Tag Archives: writing

My Rules on Monstrous Monday

Posted on March 21, 2023 by mohawkvalleygirl

I have often said that writing begets writing, and I have been writing several things this evening, yet here I sit, looking at a blank space on my “Add New Post” screen.  Maybe I was writing the wrong things.  I wrote a couple journal entries and finished a letter to a friend.  By my rule of Any Writing Counts, that should help.  Then again, why do I think that my rule made up by me has to always be true?

“Why oh whyyyyy can’t I make a blog post?”

I throw in a picture of a monster, because it is Monday.  Regular readers know how I love my Monstrous Monday Posts.

Is this the formula for a decent blog post?

If I continue to add pictures of monsters, I’m sure I can get to 200 words.  I realize making blog posts of at least 200 words is just another one of My Rules For Me.  What is it with me and rules?

Are they pondering the rules of magic?

I wonder if I think something magic is going to happen if I follow these rules.  For example, when I started this blog, I decided I was going to make a post every day for one year.  I did pretty good for the first year, and not bad off and on for the subsequent years (it’s been almost 12).  I don’t know that anything magic happened.  I don’t make up the rules about what counts as magic.

 

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Mid-Week Monsters from my Media Library

Posted on March 2, 2023 by mohawkvalleygirl

I am having a hard time writing anything these days.  I open a notebook (the spiral-bound paper kind), uncap a pen, and…  sometimes I write a word or two, sometimes not.  I guess the important thing is to keep trying.  So I will try to make a blog post.  I know what!  It’s Wednesday:  I will do a Mid-Week Monsters Post! I look in my Media Library…

He’s not the only one who was scared!

I open with Nosferatu (1922), because I have been watching it on DVD while running in place on the mini-tramp this past week or so.  I have only been doing short runs, so it took a few times to see the whole movie.

Not showing the monster, but appropriate for the day.

I love Young Frankenstein, in fact, I love most of Mel Brooks’ movies.

 

“This is a good boy!”

Here is the monster! At first, I went to Facebook and downloaded a new photo, but when I tried to put it in the post, it was really small, so I went back to my Media Library.  I do not properly understand photos and computers.

“I said I only wanted a trim!”

After Dracula (although they couldn’t call him that) and Frankenstein,  I put in the Wolfman.  I don’t know what movie this is from; it was in my Media Library.  Sometimes I just download pictures I like.

This silliness has gotten me over 200 words.  Apparently I can come up with more words pecking in one letter at a time with the stylus.  Tomorrow I will try again with pen and paper.

 

 

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Perhaps I Should Have Left It Blank

Posted on February 20, 2023 by mohawkvalleygirl

I am sitting here staring at a blank space and feeling that my mind is equally blank.

Well, I thought that if I typed in something, anything (pecking it out one letter at a time with the stylus, of course), I could go on from there.   Sometimes these little tricks work.  Sometimes not so much.  However,  I want to make a blog post.  I will attempt to make a blog post.

The famous white bathing suit.

I throw in a picture to pep things up. Earlier I watched Creature from the Black Lagoon on a DVR’d episode of Svengoolie.  I loves me some Svengoolie.

I know how she feels.

This is also not the picture I was looking for.  However, sometimes I like to jump on the I Hate Monday bandwagon.  I personally will not be pouring myself such a measure of booze.  I had a little wine earlier, but not enough to render Monday even more hideous than it is forced to be by nature.

Cheers, my love.

Speaking of wine, here is a picture of my sadly missed husband, Steve, enjoying a libation at the Waterfront Grille in Herkimer, NY.  My friend Kim and I had a couple drinks at the Waterfront yesterday.  Did I mention that in my Scattered Saturday Post?   It is far too much trouble to go back and look.

I guess I can bill this as a Wrist to Forehead Sunday Post, because I must sound like I am about to swoon, dramatically posed with the back of one wrist to my forehead.  I will try for a little less drama tomorrow.

 

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Monsters, Murder and Memories at Mid-Week

Posted on February 2, 2023 by mohawkvalleygirl

I can call this a Blogger’s Sick Day or a Blogger’s Stress Day (I think that might be a new one), but I am making yet another post about not making a decent blog post.  Some may find it frustrating that I am sharing no details about my sickness or stress.  Others will be happy to be spared the sordid details.  I always say explanations are tiresome.

Unrelated but amusing photo.

I throw in a picture to pep things up.  I had thought to make this a Mid-Week Monsters Post, so here we are.

The fact is that even when undergoing great personal trauma (accuse me of overdramatizing if you like), I cling to my image of myself as a writer.  I have not traditionally experienced great success in writing about what bothers me.  What often happens is that as I write, I think, “Wow, I am really justified in feeling upset!”  And I get even more upset.  Go figure.

We have always been a lovely couple.

I have experienced greater success in distracting myself from my problems, if not with monsters, then with memories.  The picture shows my husband Steven and I in Fabulous and Fatal, a murder mystery we presented to benefit the Herkimer County Historical Society.

OK, that got me over 200 words.  I’ll call it a blog post and hope for a better one tomorrow.

 

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Slacker Sunday, But Here’s a Snowman

Posted on January 30, 2023 by mohawkvalleygirl

Earlier today I posted on Facebook, “Two things done.  Roughly 5,438 left to go!”  In fact, I got more than two things done today, but the backlog of things that yet need doing looms before me in a most menacing manner.  Although I have had a couple Mohawk Valley Adventures lately, I just don’t feel I can make good blog posts about them.  And so I slack.

A giant snowman might cheer me up!

I took this picture in my neighborhood yesterday while on an otherwise unremarkable walk.  I thought it would be nice to include in my Sunday blog post.  Waste not, want not, I always say.

A smaller snowman, but still cheery.

I remembered I had another picture of a snowman in my Media Library.  I even remembered it was November 2020, so my brain is apparently not completely fried.

It would take a lot of oil to fry this brain!

I venture into non-sequitur territory with The Brain from the Planet Arous.  Or is it more of a tangent, since I just mentioned brain?  I ought to know these grammatical considerations.

All this nonsense is my way of continuing my Blogger’s Sick Day.  I will strive to get my act together in the coming week.  Will I succeed any better than the last dozen times I have thought to get my act together (never mind the last 8,562 times)?  A little uncertainty will add interest to my week.

 

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Making with the Memories

Posted on January 27, 2023 by mohawkvalleygirl

If I make a Throwback Thursday Post a day late, that just means I am throwing back by one more day.  Another thing one may judge me on:  I am not going to worry about sharing pictures I have shared before.  For one reason (some may call it a rationalization, but I decline to enter into any such argument), some readers may not have seen the particular pictures I choose or they may enjoy seeing them again.

What a long introduction.  Perhaps I should go back to writing my blog posts in advance and doing a little more editing.  For right now, I’d better make with the pictures.

I’m not taking any of his nonsense.

Here is a throwback to 2012 and the Ilion Little Theatre production of Harvey.  I played Veda.  My husband, Steven, was Dr. Chumley.  How I loved being on stage with my husband!

Again, I was not putting up with his nonsense.

Here we are on stage together again, in Splitting Issues, again at Ilion Little Theatre.  I forget the year and am too lazy to look it up.

I dished out the nonsense in this show.

I was actually looking for a different murder mystery picture, but this is a great theatre memory,  A G.R.A.V.E. Murder, presented at Mohawk American Legion to benefit Herkimer County Historical Society.  That reminds me, I’d better get writing on my upcoming productions.  Off to make more memories!

 

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Lame it on Dateline

Posted on January 21, 2023 by mohawkvalleygirl

You know, instead of Blame it on Dateline.  Or have I used that before?  I would not be surprised.  I often fail to post on time, and I almost always watch Dateline  I am a little obsessed.

This was in my Media Library.

Yes, I did nothing useful last night, unless you count the crocheting I did while I sipped wine and enjoyed true crime.  I do enjoy true crime.

If I wanted to rationalize my continual viewing of Dateline (with occasional breaks for Snapped, Forensic Files and otners) (they cancelled Reasonable Doubt, dammit!), I could say that since I write murder mysteries, it falls under the heading of Research.  The problem with that rationalization is that I could get a lot better research done at the library.  Books are way better than television for research, and I know it.

However, I do not feel I need to rationalize my television viewing.  I enjoy it, I do it.  Did that sound a little defensive?  Well then, quit shaking your finger at me (you know who you are).  Shake your booty instead.

Come to think about it, blaming my failure to make my Lame Post Friday post on Friday is also a rationalization.  Oh dear.  Perhaps I should make up a new headline about rationalizations.

 

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Way Back to When I Posted On Time?

Posted on January 20, 2023 by mohawkvalleygirl

I thought to myself, I can’t do a Throwback Thursday Post immediately following a Wayback Wednesday Post.  Then I thought, Yes I can!  I’ll look in my Facebook On This Day and share a picture from there, thinking no doubt there would be something I have not shared before.  Well, not so much.

The only photos were a couple of profile pictures.  One was Bette Davis in Hush… Hush, Sweet Charlotte. A Throwback indeed, but I have shared that picture before.  The other was a drawing with a small fake-solemn speech about not letting winter defeat us.

“I could spit in your eye!”

The reason I was reluctant to share it again was that I feared it would take too l9ng to find it in my Media Library.  I gave it a try and, Hello, Bette!  I have thoughts of going through my Media Library and making a month by month index, so I can readily lay my cursor on what I want.  Well, how many things do we say, “One day I am going to…”?  How many of these do we actually do?  I know, some, but how long does it take us?

Speaking of taking a long time to do things, I might as well confess I am making my Thursday blog post on Friday morning after making my Wednesday post on Thursday.  Does that make this a Non-Sequitur Thursday Post?   Let’s pretend it does.

 

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I’ll Tell Myself I Was Tired

Posted on January 18, 2023 by mohawkvalleygirl

Hello and welcome to another Tired Tuesday Post.

I often feel like an idiot.

I am feeling rather brain dead today.  My main ambition right now is to make my Tuesday blog post on Tuesday with a minimum of whining.  But no promises.

My brain is fried like a pan of onions!

I was searching my Media Library for a picture of The Brain from the Planet Arous, which I usually use to illustrate my own lack of brain.  I was having no luck when I ran across the above.  That’s it! I thought.  My brain is fried!

My writing has been sporadic at best lately.  I progress on an interactive mystery (not murder, more about that in future posts) in fits and starts.  I tell myself any progress us still progress.  I wrote my article for Mohawk Valley Living magazine.  I feel I should have done a better job.  Thus I give myself mixed messages.

You know, something just struck me about the things I tell myself.  I encourage myself over the unfinished stuff.  Then I beat myself up over the finished project. No wonder I have such a problem finishing anything!

One may argue that the carrot-and-stick nature of my self-talk is not a bad thing.  Get the first draft out, this line of thinking goes.  Then be merciless in revision.  That is all very well, but I did revise the article! Once I have submitted a thing and it is beyond my ability to change, can I stop with the criticism?  It is something to consider.

So this is my Tired Tuesday Post.  I shall hit Publish and strive to refrain from telling myself it should have been better.  I only hope I did not whine too much.

 

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Comfortably Lame

Posted on January 14, 2023 by mohawkvalleygirl

I thought of that title a few weeks ago and wrote it down.  Then this morning (yes, I am making my Lame Post Friday post on Saturday morning, more about that later), I remembered that I had written it down and paged through my notebook (I need hardly say the paper, spiral-bound kind) (are there still computers called notebooks? I am so out of touch) looking for it. I am going to say it is appropriate, because I have become increasingly more comfortable with making a day’s post the following morning (although I will probably never feel really good about it).  In any case, if I do not use it soon, it will moulder away in that notebook, unused and unremembered.

Wow, that was a long paragraph.  I’d better follow it up with a short one.

Regarding the title on the notebook (ooh, how’s that for a title, “The Title in the Notebook”?), I know it is a time-honored practice of writers to always have a notebook where we can write down ideas and little snippets as they occur to us.  For me, this tends to work out better than the notebook by the bed for those middle of the night inspirations.  I personally have never dreamt a usable plot line.  Additionally, rousing myself sufficiently to write something down has a detrimental effect on my always troublesome insomnia.

Oh dear, another long paragraph.  Well, why not?  It got me over 200 words.  I will just add that something else I have become comfortable with is pecking in one letter at a time with the stylus on my Tablet.  I look at past posts and see how I have lamented doing so.  Now it is my usual method, and ten-finger typing is a rare treat.

 

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