It's not like I'm determined to catch this usurper (though to be honest, I am), it's just that she has no right to steal what other people have written. Some of you are probably wondering, "Hey, isn't that what fanfiction is?"

Wrongo.

In fanfiction, we do not claim the original author's stuff for our own. In fact, a lot of fandoms require their authors to include disclaimers that state that the characters, etc. featured in the story belong to whoever it is that created them. But for someone to plagiarize fanfiction? That's just low. We fanfic writers have an unwritten honor code that this chick broke to pieces. Also, I couldn't help but notice that she was a total noob. She had only joined the site this month, and the people that she had stolen from had been on the site for years (I joined in 2003, I believe). She also had an obnoxiously long profile, a definite sign of noobishness.