Minor Slushpile Musings
Oct. 27th, 2011 09:27 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ann_leckieThe novel--which I have been working on for entirely too long--is out with beta readers! It will need re-writing, of course, I've already thought of things that need fixing that didn't occur to me before I hit "send." So today is some housework and some beading while I meditate on the next project.
Meantime. Some random thoughts generated by my clearing the GigaNotoSaurus slush.
Homophones! Onepores over a book or document. You might pour yourself a cup of coffee while you pore over the ancient manuscript in your story but if you pour the coffee over it, you'll have trouble reading it.
A pile of hidden treasure is ahoard . A mob of people is a horde . I don't know too many hoarders who hoard large groups of warriors, honestly, it would be more trouble than it's worth. How could you possibly feed them? And sanitation...then again, maybe it's like people who can't stop collecting cats or similar. Hmm.
Little homophone errors won't get your story rejected. Honestly, if it's a dynamite story we can fix that kind of thing later. They're really just minor irritants, a minor irk. But you don't want to give an editor that moment of minor irk if you can possibly help it.
Another thing--one that's potentially more troublesome, for various reasons. We've got a lot of idealized notions, a lot of stylized images that represent real things. They're symbolic, I guess, like that TV show years ago that was meant to be set in a newsroom so of course they filled the set with typewriters. Even though you couldn't find a typewriter in a newsroom these days if your life depended on it. Because the idealized image of "newsroom" includes typewriters. Reality didn't matter, they grabbed for the idealized image.
So, I've noticed, there exists an idealized image of "breakfast." No, seriously. Quick, close your eyes! What's "breakfast"? Bacon, eggs, sausage, toast, pancakes, right? Right! So I've run across a number of stories where someone is eating breakfast, and it's a weekday, they're on their way to work, grabbing coffee and rushing out the door, except for some reason they're actually cooking bacon and eggs as part of their wake up/dress/breakfast/hurry off to work routine.
No, seriously, really? Look, what do you, yourself, eat when you're up at five gotta be dressed and out the door by six? Coffee maker is on automatic if you've got that, and likely you're having something quick and easy to clean up from. Toast. Bagel. Cold cereal. You can nuke oatmeal in five minutes, two if it's quick oats. If you're organized you put steel cut oats in a slow cooker last night, or made pancakes on your day off and now you grab one out of the freezer and stick it in the toaster. A soft-boiled egg or a quick scrambled egg, okay, that's nice and quick.
Do you stop and make bacon? Or sausage? No. You do not. That's the sort of thing you have on the weekend, or when you've got time to sit down and eat. Or if you've got someone in the household willing to get up before everyone else to cook and then who has time after to be home and wash dishes.
Don't grab the Breakfast Glyph, stop and think about what real breakfasts are like. And of course, that doesn't just go for breakfasts. I've seen it other places, too. It's just I've seen a couple of Breakfast Glyphs lately and thought I'd mention that one.
Meantime. Some random thoughts generated by my clearing the GigaNotoSaurus slush.
Homophones! One
A pile of hidden treasure is a
Little homophone errors won't get your story rejected. Honestly, if it's a dynamite story we can fix that kind of thing later. They're really just minor irritants, a minor irk. But you don't want to give an editor that moment of minor irk if you can possibly help it.
Another thing--one that's potentially more troublesome, for various reasons. We've got a lot of idealized notions, a lot of stylized images that represent real things. They're symbolic, I guess, like that TV show years ago that was meant to be set in a newsroom so of course they filled the set with typewriters. Even though you couldn't find a typewriter in a newsroom these days if your life depended on it. Because the idealized image of "newsroom" includes typewriters. Reality didn't matter, they grabbed for the idealized image.
So, I've noticed, there exists an idealized image of "breakfast." No, seriously. Quick, close your eyes! What's "breakfast"? Bacon, eggs, sausage, toast, pancakes, right? Right! So I've run across a number of stories where someone is eating breakfast, and it's a weekday, they're on their way to work, grabbing coffee and rushing out the door, except for some reason they're actually cooking bacon and eggs as part of their wake up/dress/breakfast/hurry off to work routine.
No, seriously, really? Look, what do you, yourself, eat when you're up at five gotta be dressed and out the door by six? Coffee maker is on automatic if you've got that, and likely you're having something quick and easy to clean up from. Toast. Bagel. Cold cereal. You can nuke oatmeal in five minutes, two if it's quick oats. If you're organized you put steel cut oats in a slow cooker last night, or made pancakes on your day off and now you grab one out of the freezer and stick it in the toaster. A soft-boiled egg or a quick scrambled egg, okay, that's nice and quick.
Do you stop and make bacon? Or sausage? No. You do not. That's the sort of thing you have on the weekend, or when you've got time to sit down and eat. Or if you've got someone in the household willing to get up before everyone else to cook and then who has time after to be home and wash dishes.
Don't grab the Breakfast Glyph, stop and think about what real breakfasts are like. And of course, that doesn't just go for breakfasts. I've seen it other places, too. It's just I've seen a couple of Breakfast Glyphs lately and thought I'd mention that one.
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no subject
Date: 2011-10-27 02:49 pm (UTC)My personal breakfast is always what I pick up at the deli on the way. I've been trained by years of commuting (starting in junior high) that I can't possibly eat breakfast until I've been awake at least an hour.
no subject
Date: 2011-10-27 02:58 pm (UTC)I do get up and cook my husband an omelet (eggs, turkey sausage, spinach, tomatoes and green chilies) every day. He doesn't eat any grains (paleo diet), so that takes out almost anything that can be carried conveniently. But I also know that's out of the norm.
no subject
Date: 2011-10-27 03:40 pm (UTC)Quick, name a boy child: Timmy! Jimmy!
Where does someone work: an office!
What color is a little girl's hair: blonde!
What might a husband call his wife: dear!
How is the crew of a spaceship organized: along military lines!
no subject
Date: 2011-10-27 04:30 pm (UTC)Oh, Mother of God, yes.
no subject
Date: 2011-10-27 09:43 pm (UTC)You've got me thinking now about how you might organize a crew on a space-going vessel that wouldn't seem military. You could do it like a merchant trading vessel, maybe? Or like a grant-funded university research team, maybe? Or, how else. Like a wagon train of explorers? Or, how were Melanesian societies organized, back when they were hopping across the island chains of the Pacific? You could pick that.
This is fun.
no subject
Date: 2011-11-02 05:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-02 05:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-10-27 09:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-10-28 12:45 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-10-27 09:37 pm (UTC)Case in point--because this is one where I saw what I was doing and corrected it: someone is a mechanic. What is he holding in his hand? Why, a greasy rag!
... why, though? We have ancient cars, so we go to the mechanic all the time, and do you know what? I can't actually remember a time when they came over to talk to me, holding a greasy rag. It's purely a TV thing--but I've seen it on TV plenty of times.
So, yeah. I excised the greasy rag.
no subject
Date: 2011-11-05 05:12 pm (UTC)