The Happiness Thread

That's the dream.

 

Finally managed to get back in the pool today after a 4 month absence and I don’t suck as much as I thought I would. Finished off with some sprints, 22m in 19.3 seconds. Feeling good.

 

Just figured out how to not suffer from any type of writers block. I am happy about it, and also mad at myself for not realizing this 9 books ago. Would have saved me a lot of time, and I probably would have written triple the amount of books.

It's simple really. Open a word document for each chapter. Write each chapter out like a 6 year old just learning to write. I mean, like a six year old.

"John is jumping. Hes mad, at that, he said don't do this but Jimmy was not happy either so he roundhouse kicked him and threw a pig at his face. The pig was round. It surprised john, and then he fell on the pavement. It was a blue pavement for some reason, and gold. The rain fell. "

As simple as you can get it.
Separate parapgraphs, and then re-write everything that I just wrote out in the style I prefer. The key is to get the raw data out first, before you start putting the style into it. Almost like painting a picture. Especially a landscape painting. You'll put down the underpainting, then the base colors, the the layers, and you build on top of it until you get the final picture.

Apparently I was doing it the opposite way, which is why I was getting blocks all the time. I wrote out plot points, but not the main actions, ideas, descriptions and quirks.

I tried this with my last three chapters, and I was able to write more in these past few days than I did in the past three months.

So yes, I am happy and mad... but mostly happy.

 

Well Happy Thanksgiving to any and all who celebrate it. I am incredibly grateful today because this year has been super kind to me. After the hardship I faced early in the year and the minor bounce back, I managed to finally leave Walmart--after 5 YEARS! This is the first thanksgiving I'm getting to truly spend with family and friends without leaving to work Black Friday. AND it's the first Thanksgiving I've spent with my dad since I was like 2. ha ha!

I got a new job in June as a developmental editor for a "magical" publishing company helping soon to be authors and life coaches design their personal development books. The people I work with, and the clients I help are all amazing--and it fell right into my lap once I made up my mind to leave Walmart.

I finally restarted my blog after a couple of years and I'm pushing myself to have the discipline to post consistently every week and share my truth.

Yes. I lot's to be thankful for and I just wanted to share this energy with you all. >_<

 

Best Saturday tomorrow!

• Looking at apartment.
• Shopping
• Date
• Panto
• Seeing Baga Chipz live.

Then most lazy Sunday ever.

 

Panto? Vas ist das panto?

 

A sort of theater that is popular around England this time a year. Usually a family friendly show based on classical fairy tales.

I'm still trying out all the British Christmas traditions and we wanted to see a live show before the year ended so felt like a good combination.

 

In a few days, I'll have been at my current job for two months. The last one I had was awful, and being outside of it now, it's amazing I lasted four years there. The new one has more opportunity for growth and I am thinking about looking into buying a house.

 

And it's usually a send-up of classical fairy tales, where the hero is played by a girl in guy's clothes, and the mother of the heroine is played by a guy in drag. Or am I not remembering right?

I got to be in college panto at Oxford once. It was a mash-up of Aladdin and The Mikado, and I played one of the Three Little Maids.

 

Home from drag show. Best night ever. Got most cringy selfie with Baga Chipz... But today's been amazing.

 

Just finished a fantastic story! Mystery, despair, vengeance, evil, redemption, resolution. All told passionately, despite goddamned Google Translate!

God bless Google Translate.

Anton, I hope your adventures are just beginning. Get a shave, for Christ's sake! Get cleaned up, and don't go letting your apartment get to look like shit!

 

Ah, I'm so pleased you enjoyed it.

 

The poem in my signature brightens my day without fail. It's not even whats being said in the poem, it's how its being delivered that kills me. Whoever produced that particular Voice Acting session deserves a raise, because they got exactly what they needed to make that seemingly simple poem, terrible, awkward, and hilarious at the same time.

 

So I bought myself a laptop finally.

It’s an MSI sumthin sumthin. Hoping to screw around with video editing. It’s overly ostentatiously edgy looking, with its LED keyboard and dragon tat, which I find droll.

But obviously I’m an idiot, because I’ve been using my old MacBook for over a decade so forgot that basically all new laptops need to get an external disc drive.

So now, uneducated as I am, I’m not sure what I should be getting and what I should be looking for and what’s a fair price for the ask.

There are DVD ones for less than $20 but then Blu Ray for $70+, and turns out not all of them work with my OS—at least one very detailed review griped as much regarding one such device. But I want to buy what I need once and have done with it—not need to upgrade to a better one down the road because what I got didn’t have the functionality I need, even if I didn’t realise it yet.


Ah well, overall I’m very happy to have a functioning laptop. And once I get the editing software loaded, I can’t wait to screw around doing nothing of value.

Merry Christmas to me〜☆

 

You can always partition your drive and install other desired operating systems for further program functionality.

 

We've got a new apartment for next year!

Bigger, warmer and overall better.

Kitchen is big enough to fit a dining table which leaves the living room to just be a living room. Also a guest bedroom!

 

That's good to know.

 

I still use them for backups of some things. They fit in a file folder rather well and once a disc is finalized it's hard to alter the actual information embedded on it.

 

External drives are much better for backing up or imaging drives now. I use Acronis True Image and back up to externals or flash drives for the microscopes at work, and at home. Haven't had an issue yet. Come back from blue screens more than a few times.

 

That really depends on your needs. If I have 3 gigs of files I need to backup or archive and don't expect to touch for 5 years, spending one or two dollars on a DVDR is far more economical than using solid state storage media and less prone to bit flipping.

 

I usually use a solid-state external for storage. Had one for quite a few years. I usually pull movies or writing files off of it when I open it, but otherwise it's been off in a drawer for some time. I don't know. To each their own. If your method works, don't change it. If I use flash drives as a backup or storage, I tape them to the PC with a label saying "Don't touch" so I don't lose them.