SUPERSTITIOUS?

Current Work: Query submissions, admin and follow ups

Listening to: Donna Summer Love to Love You Baby

Reading: Bad Luck and Trouble (Lee Child) You Can Write a Novel (James Smith Jnr)

First Thought for the Day:

Knowing what / Thou knowest not / Is in a sense / Omniscience. -Piet Hein, poet and scientist (1905-1996)

Friday 13^th

Well, lots of people get in lather when this particular date lands on a Friday. I don’t but it did get me thinking about superstitions when I got my journal out this morning. So I did a bit of free writing and have just submitted a query based on those ideas. My maternal grandmother was very superstitious and I can remember as I child thinking that I would be banished to hell if I ever made the mistake of doing something I shouldn’t. Hmm… I suppose they are like any other story, if they are told often enough they become more believable.

Writers Tools

I’ve written about my procrastination many times on this blog and it’s a cross I know I have to bear. On Wednesday I mentioned a piece of software that claims to help organise your novel. Well I have started to play around with it and after a couple of glitches (see the technobabe entry for a bit of background on my IT skills) it seems fairly straightforward and I can see why it might be helpful. I need to use it a little more before I mention here though. But the reason I mention procrastination is because on the website where I found this particular item, there are many tools and toys to play with and guess what? Yup, I wasted probably at least an hour playing about with them. They are not something I would use on a PC – one was a brainstorming tool- but it gave me an excuse not to do something else.

Something for the Weekend?

Well, for me it looks like it is going to be a very snowy one. We’ve already had two storms and although the sun is shining brightly the temperature is low and the weather man says ‘neve, neve’. So no gardening then, maybe some rugby and definitely some reading then. And if the whim takes me, I may do a bit more outlining of a new idea I have for another novel – I did a bit of research this week and it has me hooked and… I need to make up an hours worth of procrastination.

And Finally, the Last Word of the Day:

canard

PRONUNCIATION:

(kuh-NAHRD)

MEANING:

noun:

1. A deliberately misleading story; hoax.

2. An airplane with small forward wings mounted in front of the main wings; also such a wing.

ETYMOLOGY:

From French, literally a duck. The term is said to have come from the French expression vendre un canard à moitié (to half-sell a duck, or to take in or swindle).

USAGE:

"Lyndon Johnson's half-truths about the Gulf of Tonkin, supported by subservient media, embroiled the United States in a nasty war that took the lives of millions of souls. Ultimately, the Vietnam War's distortions and canards prevented him from running for a second term."

Mansour El-Kikhia; Realists Conquer Politics With Lies; San Antonio Express-News; Nov 28, 2003.