how to dismantle an atomic bomb
Jan. 5th, 2007 01:53 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
xaaraThe new next week on SPN is up over at the CW website. You know how sometimes people say they flail at something to emphasize their strong reaction to it? I--quite literally and physically--flailed. *flails again for good measure*
Also: I'm thinking about writing little reference companions to the fics that required a lot of research, description of locations, etc. I've written about such a variety of things that sometimes I end up doing redundant research, and it's a waste of time. Besides, I like to keep track of those sorts of things.
On that note, while I was thinking about how to organize these companion references, I realized just how much random information I've acquired as a byproduct of writing. A couple years ago, during my [very] brief fling with Buffy fandom, I wrote Fulgurite, about how Spike gets back from Africa between seasons six and seven. It's not one of my best fics ever; it's not something I was terribly interested in even at the time. It was mostly me, writing a story to resolve some of the problems I had with canon. I never expected anyone to read it.
I spent almost four hours researching Victorian beliefs about the meanings and uses of herbs for one throwaway paragraph.
This is a trend, not an anomaly. I spend more time researching the little details in stories than writing the stories themselves, sometimes. I sift through city municipal websites, I research mythology, I do a disgusting amount of reading any time one of the characters even mentions a medical problem. I spend hours looking at pictures of things so I can be sure I'm giving a diner the correct number of windows or a car the correct detail.
And the thing is, half the time I research something, read tomes on it, and write it into one sentence, I end up editing that sentence out by the final version of whatever I'm composing. Which means that at any given time, I have so much random information circling through my head, it's a miracle I get anything done at all.
I assume other people either (a) have this same problem, (b) think this problem is a bit of an absurd one to have, or (c) are now backing away slowly without making eye contact.
Also: I'm thinking about writing little reference companions to the fics that required a lot of research, description of locations, etc. I've written about such a variety of things that sometimes I end up doing redundant research, and it's a waste of time. Besides, I like to keep track of those sorts of things.
On that note, while I was thinking about how to organize these companion references, I realized just how much random information I've acquired as a byproduct of writing. A couple years ago, during my [very] brief fling with Buffy fandom, I wrote Fulgurite, about how Spike gets back from Africa between seasons six and seven. It's not one of my best fics ever; it's not something I was terribly interested in even at the time. It was mostly me, writing a story to resolve some of the problems I had with canon. I never expected anyone to read it.
I spent almost four hours researching Victorian beliefs about the meanings and uses of herbs for one throwaway paragraph.
This is a trend, not an anomaly. I spend more time researching the little details in stories than writing the stories themselves, sometimes. I sift through city municipal websites, I research mythology, I do a disgusting amount of reading any time one of the characters even mentions a medical problem. I spend hours looking at pictures of things so I can be sure I'm giving a diner the correct number of windows or a car the correct detail.
And the thing is, half the time I research something, read tomes on it, and write it into one sentence, I end up editing that sentence out by the final version of whatever I'm composing. Which means that at any given time, I have so much random information circling through my head, it's a miracle I get anything done at all.
I assume other people either (a) have this same problem, (b) think this problem is a bit of an absurd one to have, or (c) are now backing away slowly without making eye contact.