I Really Did Have an Idea For a Good Post...

Last night, I fell asleep to reaction mechanisms dancing in my head. They were going on for what seemed like forever, and they were happening so fast that I couldn't really comprehend what the hell was going on. I just remember things turning to things, and then to other things. I wonder how much of it really made a lick of sense?

How nerdy is it to fall asleep "dreaming" of reactions?

Last week, I fell asleep thinking about Richard Broozer and his yet unwritten suicidal past. That was interesting. Actually, this is interesting too, though in a much different way. Learning different reactions requires some patience, and of course, a head for memorizing seemingly useless and methodical information. MCPBA and alkenes yield epoxides. Epoxides can be opened to make other things. BUT you've got to be weary of stereochemistry, that can be a real bitch!

Also, ibuprofen actually is made up of two enantiomers, both of which are in the little pill you take to get rid of your headaches. One of them is totally ineffective. So really, only half of your ibuprofen is actually effective.

Last week, my boyfriend bought Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone in Latin. He's only taken a semester of Latin, and he's already trying to read the damn thing! He reads it to me and proceeds to ask me what he just read.

Speaking of Organic Chemistry, I have my lab tonight. My lab partner is one of the most meticulous people I've met, and insists on following directions exactly. Last week, she insisted on putting our material in a vial (what the directions said) vs. an Erlenmeyer flask "just in case somebody decides to check our drawers." But that's cool, at least she seems to know what she's doing.

My friend just sent me a picture of himself, where he looks like he's attempting to impersonate a rabbit.

I hate when people advertise their books as "free for Prime Members!" You mean free to rent for Prime Members?

Also: The Dowry is free on Amazon today. After today, I'm not doing anymore free promotions for awhile (at least until about March or so), so get it while you can! Srsly.

The Twitter Experiment, Part 3: What My Twitter Looks Like right Now.

Except for the yellow. That was just so I would officially have all colors of the rainbow featured in this picture.

After 3.5 Wonderful Years, My Ipod Seems to have Died...

For some reason, ever since middle school, I've found that playing music in the background of whatever I'm doing, be it studying or writing, helps me tremendously, to the point where I almost cannot do anything without it.

Yesterday, of course, was no exception. I trekked over to the library in hopes of getting some studying done, seeing as I have a scary exam coming up on Wednesday night. Like always, I had brought along my iPod and the cheap pair of $20 that's lasted me about 2-3 years so that I wouldn't have to sit in complete silence throughout the day.

I took out the ipod, plugged in the headphones, and attempted to shuffle all of my music. Hit the button, the screen switched over to "Now Playing", and...nothing. No sound, no movement, nothing.

"Did you try turning it off and on?" Yes, many times. A few times, it completely reset itself on it's own, complete with strange clicking and whirring noises. It seems to have confused itself.

Granted, the screen on this iPod was completely messed up, on account of me leaving the iPod in my jacket pocket then proceeding to toss my jacket on the floor. It sounds careless, yes, though my ipod had survived so many other beatings that I'm surprised this was the one that did it in. Also, considering I did this last May and had been using the iPod frequently in the months since, I obviously had not damaged it beyond repair; just beyond conveniently seeing the "Now playing" screen.

In case you were wondering, I'm not an Apple Junkie. The iPod is literally the one Apple product I own. Otherwise, I own a HP Pavilion running Windows 7, my last PC was a Dell Desktop running XP (which I still have, actually, I just haven't turn it on in over a year), and my phone is a Motorola Droid 3. Why do I have an Apple iPod? I bought it in May of 2008, when that seemed to be the only mp3 anybody had (obviously they're not the only mp3's, though!). I'm not even going to attempt to lie and say, "I really like the interface" or something, because somebody will come in here, swoop down on me like a hawk, and say, "The interface sucks blah blah technical jargon." Yeah, I own an iPod because it's what was cool. And you know what? With 80gb of memory, I'm perfectly fine with that. I just wish it still worked

7 Methods You Should NOT Use to Advertise Your Book

1. Do not, under any circumstances, go streaking in the middle of a crowded sporting event and write the title of your book in large letters on your back with a sharpie.
2. Skywriting. From what I've seen, this only exists in the movies. However, I do live in Wyoming, so maybe this does occur in larger towns, and I've just never seen it.
• 2a. Skywriting in Wyoming as a form of advertisement is probably a really awful idea.
3. If you or somebody know works delivering pizzas on the side, I would suggest not writing the name of your book on the inside of each pizza box for the people you deliver to to find. This is especially true if you write erotica; opening a pizza box only to find something like "DEEP THRUST" or "MY FIRST LESBIAN EXPERIENCE" might be unnerving for your customers.
4. Myspace. Nobody uses Myspace anymore.
5. If you ever feel the need to take revenge on somebody, and spray-painting graffiti on their property seems like the best way to get back at them, do not take that as an opportunity to squeeze in some free advertising. That said, you would probably make the job of a policeman a little easier that day.
6. I would suggest not asking your drug dealer to "spread the word", especially if you go by the pseudonym of "Heisenberg". 
7. Finally, in all seriousness, telling NOBODY about your book isn't helping anybody. So go on, if nothing else, call your mother and tell her you're a published author.

More Terrible 8th Grade Writing: Take Over the World Plot 2010

If you'll recall, last week, I did a short post about my terrible 8th grade story, Kirby vs. The Free Noobs, where I detailed exactly how I laughed out loud in hysterics when reading it out loud, because it was just so damn funny (to me). From what I gather, I'm alone in the fact that I love going back to my old writing every now and again and enjoying a good laugh. Most authors I've met are all "MY OLD WRITING SUCKS AND MAKES ME WANT TO DIE." Okay, maybe not that extreme; though most writers I've spoken to have thrown most of their old stuff away, and according to them, for good reason.

But come on; where's the fun in being a writer if you can't go back and laugh at how bad you used to be? Come on, I know that at least some of you wrote Twilight fan fiction before the movies came out and Twilight hate was rampant. I'm sure somebody wrote a freaking hilarious poem to their middle school crush. Come on, anybody? Nobody is going to raise their hand here? This saddens me; I had really wanted to start a weekly "Our Old Writing" kind of thing, where we all get together and post chunks of the worst of the worst. Nobody? Oh, okay.


Anyways, the following is the first "chapters" of something I attempted to write in about ~2006, and it is hilarious on so many levels. Why? Well, first and most obvious, it seems that I was typing on a machine that apparently lacked spell check - I left all the misspellings and errors in, just to add to the fun. (Note: I suspect most of these errors are more or less the product of the fact that my typing skills sucked then, and still suck today.) Also, I used to "draft" characters, which meant drafting names of my internet friends. That's why, despite the fact that everybody apparently knows each other, they're calling each other by their entire usernames. "Hey, what's up, Gleming123?" "Not much, Halo1991." Though really, the most striking hilarity of this story is the fact that most 8th graders know nothing about politics; this piece shows it. 


Also, the title of this monstrosity? Take Over the World Plot 2010.

"Good evening on this beautiful March 10th, I'm Motumbs here with the nine o'clock news,"
As Kirby was sitting in her chair brwsing her TV in search of somethnig to watch, she noticed something unusual on CNN.
"It is today that we announce a death, but not a sad one. No, tonight we announce that China is now formally a democracy. After many years, someone has managed to overthrow China's communist goverment. We now go live with China's new Emporer...Emporer Diricos,"

Kirby watched with intrest, it's not everyday that communist is once again overthrown. The TV told the story, and Kirby was fully engaged in it, as if it were a hypotizing weapon. It was sort of like a weird dream she once had. Then suddenly, jsut as the story got over, the phone rang. 

"Hello?"
"Hey," It was her friend, Gleming123.
"Hey Glem, hey did you know China isn't a communist goverment anymore?"
"Nope, I assume there is nothing on TV?"
"Nope,"
"Wanna go see a movie or someting?"
"Okay,"
-----------------------------------------------------------
On March 10, 2007, noboy suspected that Emporer Diricos was up to anything suspicious. They thought of him as a hero, a savior, and "The Greatest Man Alive," For the most part, people thought China's communist days were over. Yes, they were, but a new, more terrible fate lie within the Chinese.
But let's move on.
"Ding Dong!" Kirby hopped out of her chair and answered the door.
"Hey Glem," She smiled.
"Hai,"
"How are you?"
"Fine,"
So Kirby got into Glem's car and they drove off toward the theater.
"Hey what movie do you wanna see?" Kirby asked.
"Dunno, how about that one movie about the guys who steal a lot of money and get busted for it?"
"Oh that one? I heard it wasn't all that good. How about a scary movie?"
"The one about the girl who got kidnapped, raped, and killed by a skeleton?" Glem suggested.
"You know, as dumb as it seems I heard it was really good, is that one fine with you?"
"Fine by me,"

Also, speaking of my old adventures as "Kirby Tails", I just found the coolest thing ever: a Kirby Tails pokemon card. It's the seemingly non-sequitur image at the top of this post. 

The Twitter Experiment, Part 2: My Experience with Twitter so Far.

What I expected: People tweeting every single moment of their day. "Just got out of bed." "Just ate breakfast." "Getting in the shower." "Showering ;)"

What I Seem to Have Gotten: "Buy my book!" "[TITLE] is free on Amazon Today!" "[Preview of Book]. [Only $x.xx on Amazon] [Link]."

I suppose that's what happens when you just start following indie authors.

What I Like: I've been "tweeting" for a week, and already, I have 72 followers. Considering it's taken me nearly two months to get 8 followers here on this blog, I would say it's not a bad deal, especially with the possibility of people seeing my stuff and thinking, "Hey, I'll totally Retweet that." Is it going to happen often? Probably not; I'm not really all that interesting. And with so many others clogging up feeds with "Buy my book!", what chance is there that my little Family History is going to be mentioned? It's highly unlikely.

What I dislike: Again, the fact that so many authors use it for only advertising, and only advertising. I've already unfollowed one or two people who only posted advertisements, and posted them all. the. time. I've got enough of that without seeing your picture every other tweet.

Also, some of the "Worldwide Trends" that pop up in my side bar seem so inane and stupid. I don't care about Britney Spears being president, or whatever. So far, my favorite has been "Replace Band Names with Doofs."

What I would like to see more of: So far, this entire endeavor feels very impersonal. When I see a tweet about something other than "Buy my book!", I'll often try and respond, just to try and open up a conversation with somebody, though I've had very little of the same. In fact, most of my "personal messages" are from people I've newly followed telling me to "Check Out [X]." Today I had a "personal message" from somebody saying "We make book trailers for $150!" Most of the book trailers I've seen have been nothing more than something of a powerpoint-type show with pictures, music, and words, and I've never really heard of them helping generate any type of sales. If I have $150, I'm probably going to spend that on advertising my book somewhere. But that's another post for another day.

So far, I can't say I'm disappointed with Twitter. Again, I was pretty anti-Twitter ever since I heard of the website, and still am, to some extent. I suppose this was more or less of an experiment, since I kept hearing that it was an excellent social networking tool for reaching out to readers and other writers. And it is, really. Like I said; I've gotten 72 followers in a week without doing anything other than following others. However, I was hoping to use this as a tool to "connect" with others; thus far, I feel like I've entered myself into a not-so-successful advertising campaign.

In other news: there's this awesome new site that's been created by a Redditor, Reddit Authors. The point is to show off Redditor-produced content. The site is new, though it looks sleek and professional already. And, from what I can tell, the creator seems like a pretty nice guy. Also, I'm on there (but, for whatever reason, Family History: Part 1 is not, though Part 2 is. Weird.) and I didn't even have to request it. Seriously - if you're a Redditor, I suggest at least stopping by and taking a short look around, and not just because I was somehow automatically thrown into some "Yay! You're Affiliated!" category.

The Last Poem I Ever Wrote (To Date).

Last year, to gather a few extra credits, I decided it would be a brilliant idea to enroll myself in an "Introduction to Creative Writing" class.

Overall, the experience was pretty "meh", actually. While there were one or two older writers who did actually produce some quality stuff, most of the "peers" were young freshmen, some of whom were probably taking this as an "Easy-A" class. Then again, many of them were also English majors, so the latter statement is more difficult to "verify".

Anyways, one of the units we were required to do was a poetry unit. I hate poetry. Okay, so hate is a strong word - but I do very strongly dislike poetry. More so than that, I hate analyzing poetry. I hate being expected to search for hidden messages, matching words to meaning, etc. It's just not for me.

So, naturally, I was more or less very apathetic about the whole idea of a "poetry" unit. But, we were required to choose a poem we had written recently to submit to a workshop. Oh, and we also had to read our poetry out loud to everybody. Blech. Did I mention I'm not a poet? Anyways, like I mentioned previously, I was very apathetic and, quite frankly, unhappy about the idea of poetry. And, of course, the "spunky, sassy, fun" me wanted to show this. What better way to do this than in the format of a poem I was required to read out loud to the class?

The journey began. Determine to express my extreme irritation at having to deal with poetry, I took the theme of a high school student also very apathetic about poetry (it seemed appropriate, I suppose) and started Googling different sorts of poetry. What came out, of course, was less than ideal; however, it did show me that I was either in a terrible group of writers that day, or that I am a god when it comes to poetry, because I only remember one very minor criticism about the piece. Anyways, here is the piece, entitled, "Untitled Poetry Written by a Jaded High School Student."

In school, they told me to rhyme,

But I haven’t got the time,

Nor will it ever earn me a single dime.

“Leaders love alliteration,” Lucy loved to lie.

In school, they say learn

when we only want to play.

So we write Haikus.

Cinquian

Poetry Type

Used by teachers

Not for creative purposes

Lackluster

O Poetry, the bane of thy existence.

Especially now, with my Terza Rima.

From me, please disappear into the distance.

There once was a poet named Thyme

He claimed he was a master of Rhyme.

Then the rappers walked in

With grammar like sin,

Said, “We limerickin’ ‘bout hoes and crime!”