Posted on

Favorite Online Writing Resources

While doing Nanowrimo, one does need to spend some time procrastinating. So I am finally polishing my list of writing resources.

  • TV Tropes is the best inspiration, it also warns you of the worst pitfalls and clichés.
  • I write in English, I often have to look up words in the dictionary.
  • English has all these beautiful words meaning comparable, similar or even identical things. I love the Thesaurus. Also very useful for colors
  • My favorite writing podcast, just 15 minutes long
  • Just books.
  • Writing Tips and more writing tips.
  • Writers Helping Writers. Wonderful resource with the Emotion Thesaurus and many more.
  • Names and more names.
  • Are your characters all scared of the same something? Fear not.
  • Ask Google anything.
  • The IMDB is a treasure trove of actor’s pictures (as is Google image search), I – like many others – tend to use actors as faces for characters, at least during the outlining phase
  • The single great know-it-all, it may not always be deep enough for a scientist, but for a writer the wikipedia is perfect (and so obvious I nearly forgot to list it)
  • And currently (until end of November 2014): Nano Storybundle (includes awesome Shadows Beneath)

Books on Writing that I can recommend. The list might be longer, if only I read more books on writing.

Most important tools I am using:

  • Scrivener – writing suite for PC or MAC
  • WriteOMeter – a tomato timer for writers
  • Evernote – to keep my research
  • Still looking for a good mobile writing tool for my tablet

Of course the inter-webs are full of great resources you can use in your writing. These are just some of the things that I use the most …

Posted on

Weekly Words to Read

Here’s an article on what often happens to strong female characters when they have finally made it into the movie/book.

A round-up of English words you are likely to misuse – consider the nauseous enormity …

I found The Last Billboard – once a month someone can post a message that will be displayed on this non-digital billboard. How cool is that.

Finally part 8 of the Outlander series Written in My Own Heart’s Blood is here and Diana Gabaldon posted a link to the Outlander family tree, for those with ebook editions (like myself) that can’t view it properly. Thank you!

A funny weather story found via npr books – my very favorite tumblr on books.

And I am still looking forward to July 1st when the sequel to Blood Song will finally be published. There is a sample for The Tower Lord on the author’s website.

Posted on

Insight Outside

Or is it inside out? That’s sushi.

Work is not sushi – most of the time – however it is giving me interesting insights. Nothing I can post of course. Haha. Had you there for a second, didn’t I?

There’s some insight for you.

I am learning new things every day. Mostly from mistakes – not all of them mine. And then there’s King Henry – a classic so to speak.

Most important: communication, transparency, traceability … (I could write a post about jira at this point, or I could just make sushi from my work, just give me a sharp knife, there’s enough raw fish for everyone)

And most important: don’t post on your blog late @ night when you cannot sleep.

PS: I preordered Season 2 tonight. Season 3 is starting soon.

Posted on

Schlechtes Gewissen?

Ich stieg im 2. Stock in den Fahrstuhl um in den Keller zu fahren.
Ich dachte: “Für 3 Stockwerke, das lohnt ja kaum!”
Im 1. Stock stieg jemand zu, der ins Erdgeschoss wollte.

Posted on

Scope

For you it is drama. Something to fuss about.

For me it is just another moskito bite I am trying to ignore.

You are like the child crying for help without cause. One day … nobody will come running.

Posted on

Social Networks

One thing I really hate about social networks is that all the people I know are on different ones. …

So surprise, I just got back from the US and made a facebook account. I resisted for a while since I already have an unused myspace page, a neglected xing account and a studivz account for fun.

There are quite a few people on facebook I know though.

Posted on

Is it friday?

wasting timeThis is what happens when somebody accidentally adds the complete company to some mailinglist and writes a “Test” mail to that list.

All in all it was about 60+ mails that everybody received until the wave of office spam was stopped. Of course it took a technical intervention to achieve this, once the trolls are out it is hard to stop them.

I am guessing that there are some more mails going out to those who are still on that list now.

Posted on

To eat or not to eat – the couch

I found this funny quiz page (I recognized 11 out of 12 snippets of code and could name the correct programming language) and took a quiz:

How Long Could You Survive Trapped In Your Own Home?

I wonder if on the assumed 30kg of food we might have in the house which is a rough and probably incorrect estimate, we could really survive that long.

They ask if you have pets and count them as additional food source and they seem to assume that I will eat my leather jacket and the couch as well. I wonder if when they asked how many people lived in the home they meant everyone besides me to be an additional food source as well …

It’s late and I just watched the movie “Marie Antoinette”.

Update: they also have this nice test. So yes I kind of tend to think now that the survival test assumed that only the person who took the test would survive that long oO (I scored 11 on that last test). The most fun test though is the one I found the page through: the caffeine test. (I scored 148 = Very High – Productive Worker, Jittery)