the trick is to keep breathing

no, this is not the post about job search depression. not yet.

I participate in Get Your Words Out every year as something that motivates me to make words, much like NaNoWriMo -- it isn't necessarily about "winning" either, but it's about having a reason to track words, which then becomes having a reason to write. In 2020 or 2021, I forget which, I managed to write somewhere near 350,000 words. What a fuckin' banger. A lot of it was Old Vines, and some of it was work words, and all of it was fun as hell.

The thing I noticed at the end of the year, however, was that my writing was just inconsistent -- I was carrying myself towards that goal with days where I wrote 5000, 7000 words in one day, and then not writing for the next 4 days in a row. So if I could get my ASS to the COMPUTER to do the THING, i usually could get a significant number of words done. So let's focus on that, sez my brain, and we'll be a super-writer.

2022 Sev said well, hey, there's a habit pledge for GYWO, so: I took it, with the rather extreme idea of writing 240 days out of the year. that's like 4-5 days a week. But hey! It isn't wordcount! Although I still fucking decided I was going to try to write 300,000 words. just 300K. Not 350K. lol. I'm stupid.

Then at the beginning of 2022 I lost my content writing job - more like, they hired someone full-time and let all the contractors go without warning, yes, I'm still mad - and therefore lost one of the major impetus for me actually sitting down at the computer to write. Plus, I'd been counting work words as part of the yearly target -- which I think is fuckin fair when you write for a living, yeah?, so.

And then as I realized other work had also dried up and I was going to have to start major job hunting - and then the experience of that job hunting - there was a depression zone where I absolutely dried up on words. Like, nearly completely. Most of my WIPs just kind of hung in space, and I had to start an entirely new Good Omens fic (forth the fifth) to have anything going on, and THEN it was only a super-hyperfixation on Detroit: Become Human that really pulled me out of the wordslump and back into writing things. Getting back to the WIPs has been challenging.

And with my new job, there aren't wordcounts I can tally towards anything -- I'm writing and editing at the same time, and sometimes working on things like how the fuck do we cite this and a surprising amount of meetings, and the moral of this story is that I'm unlikely to make either my formal or informal GYWO target this year -- which again, I don't do it for the win, but boy howdy did I misjudge this year.

And what have I learnt about my writing process this year? Since that was the entire point of trying a new target and a new approach? Well, fuck, I'm not sure I've learnt anything, except that it's more fun to write when people are directly cheering you on, which isn't anything new. As of today I've written about 150K, and 135 days out of the year. I am 69 days behind where I should be and there are like. Idk. 70 days left in the year? So obviously I'm not gonna make it lol.

Anyway this has been a long ramble about things that are only important in my head, with no real conclusion. Clearly I am a professional! And I need to get back to actual work!

Stay tuned for NaNoWriMo, where I try to get my 3 FTH fics out in a month while still updating at least 3 WIPs! oh my god, why am i like this? I'm so stupid?

Talk to me about your 2022 writing (or creating in general, if you're a creator but not a writer!). How did you do. How dumb am I. It is a mystery!

a wild sev emerges from the depths of the ravine HI WHATS UP LETS TALK ABOUT NANOWRIMO, ORIGINAL FICTION, AND MY FUCKING SABBATICAL

( me yelling into space about my life )

Anyway, the IMPORTANT question is about NaNo projects. I've narrowed it down to 3, because I have to start somewhere. (none of them are lesbian werewolves in space, namely because while i have the characters and worldbuilding down, the plot needs some solid work i haven't done.) Let me know what you think of the following concepts -- you don't have to vote or anything, but if something sounds interesting, I'd love to hear it.

1. Young woman working as a non-magical analytical scientist suddenly and drastically discovers she has the specific magical ability of working a season's circle with a coven of four (spring summer autumn winter; she's autumn). The season's circle is when four witches work together to create a passageway between the [land of the fey] and the human's world, allowing an (1) powerful being to step through or back. This particular circle is attempting to summon a cool demon-type dude who is powerful enough to stop an entity called the Oak King, who's basically spreading dark magic through the land etc etc. The circle has been holding on to the magic with only 3 witches but they need the 4th to complete the rite. Unfortunately, Amber has no fucking clue how any of this works and basically gets stabbed with her power; Summer really hates her for some reason; she has to come to terms with Autumn being the season of death; and who the hell is going to finish her analytical work while she spends three months in a season's circle coma? Additional options include: background romance, Gay, lots of fun worldbuilding, urban fantasy type setting where this could be the real world just with some magic bullshit.

2. Sassy idiot lady born with the power to scry into the past uses her magic and tools to make a living exploring things for fussy customers who want answers. Lives in a rough edge of town, doubles at a bar for free food, manages to get by in the grey area between the brightness of the City and the darkness of the Void. One day a scry doesn't work, which has never happened in her career, and she starts finding out other magics are failing: the bar owner's beer went off, her father's healing magic didn't come when called, etc etc. She's eventually sought out by [the equivalent of a detective] to help [a City murder case] but drags him into finding out what's going on in their small town as recompense. Turns out the two are related, but she doesn't have any other magical powers and doesn't know how to fight off this [creature] that's slowly moving in on their City. Bisexual protag and this is definitely Not Our World. Additional options include: Karma Knights (when killing someone is right, they're the ones who do it), Wild Gay Fairy, this world could easily explode if i let it.

3. Young lady was born with a huge reservoir of magical energy but lacks the ability to channel it all. Having been abandoned/orphaned (not sure yet) she's now training with the dwarves to learn how to be a healer, figuring she may as well try it. Her (erstwhile; somewhat removed) cousin has the gift to heal the earth, and asks Enna to come on her pilgrimage across the Civil Lands and into the Nolands to try to heal the damage so that the land can be used [think: remnants of a nuclear apocalypse healed by elemental magic]. Cousin, her existing band of jolly protectors, and Enna set out across the absolute disaster of the journey, haunted by demons and Nightmares, often having to invent new ways to use their skills because nobody has faced this shit yet. One part FFX pilgrimage, one part Enna finding her own purpose, one part environmentalist rants in the form of a tiny girl.

Thoughts?

[edit] markdown y u always do this to me fuck ity

(Who wants to make me an “I’m not dead yet” icon) (Or some sweet Good Omens icons) (Or any MCU icons at all, I guess, I’m like 20 years behind on icons)

I LIVE.

Things are both exciting and not, and I’ve had some grand old panicking, and I’ve had a lot of sleep and alcohol, but today I’m here to talk about commissions.

I intend to open up a second round of commissions, all of which will go towards a new laptop and a mobile upgrade. I am finding my old laptop only barely adequate for (a) the work I’m currently doing (the screen is being a weird with spreadsheets etc) and (b) the other activities I’m picking up. For many things I can use my iPad Pro but it’s still a mobile device and I’ve found some definite cases where I need the actual power of a computer. Desktops no longer interest me, I’m a mobile person, so a laptop it is. I don’t need top of the line or SUPER gaming power (I’d like a little, yes, but I’ve also found I much prefer games on console when possible) but I do need something sleeker, quicker, and more stable than what I have, which has aged poorly.

But: I opened commissions in February, and here I am in July, still finishing them up. Is it stupid to open another round? probably I’m actually gonna say no, really, cause I learned a lot about what works for me and what doesn’t, and I’m hoping the next round of comms can be a lot more successful and efficient. So, in the hopes of people still being interested in a commission, here are some things I learned.

( “cutting )

I have a draft, right now, I’m working with to consider all of these things together. Thoughts from anyone, commissioners or not, totally welcome!

Basically I’m recognizing a point where I can offer commissions as something different than the other fanfic I will continue and write and post for free, tl;dr, i still need money lol.

Lessons learnt, though, lessons learnt, thinky thoughts, god where is my lottery ticket the eND

So I've been reading about stress management, and one of the things I've seen recommended a couple times is to keep a journal. I assume it's along the same lines as let it alllll out kind of thing, which often causes more problems for me than it solves -- much like the whole "talk to someone" thing; it doesn't work for me because while talking to someone about an issue may make me feel slightly better about that one issue, that gain is utterly and completely negated by the hassle involved in telling someone about my shit: background on the situation, background on me, background on my brain, what's bothering me, why it's bothering me, what I don't want to hear, what I meant because the first explanation of something is guaranteed to be shit; plus the neverending hassle of that person then, continually, and without fail, asking me, "so how is [issue]?" at a future date, which frustrates me so much that it literally undoes any small good I may have gained from the conversation in the first place: I don't talk to people because it doesn't help me, and that isn't because I think I'm some special snowflake and no one will understand my problems; it's because it quite literally on paper does not help me.

But! Despite the derail! Keeping a journal is supposed to be helpful, and luckily I already have a journal of sorts I use for this kind of thing, so here we go. I will probably be slow with replying to comments, because it's occasionally difficult to keep up with them via mobile, but please officially note that I read them and appreciate them.

SO today sucked. I could start off every day like that: Dear Diary, Today sucked nasty fermented goat balls. Gundam Wing was good today.

At one of the management trainings I was at recently, we went over some of those "life tips" they give you in classes like that. I've decided to give a trial run to one of them: do three things every day. It appealed to me: three things is enough that you're making progress, but not so much that you feel overwhelmed. Just pick three things and do them. I figured I would start with work: Three things every day. On busy days I can pick three easy ones; on days I have no meetings I can try for one longer one. But three things a day, of my own, off of my own to-do list. Should be manageable, right?

I can hear you laughing. Shut up.

Today I came in and the first thing I did was pick three things: Finish slides for a training I have to give Thursday; print out training sheets for about 5 outstanding MOCs; compile a brief incident review on the last month that I also have to give Thursday. None of these are quite extensive.

I worked on my slides for approximately 7 minutes throughout the course of the day.

I started alright, but of course I've been out of the office for a while, so once I'm back everyone has to come in: how was the baby (cute), how was babysitting (exhausting), how was the weekend (fuck off), let me tell you this thing I did (fuck off), this happened last week (kindly fuck off), I did this thing (unkindly fuck off), did you get my email about (fuck right off with a british accent), I left you a note but (go fuck a rhino) -- you get the picture.

Had a meeting at 9:00am. Blew the entire rest of the day. Something exploded in the middle of the meeting, when E just exploded at Golem and the whole thing devolved into this weird yelling-and-cussing bit where they both snapped at each other (using stronger language than I've ever heard from E in all my days there) and then E calmly told Golem to fuck off, stood up, and walked out.

Because E is my Starbucks-and-texting friend, and because Golem is my eidolon team friend, and because this project directly affects my department, not their shit, so if something gets fucked I get directly fucked, I then spent the rest of the morning attempting to fix this shit. I took E into an abandoned conference room, let her rant, listened to what she was saying, and made sure I was picking it up right. That of course got invaded by L and L's boss, which threatened to devolve into a general wank-n-whine about this stupid godforsaken software system at which point I said nope nope noooope this ain't my problem, kindly fuck off and left to talk to Golem, who I got calmed down right in time for my 10:30 meeting on Running Chemicals In The Pilot Plant That We Aren't Electrically Classified To Run: An Exercise In Horribly Stressful Operation, By Me (Introduction written by Fuck Previous Management In This Plant And Their Complete Lack Of Oversight And Shits To Give).

Ran out for Starbucks and a Wendy's salad at 12 with E. Spent more time resolving the fight after lunch, in addition to having to deal with the fact that one of our monomer feeds is having a grand old time self-polymerizing and plugging up everything it finds up to and including an entire process area (joy; cue trumpets), and went right into the meeting I was running from 2-2:30 on the results of the alarm management workshop I did when I was in Midgar -- meeting #3 of a 4-part series -- which just infuriated me because no one understands the goddamn ANSI atandard, like, not that nobody understands the language, nobody understands why we want to align ourselves with an industry standard????????????? and they all keep insisting that the old system will be able to handle it, which is like telling someone that Internet Explorer 5.0 will be able to do your web browsing for you.

So that whole meeting got me riled up and went way over - despite the presence of my boss Bahamut, who claimed he was only trying to help - and fed right into the 3:30 meeting which was on a project for improving finishing that I desperately want and have been begging for but at that point had like 0.27 fucks left to deal with.

4:30. Out of meeting. Caught twice on my way down the hall. Sit down. Write up the follow-up minutes/record from the 10:30 meeting and send them out. Write up follow-up notes from the conversations I've had regarding the 9:00am shitshow and send that out. 5:45pm. I can finally start my workday.

5:48pm one of my second shift operators shows up in my office. I had asked for him to come down, because I'm promoting two of them this year (because fuck they deserve it), so I gave him the papers and congratulated him and we chatted a bit about the year and everything and then it's 6:20pm so I decide I am just going to go home

--and Golem catches me with a question as I'm passing his office, the conversation devolves into work shit we actually have to take care of, and suddenly it's 7:15pm.

My normal work hours are 8:00am-4:30, 4:45-5:00 if I have a long lunch.

I was home and changed and making dinner by 8:00pm. Watched one episode of RPDR, drank a glass of wine, and that's it.

This is how days go in this job though. Out of the 3 things I wanted to accomplish today? Ha. And that doesn't even consider 3 things at home, as well. This is an average day in my job.

I'm so tired. I'm so, so, so tired.

[EDIT] THE WORST PART OF ALL OF THIS is that I look back and there's this sick satisfied part of me that knows I was super effective today and that I, personally, just being me, made shit better by dealing with this bullshit today, and so there's like this load of angry exhaustion and then this tiny little shit candle of fuck yeah and that, my friends, is what keeps me from walking out the door and never coming back

So today I got injections into the trigger points in my muscles. It sucked. I blacked out, nearly vomited, almost cried, and was shaky for probably ~two hours afterwards. Conclusion: Highly Uncool.

( medical details -- cut for the queasy or uninterested )

They hurt, but not like a ton - but enough that it sucked. They were also just the worst possible combination of pain, incredibly weird, and horrendously gross.

Of course I'll put up with them if they help - procedures get better once you know what to expect; also they can give me a Xanax - but uh, it pretty much sucked.

Since trigger points are very individual and can be highly affected by variations in body chemistry - and since we all know how shite my body chemistry is - there's no good way to predict when I'll know whether or not it worked. Within a week I should have a better idea.

I spent the day lying on the couch or in bed or otherwise moving as little as I could because my body just felt weird, wrong, and I didn't want to think about it. Today sucked. :/

and my first thought is, "Awesome! I'm done with that and now I can replay FFVI!" >.>

This should not be my reaction to beating the most recent FF game.

Final Fantasy XIII is an amazingly awesome game wrapped up in a thick gigantic blanket of garbage disaster bullshit. It's about 1/3 addictively enjoyable, and 2/3 horrible. This doesn't average out to make it an average game. It is simultaneously great and shite. This takes talent!! I actively loved parts of it and thoroughly loathed others. I feel very confused about it.

( more thoughts on the ending, that may include spoilers if you care )

Overall, I liked and disliked the game, like I said. I came to really enjoy parts of the battle system, eventually: I love Paradigms and the concept behind them, and it really did make battles strategic at a level I really enjoy and can get into. However, the thing about "if your party leader dies the entire battle is lost?" FULL FUCKING STOP, I HATE THAT, AND I DON'T CARE. IT'S UNFAIR AND STUPID. I don't care if you can "Retry" the battle. I don't care if you're supposed to know and be prepared. Fuck that. It's dumb.

I didn't really understand the story, and I'm not sure I like that I was 'supposed' to be keeping up with the Datalog - that's cheap storytelling, IMO. I loved some of the characters, especially by the end, but I couldn't care enough about the party as a whole to really get invested. And I couldn't keep track of so much of the rest of the cast -- seriously, when I fought Rosch I had to look up who he was and why I should care, and then during the final battle someone said, "Dysley?" and I actually yelled out loud, "DYSLEY? WHO IS DYSLEY?"

I'm not sure I'll make it back to doing the missions - even though the missions were one of the most enjoyable parts of the story since they were just fun smashing time with Fang, Sazh, and some other people - because I'm just not sure I'm invested enough.

But some parts of it were so awesome that I can't just say, like, "Don't play it" -- because it was actually pretty fun. In the middle.