A Fickle Muse

Isn’t it funny how you can have a writing prompt one day and the story flies through your brain, basically writing itself, and it’s all you can do to keep up with the words, then a few days later you couldn’t answer a prompt to save your life?  That’s precisely what’s going on.

I saw the prompt for the Big Think Short Fiction contest, future food, and thought – well, that’s easy.  I thought it out then my fingers flew on the keyboard the next morning.  Now, I have the wide open topic of science fiction and… nothing’s coming. 

There are two modes of thought when it comes to writing.  One is not to force it, just to wait for an idea to come and then you write.  Proponents contend that if you force it, you’ll get stilted gibberish.  The second mode of thinking is that you sit down and write daily, train your brain, so to speak.  I lean toward the latter, myself.

That has not been working for me with this science fiction story.  So, I’ve been exploring info. on different science fiction sub-genres and perusing all the science fiction I have read and loved.  I actually finally watched The Matrix yesterday.  Nothing.  Nada.  Nyet.  Nunca.  

Maybe it’s because I’m sick.  I’ve only got a couple days though.  Somebody needs to give my muse a stern talking to.  I suppose it’ll have to be me.

Big Think Short Fiction Contest

Well, this one is a little more than 50 words but it’s still going to be short.  Bigthink.com is running a short story contest this weekend.  In no more than 1,000 words, give them a story on “future food.”  It must be submitted by midnight Sunday, February 19th (a.k.a. 12 a.m. on February 20th) through Storiad.com.  

Signing up on Storiad is pretty easy.  Then you simply submit a new project and check mark the box that you are submitting to the Big Think Short Fiction Contest.  You do have to submit the file as either word or a pdf.  (I think pdf is the more all around friendly choice to make sure anyone can view your document.) 

The top three winners will be published on Bigthink.com.  There’s no other prize that I noticed, but just adding a win to your writing credentials is a good thing.  Why not?  This could get interesting.

Getting Noticed

It’s a thrilling experience when something you write starts getting some attention.  That little flash fiction homage I wrote, Sweet Summertime, went from 8 views to 800 then on to 3 THOUSAND 841.  (Update – I just checked and it’s up to 6,600 views.  Apparently it stays on their front page for at least a week.  Wahoo!)  I’ve actually made a few dollars off something that just occurred to my brain one Sunday morning.  It’s nice to see that but it makes me wonder why?  Is it just the search engines noticing the tags I put on it or is it people actually reading it?  That’s hard to say when you don’t get feedback.   I did have one nice note from someone I don’t know.   (People I do know don’t bother to comment. Wish they would.)

I certainly appreciate the edict not to look a gift horse in the mouth, but I would like to understand what drives the numbers on a thing like this.

Creative Outlets

I have two essays that I should be working on these days, articles really, but I seem to be procrastinating very well.  It’s not that I don’t want to work on them but… well, I don’t want to work on them just now.  This happens when I’m low on sleep sometimes.  My brain has started thinking more in colors than words.  (Does that happen to anyone else?)  So, I got the urge to make something out of dark gray, dark blue and dark purple yarn.  I mentioned that on Facebook and a cousin put in a request so I will be working on that every spare moment for the next couple weeks leading up to her baby shower.  It’s still a form of creativity, particularly since I don’t have a pattern, but now that I have the yarn and a vague idea of what I’m creating, it’s fairly low effort.  An easier creative outlet for the sleep deprived.  Try it sometime. 😉