Writer's Block

Hello, Porkchaps! Long time no post!

Once again, I am bored at work so I thought I'd give a tiny update and what not.

Once again (again), it's Camp NaNoWriMo month! Yaaaaay! I'm still working on that same middle grade book (hooray actual dedication!), but for the last few days I have hit a stumbling block. I'm finally in the last phase of my first draft, leading up to the climax, but my brain decided to take a holiday (not that that's different from usual).

I've been trying to get myself to put down the next few words, but something is getting lost in translation between the images in my mind and my fingertips on the keyboard. So instead of forcing the words to come, I channeled that creative energy into a rant/encouraging tale of overcoming writer's block! 

Anyway, here's the poem, yo.

An Ode to Writer's Block

Oh, that wall in my brain

That makes me go insane,

Though I try in vain

To impale it

Writer's block is a pain

Of my existence, 'tis the bane

Like an oncoming train

Can I derail it?

What wisdom can I gain

When my brain's split in twain?

Like a barrel of hay,

Can I bail it?

It does no good to complain--

I'm a swashbuckling swain!

These words flow in my veins--

I shall prevail it!

So Writers of the World, let us unite! Pick up your pens and laptops (typewriters for you hipsters out there) and let us vanquish the Block Menace! 

Happy Camp NaNoWriMo, errrbody!

Still Hardly Working

So two and a half years ago, I made a post called "Hardly Working" that showed all the random pictures that I drew while I worked at Random Department Store, Inc. Well, here is the sequel, only this time I shall paint you a picture with WORDS.

Oooooooooh.

So, the queues at my current job are completely empty and have been for the past four hours. So, because my supervisors are cool and devious at the same time, they sent us creative writing prompts to keep us busy. I know I've said this before, but I'll say it again: I'll admit, I've actually been having way to much fun with these. Just like Obama & the Kangaroo, I decided to let my mind wander off the beaten path and just do whatever the bleep it wants.


Prompt: Create an advertisement (three to five paragraphs) using this image as your inspiration:

"Allow me to sing you the song of my people."

Now, to me, it looks like these guys are sharing in some particularly hilarious joke. As a result. here is what I spawned:

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Do you ever feel like the Netherworld is just a little too dreary at times? Our home may be riddled with trillions of dead folks, but that doesn't mean we have to act like it! Even Hades needs a chuckle once every few millennia.

As the sole proprietor of "Funderworld," I am here to bring the gift of laughter back into your afterlife. My improv training seminars give you the tools you need to tickle the funny bone of everyone you meet.

Whether you bump into the head of a somber guillotine victim down by the River Styx or a dispirited pioneer who has still not gotten over their death from dysentery on the Oregon Trail, I teach you how to transform any situation into a gold mine of comedic wonder. Along with my fellow humor instructors and the jocular antics of Cerberus, my in-depth classes are sure to make you a veteran member of the Army of the Fundead in as little as 37 years! Transform your eternal afterlife into the Laughterlife by enrolling today.

Contact Komos on the outskirts of the Fields of Asphodel to register for his posthumous and post-humorous training sessions.

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AKA; My life in a nutshell.

Also, shout out to the person in Romania that's actually reading this. "Vă mulțumim!" ;)

Obama & the Kangaroo

Another strange title. Explanation:

At my job, we work out of a queue system, meaning there's a queue of websites that need to be written, and you go in order from there. After working overtime for a few weeks, we finally got the queues down to zero, meaning there was nothing to do.

Because of this, my now-supervisor, Stephen (whose blog you can read here), sent out a list of ridiculous creative writing prompts to do on company time to keep our creative juices flowing. This was one of them:

A kangaroo has taken the president hostage. His terms for release are the following: 

                This is Barack Obama, President of the United States of America. The White House has been overtaken by a group of Australian nationalists, code name Kangaroo. Wait, it's an actual kangaroo? Really? How did this happen?

                I have been informed that it is just one kangaroo, acting of his own volition, who has apparently subdued hundreds of trained special agents and overthrown the most heavily guarded building in the Western Hemisphere. Because he is unable to speak, since he is indeed a kangaroo, I am to read his demands on-air to the entire world. Because though he cannot speak, he still does know how to write for some reason.

                Firstly, stop calling him Kangaroo Jack. He prefers his Christian name, Kevin.

                Second Item: Stop trying to put things in his pouch. That's not for you.

                Third: An endless supply of Dunk-a-Roos.

                Fourth: Exterminate every dingo in the world. One ate his baby.

                And finally, the fifth demand: Meet the previous demands, or Kevin will kick you in the face.

                End transmission.

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My mother made the comment that I should have had Obama sitting in the pouch of the kangaroo for safekeeping, so I will leave you with that ridiculously amazing image in your head for the rest of the day.

Oh, and BTDubs: Camp NaNoWriMo starts again tomorrow! Oh boy. 10K word count, here I come. Again.

Día de los Padres

Sup, guys?

Real quick before work starts, I thought I'd post a little blurb about my dad in honor of (belated) Father's Day.

Just to show you where half of my ridiculousness and narcissism comes from.

So on Sunday, my dad and I went to church and they're singing, ya know, the usual.

And my dad decides that every single song they sing, he's going to substitute the word "God" for "Dad."

Case in point: we walk out and he starts singing "My Dad is an awesome Dad, He reigns. . ."

I asked him about why he was being a blasphemer, and he just looked at me and said, deadpan: "Cuz I'm da bomb."

Despite basically calling himself God (of our household), he is right: My Dad is an awesome dad.

And now you understand me.

Sort of.

The Writers Meeting & NaNoWriMo

Hey everyone!  Sorry it took me three months to write again. . .  I'd come up with excuses, but I seem to do that a lot sooooo I'm just gonna ignore that and act like absolutely no time has passed.

Hooray it's still March!

Anyway, so back in February my friend and fellow writer Amy and I started a weekly get-together that we have dubbed the Writers Meeting (how original!).  She is in the process of writing this wondrously awesome novel (a trilogy, as a matter of fact!) and I am writing a musical set to the songs of the band Ludo!  Whoo!

We started this meeting as a means of sharing ideas and helping each other further our creativity, and it's been great!  Recently we even expanded our group to include Shellie (remember her???) and Amy's roommate Jamie (Amy and Jamie.  Yup.)

Shellie, Amy and I decided to try our hand at participating in NaNoWriMo, or National Novel Writing Month.  You write a novel in an entire month and get help from fellow participants online.  It's technically in November, but they've started something really cool called Camp NaNoWriMo where it takes place during July.  Yay, virtual summer camp full of geeks!  My kind of crowd.  =D

So I'll be focusing all my time and energy on this play because it's been a year in the making and I finally am going to complete it!  Whoo!  =D

I've found a good way to keep up with Midnight Porkchop while simultaneously working on the play!

Recently at our Writers Meetings, we have been using prompts just to get our creative juices flowing.  So I am going to share them with you!  Every Monday night at 5:30, 4:30 central, yo!  (Well, that's when our meetings are.  I'll probably publish them that night sometime.  Oh and also not next week because Amy has to hang out with her fiance instead of us.  What a horrible person.)

But here's a little ditty to hold you guys over for a while!

~~~~~

Prompt:
You're standing in a doorway.

"Don't forget to pack your underwear," she said, lazily leaning against the door frame.  Did she think this was some kind of joke?  Lives are at stake here!

I threw the jackets haphazardly in the corner.  I wouldn't need them where I was going.  I heard a loud rumbling noise above me and I gasped and jumped under the bed.

"It's just an airplane," she scoffed.

I climbed over a pile of boots that I wasn't bringing either.  I looked down at the settings on my ankle cuff.

Fifteen seconds until detonation.

I didn't have time for anything.

I breathed deeply and turned to Robin and grinned.

"Well, you might wanna move quick, or soon we'll both be artwork on the walls."

Her eyes widened.  She looked at my ankle.  I closed my eyes.

Beep.  Beep.  Beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep.

~~~~~

Prompt:

You found out something you weren't supposed to know.

I run.  I run with all my might, leaves and trees a dark blue blur in the cold night.  My breathing is harsh and ragged and there's a stitch in my side, but I have to keep going.

Oh God, I can hear him behind me!  Calling to me, pleading to me in a hauntingly harmonic voice.  He doesn't sound out of breath.

Keep moving!

I gasped and suddenly the ground becomes my sky.  I tripped on a root, or was it a corpse?  I land with an echoing crack on the forest floor and the most excruciating pain enflames my ankle.  My eyes are closed as I will the pain and nauseating dizziness to subside for even the briefest of moments.

Silence.  No noise at all except the cacophonous drum beat of my heart.  Oh, God.

He's here.

 I dare to open my eyes.  I am met with a pale blue moon.  No, two moons.

His eyes.

"Darling," he whispers, like the purr of a lion.  He smiles, a serene, enchanting mask that covers the madman within.

My heart freezes as if I have been doused in ice-cold water.  He seductively caresses the silver of his revolver, a dark substance glittering on his cheek.  His eyes are now black.

"Darling," he coos, "you should have told me you'd be home early."

~~~~~

All right, guys, stay tuned for the next installment!  Maybe I'll even post Shellie's or Amy's excerpts next time, depending if they allow me the honor.

The prompt for next week is:

You're in a motel room.

Why, anything can happen.  ;)

UPDATE: Apparently Google Chrome is trying to tell me that "enflames" is not a word.  Well, in my world it is, so I'm keeping it.  Good riddance!