finally, some thoughts about writing.

Step #1.  Go to the library.  Check.

Step #2.  Locate nook.  If occupied, locate next available nook (there are several to choose from, here).  Check.

Step #3.  Drink white chocolate/macadamia nut latte.  Double check.

Step #4.  Disconnect from the internet.  Um... no check.

Step #5.  Write with abandon.  For the first time in two weeks, check.

Step #6.  Have an interesting thought.  Take a break to blog about it.  Unfortunate check.

This is usually how it goes for me.  My brain gets so excited, thoughts start going out all over the place.  It's the opposite of how I focus on something.  I remember learning that women can concentrate on or notice multiple things at a time, like they have millions of antennae coming out of their brains.  On the other hand, men generally only concentrate on one thing at a time, like they just have one big tube on their forehead that sucks up the information right in front of them.  Well, if this is the defining quality of gender, then I am a very confused girl.  I have remarkably few detail-receptors gathering information from all around me.  I have the man-tube.  I am a horrible multi-tasker.  Reading more than one book at a time feels like a thrill ride.  I don't really know what's going on around me, especially if I am particularly absorbed in something else.

But writing today was different, somehow.  I mean, the man-tube (the more I type that, the more awkward it sounds) is definitely in action.  I can't STAND ambient noise, especially in the form of children.  I am either going to be a horrible mother one of these days, or realize how horrible I was before becoming one.  Probably both.  I usually can't stand to listen to music, either, though today I did.  I think I have two qualifications for that:  it must be instrumental only, and it must be relatively unfamiliar, lest I get annoyed.  Also (okay, three qualifications), if one song works, I have to play it over and over again until the mood changes, and then find another song.  If there's not a song that fits the mood of what I'm writing, I can't listen to anything.  Boy, am I picky.  In six months of drafting (has it been that long?), I've only listened to music about twice, so that proves it.  But it really worked today, so that was... sort of fun.  And really weird.

Who am I, all of a sudden?

And then I started thinking about things.  So, I have a completely unrelated question for all you writerly-types out there:  What the heck makes boys cry?  I mean, I was about in tears writing just now, and so it seemed super-natural (not to be confused with supernatural) for my character to cry, as well.  But... but... he's a boy, and boys don't cry, right?  Do boys cry?  Over being reunited with their family?  Is that something that would make a boy cry?  Wouldn't I get mad if I read this from someone else and the boy didn't cry?  Or would I get annoyed that he did?  [If you can't guess, I married a very non-emotional boy.  We make a bizarre pair.]  OH MY GOSH!  WHAT MAKES BOYS CRY?!?!

According to the majority of my Google-image findings,
the only boys who cry are under 12,
impoverished, or artistically rendered.
With one possible exception:

This came with the explanation, "Stock photo,"
meaning it was likely staged (thus, artistically rendered).
You can't even see his face.  Is this a real thing?
Or only an idea perpetuated by
 emotional women trying to write male characters?

Think back to high school, Julie.  What made boys cry then?  You had enough guy friends to see it happen.  Hmm.  Death?  Accepting Christ?  Yes, those things.

Anything else?

Someone help me before I turn this into more of a crisis than it is.

Step #7:  Publish post, get over the thought, and go back to previous writing.  Hopeful check.

a few more thoughts for today.

I wanted to post my adventures with donating blood last night but, you know, I was pretty tired from the whole thing.  Now I feel great!  A whole pint lighter.  :P

In other news, I took the plunge.  I posted something about myself on a classifieds ad for critique partners.  [Is that the plunge?  I'm not sure.  Maybe submitting work is the actual plunge.  We'll call this the baby plunge.]  Don't worry, it was on a blog I frequent and not just out in the middle of Internet Wasteland.  And, like the big, fearless girl that I am, I've contacted a few of the other writers.  It's been fun and scary and I don't think I've checked my email this compulsively since I was in college, stalking boys.

It's been such a blast learning that I'm not alone in what I like to read and write.  Isn't that a ridiculous thing to just now be learning?  It's not like I don't have real life writer friends (hello, real life writer friends!), but meeting new people who share interests and passions is just thrilling.  And anyway, all my real life writer friends are published poets, and a lot better than me.  :)

Another amazing thing that's happened is... I have new followers!  Whom I don't know in real life!  Hello, there!  Ooh, I feel so interesting.  

So, this is just a quick note to say, thanks for following.  And to my potential crit buddies, thanks for giving me a chance to get to know you.  This is so fun!  Now I only need to tear myself away from blogs and emails, so I can move ahead with writing and actually have something to show for myself.  Ha!

gregorific.

Adj.  Simultaneously awesome and depressing.

Maybe we should call it Suzannetastic, actually.  It would mean the same thing.

No, but really.  I loved these books.  It was both very like and very unlike reading The Hunger Games.  Similarities:  violence and adventure and anti-war themes.  Differences:  a more juvenile voice, more fantastical elements, and a boy's perspective rather than a girl's.

There is something I love about a boy's point of view, and I don't really know why.  I'm a girl, so you'd think it would be the other way around, but no.  Heck, my own current writing project is from a boy's perspective.  A good chunk of my favorite books are also male POV, now that I think about it.  Life of Pi, for one.  Also, Harry freaking Potter.  And, of course, Gregor.  But also White Cat and Looking For Alaska, both of which I read last month, and The Replacement, which I read back in the fall and then never wrote about, but probably should have because I really enjoyed it.  Let's see...  I think my favorite read of the past year is still Lips Touch, by Laini Taylor, and about a third of that (maybe more, depending on how you define POV) was told through male characters.  I don't know why I'm rambling about this, but it's funny to think about because even growing up, I always got along a little better with boys than I ever did with girls.  Maybe it's because I have a brother and no sisters.  Plus, with male main characters I can have crushes.  With female main characters, they have the crushes.  NotthatthismattersanymorebecauseIammarried.  Ahem.  [Also, this is not an absolute rule because I have both disliked male MCs, and adored male side characters told from female perspectives: examples:  Harry Potter: boo, get over yourself.  Peeta Mellark:  oh my gosh I think I married you.  It is time to move on to another topic.]

Anyway!  Also, like The Hunger Games, Gregor left me in a stupor.  A haze.  Because life sucks and then you die, but there are so many important things to learn from it along the way.  Like, quit killing each other!
[P.s. While typing "are so" just now, I accidentally forgot the space bar and ended up with the word "ares."  Ares!!!!  I want a pet bat.  Just so I could name him after the bats in the series.]

I meant for this to be more about Gregor and less about other things, but it doesn't seem to be working.  Here's something awesome, though:  The Gregor books were published annually from 2003 to 2007, and then The Hunger Games books picked up and were published in '08, '09, and '10, respectively.  Which is to say, Suzanne Collins is an absolute machine.  Is she publishing anything this year?  Goodness knows I will devour it and then be depressed by it, but still love it.