New chapter of Almost Nowhere is up. Sorry it took forever! I do actually want to write this thing, hopefully I’ll get some momentum going after this
spookyrukie asked: is almost nowhere still a thing?
It has not stopped being a thing, in that I still want to keep writing it. I haven’t been getting into the writing-headspace as much as I used to, and for my earlier fiction I’d just write whenever I spontaneously got into that headspace. So I haven’t been writing much. I do hope this changes, and it’s worth thinking about whether there are things I can do to change it.
(I can also tell myself “just write the next chapter whether you’re in the ‘writing-headspace’ or not, dammit,” and sometimes I have done this in the past, but I think it makes for lower-quality work when I do it and can end up being a pyrrhic victory. On the other hand, it can give me momentum that will lead to more, better stuff soon after. Anyway, thanks for reminding me to think about this kind of thing, I haven’t in a while and I should)
(More concretely, I think my graduate thesis – which is currently more of a writing project than a sitting-and-thinking project, the latter part is done – is currently monopolizing the part of my brain that does things like having writing projects)
Finally wrote some more Almost Nowhere. Chapter’s not done yet though.
urpriest asked: So I have to ask, since you do have a math background: to what extent are the spinor anomalies supposed to be actual spinor anomalies, versus just a set of buzzwords that sounds cool?
Somewhere in the middle – I chose the phrase with the math/physics connotations in mind, but it’s not meant to correspond to anything specific in any actual field theory.
Chapter 2 of Almost Nowhere is up here
I will be trying to avoid the news and the national conversation for the next while, and focus on the things I can do within my own little sphere, the skills I want to learn and practice.
That means data science, which I am planning to get a job in soon, and also the last steps of my dissertation, which I hope to finish by the end of the year and defend in January. But it also means working on Almost Nowhere. Staying creative is important; having a creative project is a way of generating ongoing enthusiasm that comes from inside and is relatively impervious to outside influence. (Creative work can even be fueled by negative emotions about the wider world, sometimes; I can’t heal the world but I can put something new in it that wasn’t there before, and shape that new thing according to my own passions, impotent as they may be elsewhere.)
towardsagentlerworld asked: the first chapter of almost nowhere was really intriguing! i keep checking back for more, any thoughts about when you'll post the next one?
Glad you liked it. I have a bit of the next chapter written, and I really want to write the rest when I get the time and writing-energy – I’ve just been very busy lately and it’s literally a matter of not having the time and/or being too worn out from working. Earliest possible time is this coming weekend; after that, I’ll be busy M-F again next week and then my schedule changes a bit.
almost nowhere
For a long time now, I’ve had ideas and notes and stuff for my next fiction project, but I keep telling myself I don’t have time to write. But I’m not planning to have more free time anytime soon, so if I can’t write now, I won’t be writing for a long time.
And sometimes a thing happens like last night, when I was on the bus going to a programming meetup and suddenly my head was just full of ideas and phrases and scenes, non-stop. I almost considered turning around and skipping the meeting. Instead, I went, then went home and wrote for a few hours. And probably that’s how it’s going to have to be – writing when I get in the mood and happen to have some spare time. Not methodically building something.
I posted the first chapter of this thing just now. I was hoping to be more methodical and responsible this time and have, like, an “update schedule” or something, but I think it just works better for me to just write when I’m in the mood and post immediately after, so I feel like I’m continually working on something and I could make a new tangible ripple in it any time I want.
So, anyway, the new thing is called Almost Nowhere, here’s the link again, and I have no idea when I’ll post the next chapter