In part one, I described how to begin outlining a novel.

To summarize, create a grid describing characters, plot and setting and add in everything you can think of. Have a character that fascinates you but not sure what role she’ll play? Put her in. A subway fight, but don’t know who’s fighting or why? Add it. Want a massive, totally-out of place stucco mansion in the middle of Iowa farm country but not sure why? Yup, put it in there.

Do not discount your imagination. Just because you don’t immediately understand something does not mean it’s purpose will not reveal itself later. And if it doesn’t, you can always take it out later.

Revised Outlines

By the time you’ve filled in the grid, you’ll have a solid grasp on your novel from start to finish. You’ll understand the role each scene plays in advancing plot and character.

That’s the time to change the multi-column grid into something simpler with only three columns that combines several of the columns from the earlier version. The first column contains scene information with the POV character in bold and info about that character in italics. Plot and setting information, underlined, is in the central column with any notes in the right-hand column.

The goal of this outline is to describe the scene in its entirety that you can write from. Since you shouldn’t have one sentence for setting, another for character and one more for plot, your outline shouldn’t either.

For example:

The police station was a beehive of activity. Phones rang, cops pressed by each other in the narrow gaps between desks. All the commotion made Ian’s anger grow. Not to mention these cops were doing their part to solve the case, but Ian still hadn’t briefed Chris, his sergeant.

So, we have Setting / Setting / Character / Plot. What if we combine these elements:

Ian wanted to throttle the next uniformed beat cop who bumped his desk in a rush to get by. The ringing phones, the chatter of cops, the moving bodies—Ian wanted to scream. The cacophony made it hard to think, but also reminded him that the investigation pressed forward but Chris—his sergeant—still hadn’t made one damn second to hear Ian’s briefing.

In the above, character, plot and setting are all tied together making for more interesting reading.

Character Outline

While this three-column outline works for plot, you must track your characters’ development as well. It can be very easy to put together a tense, fast-moving plot only to find your characters don’t change and remain one-dimensional. No matter how fabulous your plot, if it has characters your readers don’t care about or aren’t rooting for, no one will care.

To track character growth, I created a chart that works in parallel with the plot outline described above. (That is, they are two separate but related documents.) Below, I’ve presented the steps in character development along with how they relate to Luke Skywalker in Episode IV of Star Wars.

Why Have Two Outlines?

As mentioned above, one tracks characters and one tracks plot. Usually, a novel will have more than one major character and you should track their growths. Not to mention that the three-column outline should not be locked in stone and changes might still happen… changes that might affect your characters.

In my case, I had outlined how the main character of my novel would develop—what events in the story affected them and forced them to change and grow. Then, I decided to revise the plot again to increase the tension. After moving elements around, I discovered Disaster One for a character—which should happen about a quarter of the way through the book—now happened at the halfway point. More than that, Disasters Two and Three happened at the same time, not allowing the character the chance to grow.

My solution was to make Disaster One into a new Disaster Two, combine the event of the original Disaster Two into Disaster Three, and bump up the impact of another event in the story to serve the role as Disaster One. Doing this allowed me to keep the plot fast and excited, but also let my character grow and remain interesting so readers will root for him.

All of This is to Say…

You results may vary. You might be able to sit down and write a great story with little planning that only requires a quick polish. If so, I envy you. Or, you might enjoy outlining but have a different method. Or take my method and tweak it. It’s all good.

But if you’ve found yourself going round and round on story you know to be great, but can’t make it work, maybe take a step back and create an outline.

It’s amazing what you can discover (and fix) when you can see the whole story over a few pages.

One of the things I hate about being hurt is the haze the medication puts my mind in…I was never one of those people who needed/used drugs to get inspired creatively.  They instead have the opposite effect on me entirely.  Which is driving me absolutely bonkers considering I now have a week’s worth of free time to write.  I had a great idea for a story and I have the outline completed based on a dream I had a few weeks ago but I can’t think of an opening for the life of me.  Intros are always the hardest part for me, I want to set the stage and paint a  vivid picture for the reader so that they become so immersed in the lives of the characters they can’t put it down.  But thats what every writer wants isn’t it?

Maybe tomorrow will be better, for the pain and the writer’s block.

Here’s hoping that this time next year I can add published author to my resume.

For those who are interested…  I’ve copied below a summary of my Exodus sermon series.  Yes, it stops at chapter 20. We’ll be covering the rest of the book in a Wednesday night Bible class.

If I was a really clever preacher, I expect I’d have some fancy acronym, or 6 Steps, or an intricate diagram of how Exodus demonstrates the process of Becoming People of God.  I just have a list of observations and applications.  If you want to make some suggestions on how this list could be simplified, I’m all ears (and eyes).

I really enjoyed this series and hope others find it beneficial also.  If you can’t figure out how I reached a particular conclusion from that text, First, look at the relevant post on the blog; Second, leave a question on this post and I’ll respond.

EXODUS: Becoming People of God

Ex. 6:6-8 – Exodus tells us of a God who’s very involved in the lives of His people.  This is our God!

Ex. 1 & 2 – The beginning of Exodus tells us that God’s working, even when we don’t see Him.

Ex. 2:11-22 – Like Moses, we need to stand up for God.  Then we need to fall before God, relying on Him.

Ex. 3:5-6; Rom. 8:9-11 – The ground wherever we go is Holy, because we bring the presence of God with us in a special, tangible way.

Ex. 3:12 – The guarantee of God’s presence is not in the way we feel, but in the results we witness and in the lives of the people we worship with.

Ex. 5:22-6:1 – Moses didn’t let Pharaoh defeat him.  Don’t let reality wear you down.  Keep the dream.  Keep the wonder of the message of God salvation.

Ex. 9:34-35 – BEWARE. If we get to a point where we know all the answers, or if we’re unwilling to make any more changes in our lives, then, like Pharaoh, we’ve stopped listening to God, our hearts have hardened.

Ex. 6:28-7:7 Moses learned to let God be God and look at the results.  Moses didn’t have to get busier, or try harder.  He just had to deliver God’s message to Pharaoh and let God do the rest.

Ex. 12:11-14 – Jesus is coming for his people and we have faith in his promises.  We eat today as though God’s promises have already taken place.  That’s faith.

Ex. 12:3-4 - As God formed his new nation He emphasized stewardship, and community.  Sounds like church!

Ex. 13:17-18 – We often think of baptism as the end of the journey, not the beginning.  If temptation was part of Jesus’ life from the moment of baptism, we shouldn’t expect any less.

Ex. 12:29-30; Gen. 15:18-21 – The Exodus reveals a God who values justice, but pairs it with patience because He loves His enemies and gives them opportunity to repent.

Ex. 14:13-15 – Can we imitate the Israelites at the Red Sea?  Can we stand still at the foot of the cross and accept God’s grace and forgiveness? or do we need to find our own solutions?

Ex. 15 – In Moses’ song, God’s actions and Moses worship intersected.  We also need to ensure that our worship reflects the events of our lives.

Ex 19:3-8 – God seeks relationship with us before He demands obedience.  How’s your relationship with God?

Ex 20 – We can’t ignore God’s laws.  Notice the similarity between the first 4 and last 6 commandments and the 2 greatest commands in the NT (Mt 22:34-40).  Loving God involves keeping His laws.

All right, finally I’m creating the sequal to Clay! So far, I have ideas for gravity changers, sticky walls, two new droppable blocks, and acid blocks. I’m pretty excited about it, and once again I’m working with a friend (Zachary Bruno) to make all the graphics. The only things I’ve had to make so far (well, really just edit) are the acid and sticky walls, the gravity arrows, and the background a little. It looks good, but there are a few glitches I have to work out still. Hopefully it won’t stall progress much. I plan to make all the features first then start with the levels, so I can fix all known bugs. Pink walls = sticky walls, and green floors = acid floors. When you change the gravity, it changes the gravity of all the blocks, so it adds much more depth to the overall game. So many options for level design now. Also, the blocks come out randomly, but each level will still be possible no matter what. To play the first Clay, click here.

Also, yesterday I created a cool Christmas based graphic with GIMP. Basically I made two layers, the top one transparent and with the black outline, and the bottom one with all the colors. For the shading, I just took the paint brush, set the base color, and then lowered the opacity. All I had to do is go over the desired area a couple times, getting lower each time, to make it look darker. Today, though, I noticed the leg looked more like a piece of cardboard with green wrappings on it, so I changed the wrappings to look more rounded. Unfortunately, it’s still not looking the best, but I’ll continue to try to fix it.

Interesting, huh? It was a spur-of-the-moment idea, and took me about 30 minutes to create. I went for a REALLY colorful theme, as you can see from the image, with stained-glass and a giant candy-cane in the background.

-Nathan Wood

P.S. - Yeah, I know the post image is pretty pitiful. I just wanted to publish this fast. I figure the image included in this can make up for it, since I didn’t feel like prettying up the post topic. Really, does it matter all that much to you?

I Used to Hate Outlining

Back in school, I hated when English teachers wanted me to outline an essay before I wrote it. My method of writing—for fiction, essays or whatever—was to write and revise and move stuff around and re-write until I was done—a process called “organic” writing.

So I’d write my essay, then create the outline.

Though I scored good marks, I ended up with poor writing habits that have taken me 20 years to realize even with evidence staring me in the face:

• Dozens of short stories that took many, many revisions to fix plot issues and figure out what they were about
• About the same number of abandoned stories and story fragments
• A 250,000 word novel that wanders across too many character and too many subplots
• Four dynamite novel openings that die out because I didn’t know where they were going

Ten years after the last novel attempt, I decided it was time to try again, but I needed to avoid the mistakes of the past and embrace outlining to make sure I did not waste months or years on endless drafts and revisions.

And it worked.

In this two-part post, I’ll cover the importance of outlining and a method I have found that helped me organize a story before I began the first draft.

First Outline

Don’t Think About It

The first thing to do when outlining your novel is to write down everything you have in mind—scenes, beats, characters, settings. Even if you don’t know where an idea would fit, don’t censor yourself—your creative mind can be a lot cleverer than your rationale mind is willing to admit. For example:

• You have this image of a brutal fight on a subway, but aren’t sure who’s fighting or why. That’s fine. Add it in. If you can’t figure it out, remove it later.
• A lot of set up is needed before your villain can take action, but you can’t just have him walk-on halfway through the story. So, you need a scene or two with the villain “on stage” even if you don’t know what he’s doing. To do this, simply add “Villain Scene One” and “Villain Scene Two” in the outline. Later, when you’ve figured out what the villain might be doing before hatching his plot, add those details.
• “Laurie” is a late-30’s divorcee and gifted detective. She’s torn between using her gifts to investigate crimes (driven by the unsolved murder of her mother), and wanting to start a family since she feels the window to have children is closing. She’s smart, funny, a little insecure and swears too much. But you don’t know what role she plays. No problem—sprinkle in scene titles “Laurie Arrives at Crime Scene” and “Laurie Talks to Ex-Husband” and see if they connect to anything else. If it turns out the story has no role for Laurie, keep her around for another story.

And, now that these three ideas are written down, you might have Laurie be the one who tracks down and fights the villain on the subway in the opening chapter. All three problems solved!

Structure

Where and how you capture this information is very important. For your first outline, use a grid with scenes as rows and columns titled:

• Brief scene title
• Character
  • Who is the point of view character
  • Their mood and how it will be shown
  • Where they are in their arc
• Plot
  • What happens
  • Chekov’s gun – Being set or going off
  • Foreshadowing or pay off
• Setting:
  • Time since previous scene
  • Time of day
  • Location and sense details
• Notes

For example:

Breaking items into character, plot and setting lets you trace a column to see how each of these story elements progresses and relates. For example:

• Character & Setting
  YOU FIND: Every scene with Asha is at her office.
  ASK YOURSELF: Does Asha have a home/social life, or is she a workaholic? Or, do you need to find a way to vary the settings where we encounter Asha?
• Character & Plot / Timeline
  YOU FIND: Chris gets shot and nearly dies causing his fiancée to want him to quit the police force, but it’s only a day later that Chris is running after the villain.
  ASK YOURSELF: Can more time pass, can someone else chase the villain, or can a less serious injury make the fiancée want Chris to quit?
• Character Arc
  YOU FIND: Chris does not grow, change or learn from the challenges he faces, making him a one-dimensional character.
  ASK YOURSELF: How would he change after getting shot and how would that change affect the plot? Would he hesitate now in drug raids, which is what allows the villain to escape a few scenes later?
• Plot Logic
  YOU FIND: The villain follows Chris to his house, but they why would the villain get confused during the car chase in the climax?
  ASK YOURSELF: Does the villain follow Chris to the office? Then what makes Chris go to the office?

Revise & Organize

As you explore and develop your story, you’ll discover missing connections and motivations. You’ll find answers to questions you’ve asked yourself already exist in the story. Those blank grid cells will get filled in while you’ll realize others have no place in this story.

You’ll also re-arrange scene to improve pacing, not keep a character off screen for too long, change the timeframe of the story and combine scenes (for example, you discover a scene to develop your character and another scene to set up some plot elements can happen at the same time).

You may revise your outline many, many times. That’s to be expected and not the sign that your story isn’t working. Besides, it’s a lot easier to revise an outline than a 100,000 word manuscript.

What Happens Next?

I will post a follow up piece to outling to show what your initial, multi-column outline should morph into as you get closer to beginning to write your first draft.

Downloading trial versions of programs and playing with them is a little hobby of mine. Every time I hear about a new one, I have to check it out. In this way I’ve found many useful writing programs: Scrivener, VoodooPad, Macjournal. I’ve also wasted a lot of time when I could have been writing.

I need a program that will taunt me into writing. It would look like the Paperclip Guy in Microsoft Word 97. When I pull out Chapter 1 for the eleventh time, the Paperclip Guy would say, “It looks like you’re trying to revise this again. Would you like me to kick your ass into Chapter 2?” When my characters decide to go on a quest to find the magic-thingy so they can stop the evil wizard from destroying the world, it would say, “It looks like you’ve run out of original ideas. Would you like some advice? a) Give up writing; b) you’re a loser.”

A while ago I wrote about Scrivener, one of the very best writing programs out there. Unfortunately non-mac users can’t take advantage of it. A good enough reason to convert to mac, as I see it, but I will keep my religious views to myself.

Recently I found another program, less well-known than Scrivener, but doing many of the same things — and it has a Windows version. It’s called SuperNotecards, by Mindola (www.mindola.com). At $29 it’s a bit cheaper than Scrivener, and provides some different tools.

If you were to ask Dax, “Do you have any index cards?” the reply would never be, “Maybe. I’ll look in my desk.” Dax would say, “What size? What color? Neon or regular? Lines or no lines? Do you want them in a pad or loose? How many packs do you need?”

I am embarrassed to admit how many index cards I have in my desk, in my drawer, in my closet, in my briefcase, in my glovebox… I love index cards. I use them for everything — quotations and questions, poems and notes.

When I was in seventh grade, we learned how to write a term paper using 3×5 index cards – one card for each fact and reference. Our teacher had already forced us to write a hierarchical outline with Roman and Arabic numerals, capital and small letters. But cards were much easier; information could be shuffled around more easily. To please her, I re-wrote my outline several times, and still only got a C. I decided that hierarchical outlines were a way for teachers to weed out those who were not really serious about term papers. No outline, you get a D. My outline was only just ‘adequate,’ not ‘complete and detailed.’ Notecards were the way to go, I decided.

I have found several notecard programs for computer and for phone, but most are for making flashcards, not so useful for writing. SuperNotecards is made for writing. Scrivener uses cards, too, but SNC allows you to categorize and link them in many more ways. There are so many things to think about while writing a novel – continuity of characters and plot, the introduction of backstory and foreshadowing. SNC excels at this kind of planning. It’s made to organize and link pieces of information in various ways, useful for both fiction and non-fiction.

You could write your entire novel on cards, but that’s not really what it’s designed for. I switch over to Scrivener when I’m ready to write. I may not use SNC for every project, but when the amount of information I’m dealing with becomes overwhelming, this program perfect. Its flexibility allows me to use it in different ways — to create a broad outline of my story or to detail every aspect of every scene.

If you are more a seat-of-the-pants writer, not an outliner or organizer, SuperNotecards may not appeal to you. But if you’re struggling to get your story together, or find yourself re-reading pages of revision notes, this program may surprise you.

It’s funny how when you think something is over, it can come right back and something can bloom out of it. But then when it comes back around, is it possible to completely forgive and just jump into it? What if you’ve had nightmares about said situation…is that a sign that something bad is going to happen, or is it just a lie that is forming in your head because of fear?

I’m learning every day how much I can relate to the things that Hadley goes through. I get very angry when people say she is me. I don’t think I will ever be able to stress enough that she isn’t me at all. I can just relate to a lot of things about her. Her life can parallel mine in a few ways. Or many ways. Depends on how well you know me, I suppose.

I’m also learning, that writing a story outline is difficult for me. I had my planner setting in front of me and I skimmed through it a little bit. All of the major points plotted out and dated. It’s the stuff in between that has my mind stumbling. Somehow, something will end up clicking in my head. I just need to give it time.

I have been a writer for a long time.  Not published mind you, but the writer of fragments of stories over the years.  In the past 5 I have put a bit more dedication into it, but still have not felt comfortable enough to really push what I know I can do.  It has cost me, but I hope I have learned.

Most writers know the story that they are going to write.  They know the characters, the story line and the ending to some degree.  The details mostly come out in the writing but most I would say are planned on during the outlining phase.

I don’t seem to be that kind of writer.  The stories that I have begun with an idea of how to get from beginning to end just sort of fizzle out in the interest department, at least to me.  I get about 20,000 words into them and then I lose interest.

It is not the story or the idea that makes me lose interest.  It is the process of keeping up with the plan.  It seems that I do not do well with writing according to a set plan.

It seems that when I write according to a plan that I come up with where the story wants to go and it does not agree with the destiny that I had intended when I worked out that outline.  More often than not, where the story goes seems to come into conflict with what I had orgionally designed.  The more I work towards getting back into the framework of the outline, the more I find myself at odds with myself on the stability of the story.

I’m not really sure what the problem is.  I should be able to in-cooperate what I have discovered into the outline that I have set up, however, there seems to be a problem.

When I write I focus a lot on the characters. After all, what is a story without characters? Sure you might have a setting, a plot, but none of it matters without someone the reader can connect with. For me the characters are the key not only to the story but to the writing itself.

I can really get into the characters heads some days, even to the point where it is difficult to come back to the real world. While I am in there, I find that the things on the outline don’t mean as much as the problems that the characters face in the immediate moment of the story. Here is where my problem begins. I focus more on what is inside than what is going on around them.

Now this is not necessarily a bad thing, but I lose track of the plot and it is difficult to pull it back into shape once I know where the characters are at in their minds. What happens with them does not always coincide with what I had planned.

This story that I am writing currently does not have an outline, it does have a vague idea of conflict but it is not set out as to what needs to happen.

There is magic in this. I have already come upon a few surprises that I would never have anticipated in an outline. I am going with this, its how I write, at least for now.

I Used to Hate Outlining

Back in school, I hated when English teachers wanted me to outline an essay before I wrote it. My method of writing—for fiction, essays or whatever—was to write and revise and move stuff around and re-write until I was done—a process called “organic” writing.

So I’d write my essay, then create the outline.

Though I scored good marks, I ended up with poor writing habits that have taken me 20 years to realize even with evidence staring me in the face:

• Dozens of short stories that took many, many revisions to fix plot issues and figure out what they were about
• About the same number of abandoned stories and story fragments
• A 250,000 word novel that wanders across too many character and too many subplots
• Four dynamite novel openings that die out because I didn’t know where they were going

Ten years after the last novel attempt, I decided it was time to try again, but I needed to avoid the mistakes of the past and embrace outlining to make sure I did not waste months or years on endless drafts and revisions.

And it worked.

In this two-part post, I’ll cover the importance of outlining and a method I have found that helped me organize a story before I began the first draft.

First Outline

 Don’t Think About It

The first thing to do when outlining your novel is to write down everything you have in mind—scenes, beats, characters, settings. Even if you don’t know where an idea would fit, don’t censor yourself—your creative mind can be a lot cleverer than your rationale mind is willing to admit. For example:

• You have this image of a brutal fight on a subway, but aren’t sure who’s fighting or why. That’s fine. Add it in. If you can’t figure it out, remove it later.
• A lot of set up is needed before your villain can take action, but you can’t just have him walk-on halfway through the story. So, you need a scene or two with the villain “on stage” even if you don’t know what he’s doing. To do this, simply add “Villain Scene One” and “Villain Scene Two” in the outline. Later, when you’ve figured out what the villain might be doing before hatching his plot, add those details.
• “Laurie” is a late-30’s divorcee and gifted detective. She’s torn between using her gifts to investigate crimes (driven by the unsolved murder of her mother), and wanting to start a family since she feels the window to have children is closing. She’s smart, funny, a little insecure and swears too much. But you don’t know what role she plays. No problem—sprinkle in scene titles “Laurie Arrives at Crime Scene” and “Laurie Talks to Ex-Husband” and see if they connect to anything else. If it turns out the story has no role for Laurie, keep her around for another story.

And, now that these three ideas are written down, you might have Laurie be the one who tracks down and fights the villain on the subway in the opening chapter. All three problems solved!

Structure

Where and how you capture this information is very important. For your first outline, use a grid with scenes as rows and columns titled:

• Brief scene title
• Character
  • Who is the point of view character
  • Their mood and how it will be shown
  • Where they are in their arc
• Plot
  • What happens
  • Chekov’s gun – Being set or going off
  • Foreshadowing or pay off
• Setting:
  • Time since previous scene
  • Time of day
  • Location and sense details
• Notes

For example:

Breaking items into character, plot and setting lets you trace a column to see how each of these story elements progresses and relates. For example:

• Character & Setting
  YOU FIND: Every scene with Asha is at her office.
  ASK YOURSELF: Does Asha have a home/social life, or is she a workaholic? Or, do you need to find a way to vary the settings where we encounter Asha?
• Character & Plot / Timeline
  YOU FIND: Chris gets shot and nearly dies causing his fiancée to want him to quit the police force, but it’s only a day later that Chris is running after the villain.
  ASK YOURSELF: Can more time pass, can someone else chase the villain, or can a less serious injury make the fiancée want Chris to quit?
• Character Arc
  YOU FIND: Chris does not grow, change or learn from the challenges he faces, making him a one-dimensional character.
  ASK YOURSELF: How would he change after getting shot and how would that change affect the plot? Would he hesitate now in drug raids, which is what allows the villain to escape a few scenes later?
• Plot Logic
  YOU FIND: The villain follows Chris to his house, but they why would the villain get confused during the car chase in the climax?
  ASK YOURSELF: Does the villain follow Chris to the office? Then what makes Chris go to the office?

Revise & Organize

As you explore and develop your story, you’ll discover missing connections and motivations. You’ll find answers to questions you’ve asked yourself already exist in the story. Those blank grid cells will get filled in while you’ll realize others have no place in this story.

You’ll also re-arrange scene to improve pacing, not keep a character off screen for too long, change the timeframe of the story and combine scenes (for example, you discover a scene to develop your character and another scene to set up some plot elements can happen at the same time).

You may revise your outline many, many times. That’s to be expected and not the sign that your story isn’t working. Besides, it’s a lot easier to revise an outline than a 100,000 word manuscript.

What Happens Next?

I will post a follow up piece to outling to show what your initial, multi-column outline should morph into as you get closer to beginning to write your first draft.

Torts is over – YUK!  It’s not that it was so hard – it was just so stressful – so intense!  Actually, fact pattern was relatively benign – it was just loaded up with tricks and red herrings and I fell for MANY!!  Hopefully I wont LOSE points…

Problem was I was not prepared with terms/definitions/rules on step by step way he wanted analysis to flow to the extent I should have been.  I did fine, but missed a bunch here and there that should have come easy!  I needed a good 2 more days to memorize it cold!  It’s not like I didn’t have the 2 days – I just didn’t do it!!  THAT is what is making me mad now – had the opportunity and let it slip away.  In the last 48 hours before the test, I bet I spent 38 hrs studying!  I should have been THAT urgent within last WEEK, not 2 days!!!  Lesson learned, tho.  I just hope I did well enough to get a B.

So, tomorrow is Contracts – take home, open book.  YIKES!  Why am I terrified for that?  Plus, Professor Contracts has been knowing to write impossibly difficult exams.  I have prepared SOMEWHAT but again, I have not attempted to memorize and really KNOW material in way I should because I know I have all this material available and the time to do it in (24hrs to complete it).  That is BAD!!  If I was smart, I would have prepared like it was a closed book and then only used notes as back up!!  Again, lesson learned (although hopefully I will have good chance to do well still)

Finally, my last chance – Criminal law next week.  I plan to get that one right.  Professor Criminal Law was quite helpful to me and I feel a need to show her I was worth the struggle so I MUST do well!!  It is open book but under strict 3hrs so I need to know this info COLD because I wont have time to thumb through my notes much!  I have a week to get it right!  Thankfully much of my outline is done so I can just memorize/KNOW it!

Oh man – at least it is almost over – how draining – i mean I feel beat up!!  It’s good tho – I know I will feel such a sense of relief that I made it through to the other side of this hellacious last 3 months!!!

AHHHHHHHHHHH!

Ahhhh!!!  Finals!

Everything comes down to this! Your grade, your GPA, your good standing with the parental units (who “aren’t paying for you to party all the time, you know!”). You’ve got tests and papers and presentations and it’s all coming at you so fast and you barely opened the book all semester and there was that 2 week span where you couldn’t stop watching Gilmore Girls on DVD and skipped, like, 12 lectures and now you have to make it all up and pass all the tests and OMFG.

How are you ever going to survive?!

These feelings of stress and near-mental breakdown come every year, with every finals week. The combination of stress, seasonal depression and gallons of caffeine wears down even the most seasoned student until she’s hunched over that 7lb textbook at 4am on a Tuesday crying into her Venti Americano. But once the fear subsides a bit (and she’s wiped that snot from her upper lip), she gets into her groove, remembers her fool-proof study strategies and plows through those notes like drunken frat boy through a wall.

If you’re feeling the finals stress (who isn’t?!) and need a little advice on how to make it through, read on. This week the CollegeCandy writers share their secrets for finals survival. One of these is bound to get you one step closer to that 4.0. And if not, well, at least give us an “A” for effort.

Brithny – Duke: I make sure I’m never too far from a coffee shop. Oh, and I’m seen double-fisting sugar-free Red Bull quite frequently too.

Norah – Drake University: Thankfully, as a journalism student, most of my “finals” are semester-long projects. But to stay on top of things, I rely on my Yo-Yo Ma station on Pandora…and I ask a friend to change my Facebook password during finals week.

Kendra – University of Pittsburgh: My finals trick is Adderall. I know it’s kind of like cheating, but it really helps me buckle down and just study. Other than that, my trick is coffee. Lots and lots and lots of coffee.

Elizabeth – UC Berkeley: I listen to annoying 90’s pop music to keep me awake.  Screw caffeine, I’ll take *NSync and 98 degrees any day.

Lauren – University of Michigan: I think setting goals is important. Like, “I can watch an episode of Community after I finish outlining this chapter,” or “I can go on Facebook and stalk my ex for 15 minutes after I successfully run through all of these note cards.”

Ness – Sheridan: I’ve been diligent about taking really good notes during my whole semester. While I attend a school that is very hands-on, I have the bonus of having pretty easy finals so I’m not too stressed. Thank you so much, art school!

Lexi C. – Brown: ACRONYMS! They are a fantastic way to store lists of information you might need to remember. I always tried to make mine as funny or as tasteless as possible, and use people’s names too! For example: Instead of “My very elegant mother” for remembering the order of the planets, whip up something like “Missy’s Vagina Eats Men” and you’ll ace that shi

Ricki – University of Michigan: After years of searching for the perfect study place, I finally discovered Starbucks. The noise level is perfect- you can ignore conversations at other tables since you don’t really care what other people are saying, but it’s not too quiet that you feel bad if your phone vibrates. Plus, you can indulge in a caffeine trip whenever you need!

Noa – CU Boulder: Get everything you need (and I mean everything) before you settle down somewhere to work: tissues, a giant fountain soda, snacks, hand cream, lip balm, a cell charger… You don’t want to give yourself any excuse to get up. Then make a list of what you need to get done. You’ll feel super good when you can cross things off (even if one of those things is “order dinner”).

K – GWU: Finals abroad are not easy. How do I cope? Escapism in the form of a 4 am flight to Sweden! Viking husband, here I come!

Jessica – Hofstra: Triple grande nonfat lattes from Starbucks, lots of chocolate, and index cards. I write out flashcards and notes for everything I’m studying. Writing everything is annoying but I’ve found that it is definitely the best way to remember it all!

Kelly- Simmons College: Studying with someone else helps me, because I learn better if I’m also teaching.

Brianna – Fordham university: My best friend and I always have an annual study date at our favorite coffee shop and we share iced cappuccinos and sandwiches while we study. Even though I dread finals I’m always looking forward to them because it’s the only time we have four hours to gossip and eat…. Oh yeah, and study of course.

Mechelle – Florida State: While the rest of campus is hopped up on Adderall, I’ve drank enough Diet Coke to kill a horse.

Charlsie – Hollins University: The key to getting through finals for me is to do as much work prior to finals week, so I don’t have anything hanging over my head. I’ve been able to do all my work, so for this upcoming finals week, all I have to worry about is taking an essay final and turning in a portfolio. It makes things easy peasy when you get them done ahead of time.

Emmy – Loyola: I hide in the stacks of the library where I don’t have cell phone reception and no one can distract me. Oh, and I drink a LOT of water to help with the lack of sleep.

Sarabeth – University of Texas: I just take things one chapter at a time with 15-30 minute breaks in between. It keeps me from cramming things at the last minute, which never works.

What’s your secret?

Elsa is in the doghouse, metaphorically speaking

Thursday, December 10
Waning Moon
Uranus Direct (oh, so many dates were given for this one)
Sunny and COLD!

I never got around to posting yesterday, but you had the Tuesday update, so I didn’t feel too guilty.

I’m really tired of feeling nauseous all the time. Wish the stomach bug would clear up. I still have an appetite — it’s just the consequences kind of suck. I’m a little better today, and hope that means I’m on the road to feeling like myself again.

Got the assignment for Confidential Job #1 finished and out the door. Phew! Now, I have to drive to the public library in Greenwich today so I can invoice them, since they only take invoices over IE, and I can’t run IE on this machine without major re-arranging. So I send the invoice from the library computer, which runs IE. Yippy Skippy.

Got quite a bit of writing done, although it always feels like it isn’t enough. I let the pressure build on the Apocalypse story so it would flow well this morning. There’s more of a fractured fairy tale feel to it than anything else. I suppose one could argue that the Apocalypse isn’t funny, but one has to find humor in tragedy, and sometimes, you get the point across better. That’s what I hope to pull off, anyway.

I got an idea for a thoroughbred-oriented tale for another anthology percolating, too. I was going to pass on that deadline (again, the end of the month), but this morning, the idea started going, so . . .if I can clear the Apocalypse tale off the desk by next week, I’ll go for it.

Did a lot of work on the outline I mentioned the other day. However, I don’t know how I want it to end. I may have to write my way into it in order to find out.

Had a good writing session this morning.

To answer some of the comments on the Tuesday update, no, telling the characters to shut up doesn’t work. But at least I feel like I’m being active, rather than just letting them muck around inside my head too much. I’m trying to prioritize projects for 2010,while still leaving room for the unexpected — the unexpected opportunities, for me, tend to be the ones that pay off both in financial and creative terms, so I don’t want to lock myself in to too much.

Sent out nearly two dozen pitches/queries for the plays whose rights are now coming available. They don’t do any good just sitting in the drawer — they need to get out in the world and earn their keep.

Perhaps I’ve simply gotten addicted to royalties!

Longing for the days when there were so many magazines publishing fiction one could make a living at it,

Read some of the reviews for ALICE. I’m surprised that a lot of the reviewers think TIN MAN was better; I think ALICE was. It was tighter, more focused, and the chemistry between Scorsone and Potts worked really well, in my opinion. In particular, Potts is completely present and committed in every moment of every shot he’s in, whether the focus is on him or not, and that brings out more from those around him. You can tell he was trained in the theatre, and it serves him well.

Well, that’s what reviews are, aren’t they? Opinions. I’ve certainly read some reviews on my work and wondered what they hell they watched/read, because it had nothing to do with what I believe I wrote!

On the agenda for today: writing, baking, a few errands, working to get the decorations up. I feel a little better, but sill not great.

Annoyed at FedEx — they delivered a package, but not only did they contact a neighbor instead of me, they left the cardboard package out in the pouring rain. I am NOT amused, and I have let them know my lack of amusement.

Very tired. Was woken up by a disturbance at 3:30 this morning, and, after that, the cats didn’t let me go back to sleep. Ah, to live in a place where the doors actually close, and the little darlings can be locked out! All the doors in the apartment have so many coats of paint on them that only the front door actually shuts. In general, the cats were difficult anyway — running around squeaking all day, Elsa got out and had to be chased down the stairs before she could get out of the building (she was so proud of her adventure; she boasted to the others for the rest of the day); they were all rummaging all the time. It was like having a trio of two year olds in the full throes of “The Terrible Twos.”

Speaking of which, as I wrote the above, Elsa jumped on a table (where she shouldn’t) and knocked over a candleholder, breaking off the head of the figure and smashing the glass insert. That cat is in the doghouse today!

I cleaned it all up, I’m posting this, and then it’s back to the page. I put the figure’s head back on and fixed another ceramic piece Elsa knocked over and injured a few days ago. Sigh.

Devon

PS. I heard a shriek from the kitchen. Iris investigated the repaired ceramic figures. She’d someone managed to knock the head off one figure again, and it was stuck to her tail with the wet glue. I had to chase her through the apartment to get it off before the glue dried and repair the figure again and well, you can imagine . . .

Last week as I began reading Revelation I didn’t make it far before I hit a snag.  Actually, I only made it three verses, until I landed on this:

Blessed is the one who reads the words of this prophecy aloud, and blessed are those who hear and obey the things written in it, because the time is near!

This of course, got me to thinking, “How does one obey the book of Revelation?”  The journey that ensued and consumed the last week of my devotional time with the Lord came out something like this…

To “obey” Revelation means essentially to worship Jesus.  Revelation is “prophecy” (1:3; 22:7)–the spirit of which is “testimony about Jesus” (19:10).  Testimony about Jesus defines those who are for Him (1:2, 9; 6:9; 11:7; 12:11, 17; 15:5; 17:6; 19:10; 22:16–testimony about/for Jesus seems to be the primary designator of Christians in Revelation; 10:7; 11:10; 22:6–of prophets testifying about Jesus; 11:18; 16:6; 18:20, 24 of prophets testifying about Jesus in parallel with “saints”) and defines those who are false prophets (2:20; 16:13; 19:20; 20:10) because their testimony leads people to worship someone other than Jesus (19:20).

Twice John tries to worship the angel who speaks with him.  Twice the angels forbid him and urge him to worship God.  The first time (19:10) this urging appears to elaborate what it means to “hold to the testimony about Jesus”.  Alternately, the second exhortation to worship (22:9) appears to elaborate what it means to “obey the words of this book” (which is itself a testimony about and revelation of Jesus, 1:1).

Repeatedly (7x in the opening 3 chapters) we hear the refrained exhortation: “The one who has an ear had better hear what the Spirit says to the churches” (2:7, 11, 17, 29; 3:6, 13, 22).  Rather than being an aside to those reading the Spirit’s words to the churches in chapters 2-3 (i.e. an aside to us), I believe it makes more sense that the Spirit’s “word” should be that which comes after chapters 2 and 3.  One reason for this is in the repeated blessing on the one who obeys the words of the prophecy (1:3; 22:7).  Essentially John says, “Blessed are you if you obey [1:3]…Now that you’ve heard, you’ll be blessed by obeying [22:7].”  Notice: the blessing at hearing is NOT repeated in chapter 22.  Instead, John curses anyone who, having haerd, chooses to add to or take away from the prophecy.

As for timing, I believe the book’s own timetable seems to make the most sense.

• “The time is near (1:3; 22:10)
• “…must happen very soon” (1:1; 22:6)
• “little longer” (6:10)
• “There will be no more delay!” (10:6)

UPDATE: I’ve been wondering lately if maybe our living in the last days has more to do with the NT idea that in Jesus’s resurrection the final restoration has already begun and than it has to do with the number of years before Jesus’ return.  More on this later perhaps?  We’ll see.  Back to Revelation…

Lastly, the imminent expectation of Revelation’s occurring is also bolstered by John apparent placement of himself in that group which would experience the persecution of Revelation “very soon” in 1:8 (“I John…who shares with you in persecution”).  If the book is something imminently to happen (which does not preclude its being future yet still, so don’t get too nervous if this messes with your chart) then I think the repeated exhortations to endurance are not idle (2:10, 24; 3:11; 13:10).

In light of all these thoughts, here is my proposed outline for the book:

I.  Introduction to the revelation and testimony to Jesus Christ (Ch. 1)

II.  Exhortations to the Churches called to live in response to the revelation/testimony about to be given (Ch 2-3)

III.  ”What must happen soon” (22:6) so that the world might repent and turn from their blasphemies (9:20-21; 11:13; 16:9, 11, 21) to worship God (19:10; 22:9) with all who are His (4:1-11; 5:8-14; 7:1-12; 11:13, 15-19; 14:1-3; 15:1-4; 16:5-7; 19:1-8) (Ch 4-22:5)

IV.  Closing exhortation to obedience: worship and come to Jesus in the brief time before He comes (22:6-21)

I’ve been slow in my approach to Revelation in past years, so this is among the first of my forays into understanding this infamously difficult book.

Thoughts?  Questions?  Shared questions?

Photo of the comedian Norman Maclean taken from The Urban Clansman, the blog of the Galgael Trust

From the Guardian -

Its freshly oiled pine hull is as fragrant as a wet winter woodland. Modelled on a thousand-year-old prototype, this hulking birlinn – a Gaelic longboat – will soon be ready to sail out along the Clyde and up the west coast in homage to the time when water was Scotland’s main thoroughfare. It is taking form in an old iron foundry in Glasgow’s Govan, home to a uniquely imaginative community project called the GalGael Trust.

Here, local volunteers teach carpentry, saw-milling and metalwork, as well as boat-building and sailing – the skills so valued in the once thriving shipyards that secured for this area its reputation as the workshop of the empire. It was the inexorable decline in demand for such skills that gifted Govan the reality it contends with today: paralysing levels of unemployment, chronic alcohol and drug addiction, and habitual violence on the streets. The fractured life stories of the men who come here to learn bear witness to all this.

The GalGael philosophy addresses what many an academic study has theorised: that deprivation has psychic as well as economic consequences; that social exclusion is ameliorated as much by a sense of place and heritage as it is by targeted benefits and instrumental interventions; and that hope flourishes in the most unlikely soil. Crucially, given Govan’s history, it recognises that the future is informed by the past.

Perched on a high-backed chair as expertly rendered as anything you’d find in Heal’s, Jinksy tells of 10 lost years sitting in the house, “becoming a vegetable”, after he was laid off as a council roadsweeper. Then a pal told him about the GalGael. “I’d lost trust in people, but there’s a family feeling here. I’ve always been an outside person and this brings you back to the land. It gives you an idea of place.” Over the years, the GalGael has helped hundreds like him to regain confidence in their working abilities, relationships and community.

Gehan, who set up the trust in the mid-90s with her late partner, explains how the act of building and sailing a boat in the same way that one’s ancestors did offers an immediate connectedness that is different from academically acquired history. The fact is that many city-dwelling Scots are only three or four generations removed from rural living, and connection to the land looms large in the national psyche. Many descendants of the half-million Highlanders driven off their crofts to make way for sheep-farming now live in poverty in Glasgow. While the Scottish land reform movement has scored recent successes with community buyouts like those on the isles of Eigg and Gigha, the GalGael is restoring an area of derelict farmland in Argyll.

It is thus entirely appropriate that some of the men working here have recently enjoyed a foray into acting, as extras in a television series on Scottish history. The History of Scotland, which concluded last Sunday on BBC Scotland, proved controversial, with many senior academics lamenting its broad strokes and glaring omissions. This reaction was perhaps inevitable, given the startling lack of popular treatment of Scottish history, as well as the legacy of poor and piecemeal teaching of the national heritage in schools. For many Scots, knowledge of their history begins and ends with William Wallace – and Mel Gibson’sBraveheart version of the man at that.

The 10-part series, fronted by the archaeologist Neil Oliver, was a watchable introduction, and avoided the usual shortbread-and-saltires mythologising, even tackling the country’s role in the slave trade. But it remains to be seen if this will serve to kick-start public examination of Scotland’s political, social and cultural past, or be seen as the history box ticked for another decade. It’s worth noting that on the same network Andrew Marr has been offering an examination of just the first few decades of British 20th-century history with the same amount of airtime that Oliver had.

Homecoming, a year-long festival celebrating the Scottish diaspora that concluded on St Andrew’s Day, prompted further examination of the national self-image with the news that the centrepiece Clan Gatheringevent in Edinburgh, which attracted claymore obsessives from across the globe, had made a £600,000 loss. Those clan chiefs, so beloved of our ancestry-minded American and Canadian cousins, continue to draw resentment over their collusion in the Highland clearances.

An organisation like the GalGael is local by intention, a bespoke vision that is constantly retuned and refreshed by its participants, rather than a one-size-fits-all template imposed from Holyrood or a charitable behemoth in London. To recognise its worth is not to submit to David Cameron’s big society rhetoric, but to see how small-scale originals like this one can only succeed alongside centrally governed support structures.

If it can teach us something nationally it is that, in understanding our past, we must face the faultlines of Highland or lowland, Catholic or Protestant, nationalist or unionist that have come to define the nation, though not always the people within it. And particularly at a moment when independence is once again top of the political agenda.

Moreover, if a sense of history is about a grasp of narrative and one’s place in it, this can only assist us in imagining the future. Last year theGlasgow 2020 project, funded by Demos, found that inhabitants of some of the most deprived areas continued to tell stories of optimism for the future of their families, friends and neighbourhoods. The true legacy of history can be hope.

From YouTube -

From the Galgael website -

Folk without an enriched sense of their culture are like trees with shallow roots… To our minds, this analogy describes the loss of identity and sense of meaningless that creates vulnerability to the vagaries of the worst excesses of modern life. A situation steadily worsened by the consistent undermining of the bonds of community.

Agencies picking up the pieces and the tab for tackling the symptoms of this rootlessness are essential. But beyond this – what is called for is nothing less than to reconvene a sense of ‘peoplehood’; deep roots for an identity that builds resilience, embodies shared values, and in the same breath, transcends narrow forms of nationalism.

The very name GalGael is our way of re-rooting these notions of identity in nourishing ground and recognises that there is both a bit of the stranger and a bit of the native in us all. In history, Gal Gaidheal were a 9thC people; the Gal – the ‘strange or foreign’ Norse, embraced by the Gael – the ‘heartland people’.

As a modern day people, GalGael folk have been re-visioning inclusive forms of community that build on our interdependence rather than slip into dependency culture, and that explore our collective responsibilities, not just our rights. From this stand point, we are reweaving the fabric of our families and communities, experimenting with notions of clanship, extended family and kinship.