Thursday January 7th, 2010

The exercise:

Almost caught up! I'd keep going but I have other things to work on tonight (hurray for not getting Greg in the first round again!).

AFC Word Count: 6,993

AFC Word Target: 7,000

Your prompt today: spam.

Yes, spam. Allow me to explain...

Mine:

Spammers are stupid.

I'm sure that's not earth-shattering news to any of you but I needed to say it today.

Last night, as I was cruising through the archives in my attempt to label all of my old posts, I had a sudden urge to find the most recent post that had no comments. I was finding it pretty cool to be moving from the oldest posts, which regularly would go a week or two without any comments, to the most recent ones that had at least one comment every day for a very big chunk of time. While I was scrolling down my post list one caught my eye.

Because it had 109 comments.

Um, what?

So I clicked on it. Turns out? It appeared as though some idiot had posted a single comment per day since the post had first gone up (or shortly afterward, for me to have missed it at the time). I'd love to know what was being spammed, but it was all in kanji aside from the odd email address.

And I'd love to know how they thought that was going to ever be seen, as it continued to be buried further and further into the archives. I'm hoping it was just a script that was adding one comment per day automatically, and not some moron going back to that same post every single day and doing it manually.

I spent quite a bit of time deleting the 103 spam comments (individually - thanks Blogger) because I couldn't stand having them there. I'll be keeping an eye on that post to see if the streak has been broken or if the spam continues. I've gotten pretty good at hunting down and deleting spam on Protagonize, so it's not a big deal to carry that practice over to here.

But I still think spammers are stupid.

Wednesday January 6th, 2010

The exercise:

I've made a bit of a dent into the gap between where I want to be and where I am on AFC today, might get some more done tonight. We shall see.

AFC Word Count: 5,783

AFC Word Target: 6,000

Anyway, your prompt for today: in the trenches.

Mine:

I rest my back against the mud of the embankment and stare up at the darkening sky. The mess of saturated dirt and blood soaks through the back of my uniform in seconds but I'm too exhausted to care, too wore down to move. Bullets pierce the air above us like deadly shooting stars. They're so close. I want to reach up and catch one...

"Sarge?" I slowly turn my head to look at the soldier to my right. I think I've seen him before. "Are you feeling okay?"

"Of course," I reply with a shaky laugh. "I'm in the middle of a field of dead earth and dead men and I'm being shot at twenty-four hours a day. How could I possibly be better?"

He falls silent and his eyes shift to study the ground at his feet. His boots are caked in dried mud and other things I don't care to think about and I take the opportunity to study his face. He's young, too young to be out here with us old men. He should go home. No. He should never have come.

Maybe I should have stayed home too.

A shell lands close enough behind us to jolt us forward and shower us with bits of earth. The scent of burning metal and grass reaches my nostrils and I smile in shock. How is there still grass left to burn? How can anything be left alive out there, between us and them?

I scramble up to the edge, ignoring the boy's shouts to stay down. I hope there is still some green left after that blast. I need to see something besides brown and grey and red and black.

But as my eyes peer over the top of the trench I see only brown mud and the grey of cascading bullets. Then my luck runs out at last and I briefly see red before everything fades to black.

Tuesday January 5th, 2010

The exercise:

Your Two Haiku Tuesday prompt this week: muscle memory.

I went back to the gym for the first time in a long time yesterday. For the record: not a New Year's resolution, the timing and motivation just finally came together.

The more observant of you might have noticed I haven't been posting my progress on A Fighting Chance. That's because it hasn't been going well, haha. But! I'm starting to catch up. So here we go:

AFC Word Count: 4,716

AFC Word Target: 5,000

Mine:

I don't need to think

When I take you in my arms -

They act on their own.

*     *     *

Sunlight pouring down,

Tanned, fit bodies all around;

My youth at the beach.

Monday January 4th, 2010

The exercise:

As I've been going through my old posts to label the prompts I've come across a few that I wanted to make use of again. So I'm getting started today with my favorite one: the random CD prompt.

Here's how it works: grab a CD at random and pick a track, or flip through the play list on your iPod (or whatever) to find a random track, and then use the very first line of your song as the first line of your poetry or prose. Then just go wherever it takes you (and let us know which song you used!).

Oh, before I forget again, I wanted to mention one last Christmas gift I received. My parents got me a gift certificate for MEC and Kat and I went on Saturday to use it on these snowshoes. She picked up a pair for herself and we can't wait to get back up to the mountains for fun like this:

Alright, now you can go write.

Mine:

REM - Nightswimming

Night swimming deserves a quiet night

In mid-summer with stars shining bright,

A lake rippling with lazy strokes,

And a breeze that carries campfire smoke.

Life in the city can get crowded;

It's easy for sight to get clouded.

But in the silence of the country

There is room to be, room to see.

Thoughts grow still and breath begins to slow,

When you have nowhere you need to go.

So find the time to go night swimming,

And see life without all the trimmings.

Sunday January 3rd, 2010

The exercise:

Here's your prompt for today:

I took that before dinner on Christmas Eve at Kat's parents, but feel free to place it anytime and anywhere. I think this was one of the first pictures I used my tripod for and I liked how it came out.

Mine:

Six will sit down to dinner tonight,

Their faces warmed by soft candlelight.

Six glasses will be filled by the host,

Who shall then propose a wordy toast -

The waver in his voice only slight.

He sits back down, his speech concluded.

Drinks are sipped by guests so deluded,

Then one by one they fall into sleep

And collapse to the floor in a heap;

The host can no more be excluded.

Saturday January 2nd, 2010

The exercise:

Yesterday was a reminder that I'm quite out of the habit of forced writing. I had to pull those last 200 words kicking and screaming from my fingers. Hopefully it gets easier in the next few days.

Your four line poem prompt today: balance.

Update: only 895 words today, but I'll make up for that this week for sure.

Mine:

A single step to either side

Is all it takes to veer off course -

And now she's running like a horse

And he is left without a bride.

Friday January 1st, 2010

The exercise:

Typing 2010 instead of 2009 is going to take some getting used to.

Regardless! Welcome to the new year!

Let us start the year off with this Friday Four Line Prose prompt: faking it.

Small site note: I've finally started going through my old posts and adding labels for the writing prompts. 125 down, 450'ish to go! Sigh.

Anyway! While I'm chipping away at that I've added a Label Cloud just above the archive list on the bottom right. Currently I have it set to display any prompt that was used more than once. I'd love to make it a random selection but I haven't worked out how to do that yet. If it's even possible.

I'll update my progress on A Fighting Chance later (once I've actually worked on it).

Update: 1,028 words today, and the posts have been labeled up to the start of January.

That would be way more awesome if it wasn't January 2009 I was talking about.

Mine:

Over on Protagonize we've been dealing with fake accounts for a while now, but it's been getting worse recently (which lead to the blog post from Nick linked above). Basically, a few users have created additional accounts for the sole purpose of rating their own work highly so that they move up in the overall author rankings.

What a load of silly nonsense.

It's pointless and ridiculously insecure and a waste of my damn time - I'd much rather be reading and writing stories than tracking down and dealing with this crap.