The end of BEDA

That's it, 30 consecutive days of blogging.

I'm glad that I participated in BEDA but daily blogging is not something I want to do long-term. I enjoy writing different kinds of things, not just blog posts, and making sure I posted here every day meant that some days, I didn't have time for something else I wanted to work on.

So I'm going back to my usual blogging schedule with one or two posts per week.

Thank you for reading!

Choose Your Own Adventure in digital space

Remember Choose Your Own Adventure books? They were interactive books written from a second-person point of view. You assumed the role of the main character and made decisions for them throughout the book. The story outcome changed and depended on the decisions you made. The books were popular in the 1980s and 1990s and you can still find them in bookstores.

I love those books because you could re-read them, make different decisions, and end up with a completely different story. That sort of interactivity could work in other mediums as well. Some YouTubers have made interactive videos in the style of Choose Your Own Adventure. YouTube works well for this because creators can set up the decisions as annotations. Choose option 1 if you want the characters to do this and option 2 if you want them to do that instead, and then the next video plays.

Netflix's run of Arrested Development is going to be somewhat in the spirit of Choose Your Own Adventure because the order in which you watch episodes won't matter. But we aren't going to be making decisions for Michael or anything like that (x).

I think Choose Your Own Adventure stories have great potential on a platform like Netflix. Each story would essentially be a mini-series with all of the episodes released on the same day (much like Netflix is doing with Arrested Development). The episodes would be written so that you can watch them in consecutive order, or you could jump around and experience a different story.

YouTube and Netflix have changed how we watch video content, but the format of TV shows hasn't changed that much in response to internet technology. There are opportunities for experimental, non-linear series. It's only a matter of creating them.

On planning stories

George R.R. Martin says there are two kinds of writers, architects and gardeners:

I've always said there are – to oversimplify it – two kinds of writers. There are architects and gardeners. The architects do blueprints before they drive the first nail, they design the entire house, where the pipes are running, and how many rooms there are going to be, how high the roof will be. But the gardeners just dig a hole and plant the seed and see what comes up. I think all writers are partly architects and partly gardeners, but they tend to one side or another, and I am definitely more of a gardener. (x)

When I'm writing fiction, I like knowing the basic elements beforehand and figuring out everything else in the process of writing. I'm an architect at the beginning but then I take the gardening approach.

I like seeing how other people organize their notes, and maybe you do too, so here are a few ways I have organized story notes.

In my head

When I first have an idea, I keep everything in my head. I've always had a good memory for stories, so it's easy for me to figure out characters, places, plot points, even structure—and keep it in my memory. This method lets me have my "notes" with me all the time and I can work on the story wherever and whenever (nice), but it's also possible I'll think of something and forget it before I fit it into the story information I already worked out (bummer).

Paper

When things get more detailed, I move to paper. I draw diagrams, flow charts, maps, and webs. I use a notebook for this method, so it's portable (nice), but I tend to take notes haphazardly so it can be difficult to search through my notes (bummer).

Evernote

I keep one digital notebook for a story with separate notes for characters, a rough outline, locations, and ideas. I can access Evernote from any internet connection and it's searchable (nice), but digital notes means that I don't see them all the time (bummer). They don't have a physical presence on my desk to remind me that I should be writing (instead of scrolling through Tumblr).

Index cards

Using index cards is a hybrid method of Evernote and physical paper. I just started using these for the story I'm working on. I have cards for characters (one on each card, adding details as I write them into the story), locations, and scenes. I use different colored cards to separate information (character cards are blue and scene cards are white). Hole-punching the cards and keeping them on a ring makes them portable. (So would wrapping a rubber band around the stack, but I like being able to turn through the cards.) I can rearrange the cards however I want, whenever I need to (nice), but card size is a limitation, so I might need a notebook in conjunction with index cards (bummer).

How do you like to organize notes?

Weekend Roundup - April 28

A different list this week: blogs and feeds that post creative writing prompts.

On Tumblr

FY Writing Prompts
I Dare You To Write
Odd Prompts
Photo Prompts
To Write Prompts
Writing Prompts That Don't Suck
Yeah Write!

On Blogger

Prompts for Writers
Easy Street Prompts

Lists

CreativeWritersPrompts.com
25 Creative Writing Prompts (Writing Forward)
Thirteen Writing Prompts (McSweeney's)
The Daily Prompt (Reddit)

Why doesn't Nick talk to Juliette?

After all the weird stuff that has happened to Juilette, I'm still surprised that Nick hasn't told her that he is a grimm.

Nick doesn't know about Juliette's hallucinations. From his point of view, Juliette is getting her memories back, but she is having a rough time. She asked him to leave her alone, which is fine, but the self-imposed isolation isn't helping her.

I like Juliette, but at this point, I'm waiting for a wesen to attack the house. She won't be able to respond because she won't know what's going on. Hopefully Nick will be there to save her because the way her character is, Juliette won't be able to protect herself.

Hank found about about wesen and is still a detective. He can better help Nick with research and fighting wesen. The writers should give Juliette the same chance.

Community: Switching bodies and teaming up

Spoilers for Season 4, episode 11, "Basic Human Anatomy."

I loved the Freaky Friday homage. Abed and Troy have always been paired off as best friends, even within the study group, but each character maintains his own identity. Troy is friendly, a movie fan, and sometimes slow on the uptake. Abed is obsessed with TV and movies, socially awkward, and usually the most insightful person in the group. When they switch bodies, they are obviously different people. The credit goes to Glover and Pudi for mimicking each other's mannerisms and speech patterns so well. You can tell that the person who looks like Abed is talking like Troy, and the person who looks like Troy is moving around like Abed.

Troy and Abed are the perfect choice for two character switching bodies, but the Freaky Friday trope made something else obvious: Annie and Shirley are basically the same character now.

Both are up for valedictorian, as we've been hearing in every episode. They team up against the rest of the group (in this episode, as the banner approvers), and they say the same things at the same time ("Awww, that you remember?" and "Sorry."). Shirley even tells Annie to use "we" and "us" because Annie uses first person pronouns when she actually means both Shirley and herself.

The writers keep lumping Annie and Shirely together, and it stagnates both women. Neither character can develop when they keep sharing roles and goals.

"Basic Human Anatomy" is a fun episode, but the interesting developments with Troy and Abed are diminished by the redundancy between Annie and Shirley.

I want movies loosely based on novels

The major problem with making a movie based on a novel is, most people expect the movie to be very close to the novel and it's difficult to do that because stories in books and stories on screen work differently.

You'll never be able to fit everything from a 300-page novel into a 2-hour movie. You have to cut scenes, maybe eliminate characters, and probably rework parts to make the story work for the movie.

I wish instead of seeing "based on ", we would see more movies "inspired by" novels. Instead of trying to recreate the book on screen, take the characters and some plot elements and run in a new direction. 

This is how the Bourne movies were made. I watched The Bourne Identity, liked it, and then read the book, expecting it to be similar to the movie but with more fleshed-out parts. But the book is so much more than the movie. More scenes, more locations, more challenges. The movie took the essential characters and one thread from the plot and that's what you watch on screen. You don't need to have read the book to understand the movie, and watching the movie does not spoil the book for you. They are separate but related, and each great stories in their own mediums.

Pilot Study: Touch

(x)

Touch - "Tales of the Red Thread" (50 minutes)
Original air date: January 25, 2012

Themes

Fate, destiny, patterns

Setting

Modern day, New York City (with scenes in other places around the world)

Opening 

Narration: voice over by a young boy (11 years old)
- Fibonacci sequence
- Golden ratio: 1.618
- red thread of fate in Chinese legend

Characters

Martin Bohm

- baggage handler at JFK airport
- scared of heights
- former report
- Jake's dad
- wife, Sarah, was a stock broker in World Trade Center and died on 9/11

Jake

- Martin's son
- autistic and mute
- math genius—uses numbers to find connections between people and make predictions
- likes orange soda, popcorn, and taking apart cell phones

Clea Hopkins

- child services representative
- evaluating the home life of Jake because he keeps getting in trouble at school (going off on his own and climbing cell towers) and Martin's succession of low-wage jobs can't provide the resources Jake might need

Simon Plimpton

- from London
- sells restaurant supplies around the world
- lost his phone at the Heathrow airport (London), and wants it back because it's the only place he has photos of his daughter, Lily, who died the previous year.

Red threads

Globe-hopping telephone

- belongs to Simon Plimpton from London

• London: Heathrow airport. Simon lost his phone.
• New York City: JFK airport. Martin finds phone and answers when it rings, but he gets interrupted by a call on his own phone from Jake's school. Martin leaves Simon's phone on the luggage carousel.
• Ireland: Niles uses the phone to record singer Kayla Graham. Then he stashes phone in a business man's luggage.
• Tokyo: A girl finds the phone, watches Kayla's video, and starts a fan club. She arranges to have the phone's photos and videos uploaded on screens around the city. Then she passes the phone on to a man traveling to Kuwait.
• Kuwait. (We don't know what happened to the phone, but it ends up in Iraq.)
• Iraq: phone become countdown for a bomb strapped to the boy who needs an over for his mother's bakery

The phone is a red thread connecting Simon Plimpton (the restaurant supplier) to the boy in Iraq (whose mother needs an oven). Bonus: Simon is in Tokyo when the phone's contents go up on the big screens, so he sees the photos of his daughter.

Winning lottery ticket 

- belongs to Randy, the firefighter who tried to save Sarah. The numbers are the details of when and where he found her. He isn't sure that Sarah was dead when he left her during the 9/11 attack, so he played the same lottery number every day and decided if he would win, he would give the money to her family.

• Jake takes the ticket after Randy buys it, copies down the numbers, and then gives it back to Randy.
• Randy tells Martin that Jake should be kept in a cage. Randy punches Martin in the stomach and leaves.
• Martin realizes that Jake's numbers mean something is going to happen at Grand Central Station. He goes there, sees Randy, and they get into a fight.
• Randy misses his train because of the fight. On his way back to his New York apartment, he sees the overturned school bus and rescues the kids on it.

The winning lottery ticket is a red thread connecting Randy (who wants to make up for leaving Sarah behind) to Sarah's family (who need money because Martin's job does not pay enough). Bonus: Jake's predictions set up Randy to be in the right place at the right time to see the overturned school bus. Randy couldn't save Sarah, but he has the opportunity to save a group of kids.

318

- school bus number (and date it overturns)
- fire department badge at Sarah's grave
- alarm clock on Martin's computer
- address of Teller Institute (who knows about children who find mathematical patterns in everything)
- security footage time on each instance that Jake gets caught at school
- Lily died on March 18, the previous year

Grimm moves to Tuesday nights

NBC announced that it canceled Ready to Love, and Grimm is moving to fill its slot on Tuesdays at 10 p.m.

Up to now, Grimm has been airing on Friday nights, also known as the "death slot." So on the one hand, it's a good sign that NBC thinks Grimm will do well in a more competitive, prime time slot.

But on the other hand, Grimm is doing well on Friday nights, and this change asks the audience to follow the show to a new night and time.

I watch Grimm on Hulu (and hardly ever on TV, the night it airs), so this change won't affect me. I wonder how large Grimm's online audience is, and if networks take that into consideration when they re-assign TV time slots.

When a chain feels local

More and more, I notice that my local Barnes and Noble cafe feels like a locally-owned cafe, even though it's a chain retailer serving coffee and food from chain vendors (Starbucks and Cheesecake Factory).

I spent a couple hours there today, reading and writing, and I ended up people watching and eavesdropping a little too. This is what I saw:

• three people planning a community event
• a group of native and non-native Spanish speakers who meet up every week to speak Spanish (maintaining cultural ties for the native speakers and providing practice for the non-native speakers)
• two young women chatting and catching up with each other
• two middle-aged men playing chess
• an elderly couple reading magazines
• the usual scattering of solo people (including me), writing, reading, or typing

There are plenty of tables, open space, good lighting, and what I think is optimal background noise (quiet and scattered enough that it's not distracting, but loud enough to make the atmosphere feel vibrant), and there's a community-centered feeling about the place (instead of cookie cutter chain).

Usually I'm an advocate of shopping and eating at locally-owned places, but the closest locally-owned cafe to me has limited seating and I would feel bad ordering only coffee and taking up a table for two hours. Instead, that local cafe is my spot for getting coffee to go or going out to lunch with a friend and Barnes and Noble is my spot for sitting down and working.

Weekend Roundup - April 21

Articles I read this week. Sources in parenthesis. Comments from me.

Why I'm Trading a House and Salary for a Motorcycle and Map (Thought Catalog)

How the Boston Marathon tragedy revealed the best side of social media (io9)

Why You Should Go To That Interview (Even If You Don't Want To) (Daily Muse) - The second point is about going so that you can practice your interview skills. That's the best reason for me to go to an interview when I'm not that excited about the position. Last year, I interviewed at a marketing firm and halfway through, I realized I didn't want the position. But I asked great questions and finished the interview on a strong point. It's easily the best interview I've ever had, and that experience has helped me prepare for other interviews.

Why Medium Might Be Large (Chris Brogan) - An overview of a new(ish) content publishing platform.

10 Tutorials to Make Your Own Unique Notebooks (Apartment Therapy)

Blogging pet peeves

A list of things that people do (or don't do) on their blogs that bug me.

1. No search box

Search boxes are useful for 1) finding posts on a specific topic and 2) finding a post you already read. But if you don't have a search box on your blog, I'm forced to try to find what I'm looking for through the archive (if you have one available) or tags (which may or may not be helpful).

2. Pop-up subscription box

When I click on a blog post, I want to read the post first. I don't want a pop-up getting in my way. If I want to subscribe to your RSS feed or newsletter or check out your free e-book, I'll find the information for that on your site. Don't get in the way of me reading your content in the first place.

3. No dates on posts

Depending on the content of your blog, knowing the date that you posted is essential. If you review technology or online services, chances are those things change often and quickly. A two-year old post about Spotify might not be relevant anymore, so I need to know when it was posted.

4. Irrelevant or unnecessary images

Somewhere along the way, we were encouraged to include at least one image in every single blog post. Images draw people in. They're more attractive than a block of text. That's true for relevant images that add value to your content. But if you're combing stock photography for an image to stick in your post, I'd rather not see it. Skip the fluff and post good content. If I'm interested in the topic, I'll read, regardless of if you included an image.

5. Small, thin font

Blogs tend to be text-heavy, and the design should complement the content. Choose font and spacing that make your content easy to read.

6. Low contrast between background color and font color

This goes with #5. Your text should be easy to read. If I'm struggling to read light gray text on a white background, I won't spend much time on your blog.

7. Multiple pages for one post

I don't see a need to post one article over multiple pages, except for people who focus on page-clicks as an indicator of a successful site. Photo slideshows are one thing, but don't make me click through 10 pages to see "10 tips for your job search." I've found dozens of interesting-sounding articles and then never read them because the site was set up to make me click through several times before I could read one article.

Pilot Study: Teen Wolf

I noticed that the storytelling and degree of detail varies in pilot episodes of shows, so informally, I've been watching pilot episodes and keeping track of everything we find out in that episode. (Sometimes I also watch and take notes on episode 2 to see what the pilot episode set up and how it's resolved.) These "Pilot Study" posts come from my notes.

Teen Wolf on MTV.com

Teen Wolf - "Wolf Moon" (41 minutes)
Original air date: June 5, 2011

Setting

Modern day, Beacon Hills, CA

Opening

Woods - police cars, policemen with flashlights and dogs, Sheriff
House - music playing, teenage boy (Scott) fixing a lacrosse stick, doing pull-ups, brushing teeth. He hears a noise, grabs a baseball bat, and goes out on the porch. Scott's friend, Stiles, startles him and tells him he heard there's half a dead body in the woods. They go looking for it. The sheriff, Stiles's dad, finds him and walks him back to his car. Scott walks through the woods, finds the dead woman, and gets attacked by a wolf.

Characters

Scott McCall

Main character. After the wolf bite, his asthma goes away, he has better reflexes and agility, and enhanced senses. Love interest: Allison.

Stiles

Scott's best friend. Researches lycanthropy and werewolves after Scott's attack.  Love interest: Lydia.

Allison Argent

New girl in town. Her dad is one of the hunters in the woods that find Derek and Scott.

Lydia Martin

Popular girl, dates Jackson.

Jackson

Popular, rich, jock (captain of the lacrosse team), dates Lydia.

Derek Hale

Werewolf. A few years older than Scott. His family died in a fire ten years ago.

Sheriff Stilinski

Stiles's dad

Scott's mom

Allison's dad

One of the hunters in the woods

Lacrosse coach

Plot

• A werewolf in the woods bites Scott. The wound heals quickly and afterward, Scott has enhanced senses (hearing Allison's heartbeat, smelling the gum in Stiles's pocket), strength (shoving Stiles against the wall), agility, and speed (scoring goals at lacrosse practice).
  
• Police are investigating what happened to the woman's body they found in the woods. Tests revealed that the hair samples on the body are from a wolf. (But there haven't been any wolves in California for decades.)
  
• Scott and Stiles see Derek in the woods, after Derek hasn't been in town for a few years.
  
• Allison accidentally hits a dog with her car and takes it to the veterinary clinic where Scott works. The dog calms down when Scott touches it, and he makes a splint for its broken leg. He asks Allison to go with him to a party on Friday night…
  
• …but Friday night is the full moon. Derek is hanging around in the background of the party, watching Scott. Scott feels sick and goes home. He transforms into a werewolf. Stiles tells him that Allison left the party with Derek, and Scott takes off, believing that Allison is in danger. Stiles goes to Allison's house and sees she's there and safe. Scott finds Derek in the woods. Hunters find them too, and one shoots an arrow into Scott's arm. Derek saves Scott, and Stiles drives Scott back home. The next day, Allison's dad picks Allison up from school, and Scott sees that her dad is one of the hunters from the night before.

Nice touches

• In Scott's English class, they're reading Kafka's Metamorphosis, which connects to Scott's transformation intoto a werewolf.
• Scott's mom says she doesn't want to end up on a reality TV show with a pregnant teen (something like 16 and Pregnant…which airs on MTV, the same network at Teen Wolf).

Amy Pond in Pompeii

If you've been watching Doctor Who for a few years, you probably remember that Karen Gillan guest-starred in a series four episode, "The Fires of Pompeii," as a soothsayer. Here is a screenshot of her from the episode:

Years later when Gillan was cast as Amy Pond, I thought it would be neat if her story finished in Pompeii. Like River, we would see Amy's death before we knew the character was part of the Doctor's future.

Imagine my excitement last year when I heard that the final episode with Amy and Rory would have Weeping Angels in it. It made sense—the Angels would send the Ponds back in time and feed off their energy. We already saw Rory as a Roman and Pompeii isn't far off. The Angels do send the Ponds back in time, but to 1930s New York, not ancient Italy.

Yesterday I re-watched "The Fires of Pompeii" to check on the plausibility of Amy ending up as a soothsayer in Pompeii. It might have gone like this:

• The Weeping Angels send Rory back in time to ancient Rome, after seeing his memories of being a Roman soldier.
• When Amy lets the Angel touch her, it sends her to the same time as Rory, but not the same place. Amy ends up in Pompeii.
• A side effect of being sent back, a head injury, or the fumes from the hot springs mess with Amy's mind. She doesn't remember her life in the 21st Century and she barely remembers traveling with the Doctor.
• When the soothsayers find her, Amy talks about a blue box and they realize she knows about the blue box in their prophecies. The sisters decide Amy has the gift of prophecy and they take her in.
• Amy never met Ten or Donna, so she does not recognize them when she follows them in Pompeii. She doesn't make the connection between the TARDIS and the man who steps out of it.
• Ten wouldn't know that Amy is his companion in the future, so he has no reason to care about her. Amy dies in the volcanic eruption, and we have definite closure to her story that fits with the show's canon.
• We could assume that Rory lives as a Roman soldier. Maybe his memories are scrambled or forgotten too, or maybe he is the "boy who waited" once more.

 I think this would have worked better than what actually happened to Amy and Rory.

Rise of the Brave Tangled Dragons

Last week I watched Rise of the Guardians and afterwards, I went through the tag on Tumblr and I found out about The Big Four—a mega-crossover with Rise of the Guardians, How to Train Your Dragon, Brave, and Tangled. Combine the titles and you get "Rise of the Brave Tangled Dragons." There are entire blogs about this combination of characters and worlds, including this one.

People are writing fanfic, making videos, drawing fanart, and cosplaying. This is my favorite kind of fandom, when people take elements from things they like and re-combine them into something greater, something we won't see from the original creators.

Here are some of my favorite works about the Big Four:

princekido | Deviant Art

jiidesu | tumblr

The Man From Earth stays in one room

One of my favorite things about Netflix is, it predicts how much you'll like a movie based on what other movies you have watched and rated. Yesterday I was looking for something to watch and I looked at what's in my instant queue. The Man From Earth was sitting there with five red stars next to the title.

Netflix's prediction was right—I loved it.

(Spoilers ahead.)

Quick summary of the plot

Professor John Oldman surprises his friends and colleagues by his unexpected decision to leave the university and move away. They come over to his house for a last-minute goodbye party and he reveals to them that he's actually 14,000 years old. He stopped aging at about age 35 and he moves every 10 years or so, when people start to notice that he's not getting older. He's lived through major shifts in civilization, wars, and plagues. The entire movie is the conversation he has with his friends. He explains parts of his life, they ask him questions, and they try to figure out if he's telling the truth or making it all up.

This is why I loved it:

1. Bottle movie

The whole movie takes place in John's house, mostly in his living room. The simplicity makes me pay attention to the characters more, and staying in one room for an hour and a half means the dialogue and the characters are doing all the work. No room for fancy cuts, car chases, explosions, or special effects. You have to focus on the people, much like what happens in 12 Angry Men and bottle episodes on TV.

2. Scholarly discussion 

All the people in the room are professors (and one student). They cover history, archeology, anthropology, biology, religion, and psychology. The conversation reflects their academic interests, and the scenes play out like an intellecutual game. They're playing with an idea: if someone were to live for 14,000 years, what would that person be like? Each person in the room asks questions and weighs in from his or her academic viewpoint.

3. Mind game

The characters waver back and forth in believing John. John can answer all their questions with thoughtful, detailed answers, but he can't offer any proof besides his words. Some points of their conversation go to far for some of the characters while other characters want to hear even more about John's life. It isn't so much a mind game between the audience and the movie because we're just sitting in on the conversation. We can't participate. But we watch the characters figure out where they stand and what they believe.

I recommend watching The Man From Earth if you like movies with good discussion. It's technically a sci-fi film, but it plays out more like a psychological mystery. You spend the time watching a group of smart people play with an interesting idea.

Pilot Study: Alphas

I noticed that the storytelling and degree of detail varies in pilot episodes of shows, so informally, I've been watching pilot episodes and keeping track of everything we find out in that episode. (Sometimes I also watch and take notes on episode 2 to see what the pilot episode set up and how it's resolved.) These "Pilot Study" posts come from my notes.

Alphas on Amazon Instant Video

Alphas - Pilot (82 minutes)
Original air date: July 11, 2011

Setting

Modern day, New York City

Format

A case every week with a dose of character development

Characters 

Cameron Hicks

Archetype: loner, bad boy vibe, the unwilling hero
Ability: hyper-kinesis, increased sense of balance and hand-eye coordination
Limitation: Buckles under pressure (or does he?)
How we see his ability (camera work or sound editing): no cues for us, just watch him do amazing feats

Gary

Archetype: social outcast, little brother vibe 
Ability: transduction, can see electro-magnetic waves (tech in the air)
Limitation: Underdeveloped social skills, Asperger's Syndrome
How we see his ability: wavelengths as lines floating/running through the air; colorful, translucent tubes; he uses his hands to move info and zoom in; uses grids in real space to organize data (whiteboard, chessboard), or works freely in the air

Bill

Archetype: all business, bossy
Ability: super-strength when fight or flight response is triggered
Limitation: Major headache afterwards, anger issues
How we see his ability: veins in his arm tense, images of synapses firing, forehead sweats, panting for breath

Rachel

Archetype: smart but quiet
Ability: "synesthesia" - she can enhance one sense by muting another one (e.g. enhanced sight --> temporarily deaf)
Limitation: Low confidence, self-esteem issues, except when she's using her ability to help people
How we see her ability: objects glow or give off smoke, her vision zooms in, we hear sounds from her perspective

Nina

Archetype: attractive woman who gets what she wants (but she's emotionally/psychologically damaged)
Ability: can persuade people to do whatever she wants, temporary brainwashing
Limitation: Doesn't work on everyone, seems like she's paying penance for past mistakes
How we see her ability: person focuses on her and everything else fades; voice sounds hollow and echoes

Dr. Lee Rosen

Archetype: guide/comforter
Leader of the Alphas, psychologist/neurologist, bit of a health freak
Does he have a special ability?

Don

Government agent, liaison between Alphas and government
No special ability

Questions

How did the Alphas develop? (Evolution or something else?)
How did the group get together?

Weekend Roundup - April 14

Articles I read this week. Sources in parentheses. Comments from me.

How to Write an Article in 20 Minutes (Copyblogger) - Tips on how to quickly write quality posts. I like #7 the best —"Never save a good idea."

Do You Make These 7 Mistakes When You Write? (Copyblogger) - I mess up with "e.g." = "for example." My problem is, I pull from Spanish and write "e.j." (for "ejemplo").

Stop calling us 'PR practitioners' (PR Daily) -  The article says that "practitioner" is "a serious-sounding word that is supposed to add credibility to the profession." I don't think it sounds serious, though, because I associate "practitioner" with witchcraft and magic. "PR practitioner," then, sounds like a role you cannot legitimize. Magic isn't real, so what are these people doing at work every day?

What Writers Can Learn From Rockstars (The Review Review) - The analogy to aspiring musicians is great.

Words for people with magic

In books, movies, and TV shows, we use different words to describe people with magic. Sometimes the words specify gender or if the person uses magic for good or evil. But the terms and their meanings are not consistent across different stories and fantasy worlds. I wanted to compare the dictionary definitions of witch, wizard, sorcerer/sorceress, and warlock to how they are used in a few fantasy worlds that I am familiar with.

Most common dictionary definitions:
witch - A woman claiming or popularly believed to possess magical powers and practice sorcery.
wizard - One who practices magic; a sorcerer or magician.
sorcerer - One who practices sorcery; a wizard.
sorceress - A woman who practices sorcery.
sorcery - Use of supernatural power over others through the assistance of spirits; witchcraft.
warlock - A male witch, sorcerer, wizard, or demon.

How these terms are used in fiction

Merlin

In Merlin, the dragon Kilgharrah calls Merlin "young warlock." Warlocks can sometimes be associated with dark power (see "demon" in the definition above), but the dragon never seems to think that Merlin might use his power for evil purposes. In Merlin's world, then, "warlock" is synonymous with wizard or sorcerer (x). The prophecies call Merlin a "sorcerer," and that is the general term used in the series for anyone who practices magic.

The Dresden Files

"Wizard" refers to a man or a woman with a substantial amount of magical talent. Sometimes "dark wizard" will be used for someone who uses magic for evil purposes. "Warlock" is the term for anyone who breaks any of the Seven Laws of Magic (x).

Harry Potter

"Witch" refers to a female and "wizard" refers to a male. In the Harry Potter series, "witch" and "wizard" do not carry with them a certain expectation of power or experience. Twelve year-olds studying at Hogwarts are witches and wizards and adults who work for the Ministry of Magic are witches and wizards too. "Warlock" usually denotes a person with high skill or achievement (x).

A Modern Witch

In this novel by Debora Geary, "Witch" refers to a male or female with any level of talent. No mention of any other terms for people with magical talent.

I like that writers use already-existing words for characters with magical talent, but at the same time, it can be confusing that these words do not have universal meanings. There's another way of looking at this though: molding these terms to their specific worlds means that writers can form their own structures for how magical talent is defined in their stories.

The opening credits of Community (and puppet disappointment)

Sometimes TV shows change their opening credits after a few seasons or when there's a major shift in the direction of the show. I thought Community might have changed its credits this year since Dan Harmon is no longer the showrunner. But no, the credits are the same and at the end we see this:

Dan Harmon's name etched onto a desk. In the real world, that etching would be a permanent thing but since Dan Harmon is no longer working on Community, we just have a weekly reminder that he made this incredible show that doesn't know how to be incredible anymore.

I've been trying to stay positive this season. I loved last week's episode, but "Intro to Felt Surrogacy" felt messy.

(Spoilers ahead.)

The puppets were a cool idea but the episode didn't have a good story to go along with the change in format. Each character shared a "dark" secret, but that was it. There were good moments but overall, this episode felt like fluff. I didn't expect that because 1) Community has fewer episodes this year so why would they waste any of their time with filler? and 2) Past Big Episodes have had excellent stories to go with them (paintball and "Abed's Uncontrollable Christmas," for example).

I didn't hate the episode, but I didn't like it either. Community is still better than most of television, but it doesn't compare to what it used to be. I'm not sure if that's because Harmon isn't there anymore or if it's simply the show aging and transitioning.