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[My desire to write fiction/Sheltered/Nanowrimo]

-I have been re-reading (amongst other things..) my NaNoWriMo (09/10) recently. It's called Sheltered, that one, and I'm surprised, reading it back, how good it was.
Although being the author of it I can't really judge it with any distance so I'm probably talking rubbish, but I didn't hate it or think it was that clunky, as I self-deprecatingly do often when reading back my fictions to myself.
It flowed, it reminded me of places I'd been, and it put me in my characters' headspace.
Also it reminded me of things happening in the time I was writing it, as the characters all had loose basis on people I know.

So I'd love to get writing some stuff again...I still have my '11 and '12 NaNo novels to complete (Short Stories which is random as fuck, but contains some fun stuff, one actually I posted on Facebook and Meg seemed to like it.) ...and also my brand new one 'A Thought-War Is Coming' which seems to me like an incredible/modernly relevant concept that I'm not sure I can even do justice to! (Neuro-technology, such as understanding how the brain works, controlling dreams, electronically sending thoughts, accessing other peoples' mind to fill them with advertising or controlling them...as well as a man who creates his own country and uses this intrusive brain-technology to defend it, all being major story points!) ...I really would be so happy to have the time to write beautiful futurism and sci-fi, in the way that H.G.Wells & A.C.Clarke did so well!

(I also need a writing-buddy who likes sci-fi for next November!)

[dA rejuvination]

I really wanna keep posting stuff to dA and keep it alive. I'm on Tumblr now but that places is nothing compared to dA, just a big pile of pretentious un-serious toss, I use it as a secretive way of expressing parts of myself, but all-in-all dA has always been my 'home on the web' and let me express a much larger part. I'd like to use it a little longer.

[Holiday partner/travel/photography-mad person]

Since my Euro/US trip planning fell down at the start of the year, I've been saddened that I have no travel-partner and no easy way to travel in a big way because lack of company holds me back. It hit me today the most when I was looking over my old sketchbook to see the cost of my old (2011, I think?) St. Ives trip, which I'm amazed was 3 nights at under £200. I just wish when I went there I had someone other than my brother to hang with, because he didn't want to do anything decent and just held me back. I had to put a ton of effort into just getting him to do really tiny things. So I want a new travel companion from the UK, friends or new peeps, so I have someone to chat to and laugh about things we notice and take photos and stuff.  Preferably someone who likes photography because although a bit of active-ness is ok I'd mostly be the sort who's distracted by visual things.

[My interactions on twitter with people I like]

Not sure where I am with social networking at the moment...I've been answering less messages (long form) than usual recently, but have been talking very well with my Twitter friends. But I kinda imagine that they are friends, even though I haven't had a chance to meet them for long enough stretches yet (mainly Lia, Jo' and Ellen). Also I nearly met some new people...Rhi (from Tumblr) turned out to be a psycho, as a lot of people met straight out of Devon seem to be recently, then I talked to someone called Mary but she kept asking me too much stuff about myself in such a short period of time, and presuming stuff about my parents, that made me feel annoyed so I backed off from her.

[3-day work stint]

I don't usually get 3-Full-days in the row at the Shop but last week I did, and because my body's not used to it it wiped me out and made me tired at the end of day2. But to be honest that's just 'cos I've gotten too used to lack of work, and if I did the 3 days every week I'd be far more used to it.
I'm getting worse at my job though, in particular worse at interacting with customers in a polite way. That facade of politeness keeps beginning to slip lately. To put it bluntly, it's because I've been in Depression these past few months.
Dad's got ill with a skin condition and that 'sinking ship' metaphor I keep using seems closer to reality. (as in, when he goes, the business goes, and I'm 1 step closer to homelessness).

Soo yeah, harder to be nice to a frustrating customer when you darn well KNOW you're in a worse position than most of them. Especially combined with my polarisation to this job - I have to sell people stuff like Homeopathy which I know is absolute bullshit, and if they dare ask me "Do you know anything about how well this works or it's effects?" -my mouth says "Sorry I wouldn't know about that." while my mind silently screams "Are you fucking kidding me you're paying £6.50 for water!" ....ahem, anyway...

[job-hunting/house-hunting stuff]

So, I am still hunting for jobs, last one was a WHSmiths at an Airport, after applying to which, I suddenly realised I'd looooove to work at an Airport and got drawn into lots of 'first time flight' blogs and articles, and watched pilots-eye views of Aircraft taking off on Youtube for a few hours with stars in my eyes and an RL smileyface.

Thing with jobs at the moment is they've sort of become intertwined with the 'house-hunt', as I realise, living in the city would give more job opportunities, and getting a job in the city would fuel rent & living there, but the problem is the gap between leaving my family job, not really having enough money (IN TOTAL - as in all the money I own) to rent a house for more than one year - the obvious dangerous dilemma being I'd have to move in to a place in Exeter/Bristol, and get a job in 1 year, or risk reaching the end of it and having £0 and FAILURE in a dramatic way, back living with family, who'll be just as annoying as ever, and with a Dad even more ill [who, by the way, won't go to the Doctors or ever give up smoking or drinking, or hardly ever go for a walk and definitely wont Travel more than 4 miles in a car] - and he's the GOOD member of the family.

Yep, I dunno how I can sugar-coat my life, or fully explain it to other people. Especially not in any abridged way. When I let Jess into my life she learnt everything, but it did take about a year of explaining. A new person in my life would have to have more patience than a saint to re-learn all that, and I'm not entirely sure I'm worth that curiosity. At least not until I'm happy and safe from destruction again. Which would be: Stable Job, Stable Home. Simple really. Lowest rung-of-the-ladder stuff, I feel.

And people wonder where my ambition's gone to.

[recent Gaming...]

I played BioShock3 to the end recently, after doing a massive [unnecessary] overhaul of my computer from WinXP to Win7.

It was a beautiful game, and I liked it a lot. Restored some of my zest for the gaming world (despite obvious 'new-gen-game' trappings included such as invisible collision hulls, and stealing control away from the player at various points, plus super-linearity) ...but despite that I enjoyed it. They're telling a story though - which could equally have been told well without Guns (i.e. it could have been a First-Person 'Observer' rather than a First-Person Shooter) ...but I loved the amount of freedom it did manage to give despite that, and how in the unscripted bits you could craft amusing situations.

My favourite moment I think, was when I went into an ice-cream parlour and walked up to the counter, and for the first time in the game my rampant kleptomania was noticed by a shopkeeper. I went up to the cash register and stole its contents, and the guy looked at me like "What the hell are you doing?" and proceeded to assault me and call the cops. I ran away from him, by jumping over the coffee-tables to where a family on a day out was sitting, stood on their table and set fire to the place [I think the rationale for the game letting you be a bastard is a) you're free b) you're playing a jerk and c) everyone who lives on this flying city are all racists ] - the ice-cream heist kept getting crazier and crazier as more cops poured through the entrance, until it was just such a bizarre event I was laughing.
Later, I found out that although this wasn't scripted, the guys on PC Gamer podcast had created a similar fictional scenario in THE SAME ice-cream parlour. Couldn't have been coinicidence! - I think the key is the fact that up 'til that point you are allowed to freely steal money lying around everywhere and nobody cares - not sure why - and then suddenly in that particular Shop, the A.I. is told to notice you doing it. With spectacular results.

Okay, this has made my brain work, nifty.

But that's enough from me tonight!


-Des

P.S. - John Hurt in Doctor Who?  MUH?