Dorienne, the gamer Saturday, July 22, 2017

From blog.doriennesmith.com/:

Something fascinating occurred over the last few months: I’ve finally decided to fully acknowledge that I’m a gamer, instead of someone who sometimes plays games.

Star Wars Galaxy of Heroes has taken up a huge part of my time lately. Not just the game itself, or my alt account, but planning for it and researching for it, interacting with my guild members, and recently, writing about it. I’m writing about it on Gaming-fans.com, which is one of the first times I’ve written for someone else. I really enjoy writing reviews and such for GoH on the whole, partly because I enjoy the game, but mainly because I love writing about the game.

My gaming is really disjointed, but that doesn’t stop me from enjoying it from every aspect. I keep buying games like some people collect Lego sets. I had a somewhat sizeable Xbox 360 library, but then discovered Steam Sales and Humble Bundles and decided to switch to PC-gaming, which required re-purchasing (albeit for pennies on the dollar) a bunch of games and trying to play them in a different environment. That said, I’ve got 252 games in my Steam library and I’ve only played through 6% of them.

I usually end up restarting games half the time because I take such long breaks in-between them and tend to jump from game to game. Finishing Mass Effect for the first time really brought this home. Four years elapsed between the time I first attempted ME1 and eventually finished a complete playthrough, but once I got fully engaged in the game, I couldn’t stop until I’d finished. I loved every part of following my Shepard as she commanded the Normandy, befriended various aliens, and fell in love as she saved the galaxy and in playing Mass Effect and discovering its Reddit community, I finally realized that this is a media that I’ve long-since adored.

Regardless if I own a game and it’s just chilling in my Steam library or gathering dust beside the Xbox or I’m simply curious about it, I love reading reading reviews from professional critics and players alike and researching all the furor or glee about every release or console.

While every minute spent gaming is a minute not spent working on Flight or Damen or Anne or any of the other million projects I’ve got pending, with the way first-job has been stressing and depressing me, sometimes all I can do to keep my sanity is engage in interactive stories by playing, writing, or reading about them.

Whether it’s my 13-year-old Sims 2 game that still going and going until modders can’t get it to run on modern OSes anymore, or just discovering which of the latest games can hold my attention best, I’m a gamer. I’m involved.

Part of me wants to link this into all my other hobbies by thinking that eventually I’d like to write my own game, but I think it might be best to let gaming live on its own. Gaming can live beside writing and even occasionally intertwine, but there’s no need to force myself to start a new project like writing a game…at least not until I’ve made a dent in my Steam library.

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Where Inspiration Leads Thursday, August 22, 2013

I had long thought that after I began the agent search for Damen, I would immediately begin working on Jill. To my surprise, inspiration has led me to Anne, which perplexes me because I dislike doing things out of the order I’ve set out for myself.

The order is supposed to go Damen, Jill, Lydia, Lucy #1, and then a couple others before I would attempt Anne, but upon my yearly re-read of Persuasion, Anne just came pouring out of me. I suppose I can’t plan everything, and even if I could, there’s no telling how the execution of these plans will flow.

I’ve been asking God quite often lately about what I’m supposed to do with my life and, like usual, there’s no parting of the clouds, allowing the sun to illuminate a specific building or person or a billboard with the words specifically telling me what it is I’m meant to do. I’m still searching for that kind of sign, though, I’m pretty sure I’ll not see something that grandiose.

I’m not entirely sure what I’m expecting, but I what I do know is that the written word is everything that I am. Despite nearly losing my mind on Steam sales and Humble Bundles, every game I put any real time into allows me to tell a story, i.e., I play The Sims 2, and to a lesser extent nowadays, Sims 3, because I want to tell a story. I do very little in my spare time aside from reading and writing books and stories. Writing, or rather, storytelling, is not just a part of who I am, but really just who I am in total.

I suppose I’ve been a little more existential than usual because my patience with this publishing process is beginning to wear thin, and I thoroughly dislike it when things do not go according to my plans. In the end, however, I guess it’s better to go where inspiration leads and plan around that, rather than pout and grow depressed when I’m forced to Plan B my life events. So, I’ll write Anne before Jill if that’s where inspiration leads me and Lucy #2 before Lucy #1 if need be. I’ll admit, I won’t like it; I rarely like not getting my own way, but I’ll go where inspiration leads me.

Autosave! Why hast thou forsaken me?!? Friday, September 2, 2011

Last night around midnight, I decided to keep writing and finish Chapter 21. I was in the midst of a zone and in mid-word when the screen suddenly turned blue and said something about an error. Long story short, my laptop crashed in the middle of everything I was writing and I sat worried about the blue screen of death facing me. I hadn’t written a lot after I’d last saved, but I had some notes written in a Notepad doc that I really wanted to keep and I liked the little bit that I had been writing.

While I completed two hard restarts and allowed some random Windows repair screen to do its thing, two thoughts rushed through my mind: Did my novel autosave? and Was my Sims 2 game at risk? Now, the former was more of a wishful thought than anything else because autosave has failed me in the past and I did not expect much from it, but the latter was really a surprise.

I guess knowing that I had saved at least the bit that I’d included at my last word count and also knowing that the novel is not only saved on a separate shared drive between all three PCs in my house, but also backed up to my DorienneSmith.com server eased any real concern about the safety of my work, but my Sims 2 game was not so well-guarded and all I could think of as I waited for the autofails autosave’s inevitable failure was whether I’d lost some eight years worth of gaming with just one crash.

I instantly Googled how to make a laptop hard drive into an external hard drive in case the laptop couldn’t be started again and eventually I considered all the pain of not having this particular laptop when I traveled later in the month and then again about that autosave, but a real fear and this amazing sense of loss started to overcome me when I thought about my little game.

I don’t get to play the game as much as I used to play, but Jill is a story born directly out of my Sims’ game and I consider each sim and each family a potential character or set of characters. If it wasn’t for Beau and Alexander Goth and their adopted sim children, I would have never looked at Jill and said, “Hm…there’s a story in this.”

I’ve spent a long time playing this game and, as odd as it sounds, I’ve been playing some of these characters longer than I’ve known some of my friends…my good friends. So, it’s not so much the loss of the game that troubled me, but the loss of so many characters, all at once, with no hope of recovery that caused an ache in my chest and probably reduced some of my life expectancy.

Even though my amygdala started sending out all sorts of irrational thoughts, I did not completely freak out and I found that my fears were, more or less, groundless. The autosave did, indeed, fail to live up to its name, but my game and all its characters were safe. That said, I immediately created a back of my game just in case another random crash comes in the future.

I wrote 614 words today (before she sat across from him) and after each and every pause in writing, I took a minute to Ctrl+S my work to avoid another incident. I’m also going to attempt to upload the 12+ GB file that is my Sims 2 game folder…I’m sure my webhost will shut me down long before I succeed, but it’s worth try.

Build 2 Thursday, March 24, 2011

I’ve been playing a game in The Sims franchise for the last eight years and, while I spend the majority of my “free time” playing The Sims 2, I’ve edited my Sims 2 game to play the “Build” music from The Sims 1.

In the first Sims game, when you were building houses or making structural changes to the lot, a very calm piano music would play, though it changed when you went to the “Buy Mode” in the game. I spent countless hours in Sims 1 just building houses because I loved to simply create and listen to the beautiful music.

The Sims 2 brought its own brand of techno-something music that crossed every mode from Create-A-Sim to building and early on in my Sims 2 playing, I changed all the music over to the Sims 1 Build music. After realizing how much I enjoyed said music, I eventually ported it onto my iPod and then iPhone and even added some album art to it. Nowadays, most of the six Sims 1 Build Mode songs create the bulk of a playlist I call “Soothe Me” which I play when I’m in need of something to calm my mind. I also write to that list on occasion as well, which is why I’ve spent two hundred words of this post talking about it.

While listening to a song I only know as “Build 2,” I not only felt calmer than I had all day, I also wrote some really beautiful prose and was so in the zone with it playing, that I re-played it to keep the momentum going.

Tonight I wrote 260 words (and left the table to sit on the floor next to Angel) and I am calmer for it. I have no other desires for tonight, either; just to sit and listen my Sims 1 music and let my mind rest for the night.

Blue text Sunday, February 13, 2011

I’m so surprised when I come across coloured text in Damen. I had made these random insertions into the original heavy notes and coloured them blue and red to alert myself of how they belonged to a separate part of the whole text. In the last draft, I pulled all the coloured texts into their appropriate places, but I still have a bunch of them lying in wait in my “Damen reminders” file.

For some reason, I’m completely shocked when I come across these, if not because of the sudden change in colour, then because I suddenly remember why it was coloured and I’m further shocked by how well the text flows even with the blue or red text.

What frustrates me, however, is that I can’t remember why I chose the colour scheme I did. Did red mean notes? Did blue mean full prose? It doesn’t make too much sense to me…

I went to church today and sang in the choir. Pastor’s sermon really hit me today as I contemplate some terrible undercurrents at the first-job that may be just waiting to sucker-punch me. I spoke to my mother about the same today and reminded me that when waiting for a blessing, its best to keep oneself busy with other things one should be doing.

That said, I should have taken her advice to heart and written throughout the day, but I played the sims throughout the majority of the day while I edited and coded video. I managed 206 words (as the bird hit the trunk of its tree with a dull thud), but I had every opportunity to finish Chapter 10 and even break ground on Chapter 11. I suppose when I’m feeling a little down since I’m being weighed down with utter dread, I run to comfort things like old Seinfeld episodes and the sims…

Sunset Theme Monday, February 7, 2011

…by Brendon Small from the Home Movies Bonus CD.

I don’t have much to say about today since I really didn’t do anything today. I wanted to spend some time creating and playing The Sims 2, but in all my family creating, one lot ended up screwing over the entire landscape of the neighborhood and spent hours trying to move other lots pixel by pixel to correct it.

I did manage to successfully stop playing sims with the specific intention to write, which makes me feel good about myself, even though I didn’t pick up the dry cleaning or do laundry or dishes when I had all day to do something.

I wrote 1312 words today (all the Neanderthals we deal with every day) and I’m coming to a part I’ve written and re-written and re-re-written some dozen times already. It takes a while to get out what I’m saying, but I can imagine it so clearly that I can’t help but continue writing. The difficult part – for all of Damen for that matter – is to keep the reader guessing about my ultimate message, given that I don’t really have one outside of all people pre-judge.

This chapter talks a lot about guns and etc., but I worry that the message may be that only crazies like Corey would ever really use a gun and that’s not what I mean to say at all. Though I don’t own one myself, if anyone else desires to have a million of them, that’s his choice. As long as I’m not attacking him in his home, I’ve not really got anything to worry about overall.

Anyway…it won’t be like that. I hope.

Simming vs. Writing Monday, January 10, 2011

Any time I have a long expanse of time on my hands, I have to make a conscious decision on how I’m going to spend it. Often, however, this time falls into one of two categories: writing and simming. Today, like many days before it, was a day where I chose the sims.

So, while I can’t say I’ve done anything significant in regards to my literary aspirations, I have created a simified version of myself.

Meet Dorienne Duplex, created to ease sims into their duplex homes.

It’s far easier to have a random sim to have others move into duplex-type homes and I figured that I would be the best candidate for the job. She’s not truly a spitting image of me since her bottom isn’t big enough and her eyes are too dark, but I like her nonetheless.

I haven’t had a lot of things to smile about in the past few days and, if Dorienne Duplex can make me grin just for a moment…then so be it.

Back to reality Tuesday, January 4, 2011

Things I’ve done today:

• Completely edited a WP theme and fit my main blog.
• Retextured a sims hairstyle in both a Maxis-match cartoony look and a more realistic texture, including more than 8 colours for each and renamed and binned all the new hair. (Took close to two days to complete all this and I still doubt it’s share-ready)
• 
• Deleted a bunch of purple, pink and cherry red sim hair from my Red bin and made appropriate natural red recolours.
• Watched at least six “Seinfeld” episodes.
• Went to the gym.
• Uploaded a pic to my Project 365.
• Wrote 510 words.

I say actions speak louder than words and I’ve had an outstanding day! 🙂

That last one was the one that took the most out of me, even more than going to gym when I hadn’t been since probably August. I’ve never worked so hard for 500 words in my life. By the time I got to 400, they were coming a little easier, but I must have written the tie-between scenes for when Damen first meets Corey and when Corey invites him to his grandfather’s house, three or four times before I came to something worthwhile. Each time I attempted to write a scene, everything seemed like it was happening too fast.

Damen was suddenly happy and all I had to “show” how it happened was half a paragraph where I just told what happened. Very lame.

I’m on a roll now, so I’ll keep writing for sure. I said that yesterday as well, but got sidetracked by trying to edit a theme for my main blog (blog.doriennesmith.com) to death. I figure I’ll just have to create my own theme at this point to get everything that I want in a theme, but that’s a project for another day.

I have to say, I was little perplexed earlier this evening when I started to sit down with my tomato soup and fire up an episode of “Coupling.” I realized that I hadn’t updated this blog or my Project 365 and I leapt from the sofa, soup in hand, and ran upstairs to do some writing and uploading.

While I think I’ve got it a little backwards, writing so that I’ll have something to post instead of posting because I’ve written something, I like the idea of it. I’m kept honest by the fact that I’ve got a real deadline and if it works…it works!

Now to get going again… Monday, December 20, 2010

I don’t remember when I last wrote. I’d love to, but I can’t seem to get going again.

I’m not even inspired to post, but I really didn’t have an excuse for not writing and wanted to look back on today and say that I’ve at least written something.

It may be because I’ve had The Simpsons on for the last 48 hours (making that random Simpsons list was really a bad idea in hindsight) and my mind is slowly turning mush. I think if I just keep playing the Sims, I’ll get sick of it soon and move back to Guitar Hero and then back to my routine of food, Guitar Hero and writing. Hopefully…

D’oh…

Day Three Thursday, December 16, 2010

For the third time this week, I found myself lacking the desire to write.

After feeling achy from my chest, to my legs, to my hands and feet, I just wanted to be warm and to play the sims. The problem with the sims is that I’ve recently made decision in the game to make all my “breeder” families and households into just Townie sims and hope for the best since none of these families were ever fun to play since they didn’t have a backstory to them.

I was in the middle of considering to bulldoze half the Bluewater Village neighborhood and set up eight or nine families like I had in another neighborhood, but the task sounded too daunting and, while pondering this further, I dozed in my chair, eventually crawling to the bed at around 2:30am.

I woke up this morning ashamed that, again, I had not written anything and was about to just pull up Damen so it would be ready for me when I got home this evening. Then I saw the timestamp on the last save of chapters 7-8: “December 12, 2010 11:14pm.”

Technically speaking, it had still only been 3 days since I last wrote, my mind did the simple math and counted it as four days (December 13, 14, 15 and 16) without anything written and knew that I had to break the cycle before a full 7 days elapsed with nothing accomplished.

I only wrote 140 this morning and, even though it was just the “full prose” of previous “heavy notes,” I’m glad that I at least started something. The first job is just really pushing on me heavily and, though I’m tired, I’ve got to figure out a way to energize myself in the evenings.

Perhaps it’s time to turn on the heat…

Compensating Monday, December 13, 2010

I got through 1355 words yesterday and could have done more had I not turned on the sims, started watching “Coupling” on Netflix and then fell asleep randomly. I spent a lot of the day mixing Job 1 and Job 2 yesterday, obviously compensating for what I didn’t do the previous day.

I’m proud of the work I did and the research I managed to complete (Phillis Wheatley FTW!), but I am still a little bummed that I hadn’t found what book Damen would be reading at the end of the part I finished. I just wrote:

Listening to the murmurs coming from the same room, he read XX from the comfort of his hiding place for a while, when he looked up and saw Jessie Clarke staring

I had just gone on about Invisible Man for a while and would like to use it again, but Damen had just finished the book during the previous scene and it’s a little too on the nose to use Invisible Man when Damen’s…trying to be invisible. It just seems a little hackish.

Anyhoo, I’ve decided to name all the streets after Jane Austen characters (Willoughby Drive, Elliott Street, Dashwood Way) and the reason I remember this, other than the fact that it’s just so fun, is that I’ve created this “Damen reminders” sheet to help me keep things straight. I’ve got two separate files from the novel/chapter that include details about Anthony’s family and Damen’s upbringing as well as Angel’s story (which I’ve got some preliminary notes for, thought I haven’t decided if it will be it’s own novel yet), but the Reminders will be more of a quick reference than the others. The “damen-teachers” and “damen-books” files have grown far to long to remain any type of quick reference and I’ve decided to move fruitful conversations that I’ve just put at the end of “damen-books” until I find the proper place for them to the Reminders.

The thing is, I’ve got quite a few of these conversations, usually coloured dark red or blue, interspersed through several chapters, which makes me think that I should perhaps drop them altogether. I think it’s just a matter of determining whether the little talks between Damen and Brit are moving along the story.

I’ve also been seesawing with my decision to include the “I know what you’re thinking…” pieces for Angel, Anthony, Brit and Corey. I want to include them because Corey’s is very poignant and Angel’s gives the kind of insight into her that would be very long and difficult to explain since novel is a close 3rd on Damen. I have this inkling that Brit’s will be just a rant that’s almost my own words about being a black girl in America and Anthony’s will be just sound like a raving imbecile, which is how I see him at this point.

I don’t know how it popped into my head yesterday, but I imagined Anthony snatching away all Damen’s books and poetry by black authors; everything except Langston Hughes. I don’t bother going into Zora Neale Hurston since Damen and Brit will be reading her later, but somehow I see Hughes work as a little argumentative on the subject of being black. He’s like Malcolm X to Countee Cullen’s MLK and, while it often sounds beautiful, it annoys me. Also, at least at my school, black American literature is not even introduced until the Harlem Renaissance when we’re just doused with Hughes’ work and the teachers make it sound like blacks never wrote a darn thing prior to 1921 (Phillis Wheatley FTW!). Anyway, where I was going with this is that I’m beginning to dislike Anthony even more than when I first started this endeavour.

Two years ago, I imagined Anthony as having his flaws, but still having some good-naturedness to him. Nowadays, I’m about two steps from having him actually strike Angel to make him truly the most vile character in the novel, surpassing even Zach. I don’t know if it’s because I identify more and more with Damen as I continue, so it’s easier to hate Anthony or if I’m just venting my frustrations with so many black American men, but I there’s definitely more hostility in the prose when I write Anthony. Hopefully, all of this will work itself out when Damen later sees a functional mixed family (perhaps “art boy” will have an older white brother…), but for now, Anthony’s getting the third degree from me.

Perhaps all of this stems from reading about Roll of Thunder again. I haven’t read the book since I was in 7th or 8th grade, possibly even 6th, and I’ve included it as one that Kevin had read to Damen often. I suppose it’s just bringing home the point that despite any off hand remarks about blacks, Damen is not actually bigoted, but Anthony’s just an a**. What I can’t seem to get my mind around is why Angel finds the book dear to her. I came up with some info, but I still don’t know…

All right…time to make this day the success that yesterday was, though I must say, working Sundays is probably the worst thing in all the world.

Not so much Sunday, December 12, 2010

Blegh…

I barely got anything written yesterday. The only reason I got anything written at all was because I wanted to change the genetics on one of my sims and, since SimPe was lagging so much, I decided write a little of Damen to (**Sigh**) pass the time. I’m so ashamed to even remember it.

I didn’t even bother to turn off the video playlist while I was writing because (**Sigh**) I knew I would get “bogged down” writing and wouldn’t be able to keep playing the sims.

I had no excuse for not writing and it’s depressing to think about a day practically wasted. The baby shower earlier in the day was fun, but I can’t believe I only wrote 153 words on a day when I didn’t even have to go to my first job…

Determination Tuesday, December 7, 2010

I didn’t write at all last night and eventually just put myself to bed when it was apparent there was no use in even trying to write something. Whether it was from fatigue or worry or just the Aleve, my brain would not, could not function properly; I barely enjoyed playing the sims.

This morning, however, I was determined. I knew that if I went more than 24 hours without spewing anything creative, the spell would be broken and there would be no way I could face January 1, 2011 knowing that at least I did everything I could to get this novel complete before the year end.

I got up this morning (not that early, I am still me after all) and wrote 987 words and got just past Damen’s first conversation with Tabitha about Jessie’s allusions to his masculinity. The words fell quickly and I’m in the mood to read The Fountainhead. I think that novel is a little too on the nose, but I’m far happier with it than I was with The Odyssey and Beowulf analogies.

I really want to finish this chapter tonight, so perhaps I’ll just come home and write tonight. I’m a little burned out on Guitar Hero for the time being and I know that this chapter is the major hump before the rest of the book gets really interesting. From here, Damen gets to actually meet Brit and we get to see how Anthony behaves with his siblings and, of course, meet Anessa and get her brilliant barbs to her brother. It just gets better from here and I’m so excited to just get that much further into the novel.

Maybe I will have this complete by the 31st December…

Nothing Important Happened Today Monday, December 6, 2010

I didn’t end up doing any writing last night. I fell asleep in front of the TV watching “Coupling” episodes on Netflix instead.

The night is still young, so hopefully Monday won’t be a loss as well, though I have spent the majority of the day either asleep or searching for Sims 2 content. I’m just suddenly feeling very drained. I’m not sure if it’s just my Aunt Flow or everything else that’s going on my life. I didn’t even touch guitar hero yesterday either.

I don’t want to take two nights off, but I terribly tempted to just spend the evening playing the sims.

Nothing else to say about Sunday, despite everything that ended up happening…hence the X-Files episode title of the post.

“Woman” made a woman out of me Sunday, December 5, 2010

Before I talk about writing, I have to talk about my latest swing of Guitar Hero.

Last night, I defeated “Woman” by Wolfmother on Hard mode. This was no ordinary feat as many songs on Hard are ridiculously hard. Just look!

I first attempt this song about a month ago. I had completed all the songs on Medium and, once I had figured out how to complete Cheap Trick’s “Surrender,” I had zoomed the rest of the songs on the first tier. I was flying high and imagined I would fly through all the songs on Hard as did on medium. Then came “Woman.”

I attempted it several times and then quit the game, realizing that I had hit a wall so tall I had no hope in ever climbing it and it was quite possible that I would never be able to play any other song on Guitar Hero.

A few weeks went by and I attempted the song again, only to fail even harder than I had on the first attempt. What made it so difficult to stomach, aside from my hatred of failure, was the fact that I couldn’t stand the song. The hard songs are fun to master when I actually like the song, like “Message in a Bottle” or “Jessica” or even “Free Bird,” but a song, I can’t imagine I’ll ever listen to outside of Guitar Hero is just painful to keep playing over and over and over again, with no hope of ever playing another song on the Hard tour.

To satiate my Guitar Hero desires, I started to go through the Medium tour again to play as many songs as possible to five stars and even got through the first tier, but at the back of my mind “Woman” still lurked, waiting for me like a behemoth that knew it could never be defeated.

Last week, I decided that I was going to beat “Woman.” If I did nothing else in life, I could at least revel in the fact that I had beaten my Everest of Guitar Hero songs. I tried just playing and playing the song in hopes that I could just “get” it randomly, but I continuously failed at 48%. The hammer ons and pull offs were what perplexed me. I took the tutorials twice more in hopes of understanding the concept, but nothing came. I pulled YouTube videos of greasy 13 year olds explaining how to accomplish the hammer ons and pull off, but I could only take so much of those cracking voices and quickly grew frustrated.

I tried practicing the song on every speed, but even there I was making less than a third of the notes. Finally, I literally said “F**k it.” and just decided that I was just going to keep playing the song until I died. For the past four nights, I’ve been doing just this. I go to work, I go home, I eat a bit, I play Guitar Hero and I write. Every night I would play, but I would get no further.

Friday night, I discovered to my amazement that I had actually mastered the verses, but could not go any further. Then, I realized the usefulness of the star power and got a little further and even into 71%, but continued to hit that wall. Last night, however, I discovered how Dorienne! does hammer ons and pull offs. On a whim, I just slid my fingers across the fret buttons and Lo and Behold! I had made the pull off!

It was like a stroke of genius, like getting hit on the head with an apple and I grinned wildly as I continued to play and play and play using my newfound skill and going further and further into the song. Then…I did it.

My mouth hung as I realized I had surpassed all my other hiccups in the song and was winding the turn into the end of the final verse and then, I did it! My neighbors probably thought I was being attacked by the amount of screaming and jumping that was going on when I saw “You Rock!” at the end of the song, but I didn’t care. I did it. I beat “Woman” on Hard tour. After I beat that song (and after a short rest), every song that came after it was a cakewalk. I had arrived!

I have no delusions of grandeur about completely beating the game and getting through Expert mode, but the moment I beat “Woman” was just so sweet.

On to more important things…

So, all this week, I’ve been falling asleep in my chair, waking at 4am and then dragging myself to the bed. Last night, I took things to another level and just slept in the chair.

Out of the pure stubbornness of not wanting to go to sleep until I finished the chapter, I refused to go to sleep. I’d lean back in my chair and then push myself forward to type just one more word…I was so close to the end. But, then, I awoke and found myself in my chair, my space heater whirring gently beside me. I expected to find that it was 5 or even 6, but it was 8:30.

I knew I was going to church this morning, but was just annoyed that I hadn’t even got to my bed. The same stubbornness that kept me in the chair until 8:30 in the morning, pushed me back into my bed just to gain the feeling of getting out of bed in the morning.

Despite all my best efforts and the rampant stubbornness, I only managed to squeak out 611 words last night. I’ve decided that both the Brit/Britiana and the Facebook friending/unfriending will be an allusion to the turbulent state of Damen and Brit’s friendship. I also realized, however, that I have yet to really answer why Brit doesn’t have any black friends. I know I’ll have to make whatever the story is start sometime back when she and Jessie were in first or second grade…maybe one of the black girls in their class said something mean to Brit and Jessie just slaps the girl across the face and instant best friends…I don’t know…

I don’t think I’ll get much writing done later tonight. I’m a bit tired after spending 5 hours at work after church (an exhausting day at church at that) and I think I’d really rather just play the sims, not to mention that I’ve got the rest of the Guitar Hero II Hard tour to attempt. That said, I’ve not gone this long writing consistently since I was in the depths of Flight, so perhaps taking the night off may not be the best thing to do just yet.

Hmm…