White egret
Solemnly stalks
In stately slow motion.
All rights reserved. Copyright 2007 Trevor W. Hampel.
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Haiku #29: White Egret
I’ve been a little busy lately
No Comments »12th January, 2007; Category: The Writer's Life
It is time I gave a little apology.
Some readers of this blog have been commenting here recently without any response from me. That is not how it should be, nor is it my goal. It is just that I’ve been rather busy for the last four weeks. Many of the postings in that time were prepared well before Christmas last year and have been set to appear each day since. That is one of the wonderful things about WordPress – write, set the date, hit publish and forget.
The situation I’ve found myself in over the last four weeks is getting back to full time work on a temporary basis. I do occasional relief driving for a friend who runs a local courier business. Just before Christmas he had a major operation which resulted in an enforced four week holiday. The job involves working from very early every morning – about 7am and often does not finish until 10:30pm, with short breaks for lunch and dinner.
This has been a great challenge to me physically. Not only does the work involve long hours, it also means much heavy lifting and many kilometres of driving every day. One delivery alone several days ago tallied up to 550kg of freight. Fortunately, many deliveries are packages of less than a kilogram.
On top of the heaviness of the freight, the week before Christmas was incredibly busy, with the company’s busiest week ever. Layered on top of that has been the extreme heat we have experienced over the last few weeks, with temperatures frequently topping the 40C (104F) mark.
It will be a pleasant change to get back to writing again.
Setting realistic writing goals for 2007
On January 1st I posted a short article listing some of my writing goals for 2007. Setting goals is important in many walks of life. It is very important in a writer’s life because in many cases the writer is his or her own boss. It is easy just to aimlessly drift along. In this way the output wanes or meanders with no real purpose or goal.
Many writers need help in setting achievable goals. Angela Booth has some pertinent points about setting realistic, achievable writing goals in her article here.
What is your writing style?
What I have learned from the many books I have read about the craft of writing is that every writer has a different style of writing. There are many different methods, so-called secrets, formula and styles employed by successful writers.
Meticulous Planners
Some writers are meticulous planners. They plan the whole plot of a story or novel from the beginning to the end. Some use large sheets of paper and map out all the details; characters, settings, twists in the plot, sub-plots and so many other aspects of their story. Others use pieces of paper or post it stickers and rearrange all their notes until they make some sort of logical sequence. This type of writer may spend months or even years in this planning stage. The actual writing may then only take a few weeks or several months at most.
Seat of the Pants writers
Then you have those writers who come up with just a single thought, idea or snippet of dialogue and this is the sum total of their plan. This type of writer can sit at a keyboard and start writing, letting the story and the characters literally take over the plot line. This is “writing by the seat of your pants†type of writing. It can be very exciting if it works – or it can be very frustrating if it doesn’t.
Different styles:
In between these two extremes you have a whole range of approaches to writing. Some writers do some planning at the beginning, others may stop half way through and plan the ending. There seems to as many different styles of getting down that story as there are writers.
My Writing style:
As I develop as a writer I find that more and more I am able to write “on demand.†Blogging has done that for me. The goal of writing a new article every day keeps me accountable to myself. I find inspiration all around me and now I rarely struggle to come up with ideas. Often I feel swamped with ideas with too many to use.
I also find that I can write almost anywhere. I have my favourite spot of course but now I have a laptop I am very flexible in where I write. I sometimes write with music in the background, sometimes even with the television going.
I get a real buzz out of thinking of a setting, a character’s name or some other starting point for a story. I then start writing, letting the story or the characters take over. Discovering where the story or characters take me is just like reading a novel or story for the first time; you don’t know the ending. Sometimes the ending is as much a surprise to me as it is to the reader. Risky – yes; exhilarating – certainly.
To read more on this topic, read the article in the link below. It was written by Adelaide crime and romance author, Kirsty Brooks.
Related article:
· Writing fiction – planning your story or writing by the seat of your pants: individual writing styles written by Kirsty Brooks.
What is your writing style?
Tell me about it by leaving a comment.
Idiom #11: A lame duck
1 Comment »8th January, 2007; Category: Idioms
This week’s idiom:
“A lame duck”
Meanings:
A person who is no longer effective whatever role they have. Also used in describing a failed business, enterprise or organisation.
Origins:
The origin of this saying could come from the observation that a duck with damaged or injured web feet, a lame duck, would be unable to swim properly. It could also originate from the practice of clipping a bird’s wings and thus rendering it flightless.
The first use of this term seems to have been in the London Stock Exchange in the 18th century, and it has more often been applied in recent times to the political scene. One source I discovered says this:
A lame duck (I suppose I ought to call it “flight-challenged”) is one unable to keep up with the flock and who is thus easy prey for predators. The phrase “lame duck” was first applied on the London Stock Exchange in the 18th century to brokers who could not pay their debts. Beginning in 19th-century America, “lame duck” was used to describe a Congressional representative who had failed to hornswoggle the voters into re- electing him in November, but who was not due, under the Constitution, to actually be booted out until the following March. Thus freed of even the pretense of accountability to the voters, such “lame ducks” usually voted themselves a scandalous jackpot of perks, until a stop was put to the practice by the “Lame Duck Amendment” of 1934. Today, new Congresspeople take office in January, their defeated opponents no longer have an opportunity to loot and pillage on their way out, and thus Congress has become a temple of honesty.
From The Word Detective website.
Real life example:
- Interesting, a few weeks ago I actually saw a real lame duck. We were having a picnic lunch on the banks of the River Murray in Mannum, South Australia. Two Pacific Black Ducks flew in to see if they could score a free feed. One landed normally, the other with a belly flop on to the grass. It had a damaged leg and could only shuffle along on the grass. Otherwise, it looked perfectly healthy and was obviously coping very well. That was one successful lame duck!!
Usage:
- The committee has not made a decision in over three months; it’s certainly a lame duck.