All posts by Niamh

Cleveland-born, Purdue-trained, Detroit-toughened trans woman, engineer, and author. I like football and when Detroit wins stuff. I swear a lot, I write a lot, and I drink coffee a lot.
Writing

Hadyrland – Land of the Hunterfolk

Maidin mhaith, everyone

Yesterday I did no writing.

Yes, yes… shock and awe I’m sure.

I actually spent the entire day working on my map and doing some first reading for another author. The map, as it was on Friday, didn’t have any iconography – that is to say it was flat and didn’t have the neat little pictures of trees and mountains one expects from something like a map in a fantasy book.

But it did have features – colored features that helped me as an author understand the terrain I had designed. Mountains were brown. Deserts were yellow. Forests were a darkish green. &c &c &c.

The big problem is getting it to fit in a little, itty-bitty book. I am having a lot of trouble with that.

This new map, while wildly beautiful, is just as unfit for publishing as any of its predecessors. I need to keep working on this, but in the end the solution is clear to me: a tiny map with clear labels. That I can probably provide. So here is Hadyrland – with borders and  cities included.

Here is the full version.

Today I should be able to wrap up this whole map conundrum and move on. I’m still in a rut of writer’s block, so I’m trying to spend as much time not just starting at an unmoving word count as I can.

Not sure what needs to happen but if it keeps up I’ll probably do some gasp plotting before seeing if I cannot unstick myself.

Anyway, sláinte everyone. Enjoy your day.

Uncategorized

Immortality

Aside

This is going to be brief but in the last few minutes was reminded of a tale from the Paradox forums, where I am a moderator.

There was a popular user and fellow moderator who, when I was new to the staff, soon went silent. There were some parting remarks and the old guard exchanging niceties. And then they drifted away as the new guard came in to take over running the boards.

As always, there were promises to return and to share a pint when life’s troubles weren’t so bad.

A year or two ago I saw that he had some visitor messages posted, some dating back a few years more. People just asking how he was doing and when he’d be back to organize all those things he said he’d organize when he had time.

I had only checked his profile because a user had mentioned that they tried to PM him and it said his inbox was full, a no-no for staff. I asked the one or two old guard staff members left if they knew what was up.

“Yeah, he died back in 2007.”

“Oh,” I thought.

I wonder how many of those PMs in his inbox were internet friends dropping a line to see how he was, to see if he was coming back.

But you couldn’t tell from his profile. Some accomplishments, a few links to the forum rules. His location is “Out of exile.” There are a few visitor messages. The first, dated 2009 says, “Here’s hoping you’re in good healthl and life is treating you well XXX. :)” [sic]

 

If we ever get a new forum, would they transfer over his profile? Would it be automatic? Or would someone consciously make the decision whether or not to move him over?

 

And slowly, the internet collects ghosts. Not metaphysical ghosts. Real ghosts. The little pieces of ourselves we uploaded and then, inevitably, leave behind.

Writing

ɹ̝̠̊ɔməkal

1 Comment

So I’ve been conlanging again instead of writing. I have some plot ideas, but I haven’t really worked them out and I’m not 100% happy with the last chapter end. So I’m doing some thinking away from just words and just in the world at large.

I am much slower coming up with new stuff then I am editing and reapproving old pieces of text.

So one of the things I do to get into the heads of my characters is try to think and talk like they do. Since this is a second world (that is, one that I’ve entirely made up) they don’t speak English, they speak in their own language – Hadysh (in English) or “ɹ̝̠̊ɔməkal” in their own language.

To help with that mouthful it would be like (HRAW-muh-kahl) and one would speak “vit ɹ̝̠̊ɔməkal” or “vi ʌt ɹ̝̠̊ɔməkal” (“in Hadysh”). I should point out, “vit” and “ʌt” cause softening to the following word, but the phoneme “ɹ̝̠̊” cannot be softened. For example if you wanted to say “in language” as in the medium you are using is language you’d say: “vit çalag” from “vit” (by means of) and “kalag” (language). “Vit” itself is a contraction of “vi” and “ʌt” essentially meaning “in the composition of” and the “kal” at the end of “ɹ̝̠̊ɔməkal” is a shortened form of “kalag.”

So here are some sentences that I’ve worked on. Remember that all of this is in “perfect” speech. Someone speaking this would be considered robotic or speaking the language well, but lacking any regional dialect or native slurring/morphing of specific sounds.

 

We walk to the lake in the forest.

ʃɔnəma ɪ mjθiɹd vi mɑgət.

SHAW-num-mah ih myih-THEERD vee MA-gut 

 

Tomorrow we’re going to hunt in a forest.

xwændalə θɪbʊfað vi nɑgət

CH†WAHN-dahl-uh thih-BUHF-ahth vee NA-gut († like in “Loch Ness”)

 

Certain speakers depending on dialect would change these to more regional.

One aspect compared to English is the compression of the future tense “are going to hunt” to just “hunt” except in the future-tense.

This also highlights the difference between the inclusive and exclusive we. In the first sentence it is inclusive (meaning speaker and listener). The second is exclusive (meaning speaker and not listener). In English we use context, but it can lead to confusion. For example, “We are headed to the lake!” Inclusively I could be telling everyone in the car where I am driving them. Exclusively I could be telling a friend my plans for a date with Brigid (which he is not a part of).

I’ve also worked a bit on more of the mutations, adding and subtracting. The newest addition is the “strange” mutations, which occur in creating compound words. So that adds the third – and likely last – tier of mutations (softening, hardening, and strange).

There is only one good example so far, those who have had a chance to read my drafts so far will understand a bit more context but here is how one little bit works.

The word “to hunt” is “bʊf” and to make it a doer of the verb (-er in English) it’d become “bʊvəd” after you apply the hardening of “f” to “v”.

A specific group of people in my story are the hunterfolk, the word for “folk” or “people” is “tsiað.”

Generally word order in descriptions is backwards of English, so “hunterfolk” would be “folkhunter” so “tsiaðbʊvəd.”

But both “ð” and “b” are voiced and it can be sort of a pain to try to pronounce them both without also inserting a stop. So something has to give. Strange mutation dictates that “voiced+voiced” yields “voiced+m” so it becomes “tsiaðmʊfəd.”

It can get more complicated like how “tsiað” is the plural of “person” (so literally “persons” or “people”) but you cannot pluralize “tsiaðmʊfəd” because it is a collective noun.

So the tsiaðmʊvəd of ædʌɹɔməç are ɹ̝̠̊ɔməçi and speak ɹ̝̠̊ɔməkal among the tsiaðɹ̝̠̊ɔməç.

Simple, right? Sláinte, everyone.

Guest Post, Opinion, Soccer

Guest Post – How the Current American Soccer System COULD Implement Promotion and Relegation by Kirk

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How the Current American Soccer System COULD Implement Promotion and Relegation

If you’re an American and a fan of soccer, you probably know that soccer leagues in other countries have something that is hard to imagine ever coming into existence within any US sports league: a system of promotion and relegation that rewards the nation’s best Division 2 teams and punishes the worst Division 1 teams. Instead, we have a system that rewards the worst teams in Division 1 with the top choice of the best college athletes.

Major League Soccer (MLS) operates in a similar fashion. It’s essentially the same in that the worst teams in MLS get the best picks in the SuperDraft, but different in that some college players are already spoken for if they once spent time playing for an MLS team’s development academy. A fusion of traditional American sports systems and the soccer development systems of other nations.

If you follow me on Twitter, you might think that I dislike MLS, and for the most part that is incorrect. I like what the league has done to make American soccer what it is today. It’s been a home and/or launching point for many US Men’s National Team players and has potentially inspired many future American soccer players. Aside from that, I’m unsatisfied with the system that MLS operates in. One that isolates itself from other leagues and from any real competition, because MLS isn’t a league that coordinates competition for independently-owned clubs. It’s a corporation with 20 different franchises. Franchises that compete against each other for a trophy and bragging rights, but without any real winners or losers.

However, I’m a finance person and I understand that MLS ownership groups have made significant investments. Investments that I assume have projected costs and revenues over the course of many, many years that will at some point justify the tens-of-millions of dollars that have been paid out. In my mind, it would be wrong to significantly change the model of that investment, UNLESS the investors wanted it to change. But how could we make that happen?

Much like the aforementioned MLS SuperDraft, my proposal for US promotion and relegation is a fusion of American and foreign systems. What I propose is that the United States Soccer Federation (USSF) allow the North American Soccer League (NASL) to stop operating as a Division 2 league and start operating as a Division 1.5 league. A league in limbo that operates a system of promotion and relegation within itself. A league that is allowed to field 12 teams within Division 1 and its remaining teams in Division 2 (which would now be USL) while maintaining its current free-market principles. This would all begin in the year 2020, when we’re told that MLS will have 24 teams, a claim I have no reason to doubt based on their current trajectory. Presumably, 12 MLS teams will play in the Western Conference and 12 in the Eastern Conference, and each of those sides, as part of a single-entity structure, would be exempt from relegation. The NASL would then field 6 Western and 6 Eastern clubs to complement the MLS teams, forming two 18-team conferences. Each team would play a 34-game season, a number consistent with the current MLS season length. Each team’s season would be comprised of a home and an away match against each opponent within their respective conference. This would end inter-conference games with the exception of pre-season and playoff matches.

I don’t view this plan as the perfect end game, but a step in the right direction. And there are plenty of specifics that the USSF, MLS and NASL would still need to negotiate. Would the NASL’s free market teams be subject to any kind of Financial Fair Play rules? Would NASL teams be playoff-eligible? How many NASL teams would be relegated each year? Would any teams be relegated if, by chance, an MLS team finished at the bottom of the table? But here are the questions I’d like to take a shot at answering:

What might it look like?

Kirk_Table

Why would the USSF want this?

Better exposure in more markets: More top tier teams means increased exposure of soccer to the public in more major US markets. For the Fall 2014 season, an average of 5,619 people showed up to NASL matches.  How will that number grow when Kaka and Orlando City show up to play Fort Lauderdale Strikers, or Frank Lampard and NYCFC show up to play New York Cosmos?

Better player development: Not only should increased exposure drive more kids wanting to be professional soccer players, having more more professional clubs incentivizes those teams to locate talent within their community at an early age.

Why would MLS owners want this?

Lower costs: As a supporter of a Division 4 team, one thing that is well known is that for an entire team of players, coaches and staff to travel to an opponent is expensive. Not just financially expensive, but taxing on the individuals. With the top tier split into two single-table conferences, those costs will be reduced.

Higher ticket sales: The other benefit of having your opponents closer on average is that your club will sell more tickets to “away day” support. Fans of San Antonio, Fort Lauderdale, Indy Eleven and Cosmos are certain to bring the stadiums of their MLS neighbors closer to a sell out.

Why would MLS want this?

Derbies!!!: If there’s one thing we know for certain, it’s that MLS and TV networks LOVE derbies. NYRB+NYCFC+Cosmos= Big Apple Derby. Orlando+Miami+FTL(+Tampa)=Florida Derby. San Antonio+Dallas+Houston=Lone Star Derby.  These things write themselves.

Same number of televise-able games:  Television rights contracts would still be between networks and leagues. And the teams within those leagues would have broadcast rights for their home games. As the number of MLS home games wouldn’t change, the number of MLS games that could be televised would be the same under the 24 and 36-team models.

“Softball” teams: Theoretically, in the first seasons, NASL teams would not perform at the same level as MLS teams. I personally don’t the feel this way, but many do. As such, MLS teams would likely see NASL teams as easy wins that will help them stay in playoff contention.

Legitimacy: It’s apparent that MLS wants to maintain a European veneer. We see this in the naming of teams that include “FC” or “Dynamo”, team crests that look like they belong in the Bundesliga, and the signings of EPL superstars like Henry, Lampard, and Gerrard. Operating in an environment that promotes and relegates teams should be a part of this, despite the fact that MLS itself will still have…

Security: Because although MLS would operate in a pro/rel environment, its teams and owners would be protected, as would their investments.

Why would NASL want this?

More televise-able games: It’s inevitable that this would result in more NASL clubs being on TV. Whether that’s the result of a separate TV agreement with the NASL or just ESPN wanting to show NYCFC host Cosmos, or Chicago Fire host Indy Eleven.

More clubs: It’s also inevitable that more clubs will want to join the NASL if there is an avenue to being promoted to Division 1. This could be the handful of USL clubs that aren’t wholly-owned by MLS franchises, are those that are willing to shed their MLS affiliation. But it could also be NPSL and other amateur teams that have the financial backing, the fanbase, and the drive to be something bigger.

 

This was a guest post from Kirk, a DCFC Ultra and an all-around swell guy. You can follow him on twitter: @Kirk_NGS.

Oíche mhaith, bitches.

Opinion, Soccer

The Fuck is This?

What? The fuck? Is this?

Seriously. What the FUCK were the idiots running the Columbus Crew thinking? A women’s supporter scarf? They already have three fucking scarves now this fourth one… why? It’s a fucking supporter’s scarf! It doesn’t need fucking floral patterns and fucking bows to fucking appeal to women.

BECAUSE IT’S A FUCKING SUPPORTERS SCARF!

Woman are supporters, end of story. Perhaps I’m getting a little upset over nothing, but I never got the feeling that women felt outcast from soccer supporter-dom because we didn’t have enough pink shit with ribbons. I always got the feeling women avoided sports because we constantly subject them to cheerleaders and the social stigma that sports is a “men’s thing” and that they should just go back to the kitchen.

So why, in soccer of all things, would women need to be wooed with a disaster like this? Aren’t they there to support? Aren’t they there for the team? Aren’t they there because its fun?

I-

I just really don’t know what to think about this… but I’m going to just say this is the same mentality that leads to “pink” aisles and everything else that says women can have fun with the boys… so long as we constantly remind them and everyone around them that they are women and need different stuff.

Society – where it’s fourth grade forever.

Oíche mhaith, bastards.

Writing

The 9 to 5 and the 5 to 9

As of late, I’m increasingly beginning to refer to writing as my second job. It was inevitable, but when my coworkers are so interested in why I hold to such a strict schedule at work they deserve an answer – my second job is calling.

Anyone working with me will quickly learn that I’m a very regimented person. I like my life to be very orderly and I like to be in total control of my schedule. I don’t like changing plans and do everything in my power to arrive exactly when I say I will. I’m not perfect. I misjudge traffic too, and I know other people are far from perfect so I’ll never hold someone being late against them.

But I hold myself to it and it kills me to show up at 7:02 when I said I’d be there “by 7:00.”

It kills me to show up at the parking lot at work at 6:32 when I know damn well I should be pulling in around 6:28 to get into the office at 6:30.

That is how I work.

My life is wake up, drive to work, work, eat, work, drive home, make coffee, do my Irish lessons, write, eat, write, shower, TV, and then sleep.

Day in.

Day out.

I like this. It actually does a lot to keep me calm and collected. But it means that at this point my life consists of two jobs: Ford and Writing. I obviously treat Ford more seriously, but writing is also a serious endeavor for me. If I don’t take it seriously others certainly won’t either.

So I call writing a second job, a second career. Hopefully “real” work will understand. I don’t spend time at work writing, I don’t spend time at home engineering.

Basically my writing schedule has not lessened at all and it’s starting to consume more and more of my time. Generally I’m okay with this. Video games were not a terribly important part of my life and I was becoming increasingly bored with many games. Crusader Kings II and Europa Universalis IV are my two go-to games, but recently I start up and my thought is, I’d rather be writing.

So I write.

Because I’d rather be writing.

So I’m going to go write some more.

Gaming

Starbound Replay Review

1 Comment

If you’re not into PC gaming or have been under a rock lately, Starbound was a  pre-release game with a lot of promises and a whole lot not much else that recently got its first update in nearly a year. So I booted steam up for the first time in nearly two or three months and downloaded that baby to give it another shot. Here is my opinion.

Uuuuggggghhhhhhh.

This game has gone no where, there is just more of it lurking in the fucking background.

I have about 104 hours on record, the vast majority in the “beta” (read: alpha) and maybe about 2 hours in the “release” (read: beta). This game is really, really fucking boring. I mean completely dreary and pointless.

Oh but Nick, you’ve only gotten two hours in and you’re just running around collecti-

Just… just stop. I’m two hours into a new character and I’m FUCKING BORED. What more do you want? This is the part of the game that is supposed to be the most interesting. You know, the beginning, when they are supposed to get you hooked.

Your fucking multitool is slow as shit, the weapons seem impotent compared to monsters in the starting area, I’m lucky to have found a 50 dps weapon and it still sucks because the monsters do like 30 to 40 out of the gate and knowing the randomness of the beta, my sword is literally a sword of destiny, ne’er to be found again.

Combat is boring. Mining is boring and unvaried. Monsters have stupid drops. Everything is a fucking fetch quest. Find this, find that, mine this, rub these two things together. No. No I don’t want to sit around and fucking re-invent the wheel. Want to build a crafting table? 35 planks. Need 35 planks? Get 12 wood. Need 12 wood? Chop down two trees. Need to chop down two trees? Hover your mouse at their base for nearly thirty fucking seconds each.

It is tedious in its tediousness.

I’ve seen all sorts of “sweet” stuff to be eventually unlock, but if it is anything like the previous incarnation I don’t want to unlock it. I spent 100 hours adventuring from planet to planet with exactly zero interesting stuff happening. With zero progression. With zero anything. Bosses were stupid and easily broken by me, the least capable gamer ever. Monsters are easily destroyed by finding a similar “weapon of destiny” and just using that until you can find another, more powerful one.

I get that this is the sort of game that you get what you put into it, but everything is too rare and takes too damn fucking long to gather to be fun. And that’s what I’m here for: fun. And Starbound isn’t fun. It is a shovel to the face of mind-numbing stupidity. No sweeping vistas like Minecraft. No fast-paced growth and bosses like Terraria. No epic space battles like FTL.

Just digging a hole big enough to throw my life away into it. Cover it up and stick a gravestone over it.

Writing

Damsel in Distress

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Let’s court some controversy, eh?

This is an image on imgur, a place where free ideas are exchanged in that way that free ideas are exchanged on the internet in that it tends to be a gargantuan echo chamber full of people who like imgur.

I don’t mind imgur, it does make facebook really boring as my mum eventually shares George Takei’s page which is really just the best socially-conscience parts of imgur plus a few days. And I can’t fault anyone for that, don’t get me wrong I am not ragging on imgur, George Takei, my mother, or event these two tweets. Sorry for lying to you for your clicks. But they feed me.

What I do want to talk about is old tropes that are falling out of favor, why that might be, is that a good thing, and what if any of those tropes I have in my own writing.

First I want to expand the “damsel in distress” for the time being to the “noble in distress” as this was a very common tactic that anyone with a good knowledge of history can tell you. Kidnap and ransom have always been a huge part of how humans have fought one another. Hostages were often a part of peace negotiations and infamously while it was fine to cut down levy soldiers, you’d always want to leave the nobles alive – so that you could sell them back at a profit.

This plays out time and time again in history, for me most notably in Western Europe’s Hundred Year’s War and in Japan’s Sengoku Period. The thought was if you had a hostage, the hostage’s family would not harm you for fear that you’d first retaliate on their hostage. Other times hostages would leave with sympathies for kind captors and hopefully prevent future conflict. And of course, for the womenfolk, marriages were great ways of cementing alliances as well as building dynastic control.

These situations did not always end well and murder and “disappearances” were common. So to were attempts to recover said missing relatives for things such as “honor” and “glory” and “not liking the political disadvantages placed by having lost a hostage but also not wanting to just abandoned them because of honor and glory.”

Thus the existence of the “damsel in distress” trope is not surprising. It plays well to the the male wish-fulfillment that defined fantasy and genre for admittedly too long. Big strong lad, usually working alone, gets to rescue girl, maybe cop a feel, and be received as a hero having triumphed over evil. When broken down like that, when at its barest and driest, the damsel in distress trope moves into cliche and is rightfully something to deride.

Why does it have to be a male knight?

Why does it have to be a female in distress?

Why does romance have to be the result of rescue?

There are a lot of problems here but the problem doesn’t necessarily have to be feminist or sexual or anything like that. Often times the sexualization of damsels in distress isn’t intended but rather the by-product of lazy, half-assed, mindless writing.

I don’t get the feeling from Mario that it is sexualizing or attempting to downplay the role of women by the original having Peach trapped in the tower. It certainly looks that way in hindsight, but it is a product of its time. Mario would be backwards if made today, but you look at Mario today and just as often Peach is a main character. That is serious progress.

The downside is of course they stick to lame “rebuild the macguffin” cliche plots. Oh boy.

I am digressing, though.

The main issue with sticking to the “damsel in distress” trope is that too often people forget that the damsel is a character too, regardless if the damsel is infact even a damsel and not a… what is the male of a damsel?

Well… “damsel” is the feminine diminutive of dominus so… dom? Don? Fuck it. Let’s go with Don because “dom” has some… other… meanings.

So imagine the scenario of a person in distress. Too often they are essentially a cardboard cut-out who, with their little voice box taped to the back, coos and swoons for our gender-not specified main character.

And that’s really about it.

More recently, and this is where it gets tripe, there has been a movement that suggests that backstory = character. Legend of Zelda, Twilight Princess does this (in my opinion). Link has a significant other (not Zelda) and she is shown to have personality and backstory at the beginning. And then she gets kidnapped and ne’er more is it mentioned.

That’s just as bad! Honestly it is worse because it was like “I know this is wrong so if we throw some personality traits her way it is made okay, right? Then we can ignore her?” Its that whole cover-up is worse than the crime thing.

And for that series it is really all over the place. In Twilight the SO is interesting until she isn’t needed anymore, but at least Zelda and Midna are really strong female characters. And that is a huge plus (again to me). I’m not saying having a good character outweights a bad one, but having good important characters outweighs boring unimportant characters. Yeah, it sucks whats-her-face lost her personality to kidnapping, but in the end she was not an important character. So I guess it is okay?

I mean, think for a second if Midna was a shitty character. Then we start hitting some sour notes.

Actually, the more I think the less I want to do with talking about this game what with (thinks about Native American stereotypes shudders).

As I continue to ramble farther and farther down this trail, I should really cut to the crux of my problem and my point – the Damsel/Don in distress can be interesting – if the rescue isn’t the climax or if it is, the captured has gotten proper attention from the writer and reader.

I think the problem is the failure to create two sides of an otherwise interesting story. Interesting hero + boring villain + boring target character = cliche and boring story.  There has been some focus on sympathetic villains, which is good, but when we don’t see why the hero would rescue this person it sort of lends little weight to the story.

What if the hero doesn’t care about the target, but only the riches and fame? And not in that they’ll change their mind later way.

What if the target doesn’t like the hero? And not in that they’ll change their mind later way.

What if we take this rather dull story arc and relegate it to a subplot and  leave it there? What if we use it for characterization instead of climax? What if we…

Wait… Sam rescuing Frodo from the orcs.

There you fucking go. That is how you do the person in distress trope right.

Fucking eat your heart out.

Now I am not implying that I am the bestest writer evar. Or that my works are perfect, shining examples of it all done right, because they are not. There is a lot of saying and not doing here. That is essentially how a blog works.

In my own works I tend to use the common sense method. Or at least I think I do. My characters have gender, they aren’t like Ripley were you can essentially swap genders and still have them work beside the occasional remark. However I don’t go as far as Sam Sykes’ [highly sarcastic] remark to mention that the women are in fact women at least six times a page.

It exists. The characters exist within a society that has norms. It is a matter of fact, but that is where I draw the line. Just like I wouldn’t go on about most bodily functions (I mention urinating once and waste management once, both in “proper” ways I think), I don’t go on about a character’s gender unless it makes sense.

On of the main-est characters in Sun-King is Rozenn, who is a woman and a knight. She doesn’t completely fit in, but she isn’t rejected in her own society. There are reasons for that beyond it is a fantasy realm and the genders are equal and that is important to her character. She exists mostly within a man’s world. However I think I did a good job avoiding sexualizing beyond what a normal character would be like. She is flirty at times and reserved at others, just like any normal character or real-life human would be.

I mention her chest once and it was to characterize another character as a pig, so I think I can claim to be in the right there but perhaps someone will disagree.

But what about my male characters? Pretty much the same. I don’t on on about glistening muscles and big ol’ cocks. They exist within their societies as well and much in the same way. It is much harder to talk about how well I treat male characters because honestly our culture is much more used to male characters being treated well and female characters being defined more by what they are not than what they are.

Maybe I’m just shit at writing characters and that is what makes me so good at giving the genders equal attention and quality.

Anyway, for the most part I avoid the damsel in distress trope/cliche as much as I can because I didn’t have a chance where it actually came up in a way that wasn’t stupid. None of my characters are captured and held ransom – simple as that. It isn’t really an epic plot line, which is why Sam’s rescue of Frodo is so brief. One hero, one target, one locale, one arc. Done. Over.

Anyway. This is a long post and it doesn’t have any pictures so… um…

SMOKE BOMB

 

Oíche mhaith, motherfuckers.

Detroit City FC, Opinion, Soccer, Writing

Detroit City and a little Writer’s Postpartum Depression

This is probably going to be a bit more rambly than most posts on this site, but let’s go ahead and deal with it anyway. I have a few topics and I don’t think I can really make them stand-alone posts.

First – I’ve begun writing Book 2, which has already gone through a few working titles, but given that this is a total re-do we shall see what happens. Having previously written some 45,000-ish words in the previous version I already have a good sense of direction with this one. Hopefully I am not stuck too deep in the rails and I can move away from what I’ve got. Already two chapters have been condensed into what is now the prologue and the original prologue is actually the last chapter of Sun-King!

So yeah, that is off to a decent start but I had to say I’ve hit something I didn’t really expect – it really sucks to not be working on Sun-King anymore. Like really weird. Same characters, same settings, same general direction and it just feels like I am in some strange foreign land. If I had to guess I would assume I am suffering from the shock of having total control again. When editing and rewriting chunks of Sun-King I obviously had laid rail before and was generally following the plan if only soothing some corners out.

Now I have total control again and that is really “weird” to me. Maybe I just need a few days away from writing. Maybe I just need a few days back at the helm of creating rather than editing. Either way it was not something I expected and it has made today rather lethargic (among other things, not going there).

So that is where the postpartum comes into play. I really don’t like not working on it. Where is my baby? What is this blank sheet of a paper that I need to fill with brand new words? Fuck all this shit. Fuck it, I want to work on Sun-King some more.

But I can’t.

Or at least I shouldn’t. I need to move on. That is part of writing. Still. I miss it and I know in the back of my head another round of editing is still on the horizon.

O well. Moving on.

Soccer!

But Nick, the superbow-

Shut it.

Oh, so you’re watching the superb ow-

Shut it.

We’re talking soccer, because I care about soccer. I like gridrion. I care about soccer. It means stuff to me. Newcastle won. Celtic won. Kendal lost. And DCFC is moving forward.

Rumor has it that we are very close to running out of season ticket slots. It essentially implies we are on track to sell out every. single. game this summer. That is FUCKING AWESOME. If you disagree go fuck yourself. Little Detroit City, for whom I’ve had a place in my heart since day one.

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My friend Zak and I made those for our first game back in Season 1. I still have both and I just recently was talking with another fan and he mentioned a season 1 flag that was red with golden fleur de lis all over it. It was weird, strangely enough after the last few seasons, that this stood out. I’m really glad it did. It is a beautiful flag, it is too bad it isn’t mine (it is Zak’s even if I store it).

There is a lot going on. I can feel it. Then a few weeks the big news broke.

Check it out (25:30 in the cast).

The FO has been looking at moving up! This is great. I’m so glad to hear that and though I’m doing my damnedest to not get excited it is hard not to. Hard not to see it all paying off. Hard to not love what DCFC and the NGS have been able to put together from scratch. And from what I’ve heard Peter Wilt of the Indy Eleven is not a man who speaks lightly or rumormongers.

So fuck yes!

With tickets and the NASL in our sights, that leads to some speculation. Honestly my prediction is you won’t see DCFC on the field in the NASL until 2018 or 2020. We need a new stadium. We need major sponsors. We need major names. We need a lot of stuff, including potentially new owners who have the cash. That means a lot of growing pains and a lot of issues that might follow. The NGS might look good on paper but when so many FOs would rather have Sally DoGood and her three cum-sprites in the stands paying $10 for a hotdog with mustard each and Richy DoGood paying $12 for a can of Miller Lite; the NGS (and I’m going to quote Hot Time in Old Town):

THE NORTHERN GUARD IS WHERE FAMILY-FRIENDLY ENTERTAINMENT WENT SLUMMING AND GOT STOMPED BIKER-STYLE INTO INTENSIVE CARE

When one of your loudest mottos is “We’re ruining football and we don’t care” you aren’t a great target for rich, white suburbanites. Or at least that is what people thought until we sold out twice and nearly sold the entire allotment of season tickets three months before kick off.

The Northern Guard has a duty to stand between squatters and the club and ensure that despite ruining football, we don’t ruin DCFC as well. I don’t think that is really at risk. I can’t say with a straight face that DCFC is “less” because of the NGS. Less family friendly? Yes. Less TV friendly? Yes. But less? Less as a whole? Absolutely not. Absolutely not.

Tomorrow the season schedule should be out. There are some major mix-ups apparently. Then, Wednesday, we go to see Victory and grill the ownership at the Q&A. That will be mind-opening to say the least. Finally, Friday night, Midnight Madness as the NGS invades the try-outs.

This is a great week to be a DCFC fan.

Oíche mhaith, bitches.

Writing

Draft III is Done

I’ve wrapped up my line edits of draft III in a nearly 100-page spree of grammar and clunkiness now made more grammary and less clunky. The final word count was 117,974.

If you want to know how I feel it is mostly awesome but also sort of worn out, it was hard getting here the way I did but I am better for the journey.

I think the correct next steps is to get a good meal in me, maybe a stiff drink or two, write about some soccer perhaps? But most certainly, get to work on book 2.

Book 2 has to be top priority now that Sun-King is finished. It is being started over essentially from scratch as well and will hopefully help broaden the series to “epic” levels.

But for now, the big thing I’m facing is that I chose writing over eating this morning and afternoon. Now I am rather hungry. I should get to fixing that. I can really go for a hotdog.