Krista

Or a third reaction of... "Oh damn... no, I couldn't possibly. I am working on a 250k word 'anthology idea' and I can't handle another one." *whistles* I also forgot about both the Secret Author and the Anthology. I have time to do the Anthology, even have an idea for it... but it will spiral out of control and I know that it will.

Yikes. Remember when I said there were problematic aspects to this story....? Lol. 😮 Little naive 13 year old me is to blame.

Talking is sometimes the most difficult thing for people to do. Especially if they've made the attempt in the past and have been shut down by the people around them. Men seem to shut down when that happens far quicker than women.

Thank you for coming back to the story. I hadn't realized it was over 2 years since chapter one for the contest posted. A two year turn around for almost a 250k project isn't tooooooooooooo slow, I don't think? lol. At least it isn't TBY slow at over five years. 😮 There are a lot of parental dynamics in this story. Like I said 2 years ago, people like Trace seem to be fewer and farther between. People are too wrapped up in their personal lives, or phones rather. To even look around, let alone stop and understand the situation then take the time necessary to help.

Aww. Yeah, I did some looking back writing this with some of the people I grew up with. It wasn't good memories, so I couldn't imagine how it was for them. Seeing pain isn't the same as feeling it.

I think I've mentioned over the years the reason why I write the stories that I do is because of my experiences knowing two friends that are gay and their lived experiences. I don't want to count the number of years I've been out of high school, but I do think things have changed for the better - for the most part. I try to allow my writing to reflect true life, there are some people that have acceptance, there are some that never will and I don't think 'that' will ever change. Both of my friends are married to men that had the exact opposite experience, if I had come into this writing thing living alongside them and listening to their thoughts, stories, and outcomes my writing may be different. They grew up just a few counties and hours away from me, in the same state. There are laws protecting minors here, but I don't think a lot of them know they have rights. That is something I would like to see resources going into, to change that thought process. My two friends wouldn't have sought out such help though. There was too much trauma there. They didn't feel comfortable talking about their sexuality with one another for months.

A pre-season all-state finalist doesn't come around often for most coaches, so the sudden unexplained absence of one may cause quite the ripple.

Thank you for coming back to it. Also, for better or worse, there's around 200k words left to post in the coming months.

Trace didn’t talk, but he killed the radio as soon as we got a little further down the road. It took him climbing out of the valley, checking his phone as he held it to finally find a signal. The first thing he did was call a tow service for my truck which made my cheeks flush, because I had no way of paying him back. I didn’t want to owe anybody, but here I was sitting in the passenger seat of an obviously expensive new truck. I clutched the door handle, even though the door wouldn’t come open

I see his double vision hasn't interfered with his cheekiness. I may correct his double vision unintentionally when I get hold of him. He knows that I am a lady and would never discuss such scandalous topics. Shameful fibber that he is. Also, welcome back @Topher Lydon and @LittleBuddhaTW.

I do a little cringe whenever I see someone reading through this story. I was barely in high school when I wrote it myself. But, it was my first ever writing project for fun. A lot of the stories that were my inspiration weren't the best springboard for me either. I don't remember a lot about this story, other than it is roughly written, has problematic characterizations, and all that good stuff that comes with doing something for the first time - ever. The fact that you took on a 2* story and have made it this far is evidence of your patience, I'm thinking. Honestly, the only thing that keeps me from deleting it entirely, as well as another early work, is because this is how readers were introduced to me when I got started all those decades ago and a start - rough as they can be - are still truly valuable even if one thinks the product no longer is. I am just 'brave' enough to keep it here for those interested in reading someone's first works.

Welcome, welcome, welcome. Congratulations!

What on earth is Pass the Pigs? Also, I somewhat did Prompt 285 in an older fiction work. It was a fun write then, I may revisit it for prompt's sake.

I critique all of this knowing that I am probably more than half-ass guilty of everything that I have said, possibly more. Other than this response here though, I will never admit to it. If any of you find reasonable evidence to show me how hypocritical I am in my snobbery, I ask that you keep it to yourselves. I do not like the taste of my own medicine. Ask Wildthing.

It is a definite case of, "I don't like any of these people..." with me. If done truly and with intention, that's okay. The overall plot has to follow it though. These people were just... self-centered and stupidly clumsy when it came to socializing. Something you may expect from 18 - 20 year old humans I guess, especially if left to their own devices for the first time and navigating the world on their own. The character writing didn't cohesively fit with with all the plots the series tried to manage though. I mean they had: Slutty/Self-centered sorority girl. Self-centered society rich sorority girls. Weird roommate Attractive Nerd (female) Douchebag Frat guy Bitchy 'misunderstood' Sister/female character Awkward horny virgin (in this case there were numerous examples) Mysterious guy with an accent that's hot because he's a mysterious guy with an accent. Secret Society in College that has post-graduation implications. Weird interactions with a child-aged bully that's a lot younger than every character in the film/series. - it was just overused comedy fodder that you see in about every film or series based in college. Winning formulas don't always win and this wasn't a win for me. And they 'had' to throw in the stereotype that gay couples and gay people in general are dysfunctional at best, wrecks of people that can't think beyond their sex lives. They can't be monogamous, but their open relationship causes so much discourse that they can't function well with one another either. I've literally seen it depicted in over half of the films and/or series I've watched since like 2020. Where I don't see it, I expect to see it eventually, unless it is a simple romance with nothing else going for it. Again, if done well with fresh elements, fine. But this was just randomly thrown in for the sake of a quick laugh for like five minutes of screen time.

"Overcompensating," is a new series from Amazon Prime, featuring the writer/comedian/actor Benito Skinner. I hadn't heard of him, but I don't know many comedian/producers really. This is supposed to be a raunchy coming out series. Sort of American Pie/Roadhouse sort of television show. It isn't that deep, but there are moments of that sprinkled into the series, but it is so underdelivered that it misses the mark in a lot of ways with both leads, not just Benito. I don't really like shallow/raunchy comedies, so I went into this knowing I wasn't the target audience. I think it missed the mark on that front too though, I do have a sense of humor, I just didn't find it funny, erratic is what I would call it. It leaned really heavily on shallow uncreative jokes/punchlines and stereotypes far too overused in the attempt to be a "more modern" coming out story. It left me thinking that I didn't like any of these people. Still, I thought it better than "Bros," though, not saying much in my opinion, but it is something. I didn't like that we were supposed to believe that all of these early to late-thirty year old people were in college, especially Freshmen. Everyone looked miscast by decades. It might have been a stylistic choice, because Roadhouse and American Pie were similar in that all the actors were a lot older than the characters they played - so it may have been intentional. If not, then yeah, completely miscast. I also don't think Benito himself did well in this, a lot of his acting was one-note and a bit wooden. If he was the reason why they aged up the majority of the cast around him, then it was a definite misstep. The two leads didn't carry this series and they should have, as their own stories were so overburdened by everything else that was going on. It was difficult to care about what happens with any of them in the first half of the series. I thought it started coming together more in the last two episodes a lot more cohesively, like it finally had a direction worth going. It ends on a cliffhanger, I'm sure the series was budgeted well enough for a second season, and I think it was semi-well received. We'll see if Amazon will carry it along or not. The platform didn't with Prisma, which I felt was a far better series and still worth the time to watch, even if Season 2 is still unavailable in American markets. If you can find season two I still think it is worth the watch.

hmm... my plans this summer is to slow down a little bit. At least when I'm not trying to keep the husband, kids, dogs, and of course you, wildthing, in line. Hopefully my garden prospers so I have stuff to do there. Maybe some pool time at Momma's. The kids are older so I don't feel like I have to constantly keep them entertained during the summer to keep my own sanity. They have interests and hobbies now, thankfully. More family time. Maybe a few short road trips to do things we've not done together often. Probably camping... I don't think I'll be able to get out of not doing that all summer.

*Goes to look at her messaging logs with Wildthing* In my defense my exact words were: (also merely a random thought in passing): "This film had me fuming for a minute when I saw it advertised. I thought I had been copyright infringed upon. I think we were discussing Gay Films, it started because, "Overcompensating" is now released on Amazon. I was telling him that I watched it over the weekend and didn't care for it. It is a series and if it gets renewed I'll be surprised. Well anyway, my story, Standing in Shadows, the main character's name is Riley. He plays football, closeted, and has a strained relationship with his father. So, when I saw the film, "Riley," advertised, I watched the trailer and there were two similarities, but I wasn't about to rent an entire film just to see if there were more. So, the next day Wildthing took it upon himself, diligent as he is (when he's not being cheeky) rented it, and decided there weren't many similarities at all. --- Which, I was already thinking, as all of this stemmed from a passing observation during one of our many random mini-conversations we have whenever we communicate with one another. I mean, it wasn't 10 minutes later after he told me the results of his research we were talking about snakes. There is a reason that I cannot currently divulge for us to be discussing snakes, so not entirely random. During that conversation I did find out that Wildthing has a bit of a, I wouldn't call it phobia, as I don't know the extent of it, but a strong dose of fear when it comes to snakes. Otter intuition maybe? He made the comment that he would just visit Hawaii for a bit since there aren't snakes there. I had to break his heart and tell him there were snakes in Hawaii, just invasive non-native species that were released through the pet trade or shipping stowaways. Long and windy story, but to end I will say this: This is how the two of us work. We have the most random conversations, do not psychoanalyze us... we know it is a very odd dynamic. --- Now, to answer the questions for the blog: For AI images floating around for characters: It is interesting to see what AI can come up with. I don't want to be shown how a character should look based on AI though. It is fun for me to put my character descriptions into an AI program to see, but I wouldn't push those images on to anyone else. I want to guide readers as to 'how' a character may look, but not to the point where I feel it force feeds the information. Although, AI cannot get it completely correct it still can be a bit forceful. I am not a fan of oversharing AI work in order to give a visual aid to how your characters should look, I guess is what I'm trying to say. But if AI is used for fan-arts and such, could be fun. AI is fun in general, but the function of it shouldn't replace organic creativity, in my opinion. --- A young Keanu Reeves for Seth. No. I don't agree and never will. Keanu has a natural mischievous look to him that never would have fit Seth. Seth was the most mundane, stabilizing, and organically vanilla character. --- mind you during the height of the DomLuka fanatical craze, me saying something like that would have gotten me into a lot of trouble. Seth being that way was very much important to the story though. But I did not ever picture Keanu Reeves fitting the physical description of Seth.

If it isn't gardening related, I am not a DIY'er. My husband is. It is just hit or miss on whether or not a professional will have to be called during or afterwards. Which, I will take over an ambulance at least.

Not really, I've seen short films of similar lengths totally gut me with this theme. This one, the writing especially the character of the bully lacked all nuance. It was blatant idiocy, which gets the message across, but with little effort. The Main character did his part well, it was too bad the writing of the others were a bit lackluster. I still felt something when viewing it. I don't like to see people at the end of all hope, because I've seen it play out in front of me twice. I was the one that helped pull them up from that, so maybe I just wanted this short to reach for it a little more than it did.

I liked it, a bit short on originality, but the theme will not truly be frowned upon by me. I've seen the trauma of such similarities played out in my friends' lives, so the impact still hits if done well.

That was answered here. It appears they requested their stories be unpublished, with no reason given.

I have definitely fallen into the "weird' arena of gay films of late. Attempting to find something to watch. Which, I'm not afraid of weird, or films where no one is likeable, and there's a lot of strange aspects to characters that make them outliers of society really. I can't really recommend the films I watched recently, as they weren't really 'gay films' and the aspects were negative at best. So I won't put anyone through the tortures of watching the two films that I recently watched. Unless you honestly want me to. Then I'll post a more in-depth review of both. Other than that, I've been frustrated. I've rewatched my classic go-to films some over the weeks. What are some of your classic go-to gay films? Maybe I've missed some along the way... There are some up and coming films listed here that I want to watch upon release as well.

Most of poor Brad's life savings will likely be drained dry that weekend. Poor Brad.

10" of snow looks good on your wee head. Love to see it.