work it out

I am thinking about starting a series of writing exercises to ramp up for this November’s NaNoWriMo. I think I need to learn more about the building blocks of writing. For instance, I could go a couple of weeks of learning to write individual paragraphs with a purpose and a dramatic arc. Then I could build up to writing scenes. One of the big things I learned about my writing is that I have a good sense of what I want to happen in a given scene, but I can never seem to close one off with any finesse. I’ll have to be pretty disciplined about it, but I think that I can set a reasonable schedule to do it. I might try writing on pen and paper, but we’ll see how long I last that way.

The BBC is allowing free downloads of Beethoven’s symphonies as performed by the BBC Philharmonic. As I am pretty ignorant when it comes to classical music, I figure I can learn to appreciate and identify these works by listening to them on my iPod everyday.

My pet peeve while driving is drivers who do not signal for turns or lane changes. More than anything else, this action drives me to what I know to be an unreasonable amount of anger, but it amuses me to cuss a little and give them the “why don’t you signal, you buffoon?” gesture, which looks like closed-fist-open-palm-closed-fist-open-palm with my palm facing outward, which I know no one understands. That gesture, and my “let me merge like I’m supposed you, you moron” gesture, which looks like my left hand held out like I’m going to shake someone’s hand with my right hand held similiarly but at ~30 degree angle to that where I’m ramming my right hand into the middle of my left hand, which I also know no one else understands, are my favorite to use on the road. The other person gets confused, and this makes me giggle.

My favorite song to sing while driving has to be, bar none, Bon Jovi’s “I’ll Be There For You”, because I know all the words and it requires some screaming. Runner ups include any Motown and Dance Hall Crashers, although it kinda sucks because I don’t know enough words, so I end up doing that weird mumbling thing that everyone does when they don’t know the words.