English: David Letterman (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
This is so cute! David Letterman seems to think it’s pretty funny too. I just love the look on the dog’s face. He looks amazed when the audience clap.
Tag Archives: Arts
Seven Deadly Sins Of Self- Editing
Hieronymus Bosch – The Seven Deadly Sins (detail) – WGA2503 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Taken from Writer’s Digest 12th March 2013
We’re most likely to sin when we’re at our most vulnerable—and for creative writers, there may be no more vulnerable time than the delicate (and often excruciating) process of editing our own work. Sidestep these too-common traps, and keep your story’s soul pure.
by Janice Gable Bashman & Kathryn Craft
1. Greed
Many authors damn their efforts from the start with a premature focus on snagging a lucrative book deal. They submit to agents or self-publish before their work is truly ready. But building a career requires that you lay a strong foundation of only your best work—and nobody’s first draft is the best it can be. Careful editing is the mortar that holds the story bricks together.
Penance: Resist the temptation to convince yourself your first draft is “good enough.” If you find yourself rushing your editing process just to leap ahead to pursuing publication, look for deeper motivation to sustain you. Remember that the revision process doesn’t have to be any less enjoyable than the writing itself: You’ll be setting out to find the magic in each word, sentence, paragraph. You’ll be tapping your creative soul for ways to add tension to every page, to find clever solutions to tough story problems. Greed looks toward the uncertain rewards of tomorrow. The joys of writing are available to you today.
2. Lust
Just as dangerous as the temptation to call your first draft “finished” can be the tendency to jump into a revision right away. Words and ideas flood your mind; emotions pump through your heart. But that mad creative rush can become excessive, harming your ability to clearly assess your writing.
Penance: Step away from your current project as long as you can bear it—then wait an additional week. You’ll need that emotional distance before you revisit your work.
3. Gluttony
A great novel is like a gourmet meal. It must be prepared carefully, and to specification, with complementary flavors and courses.
Getting carried away and stuffing in all the good ideas and beautiful word pairings you’ve got in your pantry can lead to overindulgence.
Penance: Put your manuscript on a diet. Pare down or eliminate scenes that don’t further the story. Examine plot points, characters, description, dialogue and exposition, until you have precisely what you need to tell your story, and not a character or subplot more. Then apply this same philosophy to your work at the sentence level, killing your darlings and eliminating excessive adjectives and adverbs, along with verbose descriptions. Bring out the flavor of both your story and your style, but stop short of overseasoning.
4. Pride
Even in the current age of publishing, where aspiring authors can and must act as their own publicists and webmasters and take on myriad other roles, editing is one thing you can’t complete alone. As a form of communication, writing needs an audience. Thinking you don’t need feedback from others isn’t just pride—it’s pride that can squelch your potential.
Penance: Seek the help of beta readers, critique groups and editors. In return for the valuable feedback you receive, share your growing skills by critiquing the works of other participants in return. Then take your humble approach a step further and volunteer at writing conferences, libraries or literacy programs. Start a neighborhood book club, a regional networking group or a listserv for writers. Read widely and blog about it. The more you support the literary community, the more likely it will support you.
5. Sloth
The lazy scribe is one who’s failed to develop and utilize all her natural talents. To draft a story—and then stop there—is to ignore the very nature of literature, which constructs meaning through the deft layering of craft elements. If you find yourself bucking that notion, you may be guilty of sloth.
Penance: Just like with physical exercise, whipping your talent into shape takes time and dedication. You don’t jog once a year and end up with a perfect body. So it goes with your manuscript. To build the endurance skills you’ll need for marathon writing and revision, you must continuously train: Do writing prompts. Do writing exercises. Keep your writing muscles toned through daily practice, and when you review your previous work, your mistakes and weak sections will become more apparent, you’ll be more capable of dealing with them, and you’ll be far less likely to walk away.
6. Envy
Creative people are notoriously insecure. You may covet one published author’s self-confident voice, or another’s way with words. Maybe it’s his humor, or her emotional honesty. If you fear your work pales in comparison, remember that those authors didn’t strike it big by mimicking others or wallowing in jealousy.
Penance: With a friend or writing group, analyze your draft for what is uniquely you. Is it your voice? Your descriptions? Your quirky observations about the world around you? Edit your manuscript again, with an eye for drawing that element out on every page. Editors and agents don’t want another x, y or z. They want what you have that nobody else does. So don’t hold yourself to an impossible standard by trying to be one of your peers.
7. Wrath
The editing process can inspire uncontrolled feelings of rage in a writer. It’s difficult to discover or to hear from a trusted reader that you might not yet have fully developed your work—but it’s also an important step in growing your organic talent.
Penance: Wrath will only get in the way. Ignore feedback at your own peril: What angers us most holds a nugget of truth. Find it. Listen for the gifts within the criticism offered, and use them to help inspire new ideas. Your manuscript can only improve as a result.
Filed under DAILY THOUGHTS
More Awards
Thank you so much to , Dear Kitty Some Blog, http://dearkitty1.wordpress.com/ for nominating, A Daily Thought, for the Word Press Family Award! And also to 81dayswon’tlastforeverhttp://81dayswontlastforever.wordpress.com/- for nominating me for the Liebster Blog Award
Here is what the creator of the WordPress Family Award had to say about it:
“This is an award for everyone who is part of the “Word Press Family” I start this award on the basis that the Word Press family has taken me in, and showed me love and a caring side only Word Press can. The way people take a second to be nice, to answer a question and not make things a competition amazes me here. I know I have been given many awards, but I wanted to leave my own legacy on here by creating my own award, as many have done before. This represents “Family” we never meet, but are there for us as family. It is my honour to start this award”.
I do feel that Word Press has given me a new online “Family” and I am proud to nominate the following members of my family for this award:
1. Simple and Interesting -http://wordpress.com/#!/read/blog/id/35752189/
2. Ajaytao -http://wordpress.com/#!/read/blog/id/12607461/
3. Francine in retirement – http://wordpress.com/#!/read/blog/id/30481681/
4. Renard Moreau – http://wordpress.com/#!/read/blog/id/35409762/
5. Dedicated to the best – http://wordpress.com/#!/read/blog/id/42739109/
6. Coco Ginger – http://wordpress.com/#!/read/blog/id/31110176/
7. Stuff I Tell My Sister – http://wordpress.com/#!/read/blog/id/20094829/
8. Apronhead – http://wordpress.com/#!/read/blog/id/28157654/
9. Teacher as Transformer – http://wordpress.com/#!/read/blog/id/19930669/
10. Edward Hotspur – http://wordpress.com/#!/read/blog/id/24014872/
11. Burgessart – http://wordpress.com/#!/read/blog/id/36540315/
12. Positivewordsmagazine – http://wordpress.com/#!/read/blog/id/34259943/
13.boy with a hat – http://wordpress.com/#!/read/blog/id/34238443/
14.WaldoTomosky – http://wordpress.com/#!/read/blog/id/29829018/
15. Virginia Views – http://countryliving4beginners.wordpress.com/
16. A Grateful Man- http://wordpress.com/#!/read/blog/id/14869959/
Filed under DAILY THOUGHTS
David Attenborough
David Attenborough 1 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Every day we sit and moan about the rubbish being passed off as advertising, which the commercial channels would dearly like us to watch. Personally, I tape all my favourite shows and fast forward the commercials. It really gets up my nose that a high percentage of them are for junk food when more than half of the country is overweight. No wonder these poor people can’t lose weight, when they have food constantly brought to their attention. Speaking of advertising, I notice that although the stations can’t advertise cigarettes as such, have you noticed how many characters are now smoking in films, and television series etc. How sneaky is that? Alcohol is also advertised like that with characters drinking as part of the story. What sort of messages is that sending to young children? I don’t mind anyone having a drink or killing themselves with cigarettes that is their choice. What I do mind is influencing young children so they are predisposed to those behaviours. When we know the damage it is doing to society.
How refreshing would it be if more commercials were like this one? I am sure there would be no complaints forthcoming.
This really is Magic.. Enjoy 
Sir David Attenborough does it again!
http://www.youtube.com/embed/auSo1MyWf8g?rel=0 <http://www.youtube.com/embed/auSo1MyWf8g?rel=0 >
Filed under DAILY THOUGHTS
Japanese Ad – Worth Watching
This ad for Sapporo Beer is one of the most amazing and complex ads I think I have ever seen. It’s well worth a watch and shows quite a bit of Japanese culture. It’s very clever.
Filed under DAILY THOUGHTS
Building Bolero
Southbank Brisbane Qld Skyline at Night (Photo credit: Jason.Finch)
Queensland Symphony Orchestra Flash Mob Thanks to the A B C. Enjoy our very own Southbank experience with the orchestra and the public. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if they did this more often ? I think it’s important for orchestra’s to get out and about as a lot of people simply can’t afford to go to their concerts, and let’s face it, it’s the tax payers who are paying for it. I also think it makes our city more interesting not only for visitors but for the people who live here.
Filed under DAILY THOUGHTS
Magic Clerk
Jay Leno, host of the Tonight Show. Cropped from Flickr image. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Hmm! makes you wonder how gullible some people are doesn’t it?
This is entertaining…..enjoy!!!
Magic Clerk – Easter Edition:
Filed under DAILY THOUGHTS
Book Review: The Storyteller
I have just finished reading ‘The Storyteller‘ by Jodie Picoult.
As usual it is a wonderful book. I am always amazed by how Jodie puts two sides to every story, and then leaves you to ponder what you would do if you were placed in a similar, very difficult situation.
Jodie Picoult certainly knows how to tug at your heartstrings, and make you empathise with her characters. I don’t want to spoil the book for you by revealing too many details. However, it involves the Nazis and their concentration camps, and their inhumanity, and greed. The opposite of the protagonist, Sage Singer. Sage is a damaged woman , a loner, who bakes bread at night, and hides from the world. She befriends an old German man, a school teacher, who is idolised throughout the town. He reveals a terrible secret. Some scars are visible, some are not.
The book asks if murder can ever be forgiven, or evil ever justified. There are two parallel stories running throughout the book. One is a terrible metaphor for the other. A must read that is totally gripping and eventful.
Filed under DAILY THOUGHTS
4 Ways To Motivate Characters And Plot
Cover via Amazon
Taken from Writer’s Digest,March 19, 2013
4 Ways to Motivate Characters and Plot
Today’s guest newsletter is from Nancy Kress, author of Write Great Fiction: Characters, Emotion & Viewpoint.
Some of your characters will change during the course of your story-let’s call them changers. Others-stayers-will not change significantly in personality or outlook, but their motivations may nonetheless change as the story progresses from situation to situation. Both changers and stayers can have progressive motivations.
Confused? Don’t be; it’s simpler than it may seem. Characters come in four basic types:
- Characters who never change, neither in personality nor motivation. They are what they are, and they want what they want.
- Characters whose basic personality remains the same; they don’t grow or change during the story. But what they want changes as the story progresses (“progressive motivation”).
- Characters who change throughout the story, although their motivation does not.
- Characters who change throughout the story as their motivation also progresses.
When you know the key motivation(s) behind your character and plot, you can write scenes that not only make sense to you and your readers, but also add depth to your story. Because character and plot are intertwined, we’ll refer to the above four as character/plot patterns. Let’s further explore each one.
Static Personality, Static Motivation
Sometimes a character will have a single overriding motivation for the entire length of a story or novel, plus a strong personality that does not change much. James Bond is a good example. He’s a stayer who starts out resourceful, suave, unflappable and smart. At the end of each of Ian Fleming’s novels, Bond is still resourceful, suave, unflappable and smart.
Nor does his motivation change. At the start of the book he receives a mission, and his goal is to pursue this mission until it’s over, at which point the book ends. There may be interim temporary goals (not getting eaten by alligators, protecting the girl), but they are all part of the single overriding motivation. (Learn more about setting goals in The First 10 Pages: Science Fiction & Fantasy Boot Camp , which is three days of instruction and inspiration, and includes a critique of the first 10 pages of your novel.)
It isn’t only adventure fiction to which this applies. In John Steinbeck‘s classic Of Mice and Men, both protagonists, George and Lennie, retain the same motivation throughout. They want to earn enough to buy a small farm of their own. Their personalities, too, remain the same: George the planner and caretaker, Lennie the well-meaning bumbler who brings them both to tragedy.
If you are writing this type of book, your job is to present to us the character and the goal clearly and forcefully fairly early on. Then unfold your tale; we’ll know who your man is and why he’s doing what he’s doing. This leaves us (and you, the writer!) free to complicate other things besides the hero, such as the plot, the conspiracies or the hardware.
Filed under DAILY THOUGHTS
A Paperless Future?
5 Top Rated Tablet PCs (Photo credit: sidduz)
This short clip humorously highlights the fact that no digital tablet will ever replace the comfort of the paper.
Certainly not for me anyhow. My eyes get sore reading off a tablet but not when I am reading a book. Also you can’t smell and feel a tablet. Books all the way for this little black duck
http://www.flixxy.com/the-paperless-future-emma.htm#.UUFNFRzimBV
Filed under DAILY THOUGHTS
Come join us please subscribe to my blog
My Lovely Blogging Community
