A brief follow up to my recent post on moderating.
After posting it I had a few people who read my site reached out and thanked me, which I always appreciate that.
But I also had a user just today reach out spontaneously by PM and thank me too, which not only doubles my count but is also a big part of why I do what I do.
You’re welcome Gary. And everyone. No plans on quitting anytime soon.
So, as you might’ve noticed there is very little activity going on here these days. Well, that’s because Brigid and I are moving! It’s actually pretty far when you consider all things, but we’re not “going anywhere” in the sense that friendships will be shattered or jobs will be changed.
Brigid and I, after some discussions over the spring and summer, decided to sell the house in Howell and move closer to Detroit proper. So we bought a house right on the Grosse Pointe Woods/Harper Woods line and will hopefully be closing/moving at the end of September.
We’re both really excited at the opportunities this presents us with.
So expect more news eventually. Also expect the third-annual “Kit Day” posts soon-ish.
Cheers, everyone.
These are some earlier ideas for the home kit, before I went straight rouge and rouge.
These two have some white accenting on the socks and on the kit itself. I ended up thinking that it was a bit like last years: just too much. So I simplified them a bit.
While this one only retains the white on the Adidas logo. Even this felt so of… weird. So I set the logo to be rouge too, it helped the sponsor stand out and just made it nice and clean.
Now my site actually fills up your screen. Enjoy.
Also, I’m not dead – just busy.
Also, also to Dunes8 on imgur. Until they properly balance the first stage of the game, Starbound will always be a shitty knock-off of Terraria that tries to distract you from its lack of depth with spaceships.
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.
Special edition kit for St. Paddy’s Day when we do a charity match against Celtic.
A man can dream, a man can dream.
I want to add this as a sort of after-the-fact question to readers.
A lot (not all) of people who support Pro/Rel don’t root for teams in the MLS. A lot (but not all) of people who are against Pro/Rel do root for teams in the MLS.
So I would pose this as a sort of Litmus test on whether you support Pro/Rel or just want an MLS club: if you team was threatened with relegation, would you still support Pro/Rel? What if it was a rival getting promoted instead of you? This is where it sort of breaks down for me. Maybe?
I definitely want to see DCFC reach its potential, and promotion would sure make an easy way for that to happen. But can I take the bad with the good?
I don’t know. I think I know. But I don’t really know until it happens.
So ask yourself if you actually support Pro/Rel or just support your team moving up (as you should).
The rut continues. I was really hoping to put this week off to good use and get a lot written. In nine day’s I’ve written like 300-ish words.
Probably going to take tonight off. Hopefully have something for the blag tomorrow (I wrote and deleted two or three posts already).
Ugh.
Newcastle United: Win 1-0
Kendal Town: Lose 3-2
Been writing this morning. I fell about a thousand words short of my goal last night but some things came up that couldn’t be avoided as easily as Facebook.
Decided to try to make a made scramble to catch up today. Am I going to make it? Maybe. Not that I care. All my deadlines are artificial constructs of my own mind.
So, in a pause between chapters I decided to re-read one of my previous chapters to reset my tone and consistency. I do this a lot. I love to reread my work. I specifically write what I want to read. I don’t read a lot. A book or two a year is pushing it for me. I was barely able to drag myself through high school “English” (read: “Reading”). There is only so many times I could read a book I hated and write a five-paragraph BS essay every few chapters.
I’ll bitch about fivers later.
So I lost a lot of interest in reading because to me it was all associated with the pain of over-analysis. Nothing is fun to read if some mad-woman is stopping you every few lines to ask you what it means and why it was done that way. I don’t know bitch, maybe he was being paid by the word and all those words contribute to a higher pay cheque. (Pro-tip: never suggest to your English teacher that Nathaniel Hawthorne was being paid by the word.)
This led to the golden-age of my childhood writing. I was writing the equivalent to a novel every year or so. That is a lot for a kid. I’d hardly finish what I’d start, writing a third of a novel and moving onto the next third. I did this for five years (counting the first year of middle school) until I went off to college, by which time I had started my serial publishing.
Everything I write, including this, will be read and reread countless times by me. I write what I want to read and so I get great enjoyment out of rereading my stuff over and over again.
The comparison is inevitable.
After I finished a bit of rereading I checked twitter and got the following tweet on my feed:
Rereading parts of your novel while writing is like doubling back at rerunning parts of a marathon mid race.~Chris Baty #writing
— Alex Myers (@Alex_Austin) November 15, 2014
I’m sorry. I completely disagree. If it said “editing” I’d still disagree but to a much lesser degree. What you need to avoid is over-analyzing everything you do. Reread all you want. Get back into your character’s heads, remember what motivates them, what they were trying to accomplish right before you stopped. Reread your favorite bits because it can inspire you to keep going.
Yes it is a first draft, yes you can change anything later. But it is later. Changing a piece because the necessary change is on your mind is important. Don’t let that idea fade. Act on it. If you characters are in a pickle because of some stupid choice last chapter, change it. Don’t “wait until the editor gets to it.” Do it now. Your editor isn’t your ghost writer.
Reread your work, it isn’t a bogey man hiding in the dark. It is a creation that requires attention. And no attention is more important than yours. Just don’t write fivers every few pages.