How young Suitov feels about Fi:

( 2 silly pop videos )

The ongoing saga of - well, mostly Dork Boy in this bit.

Little Rigey, in a four-and-a-half-year-old fit of temper, had declared that he was going to be an agrochemist and not a warlord. For this, he had been barred from the library.

(I didn't want to leave it there; this would've been longer with more dog if I hadn't run out of time and needed to go zzz.)

I seem to have become addicted to posting 'microfiction' on Twitter. This must be how they get you sucked in. #Brains.

Question: Would you like, dislike or be indifferent to seeing my Twitter updates mirrored on my blog (probably in a single post per day from some tool like LoudTwitter)?

If I found a thing that would only collect and post updates that contained certain user-defined hashtags, I'd use that for sure.

---

I get my two week placement with FM&T soon. Looking forward to it. I think they want to keep me on for longer.

---

Seen a cool video that will interest Altivo and other fur-types.

That's randomly got me looking at paw glove tutorials on YouTube. I'm not a furry or fursuiter and don't have any interest in the whole full-body itchy-plastic-fuzz deal, but I would love a properly awesome pair of paw gloves with proper pads, like so (but Black Dog, or Grey Dog, instead of Red Fox).

I saw some leatherwork gloves that are nice-looking, but far too fetishy and immobile. I'm nervous about my manual dexterity or movement being impaired in any way. (The shoes are awesome, though.)

I suppose fingerless fursuit gloves would be object-defeatist. I do like my fingerless gloves, though. Shame it's too hot at the moment to wear them.

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"Frerene is not a chick," said Suitov icily.

The continuing adventures of Dork Boy and Poochy

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Still a bit stuck on Frerene, but I know what happens later in the story, which is a bonus. (Well, we all know what happens, but I know some of the circumstances. Getting there, however... well.)

In Ree's absence, I'll have to ask Slen. My brother always seems to have good ideas when it comes to women.

...

*thinks about that for a second, then looks quite worried*

A happy little tale about monks and collapsed buildings. Contains injury.

Gentle feedback welcomed as ever.

edit:
"evil" –Kat
"dark" –Jenny
"Love it" –Vespers
"badass kitty" –Anke
"tasty goodness" –Ree
Thanks guys, I really appreciate it.

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Frerene was the only woman in the world.

The continuing adventures of Dork Boy and Panty.

I'd written half a post, sat on it for getting on for a week, and finally decided I should post it rather than waiting for the rest to occur. I still don't know where I'm going to finish this.

View the original post at Black Dog Blog

Frerene was the only woman in the world.

The continuing adventures of Dork Boy and Panty.

I'd written half a post, sat on it for getting on for a week, and finally decided I should post it rather than waiting for the rest to occur. I still don't know where I'm going to finish this.

View the original post at HellHound.net

Would someone be kind enough to rescue Sylvie from Weft? ;)

In other words, don't make me shove Basaltine in his sheep outfit again.

edit, 7th am: Alternatively, save Weft from his own stupid mouth.

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"Do you know any... tricks? Besides sitting up and offering a paw?"

"Yeah, loads," said Mistake. "Well, some. Well, one. Well... look, I'm a really fast learner when I want to be, right?"

Some dark-lords-in-training just can't seem to catch a break.

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"Rabbits!" he added, and ran away and stuck his head down a hole.

Hell yes there's more.

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I became so repeatedly mildly irked by the skewed placement of the collar on that profile view I did of Weft (I've had it set as my desktop wallpaper for a couple of days for a laugh) that I've decided to make it An Undocumented Feature instead. This way, it can be fixed right now instead of waiting for me to get home and open Photoshop. You perceive that my reasoning is coldly logical.

So there you go: the Offwhite citizenry now fastens their shirt collars on the right. Slaves and monks button to the left. I think the political (aristocratic) class buttons to the left too, but that's not to say they're equated with all those holy men and convicted criminals, heavens no.

You see, they've this concept of things alternating as they ascend, shown also in the malarkey over which hand you pass with. Someone one position above you would merit a certain hand, while for someone two positions above you'd pass with the other hand, for three positions above you'd go back to the first hand, and so on. (Before anyone asks, for a spouse you'd use both hands... but one would hope you'd be on close enough terms to pass cheeks instead.)

Aliens would be expected to button their collars to the right. >:)

Now to finish off my peas and chickpea paste and have another look at Commissioning.

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The hellhound adoption saga continues with Suitov helpfully pointing out all the apparent plot holes so far.

When I considered how to approach this story, which is an alternative telling of Basaltine's version of events, I considered writing until the point at which Basaltine's tale ends and then stopping. But that really would be pointless, because, other than some divergences in detail and a heavy difference in style, they're telling the same story.

Besides, it's in Suitov's character to question everything, even when it's potentially to his own detriment, and I rather wanted to work one particular detail in (namely the dog's name. Sometimes I think if I don't use some of the random facts and backstory in my mind, I'll drive myself nuts with frustration). So on we go, and hope that I can work out where I'm going to end it before the end...

Probably ought to have named the housekeeper, because it's far more in Suitov's character to think of people by name than as 'Servant Q', but I haven't thought of a name for her yet. So it's actually me giving her short shrift, not him...

edit, 13:13 24/03: Leaning towards Bryony Navesink or Neversink. I first thought of Catriona, but that's both Gaelic and the name of a schooldays friend of mine. Oh, and I just glanced up at the big flatscreen telly that plays muted on the wall all day, and there was an advert with a brief shot of a calico kitten that had had a ball of wool put on it. SRS BZNS.

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Robin McKinley: In which it is demonstrated that there is more than one kind of hellhound

The hussy! Because, well, clearly she has been looking at my site and reading my ongoing stray hellhound story. Because all Real Authors steal stuff off random unpublished amateurs on the internet. This is known.

Nice coincidence, though. Have to admit I've never read any of her books, because they have names like The Hero and the Crown and summaries like Aerin is the only child of Arlbeth, king of Damar, and his second wife, a foreigner from the North. Aerin inherits her mother's pale skin and fiery red hair, setting her apart from all other Damarians (who are dark-haired and dark-skinned) and causing her to be feared and ostracized by them. (from Wikipedia)

Thanks to Ree for sending me the link. It can go in my hellmutts collection.

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Another Twine Wars prequel, what I am mostly calling Baine's Resignation.

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Comment to this post and I will give you 5 subjects/things I associate you with. Then post this in your LJ and elaborate on the subjects given. (If you've done it before, feel free to add a link so I can avoid duplication.)

Altivo gave me the following five:

Doggerel [heh heh, make of it what you will]
The dictionary definition of doggerel is comic verse of irregular measure. I am not quite sure what this means, and my working definition of doggerel is "rhyming poetry written in little time, not (necessarily) any good".

The reason I wouldn't ever mind my poems being described as such is quite simple: it has the word "dog" in it.

I do enjoy poetry, reading and writing it, but it has to rhyme and scan impeccably and not be what I consider 'up itself' or 'pretentious'. It helps also if something happens in it and it's funny. Poetry written for children tends to be good for these qualities.

I've been criticised, within a small writing feedback group I've frequented, for my overadherence to rhyme scheme and meter. I don't particularly want to move away from it, though. Those are what I like about the stuff in the first place.
Otherwise it
tends to feel
like prose
with
unnecessary
line breaks.

Doggerel! Doggerel is when people rhyme fire with desire (or, worse, higher), love with above (or, well, love with anything that rhymes with love; it's all over-done) or alone with [on my] own. When I hear these, I want to smite things. A good one I heard once, from Shania Twain I believe, was optimistic rhymed with pessimistic.

A doggerel might also be a cross between a dog and a cockerel. It could comb its own fur, but it might give you some rather sharp pecks on the cheek.

English
I am, I suppose, what one might call very English. I am not talking about being born in Chester, but more about such things as dry and ironic humour, honesty, fair play, dislike of making a fuss, excess of reserve and not doing sex. Oh, and liking dogs. A lot. However, I never drink tea, don't think all that much of the Royal Family or the Church of England, loathe cricket and football and am chronically disinterested in the weather.

I like the English language, though am aware that it's a pig for non-native speakers to learn. (Something about a Great Vowel Shift, which always sounds vaguely scatological to me.) I have no ear for accents and sometimes have trouble telling what people with thick accents (of any sort) are saying. Perhaps for this reason, Received Pronunciation accents — posh English, also called BBC or Queen's English — are the most pleasant on my ears. My own accent might be described as modern RP or BBC English with the edges knocked off, or... well, perhaps I'll record it someday and let others judge. I've lived in the North all my life, but don't have much of a local accent, if any at all.

I find the Heroes character Mohinder Suresh's Indian-tinged (or... less) accent extremely attractive, and was most peeved to find it was fake. Still good, though! The actor talks about it here.

I'm extremely weak to wordplay, too. Puns aren't the lowest form of wit. They are de rigeur, even obligatory, at least when one is handed the perfect set-up.

I'm also a pedant when it comes to those parts of English grammar that I fully grasp, which aren't necessarily all of it. I do have the reputation as go-to guy within the office for matters of spelling, punctuation or usage. What surprises me is that people are so nervous and unsure of some really very basic conventions. What might surprise people is that I didn't study English beyond the mandatory level (GCSE; 14–15 years of age) at school. And I learned nothing from those lessons beyond parroting someone else's interpretation of a poem. (This is what I think of the analysis of poetry by classes of 14–15-year-olds.) My secret? Genetics and upbringing, sad to say. I came into the world hard-wired to read; the usual autistic difficulties with language passed me by quite. I learned to read when I was about two years old (apparently it wasn't a question of being taught by a pushy parent; Small Me decreed that I jolly well would be taught) and didn't stop for many years.

There, I used the phrase "jolly well" as an intensifier. What more proof of Englishness do you need?

Sang-froid
The dictionary definition of sangfroid is "coolness of mind; calmness; composure". A quality I much wish I had. On the other claw, a less neutral and more negative definition — 'cold-bloodedness' in the sense of not caring about people — might easily be applied to me. I wish mankind no specific ill. Let's leave it there.

I also write a character known for both sides, coolness and coldness. (He means well. The problem may stem from the fact that he means well in an entirely theoretical and abstract sense.) However, in my writerly universe, your Captain Kirks and your headstrong princesses tend to get themselves killed out of clear incompetence and what we might call excessively glandularly-oriented decision-making, to the benefit of chaps like him; in other words, I deeply distrust people who claim to be led by their 'hearts' or 'gut feelings', which generally means "prejudices and guesses I don't want to bother to substantiate", and so I do not do things like setting up such rather reptilian sorts of fellows as cheap fall guys to 'prove' emotional humans are superior to thinking ones. Calculating people tend to succeed. At least ones who know how to play the socio-political game.

I actually have a character called Sangfroid, too; she is the great-grandmother of the character I've been talking about. She was a military general. It's said her legendary composure only cracked once, when her infant twins were in danger of death. (I bet whoever said that wasn't present at the birth. "More morphine, darling?" "Only half a glass, thank you; I'm driving.")

Twine [not string]
There was once a little installation of UseModWiki, hacked a little bit to include a 'boilerplate' text functionality, which was rather an achievement considering its owner didn't actually know any Perl. Its name was Twine Encyclopaedia and it was and is is the main publically-accessible repository of information regarding the HellMutt's writing characters, not to mention those of des co-writers at Profusion.

The little UseMod that could is named Twine because Twine is a word associated with Profusion's shared universe — though in exactly what manner remains to be seen. That's the nature of shared universes. The idea advanced so far is that it is the name of an interplanetary organisation that sets itself up as some breed of self-declared police force, tasking itself with applying and upholding interplanetary treaties and laws.

According to current plans, The Twine Encyclopaedia shall eventually apotheose and become some manner of wiki add-on in an installation of Drupal, which shall be database-driven and PHPish and Chaotic Good. Its owner does not currently know any PHP, except phpinfo(). You may be sensing a pattern here.

Kitties
As aforementioned, I like dogs. In actual fact I grew up with two exceptionally good-natured and well-trained Golden Retrievers. The stupider one knew upwards of 100 words in three languages plus sign language. This is why I don't believe in stupid dogs, only unambitious (one might even say inhibiting) owners.

I do not, however, currently enjoy the necessary honour of living with a dog, instead being drooled and occasionally sat upon by a fat, eleven-year-old, somewhat toothless cat.

They say write what you know, and so far I have a character, and to a lesser extent an entire species, based on or influenced by my inept observations of the feline nature. According to my fair and unbiased assessment of catkind, the character is murderous, spiteful, graceful, hateful, extremely fast, distractible, equal parts cynical and naïf, excessively interested in moving objects, rather dim, insecure, almost impossible to keep hold of if he wants to escape, utterly convinced of his own species' superiority to all other forms of life, and obsessed with balls of yarn. (In addition, he loves high places, can't bear to have his tummy touched and really hates getting wet.)

The character fiercely denies being kittyish in the least. He does not have fur, pointy ears or a tail and never wears bells around his neck, so we will have to believe him.

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I think I've got Weft's face (in profile) pretty much cracked now, thanks to help from my parent. I'll plaster it up later tonight and invite feedback.

It's ridiculous how much easier it is to represent people visually if one a visual thinker and able to look at the things. Neither of those describes me, which is basically why I am not an artist.

Whereas if I write "his head is oddly shaped, rising shallowly backwards from a sloped forehead, while his face, wide in bone structure but very lean, tapers forwards at the front; his eyes are disconcertingly huge, he looks perpetually worried and he is by no means beautiful" you have to take my word for it, if you showed me a picture of someone like that, I wouldn't know where to begin describing him.

I live in words and concepts. A picture means nothing to me until it's decoded. I or someone else (and others are better at it than I am) must describe to me what's in it, or it remains a very vague swoosh of colour that slips out of my head.

Let's see... for example, have you seen the Armada Portrait? Think of it. Do you get a mental image of what it looks like? I have a very vague wisp of colour, consisting of a creamy wodge and red hair and a white ball, and a mental description that's more easily put into text than any other format: "squareish painting of a woman [Elizabeth I of England] in a large puffy dress covered with bows, a lace collar standing out around her neck, with red, styled hair. Her right hand is resting on a globe [representing conquering the world], and in two windows either side of her in the background are ships [representing the Armada her dragon smashed]. The colour is bad, as though the painting aged badly." Evidently I've forgotten the mermaid figurehead and the fan in her hand.

On reflection, this could be why I spend so much effort writing image alt text. I use it!

Incidentally, the Armada Portrait is best enjoyed while listening to Ayreon's Dragon on the Sea.

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More worldbuilding enjoyment. Instarrians are insane and so much fun.

Beauty
Fashion
and more about striation, a beauty fault

This explains why you'll never convince Weft that he isn't ugly. He can prove it with maths!

View the original post at HellHound.net

I'm having more trouble with the diet since picking it back up after Xmas. I'm still doing the cobbled version where I eat as much green veg as I want, but now I'm wanting other stuff. Like sundried tomato paste and cheese on a toasted bagel or muffin with faux sausage and fake bacon... mmm. Well, I'm still losing weight slowly(? probably too early to say, actually) and steadily.

It's just that the watermelon on the worktop's calling to me. I want it, that seedy harlot, I want to bite it.

Ah well, all very boring. Other than that, been co-writing on the first Twine Wars story, Seeds of Trouble, as well as starting another silly short called Rat Run, because we like being busy. (It's distantly based on the old kiddies' TV show Knightmare. That rocked so hard, dude.) And reading some of my Xmas books, losing weight, finishing Neoquest... I think that's it.

Someone gave me scented soap today, as a thankyou for feeding their cats. I find this hilarious. I thought scented soap only existed in clichés.

(Oh, and Anke, I discovered that there's a song called Rat in a Maze by Shade Empire. Hehe.)

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I am currently pwning a pair of jeans that fit me now, and did not before. So anyway, apart from a little writing and gaming with Paul I haven't done much that's interesting these last few days. I've been sleeping a lot and suspect, from the state of my nasal plumbing, that I'm coming down with something not quite bad enough to keep me off work. Well, it never is, is it?

Here, have a story: Apples and Apparitions, or Brimstone and Bribery

Oh, and I've been having wacky dreams, in a boring and still unbearably domestic definition of wacky. One involved my father writing a congratulations card to me, thinking I'd married one of my friends because I'd changed my name. Later on in the dream I was telling three friends about his mistake. We all found the situation funny. I remember that one of the girls was wearing a khimar. She wasn't anyone I know. Are my dreams now to be designed to fulfil Equality Commission quotas or something?

Going to Slen's house this evening for a party. There will be people there I don't know and I won't be able to eat anything or drink anything, so I shan't report further unless by some chance it isn't a mightily awkward waste of time.

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