#also i know this blog is dead but my laptop is coming in the mail soonish

[escapekissed]

the functions of my browser of choice // when ad blocker is not enough to expel your inner demons

google chrome says deleting my browser history can free up at least 395 megabytes of data. i do not know how much data that is. i know downloading a single song is 3-5megabytes. but despite my browser of choice, and my constant attempts to stave off my parents’ request for any kind of imagined encyclopedic information i have about the world or spelling ten-dollar words, i google very little, and every page i go to is a hub of parasocial personality from three different sites: tumblr, twitter, facebook (when i’m feeling especially self-loathing). 395 divided by 5, which, taking my own advice, i did google, is 79. that’s 79 songs in a single day.

(send. scroll. refresh.)

but usually when i scroll it’s in perfect silence. my hand brushes against a screen smeared with my own germination (my hands sweat, they always have, they’re small as a middle-schoolers and their thickness and perpetual grease provokes images of anxious italian chicken sausages. the splattering of red on my thumbs after hours of laying there, simply scrolling, before i switch hands or fingers, seems to match just perfectly. my fingers burn when the phone overheats from overuse and the very little air flowing into my bedroom, but they do not sizzle, and i wonder if they did, would they smell sweet instead of salty, would they brown and taste of spices, would they be soft, would the meat melt in my mouth, meat like jello in a plastic case), and i do this for several hours a day at least, unless i move to my laptop.

(send. scroll. refresh.)

the hinge is broken. i literally cannot close it---which makes a good metaphor but is in fact a simple, explainable, inexcusable truth. the anxious way i swing my chubby legs up and down fast as a dog thumping its leg against the carpet, as i lay in bed with the laptop perched atop my belly made it break. i only use it at a desk now---or sitting up---and sometimes that seems too hard. i made myself so small once i de facto broke the curve of my spine in several places. my neck hunches. my back aches. i get headaches, tension, migraines, caffiene withdrawal, but i think also it comes from a lack of human warmth and touch. i saw a chiropractor once and nearly cried. even atop the clothes, to be pushed gently back into place by a firm hand---you can almost pretend they love you, even when you’re paying a hefty co-pay to see a woman turn her face away from looking into your eyes as she cracks your neck.

(send. scroll. refresh.)

i subscribe to every streaming service. i click titles, watch for five minutes, then give up. i buy video games and never play them, but can spend at least an hour or two looking at them and thinking about the parts of them i imagine would be fun. there are games i played for days straight without blinking, until i had to wear sunglasses while i played to stop the light of the screen from hurting my bloodshot eyes. depression and global trauma aside, i can still imagine being that engrossed in something again. it makes me smile, thinking of weeks spent obsessing, weeks spent loving, my hands sweating on a controller, x pressed inexpertly over and over again. when i think of loving myself, i think of how much i loved games and music and songs, and how silly and human and weird that seems to love things so much. a harsh echo in my brain of some twitter post i saw once makes me remind me how silly and human also means foolish, that there are better and more important ways to be, and then a quiet and mindful part of myself reminds myself i will never be able to touch the world in any serious mindset, in any way that matters, cannot look at the world like the void without the void looking back and noticing the sweat on my hands and the folds on my chin and tiny neck, and calling me ugly and stupid. i am afraid to love like that again, and it isn’t healthy or normal or appropriate anyway, so i look at blogs and twitters for people who are judgemental or horny in ways i find just vaguely fascinating enough to look at tomorrow, and the next day, and the day after that. they make hot takes about people just like me and people not like me at all, and i picture my mind in a glass case or a sausage lining, and it smokes for hours over a low burn with very little seasoning.

(send. scroll. refresh.)

have i ever had an original idea? is it even possible to? i guess i could google it. but i doin’t want to know the answer, i’m so comfortable in this silence, this damp, terribly lit tourist attraction of a cave where i can hold a railing and walk all the way down. my father always makes us walk behind the group. when everyone else leaves to attend to the gift shop, we stay, we take pictures, he grabs me by my knees and holds me up to the ceiling. but i want to lay down. i want to touch the wet rocks. they are hard, and unyielding, and i do not want them impale me so much as i want them to make me line up with the earth and something other than myself.

(send. scroll. refresh.)

google chrome tracks everything you google. it tracks every site you go to. i wonder how it feels to track me going to the same three sites. they learn nothing, i learn nothing. i might be on a socialist watchlist. but they also know i want to kill myself more than any russian bot could ever want to kill me. if google wanted me dead---they would send me enough morphine and alcohol to overdose on in the mail.

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if you’ve found a way to profit off of me you’re doing better than my parents, and a hell of a lot better than i am.

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i want to get off the internet.

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i wish there was a way to get off the internet.

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but i don’t look into mirrors and i don’t take pictures. this is the only way i can remember that i am alive, and i have a form, even if it is not the one i want, even if i cannot squeeze myself into something beautiful and perfect.

(send. scroll. refresh.)

i can see the outline of my face in my phone, in my computer screen. i look so much better as a shadow. silohuetted, i look like a stalagmite, curved, cascading, upwards from the ground, built by so many sweat drops, stone, and hard, and wet.

(send. scroll. refresh.)

lurray caverns doesn’t smell like dirt. it just smells clean.

[sexnce]

Mobile Rules Page

General Rules

I retain the right to follow and interact with who I want. I do not have to rp with you if I don’t want to. If I get bad vibes or you’re just a dick or a myriad of other reasons, I can and probably will unfollow or block you

Hate is not tolerated here. Klaus is a very lgbt-positive, gender-positive, all around “Live your best life” kind of guy. No. Hate.

This blog is not spoiler free for TUA I’ll probably be adjusting my backstory info, headcanons, etc based on the show’s content in future seasons. Be prepared for that, since it’s a currently ongoing series. Though sometimes if they fuck up I’ll just say screw the canon and continue on my merry way.

Language I’m a firm believer in colorful language. I swear a lot. Hell I come up with my own swears. Klaus uses a lot of colorful language. I also believe that as long as the point gets across, use whatever words or phrases you want. (No this does not mean slurs.) However do note I said as long as the point gets across. If your post legitimately has me squinting at my screen asking myself “What does this mean” then I’ll message you and try to figure out what’s goin on there. I’ll try not to be rude.

MATURE CONTENT There will be nsfw things on this blog including gore and sexual themes. I will not rp smut or torture with minors! Smut will be under a read more. DO NOT REBLOG MY NSFW CONTENT IF YOU ARE A MINOR. Please have ‘nsfw’ and/or 'hot and bothered’ tag blocked if you are a minor! I want to be able to interact with minors but NOT for anything nsfw. Though anyone under like 15 I might not interact with.

Don’t pester Simple. Don’t expect me to always reply quickly. I do normally reply quickly but if my muse is kinda dead it’s not gonna happen for a while. I do have other things to do. I also sometimes forget to draft things. If after a few days I haven’t responded, you can message me!

No godmodding Some characters are high level, ultra powerful. I get that, I really do, but we gotta talk shit out beforehand. Plus if we write a fight that’s supposed to be fair then it’s not fun if your character just takes no damage. If we wanna plot beating the shit out of one or the other, we’ll plot it out.

Spam I don’t like chain mail sort of things but I appreciate the sentiment? Generally I’ll either delete the ask or post it with the “Sorry bud” sort of thing. Also don’t spam me with messages like “hey” when it’s my turn to reply. I know it is. It’s drafted I swear. If you tell me it’s my turn directly after posting your reply I will probably block you.

Ask Memes If I post an ask meme that isn’t starters please leave one or a couple in my inbox before you reblog it! It’s just nice tbh.

Ships Shipping requires chemistry. Proper shipping anyway. Klaus is a total god damn thot and very sexual but he forces himself not to get attached to people. If you want a romantic plot we need to establish it first. I already said this but NO SMUT WITH MINORS. MISS ME WITH THAT SHIT. I will NOT be shipping in/cest I’m not here for that and neither is Klaus.

Posts Please for the love of god, if you can, trim your posts. I know that on mobile this isn’t a thing you can do, but if you’re on a laptop or have access to trimming? Please trim your posts. It’s a lot to scroll past and I easily lose patience for it. If you don’t or are unable to I might unfollow you, sorry.

Triggers My disclaimer will have a longer explanation but I will not tag for the following triggers Drugs Drug abuse Child abuse (backstory) Alcohol Alcoholism PTSD War Death Ghosts/spirits Gore

Side note! The mun is a multiple system. Klaus is a headmate and will be writing this stuff with some help bc it’s not like he’s a writer. Our headmate is obviously different from the rp version. It’s oddly meta and technically not important but we’re pretty open about it.

[theopenbookwigtown]

Our Last Day

It’s hard to believe it’s our last day minding the shop before we move on to Ireland! Like most everyone who stays at The Open Book, we waited years to come to Wigtown, and it’s gone by so quickly. We’re off in the morning, on the ferry to Belfast.

I wrote “It’s our last day here, come say hello!” on the sandwich board this morning, and so far it’s bringing in some guests. I haven’t written since Monday because there hasn’t been a ton to say -- Tuesday was quiet, with nine guests and one sale. Gordon made a couple of sales Wednesday morning while I slept in. We’ve had fun refreshing the window displays and rearranging/organizing some of the book sections, and Gordon fixed the jammed printer and changed out the dead ink cartridges to help out future proprietors.

I do want to offer a small handful of tips and information to people staying at The Open Book in the days, weeks, months, and years to come:

The internet is spotty and the shop Wi-Fi goes down frequently. We’ve been cycling the router regularly; sometimes it helps, and sometimes it doesn’t. There isn’t much else to do about it except be prepared.

The radio signal isn’t great, so to have music in the shop we’ve been streaming through Amazon Music or YouTube on the shop laptop. Of course, if the internet goes down, so does internet radio. But when it works, it’s lovely to have music.

The coffee shops in town have irregular hours during the week. (In general, shopkeepers seem to open when they want to when it’s quiet like this -- and we’ve done the same.) Caffeine addicts like us: You can find packaged coffee and energy drinks at the Co-op.

Be sure to get out and explore. We’ve eaten at Craft, Cobwebs, and ReadingLasses in town, and everything has been delicious. We went out to Newton Stewart yesterday to visit the Crafty Distillery (where Hills & Harbor Gin is created) and had dinner at Meena’s, which was excellent. It was interesting to try Indian food in Scotland, and we thoroughly enjoyed the break from pub food. We haven’t ventured far, but it has been nice to get out of town for a bit. The roads are narrow and there are more sheep and cows than people; it’s truly a beautiful, special, magical place.

Smile and say hello to everyone.

Pet the dogs.

Come here with someone you like! :P

In Wigtown, we visited The Bookshop and met Captain the shop cat. We also purchased copies of Shaun’s and Jessica’s books, though Shaun wasn’t there and Jessica has since left Wigtown for new adventures. We also haven’t met Rosemary, so we haven’t been out to see the ruins of Baldoon Castle associated with the story of the Real Bride of Lammermoor like we’d hoped. But Nanette’s shortbread biscuits were heavenly.

Gordon walked out to see the nearby golf course. It’s been quite wet and we didn’t see anyone on the green. We did talk to local people at Galloway Bar that said they would bring him out today if it were possible, so we’ll see if that happens.

We’ve been enjoying our evenings at the Galloway Bar and Craft (Louise, Sharon, and Jock have been wonderful to us) and getting to know the people of Wigtown. We’ve been invited into our temporary neighbors’ homes; they’ve gifted us gorgeous walking sticks and a CD of poetry written and read by the people of Wigtown. Other shop owners have been generous and so kind to offer us tips and wisdom around running a bookstore. Sarah and John across the street helped us wrap and box the walking sticks so we can either mail them home or check them when we get to the airport.

I’ve been posting photos to my Instagram: @grammarslayer. It’s easier than trying to get them over onto the laptop to add to the blog. I apologize if I’ve misspelled anyone’s names in these blog posts. We’ve loved our time here and wish we could stay longer. And I’ve begun thinking in and reading with a Scottish accent!

This will likely be my last post. Whoever comes here next: Soak it all in, say yes to everything, and enjoy every second.

[ofyellowraincoats]

ur a snake

I really wish I could have just one blog without being stalked and slandered by my abuser, but oh well. Let me tell you who the real snake is. Triggering storytime below.

So I met my abuser while he was going by the name Trevor. We had a few brushes, but he only stuck around when we had a ship that gained fan traction. It almost felt like we were the center of this ship’s fandom for a while and I admit, it felt really good. He had a girlfriend at the time, but as soon as we got so popular that we had to open up a shared sideblog to answer fan questions and we started getting invited into a chat room that was built specifically to talk about our characters, he started shit talking her to me. He said she was messed up and that she had traumas and he didn’t want to be with her anymore because he wanted to be the only person in his relationship with issues. Now, this frightened me a little bit, but he was kind to me so I trusted he was just not wording his feelings very well and didn’t mean to be so toxic.

Things got worse. He broke up with her and then started latching onto me. He threw elaborate plays for our fans to watch, wanting them to be highly involved in our personal moments. I liked him, I was crushing, and I asked him out in a REALLY STUPID WAY because I’m an anxious person, but after some insistence from him I asked better. A blog about our relationship was made by fans. Everything was pretty good.

I moved to California to be with him, completely upturned my life. Things were great, we were happy. He was always unfair to me, for instance if we had four of something he would take three and only give me one, but I was used to that sort of treatment so I said nothing and did nothing. He’d continue to tell me how terrible his ex was and try to encourage me to go after her like a rabid dog. He’d tell me she made him want to kill herself, that she was abusive and toxic and manipulative and terrible.

I’d go to her like a normal human being, angry but calm enough to reason. She’d show me receipts of their conversations and nothing he said was true. All of his “psycho ex drama” was him making HER want to kill herself. He’d push her so far she wanted to self harm and then he’d come to me and tell me that I should attack her. It was like he WANTED her to really do it.

I became friends with this ex and we had some good times. Trevor eventually got used to it and we were all friends for a while. Then on a holiday, after we had watched some movies and cuddled, he got up to go to the bathroom and his phone went off right by my head. I was still fuzzy in the head because we’d been giggling and laughing and we were just so happy, I thought it was unreal. It didn’t seem fake either, I was putting all of my effort into keeping him happy and ignoring my own needs to be subservient to his. He was laughing and smiling and grabbing me and kissing me and stealing my attention. The phone lit up with a message and we had the same phone, so I looked. I didn’t open it at first, but the words that came up caused me to.

The words were, “I hope you can steal his wallet soon…”

I open the message and see that while we were cuddling and talking and being happy… he had told this girl that he was miserable and I was terrible and he was going to steal my wallet in the middle of the night so that he could take all of my money and ditch me to go to New York and be a ship/friendship from a show together.

I was shocked, I called him on it. It eventually came out that he just wanted the drama. He was happy, he said so himself, and he even insisted we go back to being happy as if nothing had happened. He just wanted the sympathy, so he had lied. After being caught in this little cheating thing (he was talking romantic with this girl, and he admitted his intentions could be defined as cheating) and apologizing and saying he didn’t even know why he had done it… he did it like five more times.

Each time I caught him, he’d convince me to trust him again. I have very personal reasons that I’m so prone to being so easy to manipulate and abuse that I will not share, but suffice it to say, he managed to keep me thinking he was made of sunshine and rainbows.

We moved, he did the shit talking behind my back thing again, and admitted again to us all that none of it was true and he just wanted the attention. But he got less convincing in other areas, he was prone to pushing me more and being less friendly when we disagreed or when I wanted to do something that he didn’t.

He would get so ridiculous when he wanted to be that while we were packing up, he -the King of Christmas, a man who listens to carols in JULY- screamed at me that he didn’t even LIKE CHRISTMAS. A ridiculous lie that we both knew was a lie just to try and get what he wanted.

We moved again. Things were still great, but he started isolating me. He wouldn’t let me have my own friends, he insisted on pushing his way into everything that I did. If my roleplay group was getting praise, he’d want to claim it for himself or he’d start yelling at me about it. If someone else pissed him off, he’d take it out on me and even admitted it upon me questioning him about it. I’d ask him what I did to deserve being treated the way he was treating me and he’d go quiet, then eventually it would come out that I had done nothing and it was just safer to take it out on me because it wouldn’t ruin his reputation like it would if his anger got splashed all over the dash for the people he wanted to manipulate to see.

And he perfected his manipulation in this time. He’d break his laptops because he didn’t take care of them and then he’d convince people to send him new ones. He got like five new laptops in the span of a single year by complaining and whining all over the dash. He’d even whine until people bought him pizza or sent him gifts. He closed his friend group to me at this time, making it so that he could see everything I did but I wasn’t allowed into his own personal world. I’d have to change the rules of my own stuff to allow him into it, in JUST the way he wanted to be allowed in. (For example, I had a character that wasn’t supposed to have any siblings and I wasn’t allowing anyone to join as staff members, but I had to change that because he wanted to be both) If I didn’t cater to him, he’d blow up.

We got along better when I wasn’t calling him out on treating me like shit. He’d eat all the candy and I’d get none, but I’d shrug it off. He’d leave a mess whenever he took on a personal project and I wouldn’t say anything, I would just clean it up. He would ask me to make him things (graphics, themes, cosplays, costume makeup) and then take full credit for them. He wouldn’t eat and would complain about being hungry, so I wouldn’t say anything about it and I would just go ahead and cook for him. When I started asking him why he didn’t just cook for himself, when I started to ask him to treat me like a real human being, when I started asking him to clean up after his own messes… that is when things went really downhill. That’s when he got even worse.

During this time, he also completely stopped taking care of himself. He hung out next to some cat shit that was on the floor less than a foot away from him and when I asked him about it, he told me it had been there for days but it was okay to hang out with it because “it was dry.” As if only wet animal shit should be cleaned up. As if it’s okay to hang out with dry animal shit. He’d go weeks without showering just because he was lazy. He’d choose not to eat if I didn’t cook for him. His bed got so dirty that a family of mice moved into it with him. If he opened something, he’d leave the trash right there where he opened it. I’d have to clean up after him, I’d have to cook for him, I’d have to cut his hair, and I’d have to do it all on his time and his terms. I wasn’t allowed to watch things he didn’t like, but he could watch whatever he wanted. I wasn’t allowed to listen to music because it annoyed him, but he could listen to music no matter what I disliked about his music. Sometimes, he’d use the excuse that he was tired or had a headache and wanted to sleep so therefore it would be rude of me to do anything that made noise at all… but then he’d Skype his friends at 3am while I (an insomniac with sleep disorders) was asleep and he’d scream and yell and laugh and wake me up. He told me all the time that I didn’t look like a man and would comment on what I chose to wear and tell me how bad it looked but then wanted to wear my clothes and wanted me to cut his hair in my hairstyle.  If I ever tried to express myself through singing or making something online, he’d just tell me how horrible it was and then steal my ideas. He even stole my writing samples to get into roleplay groups. He’d abuse me down to the point where I thought everything that I did was terrible. He’d tell me to hurt myself. I’d tell him “If I were ___ I’d throw myself off the roof” and he’d look at me dead in the face and say “well you’re ___ right now, so…”

My friends, the people who got to see both sides because he forced himself in, all told me to tell him to go to the store and lock him out. He was that terrible. They were worried that he might actually be the end of me. That he might actually kill me, whether it be by his own hand or because of the abuse he put me through. And there were plenty of times when I thought he’d be the end of me too. Just like he was almost the end of his ex before me. It takes a lot to make a whole group of human beings think things are so severe that the best option is to kick him out without warning and give him no time to find another place to be. And EVERYTHING that they had to base this decision on was FIRST HAND EXPERIENCE. Not gossip. Not shit I told them. THEY WERE THERE. THEY WITNESSED THESE THINGS in my roleplay groups, in my messengers (when he’d log in and spy on me), and over Skype.

He has even sent hate mail about me to legitimate hate blogs and then signed these pieces of hate and then he still tries to act like I’m the one abusing him? I’m bothering him? But he’s the one going out of his way to play this one man pity party? Trying to form a mob against me?

He’d join my groups and hurt other people. There was a point with his sibling character where he cornered the person I was shipping with in character and threatened to hang him by his toes and beat him until he died because he wanted to scare this guy out of the rp so he could take my character for his own ship. I had another long running ship that he pushed and pushed and pushed and pushed me about until he could slither in between the two people and try to ruin things. Everyone in the group complained about him. He was the type to pull a rape plot and a transphobic plot and then whine about people not liking him in character… like they were supposed to want to be his friend no matter what nasty things he did. He’d leave if he didn’t get what he wanted immediately, but he’d try to guilt trip people and manipulate them as long as he could.

I wasn’t allowed to write with other people. I wasn’t allowed to talk to people he didn’t know. And if we disagreed on anything or got in a fight, he would hack into my messenger accounts and spy on me to make sure I had nobody that I could talk to. And if I did “dare” to try to get comfort or talk through my feelings or anything at all, he would JUMP on me and scream at me.

It was honestly terrifying.

Then he went to Walmart and stole from them like an idiot and got sent to jail. While he was in the slammer, he sent me mail all of the time talking about how he talked about me to everyone and couldn’t wait to get home to me and missed me etc etc etc. I think it was just because he had nobody else he could write too, I was the only address he had. Then he came back and hopped back online, right back into his circle of friends that I hadn’t been allowed to join.

This is when I realized that I hadn’t been allowed to interact with any of his friends because he was shit talking me and he didn’t want me to see it and he didn’t want a repeat of his ex before me. He didn’t want reasonable people to have reasonable conversations and expose him for his lies. He’d already learned that it was really easy to make him look like a cruel human being and I’ll never forget his child-like expression whenever he’d get caught lying.

We broke up because he was cheating on me again and I couldn’t take it. I couldn’t put 5000000% effort into a relationship that was basically a master and slave dynamic. I didn’t have it in my anymore. He actually yelled at me and berated me and made fun of me for being upset that we broke up. I had to go hide in the bathroom so that I could settle myself.

Despite the terribleness of his actions, both up until then and afterwards, he’d jump on top of me five minutes later demanding attention as if nothing had happened. He’d tell me by his actions that treating me like shit was nothing and should be forgotten and immediately forgiven without him needing to actually do better. His exact words when we broke up were,

“You’re right. I’m treating you terribly. I’ve been a bad boyfriend to you for a long time. And I could change that. I could put effort into treating you like a real human being and being fair to you, but I’d rather not. I’d rather continue doing whatever I want without having to feel guilty about how I treat you so you’re right, we should break up.”

As if… not dating was a good reason to treat me like shit.

During this time, he went through more aliases too. Trevor was called a dick because he’d been so terrible to people. Nobody wanted to interact with him because he’d burned everyone out. So he changed to Neal, and he changed to Jeff. And he used a few others. Eventually though, his actions would prove who he was and people would stop wanting to be around him. He’d even go as far as to purposefully seek out the people that he had hurt, the people that had stated their interest in keeping themselves safe by staying away from them, so he could slither his way back into their lives. He wanted to steal a redo, a second or third or fourth or fifth or tenth chance without having to apologize or face what he’d done. So he’d do the same things all over again because he never had to learn.

Eventually, he had to change to Geoff. He told me that he wanted to join an rp that had declined him as Jeff and he was afraid that it was because of “his reputation.” Again, not HIS fault. So he laughed about how he could just change the spelling and nobody would know it was him. When he got into the rp, he laughed again, telling me how stupid the admins and the players were. He looked like he got a high out of tricking them into letting him in, even though they clearly wanted nothing to do with him.

During one of the times in which he was yelling at me because someone else pissed him off, I ended up cornered. He was hovering over me and yelling about me being successful and I snapped. He finally triggered me and I yelled back. I immediately scared myself and started rambling about the fact that I couldn’t stop yelling, I couldn’t stop shaking, I couldn’t stop seeing my past trauma, he had become my abuser (I FINALLY SAW IT), and I just… couldn’t. I told him how I felt and I insisted he listen and he eventually did. He’d end up agreeing with me, apologizing for being a dick, and then… running online to tell people how terrible and abusive I was for finally telling him to stop. He’d twist the situation around until he looked like the good guy. But he’d also yell at me for things as little as me being successful. He couldn’t do anything but degrade me and yell at me while using me at the same time for everything as big as cleaning up his messes and keeping him fed and things as little as attention. I cannot stand people being close to me or touching me anymore because he would force himself into my bed. He’d lay on top of me and force me to give him whatever he wanted, even if he had just been abusing me a few minutes before that. 

It only got worse after he spent months researching mental illnesses and decided he had one. He would spend hours reading about it and he’d point out symptoms of the mental illness and then sure enough… he’d start showing them, but it was always so fake? Like he was trying to roleplay his real life to fit the symptoms so he could say he was mentally ill and have an excuse for being terrible. This illness gave him a get out of jail free card by telling him that he couldn’t help but he terrible to people. That he didn’t need to worry about his inability to care about other people, and that it was okay that he wanted to be the only successful person in the world and everyone should pay attention to him. And sure enough, he started getting worse.  

History repeated itself and he found himself a new significant other based on the fact that they had a popular ship that people liked. He was telling people that I made him want to kill himself when really.. he was pushing me to self harm to the point of literally telling me in specific words that I should do it. He’d tell me how worthless I was and how “he did everything” even though I was very definitely the one doing everything. I began doubting everything. I had a panic attack on stage during karaoke in which I could hear him berating me in my head and stopped breathing. I’m a performer, mind you. I was in theatre troups and I have performed vocally more times than I can count. I started in choir in middle school and I was in band in high school. I had my own punk rock band that I fronted in high school. I was with one specific acting troup for three+ years and I played face characters for most of the time. I was able to dance on stage in my underpants but after this guy’s abuse I couldn’t even do karaoke.

When I finally got away from him, it was a power play on his part. He didn’t tell me that he was planning on anything and less than a week before the move he brought it up. We had a bunch of debt and bills and he left me with it. The way he brought up leaving was to further degrade me, by telling me that I wasn’t going to survive; that if I wanted to insist he treat me like a human being, he was just going to leave and he wouldn’t have to worry about treating me right. He could do whatever he wanted and he’d be fine. I would have to keep taking care of him as if he were my child and he could continue not listening to me, invalidating me, pushing me around, and straight up abusing me.

Yes. I told him I’d kill myself. You can’t blame someone who was abused for reacting to the abuse, or for feeling the hurtful things their abuser wanted them to feel. Why you might ask? Read above. He had done it to me. It was his fault, as terrible as he might say that sounds, it’s the truth. If he wanted to treat me like so much shit that I thought I needed to kill myself, he needs to also accept that it would have been his fault if I had. He abused me to the point where I thought I couldn’t survive without him, which is the literal purpose of most abuser’s abuse. They want you to think that you can’t live without them. He attacked me more times than I could count and he further invalidated my existence and importance by taking three of everything and then giving me only one as if I was worth less; as I explained in a previous example. Not to mention that he wanted to steal my cat and leave me with huge bills in the middle of nowhere with no safety net to rely on. He pushed me to the point of self harm multiple times and then would whine about it to his friends as if I were the bad guy because I had been pushed that far. He’d be watching stuff and laughing and having a grand old time and telling everyone he was sobbing because the big, bad, terrible boy he was living with had hurt himself and it was his fault. He was terrified. He hurt my cat too. She was unspayed so she went into heat and he got so annoyed with her that he threw something at her and it hit her in the face so hard that it made her face swell up. It looked like he’d broken a bone in her eye socket. And how did he respond? He went ahead and used that as angst for himself too. He whined and cried on web cam so people could see how pathetic he felt, because he wanted people to tell him that it was okay that he assaulted my cat and hurt her so badly.

That’s the kind of person he is. He wants to be able to do terrible things and then be consoled and told he’s valid and in the right and a perfect little ray of sunshine. But he’s a monster, and sooner or later everyone realizes it. I thought he was a good person too but I’m well aware now that he isn’t. He’s clearly still trying to abuse me now, manipulating people against me so that I’m once again… isolated. He needs me to feel like shit so that he can feel good about himself. He needs me to have nothing so that he can feel good about himself.

And he can try. He can try all he wants. He can stalk me. He can obsess over me. He can lie about me. But I’ve got plenty of my own friends and I’m stronger now. I know how wrong he is. I know that I’m better than anything he’s ever done to me.

If you want to stop talking to me because of his lies, go ahead. If you want to support his manipulation and abuse, go ahead. But I will continue to live my own life. I’m allowed to roleplay. I’m allowed to write. There is no valid reason for ANYONE to be trying to act like they have a monopoly on writing on Tumblr. There is no reason for ANYONE to be acting like I’m not allowed to do it. I’m staying in my own lane. I don’t interact with him. I don’t shit talk him. I don’t give him even a second of my time and here we are… with me getting anon hate and I’ve been nice to everyone here so the only explanation for this is him. He’s been doing this to me for years and I guess… congrats on joining in on his abuse and giving him fuel.

He might have gone through like five different aliases, but he’s the same person he was when we met. He hasn’t changed. He hasn’t become any better than the person that was so terrible to people that nobody wanted to interact with him. He’s just gotten better at manipulating people.

I’m still praying that he’ll grow up, and that he’ll face the truth about who he is so that he can really heal and grow. I wish him the best and hope he can learn how to treat people better.

And I hope that any of you hateful little anons that might want to pop into my inbox in the future think about what you’re doing before you victimize an abuse survivor on behalf of their abuser. I have done NOTHING but write with people here. I send people kind messages and I offer to make things for people. I haven’t made this an unsafe place for him to be but he is CLEARLY trying to make it an unsafe place for me.

That in itself should tell you something.

[jmoor144-blog]

BLOG #6 - Ads and Childhood

Consuming Kids is a documentary about the exploitation of young kids and their parents. 

The documentary makes a point of saying that the current generation of children is being marketed too more than they have ever before. Workers in the advertising industry realized that children are an easily exploitable mass audience that are reachable through almost every medium in existence. Movies, games, the internet, television, school. Within these mediums are where the advertisements are placed. This generation of children are the most media-connected generation that has ever existed. The internet opens up a world of advertising possibilities, even more now than when the documentary was released.

Marketers refer to children as “little sponges.” They’re constantly consuming media at rates that surpass the previous generation of people, all the time. This also comes with the advent of mass mediums. Advertising is made easier through the multitude of different options children have to access media.

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) attempted to put an end to child marketing because of it’s obvious malicious effects on the impressionable minds of young people. They claimed that it was harmful and deceiving, which is completely true. Advertising agencies are ruthless. Children were just another avenue of turning a profit, they just happened to be ultra-gullible and a large part of the media-consuming population. Unfortunately, Congress neutered the FTC by taking away their powers to interfere with anything related to child advertising at all.

Parents are a huge factor when it comes to children advertising. The documentary does a good bit on how parents are persuaded to buy things that they otherwise wouldn’t by their children. Parents are more likely to buy products when kids ask for them. Most children don’t have the ability to purchase things for themselves, they have to go through their parents. Parents want their children to be happy, so they buy these things for them.

I’m one of the children that this documentary talks about. I grew up in this age of mass digital media. I remember using my mom’s laptop frequently when I was young. I remember watching cartoons on cable TV when I was young. Like the documentary says, I’ve been subject to millions of ads over the course of my entire life. That doesn’t necessarily mean I’m some brain-dead, media consuming product fiend. I only ever remember buying something off of a TV ad once. It was for a pair of carpet sliding shoes. You strap them on over your feet and they’ll slide across carpeted floors with ease. They were something like thirty dollars, shipping included. I remember the day I got them in the mail vividly. It had been weeks since we’d ordered them off of a TV ad that I’d seen for what seemed like forever. My mom was laying on the couch because she had some cold or the flu or something. It was winter, and I ran outside without a jacket to grab this brown package. I take the slide shoes out and immediately strap ‘em on. True to the advertisement, they slid across my carpeted floors. They were a lot of fun for the few minutes that I played with them. I didn’t really have enough room to slide for more than a couple feet at a time, so their magic was lost on me within the first day that I got them. I still have one of the slides shoes in a box in my room. I don’t know what happened to the second one. One thing’s for sure, though. The company that made them got their money from me. Their child advertising strategy worked.

[someplace-that-is-else]

Into the Ether: The Thing about Milestones

 I was excited…and nervous.

 I had gotten to San Diego International early. After an effectively swift security check, I was waiting for my plane. So that meant…I was in the bookstore. LOL!!!

 Frank Herbert. James S. A. Corey. Pierce Brown. I was amused that all of them had books on display at the airport bookstore. As I took pictures for my friend Lee, I wondered. Would I ever see any of my books here? Would I be among this famed group of writers that I liked?

 I know, I know. Such a writer to have books on his mind before a flight.

 It was my birthday week. It was the norm for me to be off work for it. Especially for milestone years.

 Turning 20. Turning 30. Entering my 40s. Each one I would go out. Okay, maybe not so much when you are 20. For my 30s I went to Vegas for the very first time. And now…I was turning 40. And there was only one place on my mind.

 New York, New York. Manhattan. I had lived there for six months back in 2010. I still even had a storage out there. I had been chasing my dreams and what better place than New York? If I could make it there, I could make it anywhere.

 I didn’t make it.

 But I left a part of me there.

 And now almost a decade later, I needed a change of scenery. As a man with multiple jobs that was not giving me many breaks. As a writer at a crossroads. And there was nothing like returning to a place where I had so much focus.

 Or was there?

 Driven?

 Not that I haven’t since then, but when I thought about when was I driven…truly driven…I thought back to my senior year in college. Back to my basement apartment in Little Rock, Arkansas. Back to focusing on two things. Being sure I graduated on time in May which required me to stay focused on my studies. The other thing was working on a little book called Darkened Soul.

 Yes!!! I had other novels that I had written and put in a folder somewhere. But Darkened Soul had haunted me from the first moment I had written it back in my sophomore year at Arkansas State University. Back when I had taken a year off from college to get the party bug that I had been infected with out of my system. And now that I was back in college at University of Arkansas at Little Rock, it still haunted me. It was back in the days of big computers parts, pre-laptops. So, all I had was a big screen, keyboard, speakers complete with modem. And I typed.

 It was also pre-self-publishing.

 What does one do?

 Of course, that was all a moot point. You see…I met a boy. A Russian.

 What followed was two years of friendship and three years of ups and downs. Without a happy ending. By the end of it, I did graduate. That focus was never lost. But I came to the realization still.

 I had lost myself. Somewhere in that relationship. Somewhere trying to be sure he was okay. Somewhere in there trying to make him happy. Because everything had to be about him. I could not even sit down in front of my computer screen to edit/rewrite parts of Darkened Soul without a whine about not focusing on him. This was also pre-smartphones so no Wi-Fi to get lost on your phone on. So…like I said…lost.

 Well…the more you know. While part of me might ponder if it was just lost time, it was a building block to something else. A lesson about growth. And with graduation done, it was time for me to take the next step. Working on getting Darkened Soul published. Chasing the dream.

 Little did I know…chasing the dream would take me back to one of the places where I had grown up in…San Diego, California. It would also take another eight years.

  Made It?

 I can still remember.

 I still remember coming back to San Diego. It was on a Greyhound bus. I had transferred my job from Arkansas to here. So, I immediately had work. In fact, I left on a Friday and started that Monday. Lol.

 I had been so confident. So sure. With my English degree in hand, I would work, but always turn my eye toward finding time to write. I would apply for writing programs in Los Angeles. Then I would see how it went. On my way to California, I also started my self-publishing career with a click.

 Darkened Soul was published on Createspace by the time I found a place to stay in San Diego. So began my self-publishing career in the summer of 2013. In the time I’ve been in San Diego, I released more books in my THE DARKENED series. It amazed me that in the pursuit of working my jobs I had written so many books.

 Only one problem with that. I had not made it into any of the writing programs. Year after year, I entered in my applications, information, and the like. And year after year, I found out that I did not get in. Usually on Facebook. Or something would be wrong with the webpage. Or it would be revealed that year that you had to have production credits (shades of college years gone by again?).

 And that was the reason that I really came back to California. One could only work so long. And for me, it felt like I was simply surviving. Not living.

 Where did I go from here?

 Phases

 I landed back in San Diego refreshed.  

 It had not been prefect in New York. It was funny. When I had lived here before, the whole world felt like it was in front of me. That there was a chance to have a life. The life that I wanted. And I had worked so hard for it. But that…was years ago. Even the friend who I visited could see the change. Who was this person that was a shadow of his friend in front of him? A person in front of him with no sense? A person who was there for his birthday, but had no clear sense of direction in front of him when the friend he knew had one?

 They were all good questions. What was worse for me? I had no answers to what he asked me. When had that happened? When had I become that person when I used to have so many answers?

 It was something that continued on my mind as I recovered from my vacation. I went to my job and sorted mail. I went to my job and ‘babysat’…as I called it. Either place, it was still on my mind. These questions.

 ____

 My eyes looked down. I frowned. I had been cleaning my room. It was a never-ending battle let me tell you. LOL!!! I had been sorting through my manuscripts. I still had not finished typing up all of DARKENED TABULA. So, there I was looking for all the pages, putting them in order. My eyes fell on some pages that were under a magazine. I paused.

 It was my agents’ list.

 Every year, Writer’s Digest released an Agent issue. Inside of it was a list of agents looking for potential new writers to promote. It was one that I got every year. And I had taken the time to go through it, making notes about what I thought. Who would be interested in one of my non-Darkenverse books (Pictures of a Jaded Bitch and He Awaits, respectively)? Since I was told that a successful writer was one who had one foot in the world of self-publishing and one foot in the world of traditional publishing, I had always wanted to test this out.

 I stared at the pages in front of me. I stared at them. And I wondered one thing.

 What happened?

 I could say life. I could say work schedule. I could say partying. I could blame it on being exhausted. I could even blame it on lack of good internet. But I knew the truth. I had only one person to blame for not being on the ball. Me, myself, and I.

 I picked up the papers. I had two sets of Agent Lists. I picked up all of them. And from there, I put them in my bag. Sure, they were some messy papers since they had been on my floor. I did not care.

 If this was 2005, I would be going through the lists like crazy. One by one, I would be researching each place. I would be creating a synopsis. I would type out a cover letter to send. Not much had changed. It was no more different than then. Other than I was older.

 Older. BUT…not dead.

 And far from finished. I had been talking on my blogs and my Facebook Author page (www.facebook.com/writerguygothic) about how it was long past time for me to work on these lists. That I should move forward with what I called Phase Two of my writing career.

 So…was I ready for the dance?

   #changeofscenery #newyork #manhattan #crossroads #milestones #sd #sandiego #airport #writing #frankherbert #piercebrown #jamessacorey #books #ready #dance #driven #arkansas #russian #createspace #college #greyhound #vacation #agents #writersdigest #older #notdead #phases #facebook #writingcareer

[jackmonkeygames]

https://ift.tt/2XfK7bC https://ift.tt/2ScDBPb

It seems that everyone is starting their own actual play podcast. There is all kinds of good reasons to do so. I can go on about the benefits forever but this blog post will be focused on making the podcast in the first place. I will also point out some critical mistakes that I have made while making the podcast in hopes that you can avoid them. Though this will also cover podcasting a while there is a focus onHow to start an RPG Podcast

Have a concept its OK if others are doing it

The Place

The Right equipment (And Software)

Hosting Services

The editing

When should you publish

Pitfalls (What to avoid )

How to make a RPG Podcast

The Concept for making a great Actual Play Podcast

As a gamemaster, we always have ideas for campaigns. Then our players seem to take them in unexpected directions. Because of this you could actually run the same adventure as someone else and have it totally different results. The focus will be on the players and their unique view on the game you have presented.

For Star-Fall Actual Play Podcast I have a major plot line and a whole bunch of sub plots. set for each season. I recommend that you do the same. Sure you can run the game on the fly but you will want a basic framework. you may notice that running a RPG Game for home is very different to running a game for a podcast

As for cast members I recomend anyone who is outgoing. They do not need to be expert Dungeons and Dragons players (Perhaps it’s better if they are not less editing out the arguments over the proper way to cast magic missle) The Fifth Crew only half the players have ever played a RPG before our first recording session.

Listening to Star-Fall

The Place where to record your podcast

One of the things that I have noticed is that its really hard to record in any place that is not totally quiet. So forget Pubs , Bars , Restaurants. Other factors is that some rooms echo a lot. It’s a good idea to test the space before you start recording. More than once I have been too eager to start recording to find the room echoed so bad that I was unable to use the recording. It is also important to make sure the softer voices are closer to the mic. (We have that problem in our show)

The ideal place would be with a lot of irregular surfaces (Curtains we love curtains) for more information on how to set up a recording space in your living room. How to start an RPG Podcast The good thing about Game rooms is there is a lot of bookshelves with odd shaped objects like Warhammer minnies that are great to get a nice sound.

The Right equipment for recording an RPG Podcast

There are all kinds of articles on what to buy. But they are trying to sell you something. when writing How to start an RPG Podcast we have a total budget of $20 a month.. TOTAL! So before you start going out to buy a whole lot of equipment know that the first season of Star-Fall was recorded on my Samsung S7 and cheap microphone. Yes, we do not sound amazing but we feel its more important to publish something that needs work then to never publish at all. Then find out if this is something you want to do while you start to save for the expensive microphones. I would hate for you to buy thousands of dollars of expensive sound equipment to publish three episodes then find out you hate podcasting.

The Software

What I lack in hardware I have an abundance of Software. Being that I used to work at Apple teaching the creative apps I was able to obtain the some software dirt cheep. (No I can’t send you a copy). Though even now I’m using a lot of free software.

Ubuntu Studio (Cost: FREE)

Ubuntu studio is perfect for the budget RPG Podcaster. Not only is it free but will run on most of the older laptops people are using today. it comes packed with all kinds of audio software to help with the RPG podcast. Do you not need to be a Linux expert to use it but it does help.

I’m suggesting Linux because I’m currently writing this blog on a $300 Laptop that is about four years old. Linux makes this thing faster then it ever was with windows. So basicly a cheep computer that will get the job done. https://ubuntustudio.org/

Audacity (Cost: Free)

This editing software is fantastic and simple to use. There is a reason why podcasters have been using this for years. What i like best about it is that when you remove a “Ummm” from your clip everything behind that point that you cut out snaps to the left.  (IF you have ever done any editing this is a time saver) I also find the noise reduction, Compression, & Normalizing feature to be very good especially for a free software

The one thing that you need to work on is that you cannot publish to MP3 without manualiy installing a plugin. (They do that to avoid copyright issues) Don’t worry there is instuctions

Audactiy Runs on Windows , Mac , and Linux

Audactiy https://www.audacityteam.org/

Hosting services

Here is where it starts to cost you money. We have been lucky to have Patreon backers help with this cost. You need to find a hosting company that specialises in podcasts. The reason for this is that it will save you HOURS of work otherwise. Getting everything coded into an RSS feed for a podcast is hard work (I used to hand code my RSS feeds in the early days of podcasting and I DO NOT MISS DOING THAT)

Also, Podcasting services like Libsyn do not charge you for bandwidth. This is very good if you get popular for some reason. They also give you a blog. I hightlyrecomend doing some blogging about your podcast.

Editing your RPG Podcast

My Biggest tip for learning know how to edit is do it when it does not matter. I know its tempting to record a session and go straight to work editing. But if you do it that way you are going to stress your self out trying to figure it out. It’s better to record a game that you are not going to publish so you can edit it without worrying about messing it up. (Trust me I have been teaching adults computers for 10 years) You will learn more in five min of playing with something you don’t care about than two hours on a clip that needs to be published tomorrow. Get to know Noise Reduction, Normalize & Compressor

Removing the dead space during the show

There is always a little bits of quiet duing the conversation. Or parts where everyone is waiting for the wizard’s action who happens to be in the bathroom to come back. These points nobody wants to hear these so cut them out. Our rule of editing. “If it does not add to the story cut it out ”

Side topics

Remember the last time your RPG game table stayed on topic the entire game? Me neither! These moments are very fun during the game and I can say that it can really bond a game group together, however. It is something that nobody else wants to hear. I would say that most of my time is spent cutting out this sort of chatter during the game.

The Dreaded ummmmm!

You are going to get really good ad editing out “Ummms” out of your Actual Play Podcast. It happens a lot. The cool thing about this is that its easy to do and it makes you sound like you have spend a lot of time public speaking.

New To Star-Fall?

Go back to the first episode to see what you are missing.

Star from Episode One!

The Pitfalls of recording an actual play pocast

What is a blog post on How to start an RPG Podcast without warnings? there are a few pitfalls you need to be aware of if you are going to start publishing your RPG podcast. Here are a few that I have discovered .

COPYRIGHT don’t be a dick!

Respect other peoples copyright. ok ok you don’t beleave me or feel you can do what you want. That is ok because there is a Lawyer who needs to upgrade their computer and could use some extra cash they will be contacting you shortly. I’m lucky that I’m married to an International Copyright lawyer. Though because I’m not a Lawyer this should not be taken as advice just “Get a real lawyer if you need help” This is just a blog post How to start an RPG Podcast

Avoid Logos of other companies. I don’t care how much you love Dungeons and Dragons or Monte Cook Games. The moment you put their trademarked logo on your website without their written permission, you will get the scariest letter you have ever seen in the mail from their lawyers. TO be clear this is not because they are evil its because they have to do so in order to protect themselves. So if you do get a scary letter from a lawyer don’t blame the company they are just doing what they need to do.

Do not read the rules out on your podcast word for word. I know this sort of thing comes up all the time in a game where you need to know exactly how a spell is used or how to grapple. If you do this you are going to make someone very angry. Edit that part out of your show. ITs ok to use your own words on the rules but word for word is a bad idea.

Do not use other peoples artwork! I know you have a character who just happens to look like Deadpool. Do not use the artwork in your show! Do not take images from other websites. Do not use the images in your books. (Comic book characters can fall under Trademark and Copyright so don’t use the artwork even if you drew it yourself )

Artists work very hard and we often do not get paid enough when we do get a gig. So don’t add salt to the wound by taking someone else’s artwork. Do everyone a favor and pay the artist to make something for you. I would also like to mention I’m married to a Lawyer who very protective of my artwork so don’t steal it .

If you need artwork you can hire an artist like myself.

Music.. only use public domain or music that was created for your show. Remember what I said about the game companies and their logos. How they are not evil? The Music copanies are the definition of Lawful Evil. Entire law firms are dedicated to finding people who have violated music copyright laws on their podcast so they can take your money (and lots of it)

I know many gamemasters who like to have music playing in the background. This is a bad idea for two reasons. One the copyright. Two if its playing in the background it will make your edits sound odd. IF you are going to use public domain music then add it in post edit. It will sound better.

Record all your shows before you publish the first one. I know it sounds daunting but it’s better to do that and then edit then to always be behind on publishing your episodes. That and we found that we had issues with scheduling a game night

Dice are loud on the table !!! If you have your mic on the same table as the dice it sounds like thunder to some mics. This may not be an issue but its something to be aware of. having everyone roll on their books putting the mic on a boom or somethign soft can help

Do not give up! You are not going to get famous by doing this anytime soon. It’s going to take a lot of work. Keep going. Your audiance will find you,

Each episode of Star-Fall Actual Play Podcast takes about 3 hours of editing. So expect to be spending a lot of time editing. If you can find a way to have some of your cast embers help do that

The Gamemaster should be closest to the Mic. We had one session that was a total nightmare to edit. As the GM I was the furthest away from the mic and nobody but the players could hear me. The sound quality was total crap and we had to scrap the episode. If you only have one mic it should be closest to the gamemaster. I do recommend more than one mic.

Battle is boring characters eating in the pub is fun … to listeners. The problem with fights in Rpg Podcasts is that its fun for the players but boring to the listeners. Try to focus on the characters more than the battle. Sure have battles now and then but try to keep them short or edit the shit out of them.

I hope this was helpful in How to start an RPG Podcast

Episode 14: Zapperburger Roleplaying in fast food

January 8, 2019

In “Episodes”

RPG Actual Play Podcasts for 2019

January 6, 2019

In “RPG Podcasts”

Star-Fall Season Two Episode Four Something is Hungry

March 17, 2019

In “Episodes”

The post How to start a RPG Actual Play Podcast appeared first on Star-Fall RPG podcast.

[webart-studio]

6 Suggestions for Posting Content material Anonymously

For one motive or one other, it’s possible you’ll end up eager to publish issues on-line anonymously. Now to some, the “A-word” conjures up photographs of hackers, Man Fawkes masks, and folks typically saying horrible issues to one another on Twitter. There’s lengthy been an ongoing debate about whether or not anonymity is one thing that ought to even be allowed on the Web.

Sure. Sure it ought to. There’s little question that there are horrible folks on this planet; however anonymity is a strong software for good as nicely. Listed here are a few of the extra apparent examples:

Combating the facility: It certain could be good if we lived in a world the place everybody in each authorities had the folks’s finest pursuits at coronary heart. We don’t, and so they don’t. Ask Nelson Mandela, or any variety of different nice women and men all through historical past who’ve fought for progress and human rights.

Exposing legal exercise: Whether or not you’re against the law blogger writing concerning the legal underworld, or a whistleblower from some giant company, exposing legal exercise is harmful. Folks have died.

Grownup content material, and different “culturally offensive” themes: One thing so simple as writing your personal (very private) memoirs can draw a whole lot of undesirable consideration from these round you. Even when what you’re doing isn’t morally or ethically mistaken by any affordable customary, folks aren’t all the time terribly understanding. After which, maybe the folks in your life would relatively that their private actions didn’t turn into public data. Staying nameless is an effective approach to keep away from pointless drama, in instances like these.

Possibly it’s simply work: One among my favourite blogs again within the day was Waiter Rant the place a then-anonymous waiter informed all of his juiciest tales. He stayed nameless for the easy motive that his bosses didn’t need any further drama at their restaurant. In addition to, impolite prospects who may’ve simply been having a very dangerous day don’t deserve the sort of hate the Web can put out.

Not holding again: Webdesigner Depot runs a collection of posts written anonymously known as The Secret Designer. They’re nameless, as a result of they expose the underside of the online design business that the writers don’t wish to be related to.

Now if any of this sounds acquainted to long-time WDD readers, that could be as a result of I addressed a few of these factors in The Final Information to Running a blog a while again. I wished to handle the subject in a bit bit extra element, and canopy some extra choices now we have for safeguarding our privateness. Right here they’re, in no specific order:

  1. Paranoia

The most typical safety level of failure all the time has been, and all the time can be folks. You possibly can be uncovered by some random screw-up you make your self, or you might be outed by trusting the mistaken individual. Even individuals who would by no means damage you on objective may give issues away by chance.

Extra generally, individuals who supposedly wish to stay nameless get caught as a result of they will’t assist however brag. If that is one thing you’re dedicated to doing, it’s worthwhile to change your whole outlook on life. You may’t be Hackerman by night time, and switch it off by day. You could get paranoid, with out performing clearly paranoid; as a result of somebody in all probability is out to get you, however they will inform in case you begin performing too paranoid.

Sounds enjoyable, proper? [/sarcasm] How are you aware if you’re paranoid sufficient? Let’s begin with the conclusion that doing every little thing on this listing alone isn’t sufficient to maintain you completely secure. This can be a primary newbie’s information at finest.

Oh, and keep in mind to keep away from truly writing any figuring out info in your precise content material in case you may also help it. Simply sayin’.

  2. Keep away from Huge Platforms

Don’t use Google for e-mail, sign-ins, or the rest. Ditto Yahoo, Outlook.com, or mainly some other main company. If they’ve a fame for accumulating your knowledge and promoting it, they’ll principally probably promote it to the folks you wish to disguise from.

The identical goes to your publishing platform. Merely put, you need as a lot management over your knowledge as attainable. Meaning you shouldn’t give your knowledge to Medium, Tumblr (which is owned by Yahoo), and even good outdated LiveJournal (yeah, that’s nonetheless a factor). The larger firms have a historical past of enjoying good with different firms, however they play particularly good with governments. They is not going to advocate to your privateness, and even to your life if you end up in that form of state of affairs.

Their PR groups may mutter one thing about human rights, however you’ll be human left-for-dead. (Sorry, I wished to lighten the temper a bit.) In any case, most of those platforms in all probability don’t even need delicate content material related to them, and can probably take all of it down.

  3. Internet hosting

So in case you’re going to be shopping for internet hosting, right here’s the standards:

You need privateness nuts.

You need a internet hosting firm that’s prepared to take the (authorized) struggle to whoever comes trying.

Ideally, it might be good in the event that they believed in your trigger, too. That can make them struggle tougher to guard your knowledge.

You need your internet hosting to be out of the country totally. Distance is an effective manner of delaying folks making an attempt to trace you down. It means much less on this day of the Web, however it nonetheless counts for one thing.

Usually, these guys are fairly good choices, and so they’ve been round for a while:

It ought to be famous that safe internet hosting and adult-content-friendly internet hosting aren’t the identical factor. In the event you want internet hosting for these racy memoirs or what-have-you-I’d-rather-not-know, it’s worthwhile to discover a host that particularly means that you can host these issues of their TOS.

  4. Intermediaries

Now keep in mind the place I mentioned to watch out who you belief? That also stands. Even so, it’s possible you’ll discover it extremely useful to search out somebody who can act as your middleman. In the event you’re performing in a whistle-blower capability, you may have the ability to discover a overseas help employee or activist to do issues like enable you purchase internet hosting and domains.

Having a third-party characterize you might be indispensable to a easy operation. However keep in mind that if issues are probably life-threatening for you, it could actually additionally get bushy for them. You need somebody both dedicated to your trigger, or not less than somebody who could be very, very distant.

In the event you’re simply posting stuff that’s completely authorized the place you might be, however nonetheless probably embarrassing, you may use an lawyer to deal with these kinds of particulars for you. Attorneys are costly, however that’s as a result of their silence is value it.

  5. Location and Units

Don’t write from dwelling, in case you may also help it. In the event you’re going to put in writing from dwelling, not less than don’t put up issues from dwelling. Take your system to a separate community distant from the place you reside, do every little thing you possibly can to masks your IP, after which put up. Do that with completely different networks, ideally in locations that forgo safety cameras. That is the time to be most paranoid.

Purge your machine of your notes and tough drafts often, ideally proper after you’ve posted. Safe your machine with a password solely you already know on the BIOS, and on the OS, and for God’s sake, use some type of Linux or UNIX-based working system. Nothing you do will maintain a devoted one who has bodily entry to your system from breaking in, however you possibly can delay them.

You may contemplate forgoing a laptop computer or telephone altogether, and simply have a USB drive with a Linux OS on it, and no persistent storage. That manner, you possibly can go to nearly any laptop, boot it up with the OS in your flash drive, write your put up, and depart. No persistent storage implies that your information is not going to be saved if you shut the pc down.

Now which OS must you use? You may strive Tails.

  6. Pay Your Taxes

No, actually. Whether or not you’re exposing corruption in your personal authorities, or simply posting some creative pictures that conspicuously don’t present your face, it’s worthwhile to dwell as legally and unobtrusively as you possibly can in your daily routine. It’s one of the simplest ways to keep away from undesirable consideration. Keep in mind, not even the Joker would mess with the IRS.

    7. Further Notes

VPNs

VPN companies have gotten traction, just lately, as increasingly privateness scandals hit the airwaves. Most of them, nonetheless, aren’t all they’re cracked as much as be. Many maintain logs of precisely which visitors goes the place, and so they’re a weak level if anybody desires to trace you down.

That mentioned, you need to in all probability nonetheless use one. Simply decide one which doesn’t maintain logs, and means that you can pay with nameless choices like cryptocurrency. Right here’s an inventory of a few of the higher privacy-oriented VPNs.

Tor

Utilizing Tor to anonymize your shopping may also help, however keep in mind that the community has been compromised earlier than. It’s completely effective to make use of it as long as you understand it’s only one further layer of safety, and never a assure of security.

That’s simply what every little thing on this listing is: a layer of safety that may, with time, be peeled again. The remainder is as much as you.

  Featured picture by way of DepositPhotos.

Supply hyperlink

source https://webart-studio.com/6-suggestions-for-posting-content-material-anonymously/

[iyarpage]

6 Tips for Posting Content Anonymously

For one reason or another, you may find yourself wanting to publish things online anonymously. Now to some, the “A-word” conjures up images of hackers, Guy Fawkes masks, and people generally saying terrible things to each other on Twitter. There’s long been an ongoing debate about whether anonymity is something that should even be allowed on the Internet.

Yes. Yes it should. There’s no doubt that there are terrible people in the world; but anonymity is a powerful tool for good as well. Here are some of the more obvious examples:

Fighting the power: It sure would be nice if we lived in a world where everyone in every government had the people’s best interests at heart. We don’t, and they don’t. Ask Nelson Mandela, or any number of other great men and women throughout history who have fought for progress and human rights.

Exposing criminal activity: Whether you’re a crime blogger writing about the criminal underworld, or a whistleblower from some large corporation, exposing criminal activity is dangerous. People have died.

Adult content, and other “culturally offensive” themes: Something as simple as writing your own (very personal) memoirs can draw a lot of unwanted attention from those around you. Even if what you’re doing isn’t morally or ethically wrong by any reasonable standard, people aren’t always terribly understanding. And then, perhaps the people in your life would rather that their personal activities didn’t become public knowledge. Staying anonymous is a good way to avoid unnecessary drama, in cases like these.

Maybe it’s just work: One of my favorite blogs back in the day was Waiter Rant where a then-anonymous waiter told all of his juiciest stories. He stayed anonymous for the simple reason that his bosses didn’t want any extra drama at their restaurant. Besides, rude customers who might’ve just been having a really bad day don’t deserve the kind of hate the Internet can put out.

Not holding back: Webdesigner Depot runs a series of posts written anonymously called The Secret Designer. They’re anonymous, because they expose the underside of the web design industry that the writers don’t want to be associated with.

Now if any of this sounds familiar to long-time WDD readers, that may be because I addressed some of these points in The Ultimate Guide to Blogging some time back. I wanted to address the topic in a little bit more detail, and cover some more options we have for protecting our privacy. Here they are, in no particular order:

1. Paranoia

The most common security point of failure always has been, and always will be people. You could be uncovered by some random screw-up you make yourself, or you could be outed by trusting the wrong person. Even people who would never hurt you on purpose can give things away by accident.

More commonly, people who supposedly want to remain anonymous get caught because they can’t help but brag. If this is something you’re committed to doing, you need to change your entire outlook on life. You can’t be Hackerman by night, and turn it off by day. You need to get paranoid, without acting obviously paranoid; because someone probably is out to get you, but they can tell if you start acting too paranoid.

Sounds fun, right? [/sarcasm] How do you know when you’re paranoid enough? Let’s start with the realization that doing everything on this list alone isn’t enough to keep you perfectly safe. This is a basic beginner’s guide at best.

Oh, and remember to avoid actually writing any identifying information in your actual content if you can help it. Just sayin’.

2. Avoid Big Platforms

Don’t use Google for e-mail, sign-ins, or anything else. Ditto Yahoo, Outlook.com, or basically any other major corporation. If they have a reputation for collecting your data and selling it, they’ll mostly likely sell it to the people you want to hide from.

The same goes for your publishing platform. Simply put, you want as much control over your data as possible. That means you shouldn’t give your data to Medium, Tumblr (which is owned by Yahoo), or even good old LiveJournal (yeah, that’s still a thing). The bigger corporations have a history of playing nice with other corporations, but they play especially nice with governments. They will not advocate for your privacy, or even for your life if you find yourself in that sort of situation.

Their PR teams might mutter something about human rights, but you’ll be human left-for-dead. (Sorry, I wanted to lighten the mood a bit.) In any case, most of these platforms probably don’t even want sensitive content associated with them, and will likely take it all down.

3. Hosting

So if you’re going to be buying hosting, here’s the criteria:

You want privacy nuts.

You want a hosting company that is willing to take the (legal) fight to whoever comes looking.

Ideally, it would be good if they believed in your cause, too. That will make them fight harder to protect your data.

You want your hosting to be in another country entirely. Distance is a good way of delaying people trying to track you down. It means less in this day of the Internet, but it still counts for something.

In general, these guys are pretty good options, and they’ve been around for some time:

IT Itch

Orange Website

Hosting by Anonymous Speech

It should be noted that secure hosting and adult-content-friendly hosting are not the same thing. If you need hosting for those racy memoirs or what-have-you-I’d-rather-not-know, you need to find a host that specifically allows you to host those things in their TOS.

4. Intermediaries

Now remember where I said to be careful who you trust? That still stands. Even so, you may find it incredibly helpful to find someone who can act as your intermediary. If you’re acting in a whistle-blower capacity, you might be able to find a foreign aid worker or activist to do things like help you buy hosting and domain names.

Having a third-party represent you can be indispensable to a smooth operation. But remember that if things are potentially life-threatening for you, it can also get hairy for them. You want someone either committed to your cause, or at least someone who is very, very far away.

If you’re just posting stuff that’s perfectly legal where you are, but still potentially embarrassing, you might use an attorney to handle these sorts of details for you. Attorneys are expensive, but that’s because their silence is worth it.

5. Location and Devices

Don’t write from home, if you can help it. If you’re going to write from home, at least don’t post things from home. Take your device to a separate network far away from where you live, do everything you can to mask your IP, and then post. Do this with different networks, preferably in places that forgo security cameras. This is the time to be most paranoid.

Purge your machine of your notes and rough drafts regularly, preferably right after you’ve posted. Secure your machine with a password only you know on the BIOS, and on the OS, and for God’s sake, use some form of Linux or UNIX-based operating system. Nothing you do will keep a dedicated person who has physical access to your device from breaking in, but you can delay them.

You might consider forgoing a laptop or phone altogether, and just have a USB drive with a Linux OS on it, and no persistent storage. That way, you can go to almost any computer, boot it up with the OS on your flash drive, write your post, and leave. No persistent storage means that your files will not be saved when you shut the computer down.

Now which OS should you use? You might try Tails.

6. Pay Your Taxes

No, really. Whether you’re exposing corruption in your own government, or just posting some artistic photos that conspicuously do not show your face, you need to live as legally and unobtrusively as you can in your day to day routine. It’s the best way to avoid unwanted attention. Remember, not even the Joker would mess with the IRS.

    7. Extra Notes

VPNs

VPN services have gotten traction, recently, as more and more privacy scandals hit the airwaves. Most of them, however, are not all they’re cracked up to be. Many keep logs of exactly which traffic goes where, and so they are a weak point if anyone wants to track you down.

That said, you should probably still use one. Just pick one that doesn’t keep logs, and allows you to pay with anonymous options like cryptocurrency. Here’s a list of some of the better privacy-oriented VPNs.

Tor

Using Tor to anonymize your browsing can help, but remember that the network has been compromised before. It’s perfectly fine to use it so long as you realize it’s just one extra layer of security, and not a guarantee of safety.

That’s just what everything on this list is: a layer of security that can, with time, be peeled back. The rest is up to you.

  Featured image via DepositPhotos.

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Source p img {display:inline-block; margin-right:10px;} .alignleft {float:left;} p.showcase {clear:both;} body#browserfriendly p, body#podcast p, div#emailbody p{margin:0;} 6 Tips for Posting Content Anonymously published first on https://medium.com/@koresol

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6 Tips for Posting Content Anonymously

For one reason or another, you may find yourself wanting to publish things online anonymously. Now to some, the “A-word” conjures up images of hackers, Guy Fawkes masks, and people generally saying terrible things to each other on Twitter. There’s long been an ongoing debate about whether anonymity is something that should even be allowed on the Internet.

Yes. Yes it should. There’s no doubt that there are terrible people in the world; but anonymity is a powerful tool for good as well. Here are some of the more obvious examples:

Fighting the power: It sure would be nice if we lived in a world where everyone in every government had the people’s best interests at heart. We don’t, and they don’t. Ask Nelson Mandela, or any number of other great men and women throughout history who have fought for progress and human rights.

Exposing criminal activity: Whether you’re a crime blogger writing about the criminal underworld, or a whistleblower from some large corporation, exposing criminal activity is dangerous. People have died.

Adult content, and other “culturally offensive” themes: Something as simple as writing your own (very personal) memoirs can draw a lot of unwanted attention from those around you. Even if what you’re doing isn’t morally or ethically wrong by any reasonable standard, people aren’t always terribly understanding. And then, perhaps the people in your life would rather that their personal activities didn’t become public knowledge. Staying anonymous is a good way to avoid unnecessary drama, in cases like these.

Maybe it’s just work: One of my favorite blogs back in the day was Waiter Rant where a then-anonymous waiter told all of his juiciest stories. He stayed anonymous for the simple reason that his bosses didn’t want any extra drama at their restaurant. Besides, rude customers who might’ve just been having a really bad day don’t deserve the kind of hate the Internet can put out.

Not holding back: Webdesigner Depot runs a series of posts written anonymously called The Secret Designer. They’re anonymous, because they expose the underside of the web design industry that the writers don’t want to be associated with.

Now if any of this sounds familiar to long-time WDD readers, that may be because I addressed some of these points in The Ultimate Guide to Blogging some time back. I wanted to address the topic in a little bit more detail, and cover some more options we have for protecting our privacy. Here they are, in no particular order:

1. Paranoia

The most common security point of failure always has been, and always will be people. You could be uncovered by some random screw-up you make yourself, or you could be outed by trusting the wrong person. Even people who would never hurt you on purpose can give things away by accident.

More commonly, people who supposedly want to remain anonymous get caught because they can’t help but brag. If this is something you’re committed to doing, you need to change your entire outlook on life. You can’t be Hackerman by night, and turn it off by day. You need to get paranoid, without acting obviously paranoid; because someone probably is out to get you, but they can tell if you start acting too paranoid.

Sounds fun, right? [/sarcasm] How do you know when you’re paranoid enough? Let’s start with the realization that doing everything on this list alone isn’t enough to keep you perfectly safe. This is a basic beginner’s guide at best.

Oh, and remember to avoid actually writing any identifying information in your actual content if you can help it. Just sayin’.

2. Avoid Big Platforms

Don’t use Google for e-mail, sign-ins, or anything else. Ditto Yahoo, Outlook.com, or basically any other major corporation. If they have a reputation for collecting your data and selling it, they’ll mostly likely sell it to the people you want to hide from.

The same goes for your publishing platform. Simply put, you want as much control over your data as possible. That means you shouldn’t give your data to Medium, Tumblr (which is owned by Yahoo), or even good old LiveJournal (yeah, that’s still a thing). The bigger corporations have a history of playing nice with other corporations, but they play especially nice with governments. They will not advocate for your privacy, or even for your life if you find yourself in that sort of situation.

Their PR teams might mutter something about human rights, but you’ll be human left-for-dead. (Sorry, I wanted to lighten the mood a bit.) In any case, most of these platforms probably don’t even want sensitive content associated with them, and will likely take it all down.

3. Hosting

So if you’re going to be buying hosting, here’s the criteria:

You want privacy nuts.

You want a hosting company that is willing to take the (legal) fight to whoever comes looking.

Ideally, it would be good if they believed in your cause, too. That will make them fight harder to protect your data.

You want your hosting to be in another country entirely. Distance is a good way of delaying people trying to track you down. It means less in this day of the Internet, but it still counts for something.

In general, these guys are pretty good options, and they’ve been around for some time:

IT Itch

Orange Website

Hosting by Anonymous Speech

It should be noted that secure hosting and adult-content-friendly hosting are not the same thing. If you need hosting for those racy memoirs or what-have-you-I’d-rather-not-know, you need to find a host that specifically allows you to host those things in their TOS.

4. Intermediaries

Now remember where I said to be careful who you trust? That still stands. Even so, you may find it incredibly helpful to find someone who can act as your intermediary. If you’re acting in a whistle-blower capacity, you might be able to find a foreign aid worker or activist to do things like help you buy hosting and domain names.

Having a third-party represent you can be indispensable to a smooth operation. But remember that if things are potentially life-threatening for you, it can also get hairy for them. You want someone either committed to your cause, or at least someone who is very, very far away.

If you’re just posting stuff that’s perfectly legal where you are, but still potentially embarrassing, you might use an attorney to handle these sorts of details for you. Attorneys are expensive, but that’s because their silence is worth it.

5. Location and Devices

Don’t write from home, if you can help it. If you’re going to write from home, at least don’t post things from home. Take your device to a separate network far away from where you live, do everything you can to mask your IP, and then post. Do this with different networks, preferably in places that forgo security cameras. This is the time to be most paranoid.

Purge your machine of your notes and rough drafts regularly, preferably right after you’ve posted. Secure your machine with a password only you know on the BIOS, and on the OS, and for God’s sake, use some form of Linux or UNIX-based operating system. Nothing you do will keep a dedicated person who has physical access to your device from breaking in, but you can delay them.

You might consider forgoing a laptop or phone altogether, and just have a USB drive with a Linux OS on it, and no persistent storage. That way, you can go to almost any computer, boot it up with the OS on your flash drive, write your post, and leave. No persistent storage means that your files will not be saved when you shut the computer down.

Now which OS should you use? You might try Tails.

6. Pay Your Taxes

No, really. Whether you’re exposing corruption in your own government, or just posting some artistic photos that conspicuously do not show your face, you need to live as legally and unobtrusively as you can in your day to day routine. It’s the best way to avoid unwanted attention. Remember, not even the Joker would mess with the IRS.

    7. Extra Notes

VPNs

VPN services have gotten traction, recently, as more and more privacy scandals hit the airwaves. Most of them, however, are not all they’re cracked up to be. Many keep logs of exactly which traffic goes where, and so they are a weak point if anyone wants to track you down.

That said, you should probably still use one. Just pick one that doesn’t keep logs, and allows you to pay with anonymous options like cryptocurrency. Here’s a list of some of the better privacy-oriented VPNs.

Tor

Using Tor to anonymize your browsing can help, but remember that the network has been compromised before. It’s perfectly fine to use it so long as you realize it’s just one extra layer of security, and not a guarantee of safety.

That’s just what everything on this list is: a layer of security that can, with time, be peeled back. The rest is up to you.

  Featured image via DepositPhotos.

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Source from Webdesigner Depot http://bit.ly/2XqeXxs from Blogger http://bit.ly/2ULxaIP

[ciathyzareposts]

Lords of Bedtime

The game requires sleep but at least offers several types of locations where you can sleep.

         This entry represents an accomplishment that many people wouldn’t see as much of an accomplishment. I’m writing it on 18 January and scheduling it to post on 22 January, which means that I’ve managed to keep my blog on schedule for the entire duration of my two-week Caribbean cruise. This hasn’t been easy, what with inadequate Internet access most of the time, lack of a second monitor, uncomfortable places to work and play, and of course Irene constantly urging me to “do” something other than sit on the balcony with my laptop. On the positive side, I’ve been able to visit, for the first time, many of the very forts that I sacked in Pirates! 

I may have conveyed this in previous postings, but I’m a total wuss when it comes to international traveling, despite (or, perhaps, because of) how much of it I do. I get annoyed swiftly with the lack of my usual comforts. For instance, when I’m in the United States, and before 17:00, it’s a rare moment that I don’t have a cold bottle of Diet Coke within reach–a bottle, mind you, not a can. In the U.S., I depend on the excessive availability of vending machines and convenience stores, many open 24 hours, to supply this need. I find that such stores don’t exist, or are not convenient, or are not always open, when abroad. I don’t understand this fad for “body wash” that European hotels seem to have embraced, but I use bar soap, thank you. I don’t pack carefully, and I need an iron and ironing board each day.           

I’m going to be rambling for a while, so here’s a shot of my character being chased by a dwarf on Wyvern Mountain.

          I have a friend named Eli who will happily grab a backpack, fly to a place like Indonesia with $50 in his pocket, and somehow have a great week. I absolutely cannot do that. I haven’t not showered in the morning since I was 9. I don’t wear clothes two days in a row. I don’t sleep in communal rooms or on other people’s couches. I’d rather pay for a hotel room for the night and use it for 20 minutes than use a public toilet. These types of frailties are a bit limiting when traveling. If I get too far afield, I start to worry where I’m going to find my next drink, pillow, and clean restroom. (It really says something that on a cruise, when you’re only in port for one day and you know exactly where you’ll be sleeping that night, I spent half the time on each island anxiously looking around and saying, “Doesn’t this place have any 7-Elevens?”) Sometimes I wish I could be more like Eli, who will get off a boat and stalk off towards the nearest mountain range, not worrying how, when, or in what condition he’ll return.

By way of tortured segue, those needs are somewhat mirrored in Lords of Time and its predecessor, Faery Tale Adventure. The need for food and sleep put a functional limit on how long you can adventure and how far afield you can go. If you don’t find a bed every 24 hours, your magic points drain away, and then your hit points. (Faery Tale Adventure would just have you collapse on the ground if you got too tired, but given the frequency with which monsters spawn, that would be a death sentence here.) A similar fate befalls you if you fail to eat a couple of meals a day.             

I think if I found myself in a medieval world, I’d be grateful enough for inns with beds.

          I can’t say that I find the need for food and sleep particularly desirable aspects of an RPG, but if it’s going to be done, I guess I’d prefer the way it’s done here. First, it’s somewhat “realistic” in both the availability of these resources and the time intervals that you need them. Second, they provide a logistical challenge, but it’s one that’s more of timing than one of supply. By this, I mean that beds are plentiful if you know where to look (inns, private homes, occasional “resting stations”), and food is cheap at stores and free if you can find an apple tree. This isn’t like Ultima II where (until you learn how to shoplift) you’re constantly killing creatures just to be able to afford food, and it’s not like Rogue, where the hunger system punishes you for taking your time. It’s more–and this similarity would have occurred to me no matter how I began this entry–like Pirates!, where you leave one port with not just a destination in mind, but a route that will ensure you maintain your supplies. In a modern game, I think Fallout 4 in survival mode also does this very well: food and sleep aren’t so rare and precious that they dominate gameplay, but neither are they so inconsequential that you wonder why the developers introduced the dynamic in the first place.

That’s a positive aspect of Lords of Time. Let’s talk about a negative: open exploration is basically ruined by the relentless spawning of monsters. It’s brutal. If you leave the game unattended for 15 seconds without pausing, you’ll be dead when you next look at the screen. When I decide I need to go to a particular place, I’m not so much walking in that direction as constantly fleeing monsters in that direction. “Fleeing” because even at this point in the game, with over 100 maximum hit points, training in both basic intermediate swordplay, enhanced statistics, plate mail armor, a broadsword, and a healing spell, I still can’t win more than five or six consecutive battles before my hit points get so low I have to recharge. The game will gladly hand you five or six consecutive battles in about 30 seconds if you’re not always on the move.              

Walking along water makes it easier to see enemies approach–and avoid them.

                Meanwhile, the interiors of the game make it very difficult to run away from monsters. Negotiating thick clusters of trees and bushes is nearly impossible, although the monsters get through them with unerring pathfinding. Thus, I’ve learned to follow coastal and river routes to most destinations. When I have to fight, doing so while wading in water makes it easier to control my position relative to the enemies. It’s harder when foliage is constantly blocking your view.

You may recall that shortly after my character’s arrival in The Realm, he was summoned to meet with the king, who I later learned is named Tanor. The king said to get home, I’d need help from one of two archwizards, Bessak or Kruel, and that of the two, Bessak was most likely to help. I found Bessak’s keep in the middle of the Dark Forest, but I couldn’t open the door. I suspected that a woman in Murkvale had the key to the keep around her neck.

Commenters helped me with the solution: to buy an orange sleeping potion in Murkvale, dump it in a mug of ale, and offer it to the woman. I wasn’t prepared for this level of complexity in inventory interactions or this type of adventure-style puzzle, so I appreciate the hints. I was more alert for such possibilities in later gameplay.            

Hey, it’s a medieval society.

             When she was asleep, I was able to take the key, and it did turn out to offer me an entrance to Bessak’s keep. Like most locations in the game, it was large but mostly empty. Bessak himself was nowhere to be found. Instead, I found a journal in which he noted that “Kruel has pushed me too far,” and that he intended to destroy Kruel “with the help of the Druids and their Spell of Annulment.”            

I think the second “throne” belonged to the woman in the bar. I wonder why she thinks Bessak is dead.

           The Druid Temple is a short walk from Bessak’s keep. I had previously visited but couldn’t figure out how to get in. This time, I tried harder and found a maze around back. It took a while to navigate it, but when I emerged, I was in the interior of the temple.            

I should draw this so I don’t have to figure it out by trial-and-error every time.

         The multi-columned temple was quite large but mostly empty. The only thing I found was a set of stairs leading up to a kind of altar with four braziers in the corners. The altar seemed to block a staircase going downwards.

I had an idea of what to do from a book in the Castleguard library, which said that four plants are sacred to the Druids: mountain shrub, willow, maple, and spruce. Assuming I’d have to do something with them at some point, I had spent some time walking up to each of these trees and choosing “pick a small branch from the tree” from the contextual menu. (I ended up with a lot of spruce because it has several appearances; the other three trees only have one each. Mountain shrub is particularly rare.) Thus, when I arrived at the Temple, I already had one sprig of each. I put one in each brazier, and the game told me that the braziers began burning the twigs.

Unfortunately, nothing happened. I tried different configurations of plant to brazier but still nothing happened. Thinking that timing might be important, I tried it at different times of day (including midnight, which becomes important below), still to no avail.           

None of this worked.

           Stuck again, I began exploring and re-exploring the map, looking for more adventures and hints. Among my discoveries and accomplishments:              

At an armor shop, I decided “what the hell” and gave it a try and managed to shoplift a full set of plate mail on my first attempt and a two-handed sword on my second attempt. Unfortunately, I failed the next three attempts for much less valuable stuff, and I got sick of reloading, so my shoplifting career came to an end.

There are several caverns on Wyvern Mountain. None of them were occupied by wyverns, but some of them had wyvern nests and, within them, wyvern eggs. Shortly after grabbing a couple of those eggs, I started getting dive-bombed by flying creatures that toss rocks at me from above. I assume these are wyverns, and that their appearance was triggered by my pilfering.

            This was perhaps a bad idea.

         One of the caves on “Wyvern” Mountain led to a dragon. He awoke and killed me with one breath. I assume I’ll have to deal with him later, and I wonder if it will involve the “Dragonsbane” plant I’ve been finding on some mountains.

            This is a reasonably well-drawn dragon.

           I made it to the hall of the “Dwarven High King” on the northwest part of the map, but a guard wouldn’t let me in.

            I assume I’ll be back later.

         I also found “Lord Dervak’s Holde” but couldn’t get through the front door.

In the Dwarven Mines, as a commenter pointed out, pick-axes will remove embedded jewels. These sell for about 25 gold pieces.

            The dwarves still won’t talk with me, even though I learned their language.

           Throughout these adventures, my character development has been steady, in several ways. First, you “level” behind the scenes at experience point thresholds, increasing your maximum health and spell points, and occasionally increasing an attribute or two.

Second, I was able to take most of the courses offered at the guilds in Murkvale and Castleguard. Some of them have experience point requirements that are still beyond me, but over these six hours, and between the two locations, I got “Intermediate Lockpicking” (I had taken basic last time), “Intermediate Spellcasting,”  “Potion Identification,” “Shoplifting,” “Personal Money Management,” “Weather Control,” “Traps,” “Dwarven Language,” “Dealing with Stress,” and “Fighting Dragons.” I think some of the courses were valuable for hidden attributes that they improve, but others were valuable mostly for the information conveyed right on the screen.            

Others . . . I’m not sure what use they were.

          I had been picking up spells called “Ability Enhancement,” but I wasn’t capable of casting them until I got “Intermediate Spellcasting” and at least 100 spell points. I chose to enhance strength with all three iterations of the spell, because I had been sick of messages that said I wasn’t strong enough to wield various weapons. Thanks to the spells, I was able to finally wield the broadsword that I stole. I’m still too weak for the two-handed sword. It must be said, though, that I haven’t noticed either sword or armor upgrades making combat particularly easier.           

“Enhancing your attributes” sounds less creepy in an RPG than in real life.

           Miscellaneous notes:           

The Riverside Inn lies south of Castleguard and is “fortified for your protection” with a wall around it. That’s a bit of a hoot since enemies spawn without any problem inside walls.

There are wells in a lot of places, but most of them just seem to make you sick. If you find one with good water, you can fill canteens, but since water isn’t a requirement (unlike food), I’m not sure what use this is.

Spiders poisoning me are still an automatic reload. This far into the game, I don’t have a “cure poison” spell.

“Fistak’s Magical Mapping Spell,” which I picked up somewhere, makes a little mini-map of the environment. This makes it much easier to find buildings and other important areas.

              A map shows the location of nearby rivers and mountains.

          Some kind of sea dragon started appearing as an enemy, but they’re limited to bodies of water and wander off if the character is on land.

From entering Bessak’s, my “score” went up to 10/190.

Given the number of times I’ve needed to enter the castle, I’m getting sick of guards challenging me every single time.

          Oh, come on! I just want to sleep.

        In all my explorations, I had trouble finding any hints about the next steps–until I decided to systematically tip bartenders. As an old Ultima player, I should have realized this would be important. Bartenders offer different hints at different tip thresholds, and I had only been getting the lowest tier. 

From them, and a couple of NPCs, I learned that Kruel used to be Bessak’s protege, and that Bessak has long sought the Druid Book of Life. (I assume if I ever meet him, that will be some kind of sub-quest.) The bartender in Murkvale told me that an old wizardess in the Great Swamp knows something about the Druid Temple.

The Great Swamp wasn’t on the game map, but I figured it might have something to do with the archipelago at the river delta southeast of Murkvale, and I was right. In fact, there was a whole community in those islands that I’d overlooked, including another potion shop and a second library.

           Information from the second library. I wonder if everyone in The Realm crashed test planes.

           The wizardess in question gave me a little verse:

When the moon is blue

And four twigs on four altars lie

Admittance will be gained by you

Under the midnight sky

               Reminder: poetry is about meter as much as rhyme.

            This agreed with what the bartender had told me (in another tip) about the Druids “all excited over an upcoming set of blue moons.” This is great except I have no idea how to tell when the moon is blue. Nothing in the game tells me anything about the status of the moon. (I don’t know; does the symbol above the health meter have something to do with the moon? If so, it always looks blue to me.) I don’t even know if the term refers to the color of the moon or the second appearance of the full moon within a month.

I don’t want to have to keep showing up at the temple (and navigating that damned maze) every night until the right night comes along, especially since a nighttime expedition takes some planning. You have to try to sleep into the afternoon so you don’t get tired after dusk, and thus run out of steam completely before morning. I’ll be glad for hints, but barring that, my plan is to revisit the spell stores and make sure there isn’t something magical that’s supposed to tell me the moon’s status.

source http://reposts.ciathyza.com/lords-of-bedtime/

[happy2bmyownboss]

honestly don’t even know what all we did last week. It seemed to have went by in such a blur. I do know that I had put out a few different posts and here are the links in case you missed them:

Midweek Progress: Coming Back From An Organizing Burnout

A Pocket Full of Pennies

Choosing The Right Fit For School

Square Dancing Could Add Years To Your Life

Family Fun Day: Books, Elvis, Ice Cream, and Another Huge UPS Delivery

Becoming Debt Free One Bill At A Time

Favorite Lemon Meringue Pie

A Completely Honest Review Of Our First Hello Fresh Box!

  I hate how I sit down to write a quick little post and my internet acts up and makes it take foreverrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr…………………

But anyways let’s get back to what all we did last week…

We did get more packages from UPS and Fed Ex… the drivers pretty much know me by name and recognize me when I am out and about now… I guess that’s a good thing?

**This post does contain some affiliate links that help to support our blog.

We got lots of more school supplies like the ones below:

The kids are really loving their new Add & Subtract Abacus by Melissa & Doug!

I am also loving this little book right here:

My kids know that their brother has special needs but they don’t really know how to explain it to others. They are also very accepting of other children they meet who have special needs. I am hoping that this book along with a couple others I have ordered will help them.

We got quite a few FREE samples in the mail last week:

I’ve posted most of the links for these on my Kirby’s Koupons page on Facebook @kirbyskoupons.

We had a great time on Friday at the Silver Stars Club in Ft. White, FL. I know the lighting was really bad in this photo.

Then on Saturday we went to a Christmas in July benefit dance for Shriner’s Children’s Hospital. I keep trying to upload the video clip but this internet isn’t letting me… you can check it out on my Facebook here. Here are a couple of screenshots though.

I love those ruby red slippers and they always get so many compliments but they don’t work quite like Dorothy’s in The Wizard of Oz. We just picked up this movie to watch with the kids too.

We went to Walmart to check out a few items and to get our weekly groceries. Mr. Awesome was with me, which doesn’t happen too often, and he was HUNGRY so we went a little off budget.

We did get a TON of fresh fruit which I cut up and stored in various containers in the fridge so we would have some quick and easy snacks through the week. I even cut a few apples with our favorite apple slicer and then put a rubber band around them to keep them fresh. The kids love apples but they seem to waste quite a bit when they aren’t cut up.

While at Walmart I did a little ‘window shopping’ for some new shelves that I might want when we get around to that special project I mentioned a couple of months ago… yes, I’m a little discouraged that it hasn’t happened yet and I am afraid that procrastination has taken hold of someone and it may not happen… sniff, sniff.

I looked at some planners too but the prices on what they had were CRAZY so I think I’ll look around online or just use something I already have.

I still haven’t gotten around to making those Haystack Cookies but I plan to make those after lunch which will be after I finish this post. I’ll post my recipe too when I get them made. The kids are playing some different board games right now while I blog a little.

I really wanted to try to do a vlog or two this week but I don’t know if that is gonna happen. My phone has been messing up and our lighting is not that great so my tablet doesn’t make videos very well nor does my laptop. We’ll see how that goes.

One thing I wanted to a vlog on was our curriculum for the upcoming year and the supplies we have gotten specifically for that. We have gotten a ton of other supplies that I have been stashing in the once uncluttered homeschool area… yep, it’s pretty full again but at least it’s organized!

As for this morning it has been a little bit busy trying to get our chores done. I have also been working on a new magnetic chart for the kids… it’s still a work in progress but I’ll post a picture of that soon. I did get through most of my routine and in the process I decided to cut back my poor little plant.

Pitiful isn’t it?

After I cleaned the kitchen a couple of months ago I had moved my pretty plant to the top of the cabinet. Well, I kept forgetting to water it and it was looking a bit sad. This morning everything seemed dead so I cut it back and managed to find a couple of green areas so fingers crossed it will come back.

Last week our cleaning zone was in the Kitchen where I didn’t really do anything special. This week is the Bathroom and Another Room which happens to be the Office this time around. I don’t have an office so I’m gonna just try to work on getting me a better work area fixed up. I do plan on trying to get a deep cleaning done in the bathroom because it really needs it.

We have a special dance to attend tonight so I need to work on getting our outfits ready for that. I love the garment steamer that I got a few weeks ago. It works well on freshening up my outfits even the delicate lace trim on some of them. It also works well on Mr. Awesome’s pants and keeps us looking so well put together! It is much easier than using the steam press I have set up in the tiny bathroom as well.

I’m gonna keep the steam press around because it will be really useful when I get an area set up for sewing, I am trying to work on that this week too. I have a couple of ideas in my head but I haven’t actually gotten out my measuring tape or put pen to paper yet to see if it will work.

I’ve also been working trying to work on getting some lessons planned out and ready to go for the new school year. This has been a bit frustrating as our internet is once again not working well and the kids just get so excited when they see me working on stuff and printing out things.

Whew! This has taken me way longer than I intended… the internet keeps flipping in and out and my pics keep getting taken out of the post. I better stop while I am ahead right now as I still have a lot of things to finish up before lunch time.

I hope you all have a great day… What are your plans for the week?

  A Look Back On The Past Week And A Peek Ahead To This Week honestly don't even know what all we did last week. It seemed to have went by in such a blur.

[ixvyupdates]

11 Education Stories We Couldn’t Stop Reading in 2017

2017 was, let’s just say, a lot. And we couldn’t stop writing about it. From the selection of Betsy DeVos as education secretary to the Trump administration rolling back on the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program (DACA) and, of course, we can’t forget about the Muslim Ban.

There was Charlottesville, hurricanes that seemed like they would just not stop coming, and we still haven’t been able to escape mass shootings, including in schools.

Yeah, OK, so that’s a lot, and it’s not even all of it.

I can’t promise fairy tales in 2018 but what I can hope for is that we keep writing about all of it—the good and the always inevitable bad. It’s in the moments where we write and share that we discover that we’re not alone.

Here’s 11 blogs where writers brought out the laptops—even when it was tough—to share how they really feel.

1. I Was a Racist Teacher and I Didn’t Even Know It

It’s always the hardest question to ask: Am I part of the problem? Laurie Calvert taught in Asheville, North Carolina, for 14 years. One day she was forced to reflect on whether—in her classroom—she was supporting structures and systems that kept White people in power. The answer? Yes. In her piece she digs into why anti-racism is more than a feeling, it’s an action.

While you’re at it, if you’ve ever been called a racist teacher, here’s how you should handle it. Hint: It does not include saying, “I’m not racist.”

2. Dear Senator Franken, this isn’t #SNL. It’s my life.

In recent years, “Saturday Night Live” (“SNL”) has been a little too real life for me but as Indiana mom Cheryl Kirk quickly reminded Sen. Franken, her life is not “SNL.” During Betsy DeVos’ confirmation hearing, Sen. Franken took to the mic and criticized Indiana’s school choice program, and as a mother of three who exercises school choice, Kirk wasn’t having it. She calls Sen. Franken out in this post.

(P.s. Franken has since resigned due to several allegations of sexual misconduct.)

3. A Powerful Message From A Bridgeport Teacher In The Wake Of A Police Shooting: These Kids Need Our Help

Police shootings are tough, especially when students are involved. This year, 15-year-old Jayson Negron was fatally shot by Bridgeport, Connecticut, police officers. His body was left on the street, handcuffed and uncovered for over seven hours. Alex Torres, a high school teacher, had to think about what to tell his students the next day.

4. Betsy DeVos Says Discrimination Isn’t Her Problem. And She’s Dead Wrong.

This post comes from Matt Lehrich, a former White House spokesman and U.S. Department of Education communications director, so he knows what it takes to support students at the highest level and DeVos just hasn’t been cutting it. In a budget hearing earlier this year when asked, “[if] there’s [any] situation of discrimination or exclusion that…you would step in and say that’s not how we’re going to use our federal dollars?” She couldn’t think of one! And then said, “those choices would be up to states.” “Students deserve a secretary of education who will stand up and speak out for them,” Lehrich wrote. We agree.

5. I Never Thought Gifted and Talented Kids Could Be At-Risk Too, Until My Son Said He Wanted to Drop Out of School

Often when we think of “at-risk” students, we think of students in poverty and students with disabilities. We absolutely should be thinking of those students but there’s also our gifted and talented students that fly under the radar. Mom and Colorado State Teacher of the Year Michelle Pearson learned the hard way when her gifted son told her he wanted to drop out of school. Lesson: “Doing well in school doesn’t mean a student is thriving, or even happy.”

6. #MyBlackHistory: My Mom Had to Lie to Get Me Into a Good School. No Parent Should Have to Do That.

For Black History Month, we collected stories from around the country encouraging folks to share their education stories. We got this piece from Nate Bowling, 2016 Washington State Teacher of the Year, who told the story all too many parents have to hide: His mom lied about where they lived so he could go to a better school.

7. My Name Is Tom. I’ve Been a Teacher for 10 Years and I Still Get My Ass Kicked Nearly Every Day.

This 2014 Minnesota Teacher of the Year came out with a book this year about teaching and the title literally starts with, “It Won’t Be Easy.” Even after 10 years, Tom Rademacher stills struggles in the classroom and isn’t afraid to share that honesty. Check out the blog post and then get his book after!

8. A Candid Convo With a Chicago Principal Who Says Black Boys Learn Best When Success Looks Like Them

The data came out this year: Having just one Black teacher can keep Black kids in school. Unfortunately, only 2 percent of teachers are Black male educators. That means we have some work to do. Education blogger Marilyn Rhames interviewed this Black male educator who told us exactly what we can be doing better to increase the success of Black male students.

9. Don’t Like ‘Take a Knee’? Take a Civics Class.

Full disclosure: I was 100 percent here for #TakeAKnee and kind of never wanted it to end. It was happening everywhere not just on the football field. But there were a lot of people who disagreed. But this teacher says whether you agree or disagree, everyone needs to take a civics class.

10. You Can Be Teacher of the Year and Still Get Fired for Being Gay

This story is insane! His district tried to silence him by ordering him to not say whether he was gay. He was told he could not write or speak anything unless the district approved of his words in advance and he was told to bring all personal mail from home for them to open and read. He was told if he said he was gay someone was going to shoot him in the head. You have to read the post to find out how he handled all of this craziness.

11. Dear High School Teacher Who Tried to Discourage Me from Applying to UCLA, I’m a BRUIN Now!

This is an amazing shoutout to all the haters who say you can’t or won’t do something. Her teacher told her she would never make it into UCLA, let alone graduate. Who’s wearing a cap and gown, and holding a diploma now?

There so many more blogs I could have included but will stop here for now. Here’s to more blogging in 2018!

Photo by @debb_a, Twenty20-licensed.

11 Education Stories We Couldn’t Stop Reading in 2017 syndicated from http://ift.tt/2i93Vhl

[richardrobertsimsuccessblog]

How to Write Faster: 10 Crafty Ways to Hit 1,000 Words Per Hour

Yesssss!

The schedule gods have given you a break, and you have a rare hour to actually sit down and write. You could produce an entire blog post! An article! Maybe even a short book chapter! Your research is all done, so all you need to do now is write.

You apply ass to seat, fire up your laptop, start typing …

… and it’s like watching a video in slo-mo.

Once the hour is up, you do a word count — and let’s just say the final tally is less than impressive.

It’s time to pull you out of that rut. Here are ten ways to produce great writing in volume. Using these tactics, I can write a full 1,000-word article in under an hour; I bet they’ll speed up your output as well.

#1. Write Under Pressure (from Your Bladder)

When I’m on fire (or on a deadline) and don’t want to stop writing, I skip bathroom breaks until I’m done. Nothing speeds up your writing like knowing you’re on the verge of having a potty accident.

Being a 48-year-old woman, I have to pee every 30 minutes, so you can bet I’m writing scorchingly fast to make it to the next bathroom break; but if this isn’t the case for you, try quaffing a couple glasses of water before sitting down at your laptop.

Caveat: I am not a doctor and this probably isn’t the healthiest thing to do. In fact, I’ve heard of bladder infections being called “secretary’s disease” because they used to happen frequently to secretaries who held it in while they finished “just one more task.” Use this tactic at your own risk!

#2. Outwit Writer’s Block with This Old Journalist’s Trick

Instead of insisting that your facts and examples be all lined up before you put pen to paper, which leads to over-researching, try writing from your head. Get down what you know, and what you remember from your interviews — and drop in the term “TK” wherever you get stuck and need more information.

TK is journo-speak for “to come,” and it’s used as a placeholder for copy you’ll add later. The beauty of TK is that this combo of letters very rarely occurs in the English language — so once you’re done with your draft, you can do a search on the term in your word processing program and fill in the holes.

You’ll be surprised at how much you already had in your head, and at how much faster you can produce a piece of writing this way!

#3. Use Automation to Skip Two Million Keystrokes

Rewriting the same copy over and over, or playing the cut-and-paste game several times an hour, is a massive time suck. In the two minutes it takes you to type in your bio at the end of a guest post, you could have written the lede paragraph of a new post.

I use an app called TextExpander — which expands custom keyboard shortcuts into frequently used text — for common copy like my email sign-off, bio, mailing address, book titles, HTML codes, and words and phrases I use often in my writing. You can even use TextExpander abbreviations to insert images, the current date, and more. (Similar apps include TypeIt4Me for Mac and Breevy for Windows.)

As an example, when I type in “rren,” this pops up: The Renegade Writer: A Totally Unconventional Guide to Freelance Writing Success. That’s four keystrokes instead of 80!

TextExpander’s stats say I’ve saved myself from typing over two million characters, and have saved over 142 hours. Yes, that’s six solid days I’ve rescued from the abyss of needless typing.

One trick I learned years ago is to be sure the abbreviations you choose are letter combinations you won’t be using for anything else. For example, if you choose the word “address” to expand out into your street address, that will also happen when you write, “This blog post will address common time-wasters.”

Try repeating a letter at the front of the word instead. I use the combo “bbio” for my bio and “uurl” for my website URL.

Imagine how much speedier your writing will be if you can simply type fewer words!

#4. Turn Off the Squiggly Red Lines

You’re all in the zone, writing like your life depends on it — or like you have to pee really bad; see tip #1 — and suddenly you’re stopped in your tracks by a squiggly red line under a word. You pause to check it, and realize the program doesn’t recognize the name of that city in Germany you’re writing about.

So you right-click on “Nuremberg,” select “Add to Dictionary,” and …

… where were you again?

Your word processing program’s spelling and grammar checkers are just okay at checking spelling and grammar, but they are phenomenal at yanking you right out of your flow. I actually don’t mind the spell checker, but when I have the grammar checker on I find myself stopping every few minutes to yell, “Shut up, I meant to write it that way!”

Guess what? You have the power to switch off the checkers so you’re able to write without distraction. You can always run them after you’ve finished your writing if you need to.

#5. Invest in a Faster Pen

Like to write first drafts or take notes by hand? The Hack My Study site did a comparison on which pens are the fastest to write with.

Here’s a spoiler: Fountain pens are best for pure speed, but they’re also pricey and difficult to master. The next best option is a rollerball pen. These are less expensive, but they’re still fast because they create little friction on the writing surface.

The third best for speed is the gel pen, which is less expensive than the rollerball, and coming in dead last is the standard ballpoint pen — you know, the kind you pick up for free at your local bank or dentist’s office.

I can attest to the speed of the rollerball; a few years ago I decided to toss out every junky pen in the house and replace them with a few dozen of my favorite brand, the Pilot Precise V7 Rolling Ball Fine — blue for me, black for my husband, and red just because. That way, whenever I’m in the mood to write a draft or take notes by hand, I can reach into a kitchen drawer or my purse and be assured of pulling out a fast, smooth-writing pen every time.

Stocking up on quality pens is an investment (it costs around $20 for a 12-pack of the Pilot pen I use), but it’s worth it if it helps you write faster. Not to mention you’ll never again waste precious writing seconds furiously scribbling on a sheet of scrap paper to get the ink flowing in your cheap ballpoint.

#6. Do B-Minus Work

One of the chief habits that keeps you stuck in slow motion is editing yourself while writing. There’s nothing like agonizing over the perfect word in the middle of writing a blog post or article to keep you in perpetual “not quite finished” mode. (That habit, of course, is a consequence of perfectionism, another common bugaboo for writers.)

Value done over perfect and let the words fly. Give yourself permission to do B-minus work just to get the ideas down on paper, then go back and edit when you’re done. Chances are, you’ll discover your writing was pretty good to begin with!

The more you resist editing yourself as you write, the easier writing will become. The easier writing becomes, the more confident you’ll be. And the more confident you are in your writing, the quicker the process gets.

#7. Get Zen Before You Pick Up Your Pen

If your writing slows to a virtual crawl because you feel the need to check Facebook or answer an email after every sentence, you’ll love OmmWriter, a program that blocks out the files and applications behind the writing page to minimize distractions.

OmmWriter also offers a selection of calming background colors and music to keep you in Zen mode as you write, plus soothing sounds with each keystroke. I especially love the horizontal cursor (instead of the usual vertical blinking one) that seems to say “Write on” instead of “Stop writing!”

Ommwriter was free when I downloaded it several years ago, but is now a pay-what-you-want app; the average offering is $7.33.

#8. Stop Letting the Schedule Push You Around

Sometimes a little space is all you need to get perspective on a piece of writing that’s giving you fits, so you can get the words out faster.

An example: Last week I had scheduled myself to write an article for my website called “How Writers Waste Time by Saving Time,” about the dangers of cutting corners in your research and interviews. I eked out about 500 (crappy) words at a glacially slow pace before giving up; the article sounded more like a rant than a solid service piece, and I just couldn’t figure out how to fix it.

Then I looked over my ideas for future articles, and one called “Let Future You Handle Your Writing Problems” jumped out at me. I was inspired! I opened a new Word file, and that article — all 900 words — poured out of me in less than 60 minutes.

This week, I revisited the article I had been stuck on, and immediately saw exactly what the problem was and how to resolve it. An hour later, that article was done too.

If you have control over what you write and when you write it, this tip is for you: Stop being a slave to your editorial calendar. When you’re wrestling with a scheduled article or post, let it go. Scan over your editorial calendar and see if there are any post ideas that get you all fired up, and make the switch. You’ll find that the writing flows much faster that way.

#9. Play Games to Boost Your Words Per Minute

A big problem for many writers is that we think faster than we type. If your brain is churning out amazing ideas and perfect turns of phrase at a blazing pace, but you type slower than my husband trying to help me come up with a funny metaphor for something slow — you’ll finish out your allotted writing time with a only fraction of your page filled with, you know, writing.

Learning to type is a lot more fun than it used to be, with many sites offering free games, lessons, and tests to help you up your keyboarding speed. FreeTypingGame.Net has, among other goodies, a game called The Frogs Are Off Their Diet. A similar site, WordGames.com, offers hilariously titled typing challenges like Zombie Typocalypse and Type Type Revolution.

If you often find yourself writing on the go, seek out free apps that will help you learn to type faster on your smartphone or tablet. TapTyping is one example for the iPad, iPhone, and iPod Touch, and Typing Master is an app that works on Android devices.

#10. Gamble with Your Reputation

Feeling competitive? Challenge yourself to write your blog post, article, or book chapter in a (much) shorter amount of time than you normally would.

I did this once while working with a friend at a café and her jaw dropped open as she watched me complete an 800-word article in 30 minutes. (And yes, it was good!)

Even better, bet a friend something juicy that you can do it, or throw down the gauntlet on social media. The more people who see it and the harsher the consequences should you lose, the more likely you are to get those words down on the double.

On the low-pressure end, I also like to do mini challenges: I’ll see how much I can write in the five minutes while my tea steeps … in the two minutes before the microwave dings and my lunch is ready … while I’m on hold with AT&T before someone picks up. It’s incredible how quickly you can write when you have mere minutes to get it done.

Be More Prolific than You Ever Thought Possible

Fab news! It took me years to develop and learn these effective tactics for writing like a bat out of hell, but you can try them all on right now.

Feel free to combine tactics: Turn off the grammar checker, down a couple glasses of water, fire up Ommwriter, and use a text expander app to produce B-minus work.

Chances are you’ll boost your speed many times over, so you can do even more of what you love (hint: writing) every day.

Ready for the writing to simply pour from you? Set your timer and get started!

About the Author: Linda Formichelli has been a full-time freelance writer since 1997. If you’re marketing your butt off and getting nowhere, Linda’s theory is that it’s because you’re doing all the right things—and getting overwhelmed by it all. Instead, check out her upcoming Volume Marketing Challenge for Freelance Writers. During this fun, intense challenge, each week you’ll do the heck out of one type of marketing to reveal the one that will get you the most freelance writing assignments. Registration opens March 3!

How to Write Faster: 10 Crafty Ways to Hit 1,000 Words Per Hour

[annegalliher]

How to Write Faster: 10 Crafty Ways to Hit 1,000 Words Per Hour

Yesssss!

The schedule gods have given you a break, and you have a rare hour to actually sit down and write. You could produce an entire blog post! An article! Maybe even a short book chapter! Your research is all done, so all you need to do now is write.

You apply ass to seat, fire up your laptop, start typing …

… and it’s like watching a video in slo-mo.

Once the hour is up, you do a word count — and let’s just say the final tally is less than impressive.

It’s time to pull you out of that rut. Here are ten ways to produce great writing in volume. Using these tactics, I can write a full 1,000-word article in under an hour; I bet they’ll speed up your output as well.

#1. Write Under Pressure (from Your Bladder)

When I’m on fire (or on a deadline) and don’t want to stop writing, I skip bathroom breaks until I’m done. Nothing speeds up your writing like knowing you’re on the verge of having a potty accident.

Being a 48-year-old woman, I have to pee every 30 minutes, so you can bet I’m writing scorchingly fast to make it to the next bathroom break; but if this isn’t the case for you, try quaffing a couple glasses of water before sitting down at your laptop.

Caveat: I am not a doctor and this probably isn’t the healthiest thing to do. In fact, I’ve heard of bladder infections being called “secretary’s disease” because they used to happen frequently to secretaries who held it in while they finished “just one more task.” Use this tactic at your own risk!

#2. Outwit Writer’s Block with This Old Journalist’s Trick

Instead of insisting that your facts and examples be all lined up before you put pen to paper, which leads to over-researching, try writing from your head. Get down what you know, and what you remember from your interviews — and drop in the term “TK” wherever you get stuck and need more information.

TK is journo-speak for “to come,” and it’s used as a placeholder for copy you’ll add later. The beauty of TK is that this combo of letters very rarely occurs in the English language — so once you’re done with your draft, you can do a search on the term in your word processing program and fill in the holes.

You’ll be surprised at how much you already had in your head, and at how much faster you can produce a piece of writing this way!

#3. Use Automation to Skip Two Million Keystrokes

Rewriting the same copy over and over, or playing the cut-and-paste game several times an hour, is a massive time suck. In the two minutes it takes you to type in your bio at the end of a guest post, you could have written the lede paragraph of a new post.

I use an app called TextExpander — which expands custom keyboard shortcuts into frequently used text — for common copy like my email sign-off, bio, mailing address, book titles, HTML codes, and words and phrases I use often in my writing. You can even use TextExpander abbreviations to insert images, the current date, and more. (Similar apps include TypeIt4Me for Mac and Breevy for Windows.)

As an example, when I type in “rren,” this pops up: The Renegade Writer: A Totally Unconventional Guide to Freelance Writing Success. That’s four keystrokes instead of 80!

TextExpander’s stats say I’ve saved myself from typing over two million characters, and have saved over 142 hours. Yes, that’s six solid days I’ve rescued from the abyss of needless typing.

One trick I learned years ago is to be sure the abbreviations you choose are letter combinations you won’t be using for anything else. For example, if you choose the word “address” to expand out into your street address, that will also happen when you write, “This blog post will address common time-wasters.”

Try repeating a letter at the front of the word instead. I use the combo “bbio” for my bio and “uurl” for my website URL.

Imagine how much speedier your writing will be if you can simply type fewer words!

#4. Turn Off the Squiggly Red Lines

You’re all in the zone, writing like your life depends on it — or like you have to pee really bad; see tip #1 — and suddenly you’re stopped in your tracks by a squiggly red line under a word. You pause to check it, and realize the program doesn’t recognize the name of that city in Germany you’re writing about.

So you right-click on “Nuremberg,” select “Add to Dictionary,” and …

… where were you again?

Your word processing program’s spelling and grammar checkers are just okay at checking spelling and grammar, but they are phenomenal at yanking you right out of your flow. I actually don’t mind the spell checker, but when I have the grammar checker on I find myself stopping every few minutes to yell, “Shut up, I meant to write it that way!”

Guess what? You have the power to switch off the checkers so you’re able to write without distraction. You can always run them after you’ve finished your writing if you need to.

#5. Invest in a Faster Pen

Like to write first drafts or take notes by hand? The Hack My Study site did a comparison on which pens are the fastest to write with.

Here’s a spoiler: Fountain pens are best for pure speed, but they’re also pricey and difficult to master. The next best option is a rollerball pen. These are less expensive, but they’re still fast because they create little friction on the writing surface.

The third best for speed is the gel pen, which is less expensive than the rollerball, and coming in dead last is the standard ballpoint pen — you know, the kind you pick up for free at your local bank or dentist’s office.

I can attest to the speed of the rollerball; a few years ago I decided to toss out every junky pen in the house and replace them with a few dozen of my favorite brand, the Pilot Precise V7 Rolling Ball Fine — blue for me, black for my husband, and red just because. That way, whenever I’m in the mood to write a draft or take notes by hand, I can reach into a kitchen drawer or my purse and be assured of pulling out a fast, smooth-writing pen every time.

Stocking up on quality pens is an investment (it costs around $20 for a 12-pack of the Pilot pen I use), but it’s worth it if it helps you write faster. Not to mention you’ll never again waste precious writing seconds furiously scribbling on a sheet of scrap paper to get the ink flowing in your cheap ballpoint.

#6. Do B-Minus Work

One of the chief habits that keeps you stuck in slow motion is editing yourself while writing. There’s nothing like agonizing over the perfect word in the middle of writing a blog post or article to keep you in perpetual “not quite finished” mode. (That habit, of course, is a consequence of perfectionism, another common bugaboo for writers.)

Value done over perfect and let the words fly. Give yourself permission to do B-minus work just to get the ideas down on paper, then go back and edit when you’re done. Chances are, you’ll discover your writing was pretty good to begin with!

The more you resist editing yourself as you write, the easier writing will become. The easier writing becomes, the more confident you’ll be. And the more confident you are in your writing, the quicker the process gets.

#7. Get Zen Before You Pick Up Your Pen

If your writing slows to a virtual crawl because you feel the need to check Facebook or answer an email after every sentence, you’ll love OmmWriter, a program that blocks out the files and applications behind the writing page to minimize distractions.

OmmWriter also offers a selection of calming background colors and music to keep you in Zen mode as you write, plus soothing sounds with each keystroke. I especially love the horizontal cursor (instead of the usual vertical blinking one) that seems to say “Write on” instead of “Stop writing!”

Ommwriter was free when I downloaded it several years ago, but is now a pay-what-you-want app; the average offering is $7.33.

#8. Stop Letting the Schedule Push You Around

Sometimes a little space is all you need to get perspective on a piece of writing that’s giving you fits, so you can get the words out faster.

An example: Last week I had scheduled myself to write an article for my website called “How Writers Waste Time by Saving Time,” about the dangers of cutting corners in your research and interviews. I eked out about 500 (crappy) words at a glacially slow pace before giving up; the article sounded more like a rant than a solid service piece, and I just couldn’t figure out how to fix it.

Then I looked over my ideas for future articles, and one called “Let Future You Handle Your Writing Problems” jumped out at me. I was inspired! I opened a new Word file, and that article — all 900 words — poured out of me in less than 60 minutes.

This week, I revisited the article I had been stuck on, and immediately saw exactly what the problem was and how to resolve it. An hour later, that article was done too.

If you have control over what you write and when you write it, this tip is for you: Stop being a slave to your editorial calendar. When you’re wrestling with a scheduled article or post, let it go. Scan over your editorial calendar and see if there are any post ideas that get you all fired up, and make the switch. You’ll find that the writing flows much faster that way.

#9. Play Games to Boost Your Words Per Minute

A big problem for many writers is that we think faster than we type. If your brain is churning out amazing ideas and perfect turns of phrase at a blazing pace, but you type slower than my husband trying to help me come up with a funny metaphor for something slow — you’ll finish out your allotted writing time with a only fraction of your page filled with, you know, writing.

Learning to type is a lot more fun than it used to be, with many sites offering free games, lessons, and tests to help you up your keyboarding speed. FreeTypingGame.Net has, among other goodies, a game called The Frogs Are Off Their Diet. A similar site, WordGames.com, offers hilariously titled typing challenges like Zombie Typocalypse and Type Type Revolution.

If you often find yourself writing on the go, seek out free apps that will help you learn to type faster on your smartphone or tablet. TapTyping is one example for the iPad, iPhone, and iPod Touch, and Typing Master is an app that works on Android devices.

#10. Gamble with Your Reputation

Feeling competitive? Challenge yourself to write your blog post, article, or book chapter in a (much) shorter amount of time than you normally would.

I did this once while working with a friend at a café and her jaw dropped open as she watched me complete an 800-word article in 30 minutes. (And yes, it was good!)

Even better, bet a friend something juicy that you can do it, or throw down the gauntlet on social media. The more people who see it and the harsher the consequences should you lose, the more likely you are to get those words down on the double.

On the low-pressure end, I also like to do mini challenges: I’ll see how much I can write in the five minutes while my tea steeps … in the two minutes before the microwave dings and my lunch is ready … while I’m on hold with AT&T before someone picks up. It’s incredible how quickly you can write when you have mere minutes to get it done.

Be More Prolific than You Ever Thought Possible

Fab news! It took me years to develop and learn these effective tactics for writing like a bat out of hell, but you can try them all on right now.

Feel free to combine tactics: Turn off the grammar checker, down a couple glasses of water, fire up Ommwriter, and use a text expander app to produce B-minus work.

Chances are you’ll boost your speed many times over, so you can do even more of what you love (hint: writing) every day.

Ready for the writing to simply pour from you? Set your timer and get started!

About the Author: Linda Formichelli has been a full-time freelance writer since 1997. If you’re marketing your butt off and getting nowhere, Linda’s theory is that it’s because you’re doing all the right things—and getting overwhelmed by it all. Instead, check out her upcoming Volume Marketing Challenge for Freelance Writers. During this fun, intense challenge, each week you’ll do the heck out of one type of marketing to reveal the one that will get you the most freelance writing assignments. Registration opens March 3!

[alanajacksontx]

How to Write Faster: 10 Crafty Ways to Hit 1,000 Words Per Hour

Yesssss!

The schedule gods have given you a break, and you have a rare hour to actually sit down and write. You could produce an entire blog post! An article! Maybe even a short book chapter! Your research is all done, so all you need to do now is write.

You apply ass to seat, fire up your laptop, start typing …

… and it’s like watching a video in slo-mo.

Once the hour is up, you do a word count — and let’s just say the final tally is less than impressive.

It’s time to pull you out of that rut. Here are ten ways to produce great writing in volume. Using these tactics, I can write a full 1,000-word article in under an hour; I bet they’ll speed up your output as well.

#1. Write Under Pressure (from Your Bladder)

When I’m on fire (or on a deadline) and don’t want to stop writing, I skip bathroom breaks until I’m done. Nothing speeds up your writing like knowing you’re on the verge of having a potty accident.

Being a 48-year-old woman, I have to pee every 30 minutes, so you can bet I’m writing scorchingly fast to make it to the next bathroom break; but if this isn’t the case for you, try quaffing a couple glasses of water before sitting down at your laptop.

Caveat: I am not a doctor and this probably isn’t the healthiest thing to do. In fact, I’ve heard of bladder infections being called “secretary’s disease” because they used to happen frequently to secretaries who held it in while they finished “just one more task.” Use this tactic at your own risk!

#2. Outwit Writer’s Block with This Old Journalist’s Trick

Instead of insisting that your facts and examples be all lined up before you put pen to paper, which leads to over-researching, try writing from your head. Get down what you know, and what you remember from your interviews — and drop in the term “TK” wherever you get stuck and need more information.

TK is journo-speak for “to come,” and it’s used as a placeholder for copy you’ll add later. The beauty of TK is that this combo of letters very rarely occurs in the English language — so once you’re done with your draft, you can do a search on the term in your word processing program and fill in the holes.

You’ll be surprised at how much you already had in your head, and at how much faster you can produce a piece of writing this way!

#3. Use Automation to Skip Two Million Keystrokes

Rewriting the same copy over and over, or playing the cut-and-paste game several times an hour, is a massive time suck. In the two minutes it takes you to type in your bio at the end of a guest post, you could have written the lede paragraph of a new post.

I use an app called TextExpander — which expands custom keyboard shortcuts into frequently used text — for common copy like my email sign-off, bio, mailing address, book titles, HTML codes, and words and phrases I use often in my writing. You can even use TextExpander abbreviations to insert images, the current date, and more. (Similar apps include TypeIt4Me for Mac and Breevy for Windows.)

As an example, when I type in “rren,” this pops up: The Renegade Writer: A Totally Unconventional Guide to Freelance Writing Success. That’s four keystrokes instead of 80!

TextExpander’s stats say I’ve saved myself from typing over two million characters, and have saved over 142 hours. Yes, that’s six solid days I’ve rescued from the abyss of needless typing.

One trick I learned years ago is to be sure the abbreviations you choose are letter combinations you won’t be using for anything else. For example, if you choose the word “address” to expand out into your street address, that will also happen when you write, “This blog post will address common time-wasters.”

Try repeating a letter at the front of the word instead. I use the combo “bbio” for my bio and “uurl” for my website URL.

Imagine how much speedier your writing will be if you can simply type fewer words!

#4. Turn Off the Squiggly Red Lines

You’re all in the zone, writing like your life depends on it — or like you have to pee really bad; see tip #1 — and suddenly you’re stopped in your tracks by a squiggly red line under a word. You pause to check it, and realize the program doesn’t recognize the name of that city in Germany you’re writing about.

So you right-click on “Nuremberg,” select “Add to Dictionary,” and …

… where were you again?

Your word processing program’s spelling and grammar checkers are just okay at checking spelling and grammar, but they are phenomenal at yanking you right out of your flow. I actually don’t mind the spell checker, but when I have the grammar checker on I find myself stopping every few minutes to yell, “Shut up, I meant to write it that way!”

Guess what? You have the power to switch off the checkers so you’re able to write without distraction. You can always run them after you’ve finished your writing if you need to.

#5. Invest in a Faster Pen

Like to write first drafts or take notes by hand? The Hack My Study site did a comparison on which pens are the fastest to write with.

Here’s a spoiler: Fountain pens are best for pure speed, but they’re also pricey and difficult to master. The next best option is a rollerball pen. These are less expensive, but they’re still fast because they create little friction on the writing surface.

The third best for speed is the gel pen, which is less expensive than the rollerball, and coming in dead last is the standard ballpoint pen — you know, the kind you pick up for free at your local bank or dentist’s office.

I can attest to the speed of the rollerball; a few years ago I decided to toss out every junky pen in the house and replace them with a few dozen of my favorite brand, the Pilot Precise V7 Rolling Ball Fine — blue for me, black for my husband, and red just because. That way, whenever I’m in the mood to write a draft or take notes by hand, I can reach into a kitchen drawer or my purse and be assured of pulling out a fast, smooth-writing pen every time.

Stocking up on quality pens is an investment (it costs around $20 for a 12-pack of the Pilot pen I use), but it’s worth it if it helps you write faster. Not to mention you’ll never again waste precious writing seconds furiously scribbling on a sheet of scrap paper to get the ink flowing in your cheap ballpoint.

#6. Do B-Minus Work

One of the chief habits that keeps you stuck in slow motion is editing yourself while writing. There’s nothing like agonizing over the perfect word in the middle of writing a blog post or article to keep you in perpetual “not quite finished” mode. (That habit, of course, is a consequence of perfectionism, another common bugaboo for writers.)

Value done over perfect and let the words fly. Give yourself permission to do B-minus work just to get the ideas down on paper, then go back and edit when you’re done. Chances are, you’ll discover your writing was pretty good to begin with!

The more you resist editing yourself as you write, the easier writing will become. The easier writing becomes, the more confident you’ll be. And the more confident you are in your writing, the quicker the process gets.

#7. Get Zen Before You Pick Up Your Pen

If your writing slows to a virtual crawl because you feel the need to check Facebook or answer an email after every sentence, you’ll love OmmWriter, a program that blocks out the files and applications behind the writing page to minimize distractions.

OmmWriter also offers a selection of calming background colors and music to keep you in Zen mode as you write, plus soothing sounds with each keystroke. I especially love the horizontal cursor (instead of the usual vertical blinking one) that seems to say “Write on” instead of “Stop writing!”

Ommwriter was free when I downloaded it several years ago, but is now a pay-what-you-want app; the average offering is $7.33.

#8. Stop Letting the Schedule Push You Around

Sometimes a little space is all you need to get perspective on a piece of writing that’s giving you fits, so you can get the words out faster.

An example: Last week I had scheduled myself to write an article for my website called “How Writers Waste Time by Saving Time,” about the dangers of cutting corners in your research and interviews. I eked out about 500 (crappy) words at a glacially slow pace before giving up; the article sounded more like a rant than a solid service piece, and I just couldn’t figure out how to fix it.

Then I looked over my ideas for future articles, and one called “Let Future You Handle Your Writing Problems” jumped out at me. I was inspired! I opened a new Word file, and that article — all 900 words — poured out of me in less than 60 minutes.

This week, I revisited the article I had been stuck on, and immediately saw exactly what the problem was and how to resolve it. An hour later, that article was done too.

If you have control over what you write and when you write it, this tip is for you: Stop being a slave to your editorial calendar. When you’re wrestling with a scheduled article or post, let it go. Scan over your editorial calendar and see if there are any post ideas that get you all fired up, and make the switch. You’ll find that the writing flows much faster that way.

#9. Play Games to Boost Your Words Per Minute

A big problem for many writers is that we think faster than we type. If your brain is churning out amazing ideas and perfect turns of phrase at a blazing pace, but you type slower than my husband trying to help me come up with a funny metaphor for something slow — you’ll finish out your allotted writing time with a only fraction of your page filled with, you know, writing.

Learning to type is a lot more fun than it used to be, with many sites offering free games, lessons, and tests to help you up your keyboarding speed. FreeTypingGame.Net has, among other goodies, a game called The Frogs Are Off Their Diet. A similar site, WordGames.com, offers hilariously titled typing challenges like Zombie Typocalypse and Type Type Revolution.

If you often find yourself writing on the go, seek out free apps that will help you learn to type faster on your smartphone or tablet. TapTyping is one example for the iPad, iPhone, and iPod Touch, and Typing Master is an app that works on Android devices.

#10. Gamble with Your Reputation

Feeling competitive? Challenge yourself to write your blog post, article, or book chapter in a (much) shorter amount of time than you normally would.

I did this once while working with a friend at a café and her jaw dropped open as she watched me complete an 800-word article in 30 minutes. (And yes, it was good!)

Even better, bet a friend something juicy that you can do it, or throw down the gauntlet on social media. The more people who see it and the harsher the consequences should you lose, the more likely you are to get those words down on the double.

On the low-pressure end, I also like to do mini challenges: I’ll see how much I can write in the five minutes while my tea steeps … in the two minutes before the microwave dings and my lunch is ready … while I’m on hold with AT&T before someone picks up. It’s incredible how quickly you can write when you have mere minutes to get it done.

Be More Prolific than You Ever Thought Possible

Fab news! It took me years to develop and learn these effective tactics for writing like a bat out of hell, but you can try them all on right now.

Feel free to combine tactics: Turn off the grammar checker, down a couple glasses of water, fire up Ommwriter, and use a text expander app to produce B-minus work.

Chances are you’ll boost your speed many times over, so you can do even more of what you love (hint: writing) every day.

Ready for the writing to simply pour from you? Set your timer and get started!

About the Author: Linda Formichelli has been a full-time freelance writer since 1997. If you’re marketing your butt off and getting nowhere, Linda’s theory is that it’s because you’re doing all the right things—and getting overwhelmed by it all. Instead, check out her upcoming Volume Marketing Challenge for Freelance Writers. During this fun, intense challenge, each week you’ll do the heck out of one type of marketing to reveal the one that will get you the most freelance writing assignments. Registration opens March 3!

from Internet Marketing Tips https://smartblogger.com/how-to-write-faster/