oyceter | (no subject)

Yay! My little laptop is connected to the internet! I am truly mobile now! The embarrassing thing is that I've always had a laptop; mine have just always been wired to the printer and the mouse and my speakers and USB ports sticking out like mad. So while they're technically mobile, it's usually just too much work to unhook the darn things. And they're behemoth laptops, so they aren't quite as little as this one. Yay getting office cast offs from dad! Of course, the keyboard is so small that I'm having a hard time finding all the proper punctuation.

yhlee was also evil and pointed me to an email-based RPG. I've never done RPGs before or gamed whatsoever (computer or otherwise), and I was always quite curious when I was shelving all the White Wolf and D&D stuff back at the bookstore. Anyhow. I got to the site, which is for a very character-based type game, apparently, and wow.

It's like finding tons of people do this thing that you only thought you did as a kid. For more background: as a kid, I would play these games with my sister and cousin and various friends, in which we were people in the FBI or Greek gods or something. I think I mostly did this because I so wanted to be the characters in books I read about, and instead of channeling that desire into writing, I played games. Of course, it was always more fun being the character and making up the character and doing all these background bits and everything, but usually we'd have to think of some sort of (very freeform) plot and act stuff out.

Anyhow, my entire point was that the RPG was like this! Very exciting. And someone goes about making the story around you and with you so you are not the one poking your cousin and sister to play ;). Wow. Very interesting.

I've always found it rather funny that pretty much everyone who knew me as a kid will get around to asking me if I want to write. I think it's because I've always loved reading (duh), and I was very into English classes, and I don't quite mind writing papers (unless they are theses, in which case I shudder horrifically). And I've dabbled around in writing stories and such, but it's never been a driving need. I have a world or so in my head that I enjoy tinkering around with, but I seriously doubt I will ever get it on paper, because I'm much more obsessed with reading than with writing. I feel almost bad about this sometimes, because I suspect mostly I'm just too lazy to create a good fantasy story. But I guess I am always so satisfied by other people's worlds and stories that I don't feel that much of a desire to create my own.

What drives you to write or not? I've always been rather curious about this, knowing that there are quite a few avid readers on my flist and quite a few avid writers too.

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I have people in my head, and bits of story, and if I write them down, they shut up and/or go on to the next bit. Otherwise I get the same bits on permanent loop.

It's not very much like reading other people's stuff, really. I'm fairly satisfied with other people's books. They're just not the same as mine. It's like the difference between listening to CDs and playing the piano: both good, not at all the same.

Hee, yes, I can see how getting people out of one's head is good.

Sadly (or not?), most of the people stick around. They just say and do different things and not the same great line over and over.

Apparently because I have to now. I didn't used to have to, but now it seems I do. The lines won't leave me alone. It is a new place for me to be.

Thanks for asking.

Oh how neat! Is it mostly poetry nowadays, or everything?

Come to think of it, I was wrong. I do feel the compulsion to write, but I don't feel the particular compulsion to write fiction. I LJ instead ;).

What drives you to write or not?

I've never been sure. It's a safe place, maybe, in my head? And it's fun.

Nifty ^_^. Doh, I completely forgot I haven't read your WWI book yet. Wargh.

I find I am driven to journal, but not so much to write fiction.

Yeah; I'm still sad we had to shut down Shazrad (http://www.cityofveils.com/pbem/), but we were mowed down by schoolwork. (I was also having health problems at that point.) We had some killer-good writers. This is also where we experienced player-retention problems, partly because our updates tended to be slower and somewhat erratic (and we tried to disclose this when it became problematic) and partly because this is something that tends to plague play-by-email situations--real life happens, connectivity problems, etc. (I had been fooled because The Black Wall (http://www.angelfire.com/scifi/blackwall/) managed to keep all, what, nine of its players throughout its run. I had accepted more thinking that some would probably end up dropping, and...whoa.)

Anyway, we still have wistful thoughts about doing another PBeM in a brand-new world, but it would require work and planning and a lot more free time on both our ends. (Co-GMing is good for spreading the workload and also for diversifying the worldbuilding, but it still requires time!)

Anyway anyway, I shall work on that one-shot for you.

I write compulsively. I make stories. Of course, if I didn't write them down, others would come and go, etc. It satisfies my need to do, and it's the thing I do that, at this point, I do better than other things I do. Even if it doesn't feel like it sometimes. It's come to serve as a psychological release valve; I become actively tetchier when I can't write semi-regularly. Which leads to my bafflement that I don't come out with reams of angst-fic, but that's another story. *grin*

Shazrad looked so cool! I eagerly await the one-off, and the whole visit in general! Yay! I am also going to take that Friday off too ^_^.

What drives you to write or not?

Depends on who/what I'm writing for. A paycheck drives most of my writing (the journalism stuff). A growing community of friends keeps my blog going. My fiction writing continues to take the back seat - but it's the thing I write just for me. Those are the stories that want to be told, and often at 2am when I should be sleeping.

*nods* That's interesting! I think LJ is the thing I write just for me; I would probably be writing this even if no one were reading it. Of course, having people reading it makes it even more fun.