healingmirth (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
healingmirth) wrote2014-08-03 04:53 pm
healingmirth) wrote2014-08-03 04:53 pm
Entry tags:
this was an unsuccessful drabble
This past week's AELDWS drabble, which was unsuccessful both in the sense that I'm not satisfied with it, and also that it got me voted off the island.
Also, I would like to say that I hate that summary, and feel in my soul that it should say "that Arthur had been promised" except the had not/had been in a single sentence of summary also felt clumsy. FML.
Title: ask a librarian
Summary: this had not turned out to be the thrilling adventure in library science that Arthur was promised
to: ask@eastspringlibrary.org
from: zenmaster420@aol.com
02-08-2008 02:43am
What is the sound of one hand clapping?
to: ask@eastspringlibrary.org
from: lolstfu@hotmail.com
02-08-2008 02:45am
dicksdicksdicksdicksdicksdicksdicksdicksdicksdicks...
to: ask@eastspringlibrary.org
From: wheames@byron.ac.uk
02-08-2008 02:48am
Hello, I hope I've done this correctly, but if I've somehow made a hash of it, I plead sleep deprivation. I've just witnessed my third panicked sunrise with not even a nap in between.
I'm trying to locate primary sources on an M. Brewster, full name and gender unknown, but who was a prolific amateur photographer in the early years of the Kodak...
to: wheames@byron.ac.uk
from: ask@eastspringlibrary.org
02-08-2008 02:50am
Thank you for submitting a request to East Springfield Public Library's Ask a Librarian. Our staff will reply to your request during our operating hours of 9:00am-7:00pm, Monday-Saturday...
to: wheames@byron.ac.uk
from: adl@eastspringlibrary.org
02-08-2008 08:30am
Mr. Eames,
(Or is it Dr. Eames? Apologies if so.)
As requested, here is a list of our library's holdings with respect to M. Brewster and his or her photography. The East Springfield Historical Society has published several books of Brewster's work.
I've also attached scans of a handful of references from local biographies, and the indices of oral histories of people who would have been Brewster's contemporaries when he or she lived here, possible subjects, or in the case where Brewster may have been a
pseudonym...
Attachments: [calder-biblio.pdf]
[royce-oral-history-index.pdf]
[henderson-oral-history-index.pdf]
...
to: adl@eastspringlibrary.org
from: wheames@byron.ac.uk
02-08-2008 10:15pm
Am I allowed to reply directly? Or must I start over again with that bloody form for each request?
My darling, my muse, bless you and your delightful competence. I'm ashamed to say I passed out dead asleep in the middle of reviewing your materials. Possibly the shock, probably too many late nights, candle at both ends, etc. You have my gratitude, although perhaps not quite as much as if you had discovered that Brewster lived several roaring shadow lives during her tenure in Springfield, with multiple families and several general generations of offspring. Dead boring does not begin to describe...
to: wheames@byron.ac.uk
from: adl@eastspringlibrary.org
Draft saved 01:35am
attachments: ref-docs-eames-brewster.doc (850k)
to: wheames@byron.ac.uk
from: adl@eastspringlibrary.org
02-09-2008 09:34am
Mr. Eames,
If you can provide some additional direction, I may be able to locate additional items relevant to your research.
to: adl@eastspringlibrary.org
from: wheames@byron.ac.uk
02-09-2008 09:38am
Arthur,
I hope you don't mind if I keep in touch. It seems that I never know what might be important until I find it.
-Eames
And now, because it's my blog and I can do what I want, a dvd commentary or whatever of all the things I was trying to do in 350-450 words. Mostly what I failed to do. And a bit of My Thoughts onYaoi the care and feeding of competitive fic writing.
This is like 90% for my own reference, but as always when I'm talking to myself over here, feel free to weigh in.
So, I've had an Inception AU rattling around my head forever, where Arthur is a librarian in somewhere less glamorous than a major city, and Eames is some manner of academic (usually art history, but whatever) in an entirely different location, and neither of their careers have turned out quite like they'd expected, because that's how I roll, with more or less competent adults who are vaguely dissatisfied with their lives. I'm sure you're all shocked.
Going into the week's challenge - digital epistolary - I knew that I wanted to do straight correspondence rather than a mix of correspondence and narration, mostly out of pure cussedness. I couldn't immediately think of an existing friendship or relationship story that I wanted to tell, particularly since I'd done canon epistolary courting of a sort for my first drabble. I also didn't really want to do texting/im/short-form direct communication because I was sure someone else would do it better - either funnier or sappier or whatever, just a better attempt at whichever tone I aimed for.
I also toyed with the idea of doing either a blogger/twitter AU or a message board thread (probably gaming), because I like the mixture of broadcast/public and direct communication, but I just couldn't get traction on an idea. That sent me back to e-mail as my medium, and thence to orchestrating some sort of meeting via website.
I'll note here that I think introducing an AU in any voting scenario is a massively double-edged sword, because if you fail to do it well, it instantly makes it a memorable failure when someone gets to the poll. And 450 words is not very many words to introduce a universe.
Oh, there was also about 20 minutes where they were going to be crew members on two separate spaceships, and the only time Eames can get Arthur to talk to him is when Arthur is stuck on helm watch by himself overnight. But since those 20 minutes came at like 4pm the day it was due, I decided to just go ahead and sink with what I'd already written.
Also, I couldn't decide on a last name for Arthur, which contributed to my never having an e-mail signature for either Arthur or Eames. If this had been 1000 words, those definitely would have happened, and I would have wasted a day picking a quote from a book for Eames's signature, but probably not Arthur's. Also, if this had been a thousand words, I wouldn't have had to abridge the messages.
This was just a classic case of my trying to do too much within the constraints, and that's absolutely something that I have judged others' drabbles on in previous weeks, along with other things like the spelling and grammar, character voice, and whether I thought what they wrote a) was clearly about Arthur and Eames rather than Any Two Dudes, and b) included something that gave me a sense of their versions of the characters.
I nearly just gave up and e-mailed the mods to drop out at least 3 times on Thursday, but since they have stuck to their elimination #s in past weeks regardless of people dropping out, I didn't want to push someone else, who wrote a better thing than I did and submitted it, out of the competition prematurely.
Also, I would like to say that I hate that summary, and feel in my soul that it should say "that Arthur had been promised" except the had not/had been in a single sentence of summary also felt clumsy. FML.
Title: ask a librarian
Summary: this had not turned out to be the thrilling adventure in library science that Arthur was promised
to: ask@eastspringlibrary.org
from: zenmaster420@aol.com
02-08-2008 02:43am
What is the sound of one hand clapping?
to: ask@eastspringlibrary.org
from: lolstfu@hotmail.com
02-08-2008 02:45am
dicksdicksdicksdicksdicksdicksdicksdicksdicksdicks...
to: ask@eastspringlibrary.org
From: wheames@byron.ac.uk
02-08-2008 02:48am
Hello, I hope I've done this correctly, but if I've somehow made a hash of it, I plead sleep deprivation. I've just witnessed my third panicked sunrise with not even a nap in between.
I'm trying to locate primary sources on an M. Brewster, full name and gender unknown, but who was a prolific amateur photographer in the early years of the Kodak...
to: wheames@byron.ac.uk
from: ask@eastspringlibrary.org
02-08-2008 02:50am
Thank you for submitting a request to East Springfield Public Library's Ask a Librarian. Our staff will reply to your request during our operating hours of 9:00am-7:00pm, Monday-Saturday...
to: wheames@byron.ac.uk
from: adl@eastspringlibrary.org
02-08-2008 08:30am
Mr. Eames,
(Or is it Dr. Eames? Apologies if so.)
As requested, here is a list of our library's holdings with respect to M. Brewster and his or her photography. The East Springfield Historical Society has published several books of Brewster's work.
I've also attached scans of a handful of references from local biographies, and the indices of oral histories of people who would have been Brewster's contemporaries when he or she lived here, possible subjects, or in the case where Brewster may have been a
pseudonym...
Attachments: [calder-biblio.pdf]
[royce-oral-history-index.pdf]
[henderson-oral-history-index.pdf]
...
to: adl@eastspringlibrary.org
from: wheames@byron.ac.uk
02-08-2008 10:15pm
Am I allowed to reply directly? Or must I start over again with that bloody form for each request?
My darling, my muse, bless you and your delightful competence. I'm ashamed to say I passed out dead asleep in the middle of reviewing your materials. Possibly the shock, probably too many late nights, candle at both ends, etc. You have my gratitude, although perhaps not quite as much as if you had discovered that Brewster lived several roaring shadow lives during her tenure in Springfield, with multiple families and several general generations of offspring. Dead boring does not begin to describe...
to: wheames@byron.ac.uk
from: adl@eastspringlibrary.org
Draft saved 01:35am
attachments: ref-docs-eames-brewster.doc (850k)
to: wheames@byron.ac.uk
from: adl@eastspringlibrary.org
02-09-2008 09:34am
Mr. Eames,
If you can provide some additional direction, I may be able to locate additional items relevant to your research.
to: adl@eastspringlibrary.org
from: wheames@byron.ac.uk
02-09-2008 09:38am
Arthur,
I hope you don't mind if I keep in touch. It seems that I never know what might be important until I find it.
-Eames
And now, because it's my blog and I can do what I want, a dvd commentary or whatever of all the things I was trying to do in 350-450 words. Mostly what I failed to do. And a bit of My Thoughts on
This is like 90% for my own reference, but as always when I'm talking to myself over here, feel free to weigh in.
So, I've had an Inception AU rattling around my head forever, where Arthur is a librarian in somewhere less glamorous than a major city, and Eames is some manner of academic (usually art history, but whatever) in an entirely different location, and neither of their careers have turned out quite like they'd expected, because that's how I roll, with more or less competent adults who are vaguely dissatisfied with their lives. I'm sure you're all shocked.
Going into the week's challenge - digital epistolary - I knew that I wanted to do straight correspondence rather than a mix of correspondence and narration, mostly out of pure cussedness. I couldn't immediately think of an existing friendship or relationship story that I wanted to tell, particularly since I'd done canon epistolary courting of a sort for my first drabble. I also didn't really want to do texting/im/short-form direct communication because I was sure someone else would do it better - either funnier or sappier or whatever, just a better attempt at whichever tone I aimed for.
I also toyed with the idea of doing either a blogger/twitter AU or a message board thread (probably gaming), because I like the mixture of broadcast/public and direct communication, but I just couldn't get traction on an idea. That sent me back to e-mail as my medium, and thence to orchestrating some sort of meeting via website.
I'll note here that I think introducing an AU in any voting scenario is a massively double-edged sword, because if you fail to do it well, it instantly makes it a memorable failure when someone gets to the poll. And 450 words is not very many words to introduce a universe.
Oh, there was also about 20 minutes where they were going to be crew members on two separate spaceships, and the only time Eames can get Arthur to talk to him is when Arthur is stuck on helm watch by himself overnight. But since those 20 minutes came at like 4pm the day it was due, I decided to just go ahead and sink with what I'd already written.
- I think if I could have found a less trite closing message, it would have been a much more solid story.
- If I'd been willing to sacrifice either the e-mail addresses or the timestamps, that would have given me words back that probably could have been better used.
- There was a point where Arthur's draft message was an attempt at a personal communication about how Arthur was saaaaaad, or Eames was hot, or anything, but like with the closing line, I just couldn't come up with the right words. I wanted more of an emotional connection, but it was just waaaaaaay to soon.
- Instead, I went with something that I think was too subtle - Arthur having stayed up late (time stamp!) to compose a massive text file (file size! probably could have been larger.) of additional references for Eames, and then actually sending a message from work the next day of trying to draw out their communication, rather than just sending Eames that additional work and possibly closing the door on their future correspondence.
Also, I couldn't decide on a last name for Arthur, which contributed to my never having an e-mail signature for either Arthur or Eames. If this had been 1000 words, those definitely would have happened, and I would have wasted a day picking a quote from a book for Eames's signature, but probably not Arthur's. Also, if this had been a thousand words, I wouldn't have had to abridge the messages.
This was just a classic case of my trying to do too much within the constraints, and that's absolutely something that I have judged others' drabbles on in previous weeks, along with other things like the spelling and grammar, character voice, and whether I thought what they wrote a) was clearly about Arthur and Eames rather than Any Two Dudes, and b) included something that gave me a sense of their versions of the characters.
I nearly just gave up and e-mailed the mods to drop out at least 3 times on Thursday, but since they have stuck to their elimination #s in past weeks regardless of people dropping out, I didn't want to push someone else, who wrote a better thing than I did and submitted it, out of the competition prematurely.