![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ellenkushnerFinally got the bit back between my teeth and wrote pages and pages and pages of a short story last night (by hand, in a notebook, sitting in the brown leather chair by my study window) - fueled (as I need to eat about every 2 hours or I get cranky and/or vague) by leftover Chinese food and later by chocolate almonds; stopped only by physical weariness and a sore hand. It's hilarious: it was coming to me so fast that I wrote scenes out of order as they sparked (making notes to myself for where they should actually go), using 2 different pens: my eternal favorite, the Rotring ArtPen (extrafine nib on this one, but my handwriting is so very dire that I need a fountain pen to slow me down enough to make it legible - but I press so hard that I ruin the nibs of finer ink pens, so no Mont Blanc for me - hey, what do we call such pens in the US? It can't be just an Ink Pen cause that would include ballpoints etc... In France it's a Stylo, right? I mean, a Fountain Pen implies a fillable fountain - which my Rotrings have, me being too cheap to approve of buying disposable plastic cartridges - but if it has a cartridge is it a Cartridge Pen? Is there a generic name for things with metal tips that need to be filled with ink?), filled with an ink by J. Herbin with the delicious appellation of "Lie de Thé" - it's really closer to green than brown, which bothered me at first - like, you know when you buy cheap black pants but after you wash them a few times they turn out to be kind of dark dark blue? - , but hey, it's such a cunning little bottle - alternating with one of the "uni-ball Signo"s we buy by the fistful in Japan - this one, maroon.
As for the story itself, I'm not being coy - or rather, I suppose I am, but I'm not taking malicious delight in it; it's just not good to talk about it until it is conclusively finished. I did finally end up reading most of what I had so far to Delia (after I wrote a scene that surprised me and that I like so much I wanted to try it out), and she laughed a lot and turned rather pink with pleasure (I hope), which was a good sign both that it's working and that I felt I have enough that it's got its own specific gravity and won't be blown off-track by someone else's reaction. Also, I've always read my stuff aloud when I could - dating from my days in Jr High School when my friends claimed they couldn't read my writing - it helps me hear the pacing and what's working.
It's something I started months ago - jotted down some notes & lines of dialogue during a Waterson/Carthy concert (blogged here, I believe) as they sang "Newry Highwayman" and I got a flash of something. I've been poking at it sporadically ever since - a line here, a scene there (and desperate search for inspiration online one night, only to find that everybody and their sister has recorded NH except W/C) - while also putting myself through sloggy overdue rewrites of the Witches of Lublin radio script from MFSM, and bouncing back and forth between sketches for other stories that I hope will similarly take off soon . . . . And indeed, I meant to work on something else last night, some that is actually due somewhere - but when these lightning visions come, practically playing the movie for you as you frantically try to get it all down - and it doesn't happen often - you're a fool if you let it go by.
People ask me about my writing habits? There they are.
This week, anyway.
As for the story itself, I'm not being coy - or rather, I suppose I am, but I'm not taking malicious delight in it; it's just not good to talk about it until it is conclusively finished. I did finally end up reading most of what I had so far to Delia (after I wrote a scene that surprised me and that I like so much I wanted to try it out), and she laughed a lot and turned rather pink with pleasure (I hope), which was a good sign both that it's working and that I felt I have enough that it's got its own specific gravity and won't be blown off-track by someone else's reaction. Also, I've always read my stuff aloud when I could - dating from my days in Jr High School when my friends claimed they couldn't read my writing - it helps me hear the pacing and what's working.
It's something I started months ago - jotted down some notes & lines of dialogue during a Waterson/Carthy concert (blogged here, I believe) as they sang "Newry Highwayman" and I got a flash of something. I've been poking at it sporadically ever since - a line here, a scene there (and desperate search for inspiration online one night, only to find that everybody and their sister has recorded NH except W/C) - while also putting myself through sloggy overdue rewrites of the Witches of Lublin radio script from MFSM, and bouncing back and forth between sketches for other stories that I hope will similarly take off soon . . . . And indeed, I meant to work on something else last night, some that is actually due somewhere - but when these lightning visions come, practically playing the movie for you as you frantically try to get it all down - and it doesn't happen often - you're a fool if you let it go by.
People ask me about my writing habits? There they are.
This week, anyway.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2008-01-26 04:31 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-26 07:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-26 05:24 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-26 07:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-26 09:10 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-26 06:52 pm (UTC)And I'm not entirely sure what you call fountain pens with cartridges -- I had always assumed just that, but I have a moral aversion to cartridges because they run out too quickly and I'm lazy and cheap. I also find having a collection of ink bottles weirdly appealing. That being said, I do think they're still technically fountain pens because I haven't seen anything to tell me they aren't.
no subject
Date: 2008-01-26 07:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-26 10:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-27 12:01 am (UTC)2. When I was doing my year abroad in England, the library where I studied (bc that's where they kept EVERY ISSUE OF FOLKLORE EVER) had a box on one of the catalog cases that contained three bottles of ink: generic black, generic blue, and waterman's blue-black. I still preferred south sea blue, but I'd fill my ben with blue-black when I was there just to do it.
no subject
Date: 2008-01-27 12:20 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-28 03:10 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-28 07:02 pm (UTC)But yes, they are generally called fountain pens across the board if they are refillable and have a nib rather than a ball tip. Although Pilot even has a disposable fountain pen that has a plastic nib. They only come in medium, though, and I much prefer a fine nib myself (Cross ATX is my favorite)
pens
Date: 2008-01-31 02:11 am (UTC)them well... somewhere along the line a friend gave me his Pentel Tradio (findable online if you really look), which is effectively a cartridge felt-nib fountain pen - definitely a pleasure to write with. -Jessica
no subject
Date: 2008-01-31 04:17 am (UTC)unlock iphone 4p
Date: 2011-06-17 11:48 pm (UTC)how to unlock iphone
iphone unlock (http://ounlockiphone.com) unlock iphone unlock iphone
unlock iphone
unlock iphone iphone unlock [url=http://ounlockiphone.com]how to unlock iphone [/url] iphone unlock