Gift Shopping Update

Oh, dear, did we go nuts on buying gifts for Manalito. Of course we wanted to buy the biggest and most, like the Hot Wheels. At first we put into the cart the package with six cars, but on second thought had to choose the package with only three. Same with the Legos. My husband is all about Legos, so he picked out this huge scorpion creature, but we had to go with the smaller spider and medium shark. Then we went for the soccer ball and air pump. Picked up one air pump, but lo! and behold, there was a smaller one nearby. And, yes, we deflated the soccer ball, but it still wouldn't fit with all the clothes and hygiene items. *sigh* Off to the post office I go to get a second box.

We went with those flat-rate boxes and I knew shipping was going to be expensive, but I didn't anticipate quite that expensive. Yikes. That does it for anyone else receiving anything from us. Well, I guess we'll still get the nieces and nephews something. Everyone seems to be cutting back on the gift-buying this year, so there's no need to go overboard anyway. Which is a vast relief.

Expensive or not, nothing has given me more joy than to buy stuff for this child. I just wish I could bring him home with me, but I need to pray that Manalito will be a blessing to his own people, moving mountains for them, one person at a time, perhaps.

Christmas art to ponder:

Nativity (Holy Night)
Antonio Da Correggio, 1528

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Giving Thanks...

For turkey
For cake and cookies in abundance
For great story ideas
For a husband who is patient with me while I express those ideas
For 33 years filled with precious memories
For a family that made those memories possible
For Lady and Manalito, who teach me about priorities and unmerited blessings
For a country where I am still free to worship my Savior

Did anyone eat as much as I did? I feel like a butterball myself. For a couple of months I've been carefully monitoring my eating, so this weekend, I ate with impunity. Guiltless enjoyment. Now I never want to eat again. I say that every year. :D

Also, I have the privilege of buying Christmas presents for a boy in Mozambique. His name is Manalito and he's twelve, and I have no idea what 12-year-old boys want for Christmas. The necessities are easy, but what about the fun stuff? I'm recruiting my sister's help. Maybe she'll know what to do.

Regardless, a little boy on the other side of planet Earth has become precious to me. And seeing how he lives has taught me, not to feel guilty for the house I live in and the clothes in my closet and the food on my table, but to believe that we who live in this wealthy country have a primary responsibility of seeing to the needs of these children. I wish I could buy them running water, but toothbrushes and socks will have to do.

New Ideas, Rare and Precious

It's rare anymore for me to find a story idea that takes hold of my imagination and hangs on till I reach "The End." I feel like I'm floundering about, pretending to be busy with a great idea until a better one comes along. All the while, the mental tentacles are feeling around for that new inspiration. It's a murky sea, with low visibility most of the time.

So I was checking out the upcoming themes list on Duotrope the other day and came across an anthology by Dead Robots' Society that grabbed hold of one of those mental feelers and wouldn't let go. The prompt for Explorers: Beyond the Horizon is "characters forever changed by their discovery of lands and worlds beyond their own." I have rarely found a prompt more suited to my taste. Half a dozen possibilities rose amid a frenzied brainstorm session. I finally went with one and started typing. The only problem is that the word count must be under 5000 words. I have trouble keeping stories under 8000, so this will be a challenge. Even if the anthology doesn't accept the story, their prompt gifted me with the brainfood that those mental tentacles were grasping for.

Granted, I undertook this brainstorm session while sipping tea laced with cold medicine. Does anyone else find that while on cold medicine their inner critic shuts up and ideas flow? Or is that my lame equivalent of an LSD trip? Ah, well.

Here's some art to ponder:

PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST WITH TWO PUPILS
by Adelaide Labille-Guiard, 1785

We don't hear about too many women painters before the modern era. But this one is a jewel. That fact that Labille-Guiard featured the two future female artists under her wing in this grand self-portrait lets us know that they were out there, creating beautiful things in the vast shadows of their male colleagues. Though I seriously doubt these women painted while wearing their finest. :D Enjoy!

(Click on the pic twice to blow it up all the way. The lady even painted the seam in that shiny dress. Fantastic)
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Art of the Week, Sci-Fi

I have neglected to post any art from the sci-fi realm. Shame on me, for there are some amazing images appealing to the techie side of humanity lurking around out there. I just found a gorgeous one by JP Targete and thought I would share. I guess this one is a little more speampunk-ish, too:

THE CAPTIVE
JP Targete, 2003

As for writing, I have an enormous stack of paper to get through in one year's time. I have to remind myself that the text is printed on only one side of the paper. Then I remember that, b/c there will be so much new material and so many changes in the details, I will have to revise twice -- at least. I'm not panicking yet. Besides, I've set my own deadline. I can move it if I want. But I've already told too many people I'm shooting for December 2011. To hell with that. It's my deadline, I can move it if I want! Nope, not panicking. Though I do need to stop blogging now and get to those revisions . . .

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Art of the Week, Nov. 10

Here's a steampunk-style piece by Hungarian digital artist Kornel Ravadits. Hope it stirs the imagination:

BUDAPEST - Fantasy Panorama
Kornel Ravadits, 2006

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A Worldbuild Sees Its Final Form

As a fantasy writer, I have to love worldbuilding. Taking all the historical and archaeological and social knowledge I've gathered over the years and plunking it down in the middle of a blank sheet of paper. Maps, I love maps, too, which helps.

Years ago, before I ever wrote a single word of the novels I'm revising, I drew the world maps for the stories to come. Drew a couple of circles for each half of the globe and started filling in landforms, rivers, mountains, then kingdoms and cities. Common tale, but I wonder if everyone creating a new uncharted world gets those delectable butterflies in the belly by just looking at those vast, empty stretches of territory, yet unpopulated by humanity? Did God feel that way, looking at all the potential of the little globe spinning around in that vast universe? I think he must've. It's the potential that elicits that feeling, endless possibilities before the nitty-gritty of diving down and making it all work together.

Well, last night my husband finally got our scanner to work, so I was able to scan into my computer all those ugly hand-drawn maps. Then I loaded them into the GIMP program. Wow. While the maps have to be in black and white and fit into a smaller space than the old printer paper they were drawn on, they now have mountains that don't look like jiggly triangles! And the names are in readable fonts! And the water has texture! I must admit, they don't look half-bad. They will certainly work for my self-publish project. It will be so strange to see those old maps printed in the front of a book. And since they came before the first word, it's fitting that they will be a reader's first glimpse of my world.

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Art of the Week - November 3

I have no idea who painted this or what it's called. But it's striking. A flaming, almost organic, sunset over a dark sea. One of my favorite activities is to drive out west of my house (which is surrounded by trees) and find a treeless hill to watch the sunset. The Great Plains have unsurpassed sunsets. The ocean, too, apparently.

Chiura Obata (1885–1975) Setting Sun: Sacramento Valley, ca. 1925.
Hanging scroll: mineral pigments (distemper) and gold on silk.
Courtesy of Gyo Obata

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