Timewaster's Guide Archive

Wow, I had the totally opposite opinion of HP 4. It exceeded all my expectations and made muggle's meat out of the other movies. Okay, I'm exaggerating a little. But no. 4 is by far my favorite, with no. 2 being the runner up. To each his own, of course. But I loved my journey to Hogwarts last night and want to go again before the month's up.  

*Note: the following characters and dialogue are fictional and are not intended to represent any real TWG members or actual/future events.

Mr. Lower Casey: Is not.
Green Paladin: Is too.
LC: Is not!
GP: Is too!
LC: Oh, so you're sayin' that your wife made you live there, then?
GP: Um, no, I--
LC: So she pretty much has you whipped, eh?
GP: That's not what I--
LC: No? Then I suppose you just volunteered to live in an icy, heatforsaken land of thermal underwear and perpetually chapped lips?
GP: Pfft. Whatever. I think thermal underwear is nifty. In fact, it's gonna be the next big fashion statement just as soon as Hilfiger comes out with his Winter 2007 HotterThanU line of thermals. Just you wait and see! So there.
LC: Right, and the next thing you're gonna tell me is that Hilfiger's shipping you a year's supply of thermals for participating in his ad campaign.
GP: Hey! Are you saying that I'm not Hilfiger material?? Ohhh, that's it, punk! I challenge you to a duel. Click on the button, if you dare!
LC: Ex-cellent! I excel at duels, you fool.
To be continued (never).....

Hurray for entertaining squabbling that lets me try out my as-yet-untested screenwriting talent when I should be reading my cruddy book marketing text book! Oh, I guess this screenplay foray should go on a different thread, then, because now I'm kinda happy.

But EUOL wants something he doesn't have to expend any effort on at all.

Uh-huh, I think Ookla's onto something here.... haha.

So... perhaps we ought to do some R&D to develop a revolutionary, just-add-water blog formula for successful authors with a proclivity for letting their web sites languish. We could call it Blogquick [tm] or InstaBlog [tm] and we'd make trillions! Trillions, I say! Who's with me?

Really? Hmm, maybe I should give it a shot. Gotta work up the nerve, however. Aurthur Levine? Wow. Maybe I can at least shoot for talking to an EA. I can work on the questions some more this weekend and, if I've accumulated enough nerve, call on Monday. Thanks for the tip!!
Oh, and I agree about how Tor's site is rather outdated in many places. ugh.

In EUOL's defense, EUOLogies were originally written for THIS site, and were then cross listed to his site later. He stopped doing them so he'd have the time to focus on writing more directly related to making money.

Yeah, the money part makes sense, of course. I also know how the EUOLogies were part of TWG originally. Still, they're a good "draw," you know, on his web site for those who want to know more about him as a writer and a person. That's all. Can't resist wanting more of a good thing, I guess.

The other day when I visited EUOL's website, I was rather surprised to see no new EUOLogies had been posted in a while. I guess I thought that, with ELANTRIS being out, the site would be updated more often to encourage fans to get more and more involved (i.e., "hooked" and rabidly loyal. ) So I, too, put in my vote for more EUOLogies!!

I zipped through the story ideas happily and waited for something to "happen" with them or for them to spark some more EUOLogies, but nothing happened. So I like how Eric said that the goal should be to post something else in conjunction with these ideas.

Yep, I agree that the story idea blogs are nifty. But they need to be beefed up somehow--the post should be more than just a line or two about a story idea. That just whets our appetites for something more substantial and there's not much worse than looking forward to an entree and having the kitchen close down after you get your appetizer! :-/

Like Chimera said, the point of the blogging should be that readers get to connect to the author, to feel like they "know" the author as a person not just as a name and a bio on a book jacket.

Basically, I feel kinda gyped that the ideas are just left there, floating. So if the idea-a-day (or idea-every-other-day or whatever) works as a reminder to sound off on other stuff (related or non-related), that would be awesome. Naturally, the other blogs wouldn't have to be about that day's idea. But just give us something else longer lasting to munch on, that's all. Though, I do think it might be fun to have the story ideas themselves be directly involved in the other blogging.

Like, what if EUOL were to pick a few writing/publishing topics and use the story idea to illustrate something about that topic. How about topics such as effective imagery, effective dialogue, "kiling your babies/darlings," POV problems, past tense vs. present tense, outlining, writing solid first paragraphs of a novel, etc. Hmm, well, maybe this could get too complicated. It's sounding like a book project.... Anyway, something like that would be cool.  

I'm with e on that. It "teases" in all the right ways. I felt like it had this solemn tone and sense of wonder to it, which is cool. I'm sick of the "shock and awe" teasers that try way too hard to make their point. So I liked this minimalist, solemn sort of approach. I can't wait to see more!  

I went to a place called Hansen Mountaineering off of State Street in Orem.

Hmm, I don't remember seeing it. There's that Evan's Frontier Store I remember but I didn't realize there's a cool rock climbing place in Orem. I'm not one for heights, though... I made an exception for Notre Dame when I was in Paris, though. I got right up close to the gargoyles after climbing all those steps.   Did you get to take a trip to France when you were studying in England? Man, I miss London sooo much!  I've made a goal to get back there before I'm 30, which means I've got about 2 1/2 years and counting!