I Googled "Tuesday", and was reminded of this book which I enjoyed as a child.
A lot of bloggers have a weekly tradition of some kind, usually updating people on what they’re up to. I wanted to have one at The Simmering Mind, and it seemed only natural that it should be on Tuesdays. I love Tuesdays! I was born on a Tuesday. Years ago I started a tradition of always wearing pink on Tuesday. I grocery shop on Tuesday (and I do so love food…). So here I give you…the Tuesday Ramblings. I might even do it on days other than Tuesday, if I have too much fun with it…
Written today: Zero. Nothing. Zilch. *groan* I ran lots of errands today with a cranky baby in tow and haven’t had time to write. I’m hoping to rectify that as soon as I finish this posting…
Reading today: I’m going to the library tomorrow, so I don’t have any books to read at the moment, but I did enjoy some of the writing I found over at Maria Tatham’s website. 🙂
Stuck in my head today: Deck the halls with boughs of holly / fa la la la la la la la la!!!!
Deep and important thoughts pondered today: The trend toward “simplifying” Christmas and spending and doing less for it, and – conversely – Doug Wilson’s words about the holiday season: “Celebrate the stuff. Use fudge and eggnog and wine and roast beef. Use presents and wrapping paper. Embedded in many of the common complaints you hear about the holidays (consumerism, shopping, gluttony, etc.) are false assumptions about the point of the celebration. You do not prepare for a real celebration of the Incarnation through 30 days of Advent Gnosticism.” Absolutely YES. I understand the concerns about materialism, greed, and a lack of focus on “the reason for the season”. But at the same time – this is Christ’s birth we’re talking about here! This is a time for celebrating, feasting, enjoying! I think the key is centering your celebration around Christ, rather than, “Yay, presents for me!” (Read Doug Wilson’s whole article here.)
Quote for today: I think the entry above counts for the quote of the day, too.
Amusing today: Last night I had a dream that I was Kevin from my book, and the One Ring had fallen into his hands, and he and a friend were flying a spaceship to chuck the Ring into the heart of the sun. I love interesting dreams…they almost make sleep worthwhile. While I was in the midst of reading Harry Potter, all of my dreams for WEEKS revolved around battling and defeating Voldemort. It was pretty awesome. Also amusing today: listening to my baby giggle hysterically because my husband is gargling water.
I love strange dreams! They can be really funny when they mix up stories. I remember a very entertaining dream where I was C-3PO. And another (crazy Lord of the Rings dream 🙂 ) where I was Pippin. Merry and I were Gandalf’s slaves. We ran away on a very long, dusty road and were thirsty a lot. Now, this whole dream was told as a story from a book. Gandalf wrote the first part, and I think Frodo wrote the rest. So the beginning of the dream was sort of a movie shot of the book opening, and Gandalf with a very deep voice narrating a few sentences, then the “camera” inside my head went through the page of the book to the action. So I was in Pippin’s head most of the time, but also omnisciently observing. Sometimes I wonder if some story ideas actually come from some crazy dreams I can’t quite remember consciously. If so, that would make even the dreams I can’t remember (sadly, most) worthwhile. I hate work going to waste…after all, dreams are basically a movie/story in your head. It must take SOME work, even though you’re asleep. 🙂
Do you remember how many times (if any) you won against Voldemort? Did you read the series all at once or in bits as it came out?
Cranky baby=not fun. I hope you’re still able to get something done! I hate it when events filter into my writing time or I’m just too plain lazy.
Your Lord of the Rings dream sounds interesting! I used to have a LOT of Lord of the Rings dreams, myself; I have’t had one in awhile and I was surprised to have a LotR theme in my dream last night – sometimes I wonder why certain themes or people come up in dreams when we haven’t seen them in forever!
I love dreams that seem to be stories while they’re happening. When I have dreams like that, most of the time I’m the one writing them, and I direct the events to some extent, which is fun. Unless I have an unpleasant dream (rare), I try to remember them when I get up, and many of them I write down notes. I don’t think any major story ideas of mine have come from dreams, but some minor ones have.
I’m sure we defeated Voldemort in the dreams, but I probably woke up before those parts, because I can’t remember.
I think I may have actually gotten a story idea from the “Deep and important thoughts pondered today.” I’ll see what comes of it… 🙂
What kind of stories do you write, Greytawnyowl?
I’ve written in a few genres. The past six months or so I’ve been working on a science fiction series. Before that I’d mostly been writing fantasy and talking animal stories. I have a few present day (or real-life, or however you want to put it) ideas, as well as one mystery idea. I’ve always wanted to write a historical fiction story as well, but haven’t (yet! 🙂 ). So I write/want to write in a lot of genres. 🙂 I’m really liking writing science fiction right now, though. I think it gives you just the right amount of material to make up. A lot of science fiction has to have a grounding in reality, but you can use your imagination to fill in the cracks. 🙂
Wow, you write a wide variety of stories! I’ve written in all those genres in the past, but nowadays I stick to mostly science-fiction and fantasy. I love to read historical fiction, but I don’t think I could ever write it…I enjoy inventing things, and I don’t think I could ever do all the research involved in writing a historical book. 😀 I agree, science-fiction tends to have a nice blend of reality and imagination. 🙂
Well, if I were to do a historical novel, I’d probably set it in Victorian times, because that’s my favorite time period and I know the most about it. I know it would take a fair amount of research, but I don’t think it would be that bad.
Do your science fiction stories lean more toward the science or more toward the fantasy?
Ah, Victorian times. Do you know anything about the steampunk genre? My sister-in-law is really into that and it’s kind of fun! It’s basically a science-fiction version of Victorian times, but the science is all done with steam, gears, machinery, and other technology they would have had back then.
I don’t think I favor either science or fantasy more…it depends on the story. For example, I feel like TKT has a fantasy feel to it, but Daik 11 is also science fiction and there’s no fantasy in it at all.
I hadn’t heard of the steampunk until now! It sounds interesting…