The Swamp Of Sadness

     Getting through C7 I feel like Atreyu slogging it through the muck.  Gained some ground with a good suggestion from a friend, but now find myself back in it up to my neck.  Maybe the luck dragon of inspiration will save me before the G'Mork of depression rips my legs off.
     Its there.  The substance of the scene is there but it keeps slipping through my fingers like a greased toad.
     Found a new show to inspire.  Hemlock Grove.  Finished watching it and felt a kind of kinship.  It had a very amateur feel to it, but it was done with a lot of heart.  It also had a very Hayao Miyazaki feel in that whole writing despicable characters that you can't help but identify and even like thing.
     Hate having the drive but not the ability to move forward.  There's so much more I want to do with it, so many paths to wander down.  I have such a hard time doing anything but look forward.  I want to be there, not here.  Need to lock my attention down on the here.
     Here's hoping I can kick this in the ass and get moving.

Got the madness covered, now how 'bout some method.

I feel like I'm trying to level up but can't find a quest.  Haven't done jack squat in about two weeks.  Nothing new anyway.  Took the time to go back and just read what I have so far.  Kind of a chance to stop and make sure I'm still coloring in between the lines.  So far I like what I'm seeing.
     But I keep getting hung up on the smallest things.  Trying to get this seed of an idea to grow into a full blown scene has been like pulling frelling teeth.  So far every version of the scene in the gun shop has come out like a really bad exploitation film.  Think 'Pulp Fiction' directed by Uwe Boll.
     *shudder*
     Not the tone I want for my first book.
     Still having to fight against lack of motivation.  Which kinda blows my mind seeing as I can't stop thinking about it.  All day, every day, some part of my mind is thinking about some aspect of this book.  Its the first thing on my mind when I wake and the last when I go to sleep.  So why the frelling-frakking-fucking hell is it so hard to get myself to do anything?
     Part of me thinks that I may be focusing on it too much.  Thinking about one thing all the time can get a bit stressful.  Hell, I can't even play video games anymore without feeling guilty that I am not writing.  I may have somehow crossed from being my own cheerleader to being my own drill sergeant.
     One thing that I do find helps is writing while listening to music.  I know a real revelation right?  Reading AND listening to music?  I'm a freakin' genius!
     Okay, delusion over.
     But yes I do really find that music helps fuel the imagination in a way nothing else can.  Except for smell maybe but I'm not going to write the first scratch and sniff zombie book.  Ewwwwwww.  
  Classical or instrumental works well for me.  Especially soundtracks like 'Dark City', 'Close Encounters of the Third Kind', or 'Braveheart'.  Also the soundtrack for Halo: ODST.  And last but not in anyway least the soundtrack for Skyrim and Minecraft.  Mix generously with random Weird Al and MST3K music tracks, blend and enjoy.
     Serve chilled.

Implementing an idea...

   I find myself regularly struggling to take an idea and make it into a scene.  In this case I need more conflict for my little band of adventurers and decided to give them some competition for much needed equipment.  That's the idea.  Turning it into an interesting scene is another ball of wax.
   Aside from the creative stuff of who does and says what, just the continuity is enough of a problem. Who is where in the room, what are they doing, what have they done or said. How much personality do I give to people I know are about to get munched on by zombies.
   Taking a nugget of an idea and trying to make something out of it is like trying to make a pizza crust with too little dough.  I'm always trying to fill gaps that open up. 
   This is another area that the motto of 'KEEP FREAKIN' WRITING' deffinitely applies. Its been pretty cool to see some of the things I've come up with just typing out the first thing that comes to mind. My mind pulling bits and pieces from every T.V. show, film, book, and comic I have ever experienced and mashing them together. Sometimes with really bizarre results.
   It's cool seeing characters evolve as both the book and I grow.  It's also a bit odd to have something that exists purely in your mind begin to have a mind of its own.  Maybe to be a good author you need to be an itsy-bit-schitzy.  You end up with some serious Smeagol/Gollum moments going on which can be enlightening and frightening as what's essentially different slivers of your own personality interact with each other.
   The more I write the more often I find myself questioning my own sanity.  The things I see in my head can't possibly be fueled by anything but pure insanity.  Just a spark of madness mind you, but isn't a spark enough?
   The world isn't scary or messed up enough, so let's add zombies.  Don't believe in love or see hope?  Create it.  Add heroes and heroines that one rarely finds anymore.  People who do the right thing because it's the right thing to do.
  Humans are never satisfied with what is.  That's what I love about books and writing is that we are unhappy with how things are we just ignore what's real and make it up and then share our reality with other people.  There are few things I love more in this world than picking up a book and slipping into someone else's head for awhile.

My book may kill you.

I think my book is melting my editors brain.  About a week ago Tim started getting extreme disorientation as well as visual problems, memory issues, and problems with his cognitive abilities.  And aside from his normal problems he is in some discomfort.
     Seeing as Tim has been exposed to my manuscript more than anyone else I can only deduce that my book is harmful to a portion of the populace.  Namely smart people.  I'm aiming for a cross between 'Shaun of the Dead' and 'The Walking Dead'.  What I think I'm getting is more like Harold & Kumar (Any of them.) meets 'Surf Ninja's' meets 'The Howling'.  I'm really trying to keep it to a sprinkling of stupid on a sundae of heart and interesting story.  But I find myself giggling at the dumbest stuff (Especially when recalling conversations with friends for the dialogue.).  Now if you read my book and experience headache, nausea, disorientation, arachibutyrophobia, constipation, erectile dysfunction, excommunication, alektorophobia, diarrhea, loss of rhythm, male pattern baldness, Timian Implosion Theory, exsanguination, defenestration, low resale value on your home, Hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia, spontaneous combustion, sensitive nipples, or vaginal dryness please discontinue reading all related materials.  Any injury, sickness, loss of property, wages, soul, or fatalities from shakesnovelsuckyitis are not the responsibility of the author.
Blame Tim.   It's always his fault.
     Been slacking the last few days.  Really wanted to keep to the whole page-a-night-off routine, but all I've got is a couple paragraphs.  One of those days when just putting my fingers to the keys is an effort.  What once was clear has become foggy.  You wouldn't think that getting characters from Point A to Point B would be that hard, but when you want it to be interesting it can be a bit tricky.
     It's a really odd way of thinking.  Have to look at every situation from as many angles as possible.  What started it, what's going through the heads of everyone involved, what could make it worse or better, could it have been easily prevented and if so should it have been?
     I keep surprising myself (Which seems like something that shouldn't really be possible.) with a few of the random bits.  Impromptu things that if the book takes off will probably be over-analyzed and picked apart and generally thought of to have been intentional.  But in truth were one-hundred percent pulled from my ass.
So if you read something and it was funny, clever, emotional, or cool just assume it was an accident.