Tag Archive | weeklies

That Guy Thursday: Nilam

Mar6

(It’s Thursday where Rix lives!)

Nilam cy’Friedmar

At first glance, Nilam could easily pass for a particularly ruddy one of Aelfgar’s children. He’s built similarly – solid, pale skin, and a stubborn chin – although his hair is ginger, not blonde, and his skin is more prone to freckling.

He’s not all that tall – 5’11” – but very lanky, which he never outgrows. Despite his modest height, he tends to go around looking like he can’t quite get clothes to fit him; for all her flaws, Margherita at least gets him in the proper length pants.

His Change does not change him, physically all that much, and many of the mental changes are buried under the Keeping. His hazel eyes turn sapphire blue, and he gains three inches in height and loses 20 pounds.

As to his innate? We shall have to wait until he is no longer Kept to learn more about that.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/488027.html. You can comment here or there.

Weblit Wednesday: a Guest Post on Poetry for the Masses!

Mar6

This is a guest post by [personal profile] thesilentpoet

In a way, the Poetry for the Masses! project started in 2010, when trying to raise money to attend a conference in Minneapolis, I hosted a poetry drive on my journal. While never consistent until recently,
I would occasionally resurrect it. In 2012, having renamed it to be Poetry for the Masses!, I started it for what I thought would be a one-off thing, instead, it’s become a semi-monthly event, with calls
for prompts, perk lists, and freebies.

It was through Poetry for the Masses! that Silk Road Allies, the shared world between myself, Elizabeth Barrette, and Marini Bonomi, started. Over the course of the several months, I’ve written poems on
such subjects as fairy tales and folklores, religious traditions, science, and history. In addition to Silk Road Allies, I also frequently write poems regarding to my larger and longer crowdfunded project, Sixty-Four Squared, a tentatively five-novel project, which is directly written and linked to through my journal. Currently, I am still writing my way through Book the first, The Scholar’s Mate. In Poetry for the Masses!, I also frequently dip into Schrodinger’s Heroes, another shared world co-created by Elizabeth Barrette. However, there are many stand alones, and I always love new prompters, commenters, or supporters. All the poetry written during the Poetry for the Masses! sessions are on a pay-what-you-will, with donor perks typically starting at as low as the $5 level.

I had started Poetry for the Masses! again because I needed something to kickstart my writer brain, having just come out of a too long for liking dry spell. I keep continuing it as it connects me to a
fantastic community of writers, poets, and artists, working to create a community where we can all learn and share. I hope to continue it for a long time to come.

The next Poetry for the Masses! will be the weekend March 8-9 with a theme of “rebirth”. Please follow along at http://thesilentpoet.dreamwidth.org or http://thesilentpoet.livejournal.com. Prompts welcome, comments gleed upon, and tips certainly welcome.

Thank you, good-bye, and good night.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/487329.html. You can comment here or there.

#Lexember in March: Syllabic Sunday: Snow, and snowshoes

Mar3

In the early days of the proto-Cālenyena, snow was not something that they often saw. Their Texas-like climate never had lasting snow, and rarely had snowfall at all.

Thus, their word for snow was a compound word: rain-cold-hard, teb-run-zē, which, through the centuries, and, in their new home, their far more consistent exposure to snow, became terunz. (The ending sound is actually stolen from the Bitrani. Very few Cālenyen words end in a double consonant).

And, as they were becoming more familiar with drifts of the white stuff, they needed a way to get around in this terrain.

paiterz, snow-spears, were the first innovation (essentially skis. The Cālenyena call almost everything long and pointy a spear. When all you have is a hammer, etc.)

And, in different places but for similar need, Begerz, shoes-snow, snowshoes, were developed.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/485729.html. You can comment here or there.

That Girl Thursday on Friday: Miryam

Mar1

Cautious and yet friendly, Miryam had a winning smile even before her Change.

Once her power expressed itself, she had a smile to die for. Or kill for.

The petite girl has a miniature coke-bottle figure, everything in proportion in a 4’7″-tall package. Green antennae and green fairy wings top off her petite figure.

She has deep brown hair in corkscrew curls, warm brown skin, and eyes as green as her wings.

It’s hard to tell much more about her. She hides everything behind a small smile that can grow into an intoxicating, addictive grin in a heartbeat.

She tries not to leave much of an impression, but doesn’t bother not leaving the withdrawal behind her.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/484214.html. You can comment here or there.

Tasty (Wednesday): Two-ingredient Cake

Feb27

Last week, we tried a 2-ingredient cake.

Super simple:
Box of Angel Food Cake Mix (one-packet sort, not two-packet sort)
20oz can of Crushed pineapple

Mix, including the juice in the can. Cook at 350 for 25-35 minutes. Enjoy (or frost, but we didn’t).

We then tried cooking it with strawberries instead, but the fluid level got weird and we ended up with sort of cake-mush. We shall try again!.

It’s tasty (even the strawberry mush version), and without a frosting, it’s pretty low on calories and pretty much fat-free.

<3<3<3

I’ll let you know when we figure out the strawberry version.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/483290.html. You can comment here or there.

That Guy Thursday: Thorburn

Feb21

Is Thorburn just a big jerk?

Those, and other questions, such as what exactly is his Change, have yet to be fully answered in the course of the Addergoole story.

He’s domineering, pushy, and sometimes a little bit weird. His nightmares are the stuff of, well, nightmares – some of which we can probably blame on his former Keeper. Maybe all of it. But he is, slowly, unbending.

Thorburn is a tall guy, and a big guy, 6 foot 5 inches tall and broad across the shoulders. His friend Basalt is wider and stronger, but Basalt is made out of rock.

Thorburn has a square chin, startlingly pale blue eyes, a perpetual 5-o’clock shadow, and skin the color of chestnuts. He wears his hair in braids down to his chin.

He dresses primarily in T-shirts and jeans, although he owns, looks good in, and sometimes enjoys wearing nice dress clothes.

Nobody has seen his Change since he got out from under the Collar. Who knows when we will?

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/480855.html. You can comment here or there.

That Girl Thursday: Akaterina (Kay, Kat)

Feb14

Spunky. Mouthy. Energetic.

These are things that make for an engaging personality and, generally, a very combative Kept. These are all things that describe Akaterina cy’Maureen. Or, at least, they do when she’s not collared.

The oldest child of a single mother, Kay was friendly but not the center of attention in her old school, and expected the same when she came to Addergoole. What she found instead was Agravain and a collar.

She also found Zita, Dr. Caitrin, and friends, but it’s sometimes hard for her to remember that part.

She’s a densely-built girl on the short side of average (Swimming and vollyball in her old school), with mocha skin and black hair down to her hips. Her Change gives her long, pointed ears, and a point to her chin, too, as well as elongated fingers and toes.

For more description, see her wiki page here – http://agyearnine.wikispaces.com/Kay

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/475990.html. You can comment here or there.

Weblit Wednesday: a Guest Blog by Becka Sutton

Feb13

 All about Weblit Wednesday

What is Weblit Wednesday?

It all started on Twitter when a few of us started tweeting links to our favourite webfiction serials on a Wednesday and hashtagged it #weblitwednesday or #weblitwed. It lasted a while before it sort of petered out. I’m currently trying to revive the hashtag and expand it to include reviews and similar, so when Lyn asked me to write a guest post about it I agreed. It’s all about signal boosting your favourite weblits.

How do I take part?

It’s very simple to take part. Each Wednesday pick one of your favourite weblits (or take time to read a new one) and then tweet a link to it on Twitter using the hashtag above. In addition (or instead if you’re not on Twitter) you can post about it on you blog, facebook or other social network. And if you have time you can write and post a review of it as well.

Anything else?

I’m investigating setting up a couple of Mr Linky collectors like the one the #SerialTuesday people use. One will be for people to post links to their selected weblit and the other for them to post links to their reviews. We can then collate these into a report and post them up for reference.

I think that’s everything. If you have any questions please ask in comments.

About Becka

Becka Sutton is a self-described crazy cat lady, but she’s not very good at it: while she is crazy she only has one cat. She was born in Britain in 1972 and has lived there her entire life. As a child she started scrawling fantasy stories in exercise books her mother bought her to stop her scribbling in her school books. She hasn’t stopped writing since, and she credits writing as the outlet that allowed her to recover from the nervous breakdown she had after her parents died.

Her other interests include reading, listening to music, attempting to draw, growing her own vegetables and looking after the aforementioned Pumpkin cat.

No, you can’t read the novel she scrawled as a kid – she burned it long ago because it was awful.

You can find Becka’s weblit online at http://firebird-fiction.com/ and she is currently running an IndieGoGo Campaign http://igg.me/at/storm-child/x/29867 to raise funds to turn the second arc of one them into a book.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/474704.html. You can comment here or there.

Magic Mondays: Magic in Stranded World

Feb11

The Stranded World setting is named for the way the practitioners of magic there see their world (its working title was “Spaghetti Squash World.”)

In this world, people who have the talent and skill can see – and more rarely manipulate – the strands of matter and energy that connect everything in the world, and everyone.

Some people can directly alter the flow of the Strands (or, in very rare and heretical cases, sever those strands.  Others work through some sort of focus.

All but a very few, very powerful strand-workers are specialized.  Examples of specialization include:

  • Strand-smoothing (Order-creating) – these strand-manipulators pull tangles smooth, making problems work themselves out and creating calm. Winter.
  • Tanglers (Chaos-creating) – trickers incarnate, these strand-manipulators defy expectations and shatter stagnation. Spring
  • Connection-tracers – these sighters of the Strands do very little manipulation, but their vision and comprehension of the connecting strands is highly honed. Autumn. Spring’s Star-Mapper boyfriend.

For more on Strand-Workers, see this piece

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/473849.html. You can comment here or there.

16-Minute Saturday

Feb10

This is written to the text prompt here for “Sixteen Minute Saturday,” something I adapted for alliteration from Ty Barbary’s 15-minute Fiction.

I’d love if more people played along!

Thanks to [personal profile] inventrix for the names and Rion and Freo for the quote.

Mike and Leann, Kelly and George, and of course Franklin Brown:

I can’t get service down here, so I’m leaving you a message in a text file, in case I don’t get…

Who am I kidding? I’m leaving you a message because I’m not getting out of here. Not unless the world flips, not unless the monster dies, not unless something goes south when it was supposed to be north.

They’re going to say, when they find my phone, that I shouldn’t have been out.

Everyone knows better. I knew better. Of course I did. I’ve heard the horror stories same as you have.

Don’t go out after dark. Wear dull things; they’re attracted to bright colors. I know. I know.

But this is a very bad night for me. It’s a bad night every year, and I try to hide it, and hope you guys don’t have it marked on your calendar.

(We told him not to go out alone. We told him not to wear that red tie. Especially not red.. But “it’s better to look good than to feel alive.” Damn him.)

I didn’t want to bother y’all for an escort. No, I know when Fade or Sophie say that, sometimes they mean “I’m sulking that you didn’t pay attention.” But I really mean it. This is my thing. This wasn’t your fault, and it shouldn’t be your problem.

So I needed to hear the sounds of other hearts beating, and I needed to feel other bodies around me. And I know all the places – all of them not just the ones the six of us go to together – all the places where you can get that no matter what the curfew or law.

(And any of a thousand other things. But you knew that.)

And here I am. The lights went out, three blocks from my favorite place to hide out. The lights all went out at once. I had enough time to get into a crash hole, but it’s not a very good crash hole. And I don’t think I’m going to

Shit

Shit

Not him. Not him.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/472873.html. You can comment here or there.