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About this blog

Writing and life, mostly. I'm very opinionated and I do get political. Be warned. Also, I swear a lot.

Entries in this blog

Your Existence Is Political

I've been censoring myself. We all do, here on GA, those are the rules. No political discussion outside The Pit. But what's political? When someone complains about a public figure bringing politics into what they're doing (like Wil Weaton's fans losing their shit when he posted a picture on Instagram of his hand giving Trump Tower the finger), what they're really complaining about is them bringing the wrong kind of politics into it. There's no such thing as apolitical. Everything's political. Wh

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

Why I Suck at NaNoWriMo

When I write a short story, I usually sit down and write until I'm done. Then I go back, revise, edit, remove stuff, add stuff, read it out loud to myself, fix every minor thing in the dialogue, and then, when I'm happy with it, I'll send it to a beta or an editor, or both. That is my process.   When I write a novel, I can't just write until I'm done. I'll write a chapter, go back and read it, polish it, add stuff and take stuff out. Then I'll move on and write the next bit, and maybe

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

What's wrong with my body?

WARNING: Getting mildly graphic about my symptoms here, so don't read if that bothers you...   I've not been around as much lately because I've been ill and I'm starting to worry. I've been almost constantly sick since before Christmas. I really thought I was finally better and then this throat infection took hold, the day after my birthday, no less. (Happy Birthday, Thorn! Here, have some more pain!) I'm tired. I don't sleep well. I wake up way before my alarm, feeling sick and misera

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

What's Going On With Me

So, some of you may have noticed that I haven't been very active lately. I checked the forums yesterday and had a huge shock when I noticed that the member status thingies had changed... I haven't been busy. I'm still unemployed. I've barely been writing, and I haven't touched an instrument in like two weeks.   I've just been depressed.   It's been coming in sort of waves. Then, a couple of weeks ago, I decided to make an appointment with my GP to see if I could get a referra

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

What's Easter Anyway?

Easter is a holiday throughout the Christian world to celebrate that Jesus died for the sins of human kind and rose again on the third day. That's basically the answer that most people will give, and it's perfectly correct. In most languages, the name for Easter tends to be some derivation of the verb 'to pass', taken from the Hebrew Pesach, a Jewish holiday that in English is known as Passover, and which was being celebrated in Jerusalem at the time of the Crucifixion. That name has simply been

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

What's been going on with me and why I haven't been around

So, I haven't been here much lately, and the longer you stay away the harder it is to come back. So I thought I'd post a sort of general update for those who might be interested.   First of all, I'm doing okay. I take my meds, I get up in the mornings and go to school (I haven't quite mastered getting up the mornings I don't have school, but I'm working on it), I do my homework, I mostly eat proper food and the flat isn't a complete mess. Magpie's busy with work and uni, I'm just busy

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

Unsolicited Grammar Lesson of the Day: lie vs. lay - transitive and intransitive verbs

The confusion when it comes to these two words is understandable. A lot of people write 'lay' when they should write 'lie' (as in lying down) and, however more rarely, vice versa. So here's a quick guide to how they are different and how they work. 'To lie' is an intransitive verb. That means that it's something you do, but not to something; it's an action without a direct object. You lie down. 'To lie' is conjugated: lie, lies, lying, lay, has/have lain. As you see, the past tense of 'l

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

Trans Day of Visibility

I wanted to write something for trans day of visibility. Couldn’t quite figure out what to write. Maybe cause I can’t quite figure out what I am. I keep going back and forth between this joy at being able to be myself and this fear that this isn’t me at all. That I’m making it up. Hardcore impostor syndrome. I don’t have that story. I wasn’t a tomboy growing up. I was a girly girl who liked playing with dolls and dressing up like a princess. I don’t have body dysmorphia. I didn’t always feel lik

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

To Russia With Love

Personally, I'm boycotting the olympics this year. Sadly, the gay rights aspect isn't even the worst of it. There's corruption at the very heart of the whole thing, more than a third of the money spent is unaccounted for, and guest workers from Kazakstan had their passports stolen by their employers and were deported without getting paid. Basically, the whole thing stinks.   But given the nature of this website, the LGBT issue is the most relevant, so I thought I'd share this little th

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

This Is What Always Happens

I always end up feeling a little bit on the outside. It's nobody's fault but my own. I don't do well in large groups. I used to be the one who just sat in the corner. I'm better now, I can talk to people and partake in group activities, but I invariably keep everyone a little bit at arm's length. Not that I don't share or discuss, I'm quite open most of the time, just that I keep me, the person I am on the inside, the quirks of my personality, a little bit on the inside. So I keep my distance, e

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

The Unfortunate Side-Effect

I think there's an unfortunate side-effect to mental illness that many experience. It's not one that's easy to understand or admit to, even to yourself, but I do think it's fairly common. At least I have observed it in both myself and many people I know (and I have a lot of friends irl with mental illness; it's like we're drawn together somehow, us weirdos who suck at fitting in because our brains don't function very well at times). As an example, I have a friend with ADHD and PTSD who often has

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

The Evolution of a Novel: Characters

I started writing Nemesis a decade or so ago. While the essence of the story was the same, so many things about it have changed.   Back then, Dave's name was Leo. Leo was a far more aggressive, macho type of character than Dave. When I began to rewrite the story from the beginning, a bit less than three years ago, I found that Leo had changed so drastically as to be almost unrecognisable, and his name had to change. Dave just felt right, somehow.   Nick has always mirrored me

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

Sexual and Gender Identities: A glossary

Our community is so much bigger and more diverse than many of us believe. With a lot of new-ish terms and labels out there detailing identities some may not be aware of, I figured a brief list of definitions might be helpful for someone somewhere. I shall begin with the four letters everyone knows. If you're here, you already know what these mean, but I'm including them anyway.   L: lesbian - a woman who is exclusively attracted to other women G: gay - a person who is exclusi

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

Sex Education

So, I finished watching season one of Sex Education on Netflix. I loved it so much. It’s about a teenaged boy whose mother is a sex therapist. While he himself is utterly inexperienced, by some fluke it turns out that he shares his mother’s talent for therapy and sex advice, and he ends up running a ‘sex clinic’ where he helps students at school in return for a modest fee. Hilarity ensues, along with a lot of interesting drama. The show deals with bullying, sex (duh), prejudice, first loves, an

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

Self-Publishing, Self-Marketing, and the Self

There is this overwhelmingly popular opinion that self-publishing, to some degree, isn't valid. It's what we do here on GA, of course, and putting out your work for free on the Internet for people to see seems to be acceptable and sometimes commended, but as soon as an author tries to make money from self-publishing their work—either by setting up a Patreon and asking for donations, or by publishing their work using services like Lulu and Amazon KDP and thus circumventing the traditional publish

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

Quick Guide to Archaic 2nd Person Singular

I posted this to Twitter earlier, so I thought I might as well share it here too. I've seen some folks trying to use this older form of the second person singular pronoun in stories, poetry, song lyrics and so on, but getting it all kinds of wrong, so I made a handy little guide. thou - subject (see: 1st person 'I') thee - object (see: 1st person 'me') thy - dependent possessive (see: 1st person 'my') thine - independent possessive (see: 1st person 'mine') Examples from Shakespea

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

Patreon: What It Is, and What It Isn't

Patreon is a service that I think a lot of people don't quite understand. Some people find it disingenuous, for instance, to ask people for money for a product that they will later be giving away for free, as many do. Others see it as akin to begging. That second one I find particularly odd... If anything, it's like busking.    Some history first: Back in the olden days, it was common for talented artists to acquire patrons. A patron might provide the artist with food, a place to live,

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

Out And Proud

Today, inspired by the good feels of Oslo's Pride celebration, I had a very public coming out on Facebook (very public; I even set it to 'public' so that any bigots who want to friend me will be able to see it and think better of it). I don't know what I expected, but my friends have just been heaping love and support on me, which is really wonderful. My mum hasn't acknowledged the post, though. I don't know if she just hasn't seen it yet or doesn't know how to handle it or what...   W

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

On Being a Writer and Encountering Angry Readers

Neil Gaiman once wrote, in response to angry A Song of Ice and Fire fans demanding the next book in the series, 'George R. R. Martin is not your bitch.' Much like getting attacked on Twitter, I think alienating readers is proof that you're doing something right, if that makes any sense. You've pushed someone's buttons, made them think or feel in some way, even if it was negative. I have alienated multiple readers because of artistic choices I have made, and the same artistic choices have ke

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

Now the Fun Begins

I finished NaNoWriMo! I’m a winner! I feel really happy and accomplished and proud of myself and very happy. Look, I got a certificate and everything!     Of course, this doesn’t mean that the novel is finished. Far from it. I’ve mostly finished all the chapters, and mostly done it the way I planned. But this is just a rough draft. Currently, the sequel to Nemesis (the proper title of which will be decided at a later date) is a collection of loose scenes, it feels like. That

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

No-Win Scenario

I'm in a situation where I feel like if I engage, I lose. No matter how I engage, the outcome will be the same. I feel like I'm being wilfully misunderstood. Like assumptions have been made about who and what I am, what I'm like, and no matter what I say or do, the people in question won't change their minds about me. And it makes me question everything. What if they're right? What if I'm the asshole here? I've tried dialogue, but feel like I'm met by a brick wall, utterly unyielding. I've

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

NaNoWriMo and Fundraising

I'm doing it again! November is almost here, and I will be participating in NaNoWriMo once more. Last year, I won with Nemesis 2 (which, as many of you are aware, still isn't quite finished; I'm in the editing and rewriting stage and totally stuck, but I'm sure it'll come). This year, I will be working on the detective novel I've been planning for some months now. I'm really excited for it, which is awesome, as I don't get really excited about things very often these days.   Now, it ju

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

My Problem with Writing Right Now

When you've been depressed for a while, and you've found writing really hard, getting back into it can be a bit of a challenge. I'm feeling a lot better now. Going to school to study sound engineering this autumn, and it feels like my life is back on some kind of track. But the writing is still difficult.   The problem is that I have lots of ideas, and I want to get back to writing properly, I really do. But I'm mostly motivated to work on my new ideas. So I sit down thinking, 'I'm gon

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

My Mental Illness Is Not Your Punchline

Mental illness and disability carry a lot of stigma, and a lot of people don’t understand it. Assumptions are made about various mental illnesses and the people who have them. And the way that we use terms related to mental illness in everyday language to describe completely different things can do a lot more harm than you think it might.   This isn’t about getting offended, by the way. This is about enforcing harmful stereotypes that actually hurt people who suffer from mental illness

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

My Gender Identity

Over the years I've been here, I've gotten the odd PM asking me whether I'm actually male or female. I have answered these questions truthfully. When I returned after my hiatus, I was really happy to find that there's now a non-binary option under gender, as there wasn't one before. I identify as genderqueer, gender fluid, or non-binary. When I first got here, I didn't. Or, that is, I lacked the language to.   I was assigned female at birth, and I always thought I was comfortable that

Thorn Wilde

Thorn Wilde

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