So, when revising, read for:

1. Relevance and redundancy

2. Amount of quotes vs. use of your own words

3. Sentence structure and passive voice

4. Format, citations

The numbered steps mean I’m suggesting rereading four times. Yup. At least.

Insert spell/grammar check in whatever software you are using before these steps, maybe after, maybe both.

Now I’ll erase this list from the white board and clean up the white board!

“A broken bone can heal,
but the wound a word opens can fester forever.”

~ Jessamyn West

—

A broken bone doesn’t always heal. And that injury might cause you to forever favor whatever limb you broke. But the childhood saying about sticks and stones is true. Sorta. Words do things physical damage cannot. Words hurt. Words make it so you can’t even figure out what words are in your head. Like right now, I can’t figure out what I’m trying to say because the first thing I thought of when I read the quote was “oh, bullying, right.”

Writers recognize the power of words. Good words, bad words, insufficient – immature – words. Children do too. And victims. Anyone who’s been called a name that stuck them like – like you might stick a balloon with a pin to pop it. So, that means, everyone knows. But not everyone admits it. Not everyone wants to admit they’ve been hurt by words since sometimes it’s just so silly. Or sissy. Or wussy. Where was I? Oh yea, it’s so easy to hurt another with so few words. So easy to cause wounds. But wounds can be healed too.

Words are tricky. I think I’m just going around in circles so as to continue writing. Words can make you talk in circles – if you don’t think the other person is listening, or understanding, or caring. Words are thoughts, names, injuries, promises, oaths, wishes, wants, places, objects, ultimatums, lies, truths, or echoes.

1. anger

2. animosity

3. angst

4. apple

5. anchovy

6. answer

7. antennae

8. antifreeze

9. actor

10. action

11. anonymity

12. allowance

13. addition

14. Andromeda (I said nouns so proper nouns count too!)

15. availability

16. accent

17. anaconda

18. anagram

19. albatross

20. anthem

21. anathema

22. alabaster

23. appearance

24. ass

25. asthma

26. allergy

27. agriculture

28. adjective/adverb

29. ark

30. arc

31. antimatter

32. avocado

33. artichoke

34. Anteres

35. atoll

36. anchor

37. American

38. Audi

Ok I’ll be done.

One of the difficulties I’ve run into so far with my tree nut allergy (was diagnosed summer 2011) is not knowing how to handle all the words you get on food labels about how this food was processed in the same place that manufactured something with tree nuts or this food was on the same equipment as something with tree nuts. Or this food was introduced to tree nuts once and we can’t confirm nor deny whether there are tree nuts present in this food.**

May favorite one is: “May continue tree nuts or peanuts.” I call that one the lazy CYA*** statement.

Anyways, I like chocolate and what usually comes in chocolate? NUTS! Any good decent chocolate (more expensive than the candy section at the convenience store) will probably not be tree nut free. For example, regular M&Ms? No nuts. However, peanut M&Ms? Might continue almonds! (gods I hate that!)

I picked up a box of dark chocolate truffles to try from a “high end” grocery store we shop at somewhat frequently. Anyone not familiar with chocolate truffles needs to know they are about bite size – 2 bites if you want to savor them and coated with cocoa so they don’t stick. The truffles I grabbed had a warning that said:

“Manufactured in a facility that processes peanuts, tree nuts, wheat, milk.” Ok I’m thinking, been in the same room as nuts – that’s ok. (Being around nuts hasn’t caused any kind of problems for me.)

Anyways, few days later, after dinner, I open the box, grab 2 truffles for a snack/to try, etc. You know, what you do when you want a little bit of chocolate or little bit of dessert.

A few minutes after I finished 1 truffle – I was suddenly extremely stuffy (I had a 24 hour allergy pill that morning) and breathing heavy even though I was sitting quietly in my living room. Used my inhaler, started feeling a little bit better. Took a benadryl. Waiting for the benadryl to kick in seemed like forever.

Sometime that evening I also used my nebulizer. (I have asthma.) Freaked out a little, calmed down. That also involved admitting I was freaking out about the reaction and then making myself calm down. Thankfully I wasn’t alone – in case the drugs didn’t do what I needed them to do. (I do also have an epi-pen per my doctor’s orders.)

Next day I woke up feeling like I had lost a marathon and a food eating contest in the same day. I still needed allergy and asthma medicine and I was horribly tired.

This reaction wasn’t severe. This reaction was not caused by eating food that clearly stated had tree nuts in it. This is why manufacturers should be more clear about food allergy statements.

This post is not meant to advise anyone about anything, it’s meant to share my experience since many people do not understand food allergies. This experience demonstrates a few things that my doctor told me – allergies are dose independent. It does not matter how much you eat, it can effect you. It  also demonstrated that food allergy reactions can come in stages – there is the primary stage that is a few minutes to a few hours from the exposure to the food and the secondary reaction that can be 8 to 12 hours later. I think I experienced both since I didn’t actually start feeling normal/better until over 24 hours after the initial exposure/reaction.

*I’m not allergic to peanuts. Peanuts are also not tree nuts.

**That might be hyperbole.

***Try Google.

Check your voter registration.

Supporters and Opponents in Congress

Open Letter to Congress from Artists and Creators

Do it for the kittens

http://www.explosm.net/sopa.html

Why is SOPA Bad?

http://sopastrike.com/

https://www.eff.org/

End Piracy, Not Liberty

http://vimeo.com/31100268

http://mashable.com/2012/01/18/sopa-dark-ages/#43905Wired

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:CongressLookup

Why ████ Censoring Wired █████

Small annoyances.

Allergies/medical

For example, a person who is lactose intolerant (or allergic to fish) probably can’t eat cheap meals like tuna noodle casserole without substitution of some kind – or being sick later. Chemicals like MSG is another issue too… Season packets need to be MSG free, which automatically makes them more expensive.

Then of course there’s pollen. You can’t open your windows in the middle of allergy season if you’re deathly allergic to what’s out there… which is just a few periods of 2-4 weeks for me….but that sure is long enough.

Gluten free foods are usually more expensive. Foods specifically manufactured to be a certain allergen free are usually more expensive too.

Specific to your region

You aren’t going to open the windows in June, July, August, or even September and go without the air conditioner in Texas or other southern states just as you aren’t going to go without heat in December, January, or February (or March or April?) in Minnesota and other northern states. Some areas of the country see more extreme temperatures than others.

Cost of living. Some things are more expensive depending on where you live…. gas…food…transportation…housing…the list goes on. (And this isn’t even counting states like Alaska and Hawaii.) Transportation varies depending on where you are as well. If I lived in a northeast city I might be able to use public transportation to get from my house to point B…but I don’t. I couldn’t use the bus when I lived less than 15 minutes (by car) from campus to get to school.

Utilities and broadband, cable providers vary by city too. A cheaper option might be available, but you might not have access to. This can be as simple as what side of town you live on.

Cultural/Religion

I can’t specifically think of anything but I would bet money there are cultural or religious requirements that would not allow people to do something that might actually save them money.

Health Insurance

Just another thing that varies wildly and really effects your budget. The cost of the insurance as well as the costs after insurance both vary and should be considered. Dropping health insurance to save money isn’t a viable way to save money.

Family

Maybe you have family you can rely on to help out – like you have dinner at your parents every weekend and they pay for it. Maybe your family relies on you and you could save money if they didn’t. Well, you can’t really cut out your family now can you? You could throw daycare in here too. If you have a family member to babysit for little to nothing then you save money on daycare. A large amount of money – which also varies depending on where you live.

Access

So I guess I’m saying one of the problems with giving advice on the Internet is you don’t know what kind of access a person has to resources – necessary resources or just things that are nice to have.  Like, I live under an hour from an ikea, and they have cheap furniture – but not everyone lives that close to an ikea.

*This post was actually sitting in draft form on my hard drive since sometime last summer. I finally finished it because I was looking for something to write today.

Now the headache is back, can’t read because focusing on smallish print in an oldish paperback is hard. Tried peggle, that doesn’t work either. So I thought hey, maybe I’d actually try to do today’s writing prompt. 

I fucking hate haikus.

So I’ll go back to my earl grey tea with vanilla soy milk and wish that I had the last three weeks of new Batman and Batwoman comics I’ve been reading. Well, last 2 weeks plus today’s.

Dogs (lived with them)

daffodils (up after the crocuses)

dandelions (blowing seeds)

danger (ER visit)

dragged (kids get dragged places)

deer (seeing in the field)

day (at the library)

dots (glasses in junior high)

dreams (wanted to be a veterinarian, then a scientist, then a writer)

dads

dear (cause it seems to fit when thinking of childhood)

don’t (do that!!)

distractions

dead/death

dreary (rainy days)

done (with a book, with school, with chores)

drift (watching clouds)

deed (doesn’t apply but it’s a d word!)

drowned (bugs, frogs in the pool)

dandy (cause I wanted a word that starts with d that is a candy but thought it up instead)

dessert! (Christmas cookies every year, baked by mom)

desiccated (hard shell crab dinner at home on the patio)

dragons! (I had the infamous loved dragons and unicorns stage)

digging (in the dirt, under rocks, I had the less infamous liked to play in dirt stage)

different (me)

I’m thinking the logical next step is to start writing every day, so I can get in practice again. Well, outside of being forced to write every day for class. I did blog more, once. I could use the blog to write every day or I could use prompts to write freehand/fiction. Or I could do stream of consciousness sit down with a timer and write for some specific exact period of time. I did subscribe to a blog that offers writing prompts but I’d really rather use one that I’ve got recommendations for.

I know if I do start actually writing a book I’ll use scrivener. (I’ve used it for writing in school and it’s awesome… a research paper and an independent study paper/project.)

I have also remembered that it would be fun to write a scifi(fantasy)/future/alternate history sort of story by paying special attention to the society/sociology. I’ve just figured out the future/alternate history possibilities as well as wondering if I should read more “alternate world” scifi(fantasy) books.

And then there’s the part where all of this is technically just procrastinating starting writing. So, really, I could procrastinate starting for at least another few weeks… and then if I have a job by then use the job to procrastinate more! Obviously I need to not procrastinate if I’m serious! Am I serious?

I know I like to write, I know I can research – even if I’ve really only researched for school, that doesn’t matter, because I can research. I know I like to be doing something that is creative – whether that be blogging, writing, or knitting. I also know there is some (small?) part of me that would like to publish a book – see my name on a book sitting in the store. (But isn’t everyone that way?) I also know a little about the best ways for me to work thanks to school – like changing things up every now and again. Going to $tarbucks with a laptop is almost clique now but it can really help get work done. Ok I’m not ending a blog post by talking about taking a laptop to $tarbucks.

So, I have learned. I do have a vague general idea for how to write a novel. I have no idea if it’s a good idea, I have no idea how to go about it and I have no idea if I should research by reading similar books. Perhaps if I think I should then it’s a good idea? I’d also have to figure out if I want any kind of post-apocalyptic action. I’d lean towards no because I think that kind of storyline is a bit like vampires – easy to overdo. Warping some type of current society could be interesting – but would I also need to do some political research? (not tea party vs. everyone else, but at the country level). Anyways. This is enough for now. I’ve got this here so I can refer back to it if necessary.

What in the world am I going to blog every day about?

Anyways.

Words here.