Livelihood

I’ve been working on a short story lately titled “Golden”. If you’ve heard the song on the new Fall Out Boy CD, Infinity on High, you may understand how it inspired me to write a story about it.

Musical Inclinations

I loaded a bunch of new music on my mp3 player last night.

Here’s a list of a few albums that made its way on my list:

• “Whitney Houston”, Whitney Houston
• “Don’t You Fake It”, The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus
• “Josh Groban” and “Closer”, Josh Groban
• “Chicago Motion Picture Soundtrack”
• “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon Soundtrack”
• “Infinity on High”, Fall Out Boy
• “Louder Now”, Taking Back Sunday

Then, there are the ever-popular random songs and bands that aren’t part of full albums:

• “Nutshell”, Alice in Chains
• “Simple and Clean”, Utada Hikaru
• “Smooth Criminal”, Alien Ant Farm
• “Irreplaceable”, Beyonce

There’s LOTS of stuff, almost two hundred songs. (For me and my one-gig player, that is a lot, so all you 30-gig iPod people can shut up.) I’m happy. My favorites at the moment are “Golden” by Fall Out Boy and “Cell Block Tango” from the Chicago soundtrack.

What’s on your player?

An Update on Tediousness

Editing is tedious.

I spent a good amount of yesterday editing various parts of The TECH Project. It’s just kind of… you know… ugh. Right? Very boring, a lot of reading and reading and reading and – oh, change a letter – and reading and reading and reading. I know it’s necessary for the common good and all that… but it’s boring as hell.

Added a new scene into Teenage Drama. That’s about File 17 or something like that in the second half of the novel. Did you know that The TECH Project is around two hundred pages long typed?? Well, you probably didn’t, but it is!

Today’s post is dedicated to things that are inspiring. I’m going to make a list.

• Music

Music is my numero-uno inspiration. I listen to all sorts of music, everything from Jimmy Eat World to My Chemical Romance, Il Divo to Dragon Force, and even the occasional Michelle Branch and Justin Timberlake.

Music definitely keeps me inspired when I feel like writing. All the time. There’s the fun stuff, like MCR’s “Dead!” and “Teenagers” that get my blood pumping and the rest of me dancing around the room, and then there’s the sad stuff, like The All-American Rejects’ “The Last Song” and Il Divo’s “Regresa A Mi” that bring me down and help me work on the sad, depressing parts that all novels have to have at some point.

When you feel writer’s block coming on, definitely listen to some music. May I recommend Riot Like Words, Fly Phoenix, or TheNewsCanWait if you’re bored with your old stuff? All three can be found on MySpace.

• The World

Yes. Sad but true. I sometimes have to resort to the “real world” for my inspiration. I draw from everything: my own experiences, stories my family members have told me, even school gossip. Sometimes, when I hear something, I just latch on and end up with a brand-new story.

For example: last night, I wrote a short story about Zoe Lee, the lead protagonist of The TECH Project. Although she is DEFINITELY based on a certain person in my life, most of what I was writing about when describing her relationship with her father came from my mother’s experiences with her father. (My grandfather suffered a stroke, which left him in a debilitating state.) So, if you use the real world as inspiration, draw from many different sources, your own and that of others.