NaNo Revisited

Last night was really quiet as usual and I spent most of the time watching repeats of comedy shows on TV, as usual.

I went along to work this morning for the start of another week. It was another really dull day at work again, and it was also pretty busy.

This evening I was listening to some of the comedy shows on the radio. Mostly old British TV comedies from the seventies such as Dad's Army and Whatever Happened to the Likely Lads? which for some reason were remade for the radio at the same time as the TV shows were broadcast. Although the scripts are virtually identical to the TV versions they really don't lose anything by not having the visual aspect.

I've decided to rewrite my NaNoWriMo story from last November, Vampire City. In the original version I had developed a kind of vampire world that I kind of liked, and I had a kind of idea for almost a trilogy which in the first volume would see the almost total destruction of the vampire's way of existence, and their kind of laws and rituals and colonies, and in the second it would be how the survivors try to exist and keep hidden form humans while trying to rebuild their world, and in the final story they would have to exist in their new world, and some would be more willing to accept it than others. Vampire City in it's original version was mostly rubbish, but there was less in it that I hated then there was in the previous year's novel, which is why I've decided to rewrite it.

Finished for Another Year

Last night I finially finished NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month). My novel, Vampire City, has a total word count of 50,270 (the total by the end of November had to be at least 50,000 words). Sometime during Christmas I'll probably go back to it and try and edit it and improve it.

Last night I watched the final two episodes of Karaoke which were really good. Although, I have never seen a Dennis Potter play which wasn't at the very least interesting.

My Dad came over to collect me fairly early this morning and we went to a shopping mall for a look around. Then I went back to my parent's house and we had lunch. In the afternoon I helped my Dad get the Christmas decorations down from the loft, although we haven't put them up yet, and then I listened to the first of a three part radio adaptation of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, based on the John le Carre novel.

To celebrate getting the novel finished I'm taking tomorrow off work, which should be really fun.

Karaoke

Last night I got to 48,130 words in my NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) novel Vampire City. The total has to be at least 50,00 words by Monday. I am hoping that it will be finished today. I was also watching an interesting documentary about the concerts that Johnny Cash gave in Folsom Prison. Later on I watched the sixth and final epsiode of The Singing Detective. Later on I watched the first couple of episodes of a TV serial from 1996 called Karaoke. Along with the show's companion serial Cold Lazarus, it was the final seires written by Dennis Potter before his death in 1994. The series revolves around a seriously ill screenwriter, played by Albert Finney, who notices that random people he sees on the street are reciting lines from his scripts and appear to be living out the plot from his latest play, a gangster thriller called "Karaoke". I haven't seen it since it was first on in Summer 1996, and yet I could still remember it really well.

Today I just went out to get my groceries for the week.

Eating and Writing

Last night I got to 46,107 words in my NaNoWriMo story. I've not really been eating much recently, because I haven't had much time. I usually have my dinner at around ten or eleven at night these days when I've finished my writing. Pretty much that and a sandwich at work is pretty much what I've been eating for the past two weeks. I do love food, if it's good, but I do find that I can eat very little and very infrequently and I don't get hungry at all. I was watching the fifth episode of The Singing Detective on DVD. It is a really great series.

Today I was at work and it was another very dull and quiet day. As usual for a Friday the place was really quiet and pretty empty.

Vampire City

Last night I got to 44,094 words in the NaNoWriMo novel, Vampire City. I am on target to make the total of 50,000 words by Saturday. After I had finished I watched the latest episode of True Blood and the fourth episode of The Singing Detective on DVD. I haven't had much to write about on here recently because pretty much all I've been doing for the last couple of weeks is write, watch TV and go to work.

It was another very quiet and fairly uneventful day at work. I am looking forward to the weekend.

I do find it a lot easier to write about what I really think and feel about things when I'm writing fiction, because I tend to censor myself a lot on here, often without even realising I'm doing it. I do think it would be good to be a more open and stuff on-line, so people could get to know me a little better should they want to, but it's not really something that comes naturally to me.

Nearly at the End

Last night I got to 42,062 words on my NaNoWriMo novel. Now the story is starting to move towards the conclusion. It'll soon be time to start thinking about what to do once it's finished. Later on last night I was watching the third episode of The Singing Detective on DVD.

It was another very dull day at work, which is pretty much the same as usual. This morning we had a meeting about new some new procedures that they are starting in a few months. It wasn't particularly exciting.

More NaNo

Last night I got to 40,055 words in my NaNoWriMo novel, Vampire City, I'm hoping that it should be finished on Saturday. I know it's not finished yet, but I really didn't think I would finish NaNoWriMo this year, and there was a point when I seriously considered abandoning it, but I don't really like to be beaten and so I decided to keep on with it. Last night I watched the sixth and final episode of Lipstick on Your Collar, which I thought was a really great show.

It was another very dull day at work today.

Goldfinger

Last night I got to 38,050 words in my NaNoWriMo novel, Vampire City.

Later on I finished reading the novel Goldfinger by Ian Fleming. The book was published in 1959, and the story opens with a tired and burnt-out James Bond, Agent 007 of the British Secret Service, returning from a particularly harrowing mission busting a drug ring in Mexico. When his plane is delayed in Miami, Bond is only too happy to accept an offer by a wealthy friend of his to spend the night at a five star luxury hotel and discover how the mysterious multi-millionaire Auric Goldfinger is cheating him at cards. Bond quickly discovers how Goldfinger's been doing it, and completely humiliates him. Back in England, Bond discovers that the Secret Service are also interested in Goldfinger due to their suspicions that he is a large scale gold smuggler and is also bank-rolling enemy agents. When Bond is assigned to track Goldfinger, he quickly discovers that his quarry is a lot more dangerous than he could have guessed and is masterminding the biggest crime in history. The book was made into a very successful movie in 1964 with Sean Connery playing James Bond. As with a lot of the original Bond novels, it's a lot grittier and more brutal than the films, which added most of the humour and all of the trademark gadgets. Also, by modern standards, the book hasn't aged well and it is very politically incorrect. However it is a pretty exctiting thriller, regardless. The James Bond movies that are closest to the books are the very early Sean Connery films and the recent Casino Royale film. Actually, Daniel Craig is probably the closest to how James Bond is in the books.

It was another really dull day at work. The work actually ran out for me about an hour before I was planning to leave.

Greatest Ever 3-D Moments

I got to 36,015 words on my NaNoWriMo novel last night. I've decided to call it Vampire City.

Last night I was watching a show called The Greatest Ever 3-D Moments, which was quite fun. There's a TV channel that's been running a special 3-D week all this previous week, and you can get special 3-D glasses from one of the supermarkets to watch it. The show was fun but I think 3-D works a lot better at the cinema. My TV isn't small but it isn't exactly big and so the 3-D looks more like you're watching a puppet theatre than anything else. It looks basically like a cute novelty. Also the new 3-D films at the movies have much better glasses than the cardboard ones with blue and red lenses (which are quite uncomfortable to wear with normal glasses).

I was also watching a 1960s episode of Doctor Who called "The Krotons", in which the Doctor (played by Patrick Troughton) and his friends arrive on an alien planet where the humanoid inhabitants are ruled over by a race of crystalline aliens called the Krotons, who live in a large machine The Krotons teach the planet's inhabitants and every so often select the two best students to go into their machine where they are never seen again. The story was good, but the Krotons themselves looked hilarious, because the costumes kept wobbling and the lower half was like a long skirt and they could only move in shuffling baby-steps, also one of them had a very strong Birmingham accent.

I went along to my parent's house today for lunch as usual. We had a kind of beef stew for lunch with mashed potato and mushrooms. After lunch we walked in to the Modern Art Gallery, but only really had time to check out the gift shop before heading back.

The Singing Detective

Last night I was watching another episode of Lipstick on Your Collar, and followed that up with the first episode of The Singing Detective, a six part TV serial from 1986, which was also written by Dennis Potter. The show stars Michael Gambon as detective novelist Philip Marlow, who is in hospital with a crippling skin condition whichleaves him almost unable to move. He tries to get himself out of the condition with memories of his unpleasant childhood in rural England, as well as imagining bizarre musical numbers in the hospital and also creating a surreal fantasy world based on his own novels where he imagines himself as his fictional creation the "Singing Detective", a Private Eye and part-time nightclub singer. As the story goes on his memories, his real life and his dream life start to collide into each other. It is a really great show and has been hugely acclaimed by critics. When they were first shown, a lot of the Dennis Potter shows were hugely controversial because of the sex and violence in them, although they are pretty tame by today's standards. Maybe now they can be re-evaluated and perhaps seen for the great shows they are. The Singing Detective was turned into a film in 2003.

Today was really quiet again at work. I got to 32,040 words on my NaNoWriMo novel last night. I had a lot of trouble with it last week, because I wasn't well, but I do think that I have made a comeback with it, so I am happy about that.

Writing and TV

Last night I was extremely busy with my NaNoWriMo story, which is up to 30,018 words right now (it needs to be 50,000 by the end of the month), and then I watched the third episode of Lipstick on Your Collar which was really good, and True Blood. After the show I went and had some microwave spaghetti bolognese for my dinner and watched a documentary about screenwriter Dennis Potter.

Another very quiet day at work today. I'm kind of happy that it's nearly the weekend now.

The Word Count is Increasing

Yesterday I got to 12,418 words in my NaNoWriMo story. At least the word count is increasing (it has to be a minimum of 50,000 words by the end of November).

I watched the first three episodes of the first season of The Wire on DVD. It works really well on DVD. The Wire is one of those shows that you really need to see every episode in sequence and also pay a lot of attention because it's a very complex and intricate plot line. One of the good things with having the shows on DVD is that you're not really at the mercy of the TV schedulers.

Today I went along to the supermarket to get my groceries for the week.

More Words

It was another really busy night last night. I got up to 10,312 words with my NaNoWriMo novel, and I was so tired when I was finished that I almost immediately fell asleep on the sofa. I spent three hours working on it and I was so frustrated by the end that I really did feel like packing the whole thing in. I won't though. I'll keep on with it and win the challenge.

I was only in work for a half day today, which was really good. I stopped off and got the complete DVD box-set of The Wire TV series, so that should be really good.

More Writing

Last night I was busy again with my NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) story. I've got up to 8,206 words now. It was kind of difficult last night and took a few hours to do.

I watched the latest episode of True Blood, which I thought was really good, and it was another really dull day at work today.

I've been so busy with the writing recently I've not actually had chance for much else this week.

More Vampires

Last night I was pretty busy. I got to 6,126 words with the NaNoWriMo story. It was kind of easier than it was last night because I had a pretty good idea what I was going to be writing about (basically this new vampire is forced to prove his worth to his vampire community by undergoing this kind of trial thing in which he is forced to undergo various surreal hallucinations and confront various powerful creatures).

Work was really quiet and dull, as it usually is. It's another episode of True Blood this evening. I'll probably be sick to death of vampires by the end of November!

Vampire Stories

Last night was pretty quiet. I managed to get up to 4,054 words on my NaNoWriMo novel, so that was pretty good. I am really hoping that the finished work turns out to be good. The thing is that I'm really pretty bad at writing, and I'm pretty much completely untalented.

It was another really quiet and kind of dull day at work again. I was reading some of the book Interview With the Vampire by Anne Rice on my break at work. I have read it before but not for about fourteen years. Because my NaNo story has to do with vampires I've been trying to do some research. I've had a look at Dracula again, and I should probably check out the Twilight books at some point.

Halloween III: Season of the Witch

Last night I was playing some of Batman: Arkham Asylum on the PlayStation 3. It's a really fun game. The background is that Batman has captured The Joker and has brought him to Arkham Asylum, but it turns out that it's all a trap and that Arkham Asylum has been taken over by The Joker and his henchmen, and the staff, including Comissioner Gordon, have been taken hostage. Basically you play Batman and you have to explore the corridors of Arkham, fighting with The Joker's henchmen and all the other familiar Batman enemies, including The Riddler who has left a number of puzzles scattered around that you have to solve. It's a very involving game, and a lot of fun.

Later on I was watching the 1982 movie Halloween III: Season of the Witch, directed by Tommy Lee Wallace. It's a very unusual sequel because, unlike every other movie in the Halloween franchise, this one does not focus on the indestructible psychopath Michael Myers. Instead it concerns the insane owner of a toy company called Silver Shamrock, who maufactures a range of popular children's Halloween masks which are advertised endlessly with an irritating countdown jingle ("Three more days to Halloween... Halloween... Halloween... Three more days to Halloween... Silver Shamrock"). However, it turns out that the masks are lethal booby traps which are due to be activated by a special signal transmitted on Halloween night. Apparently, the producers John Carpenter and Debra Hill, wanted to turn the Halloween franchise into a kind of anthology film series with a new seperate horror film released every year focussing on a different aspect of the Halloween season. However the idea was abandoned due to the total commercial failure of this movie. The original script was written by acclaimed writer Nigel Kneale, who created the Quatermass TV series, but he had his name taken off the film when his script was changed in order to make it more gruesome and violent.

I started writing my NaNoWriMo story yesterday. I got 2,026 words done yesterday. The target is to write a 50,000 word novel by the end of November.

Today was yet another dull and quiet day in the office.

Halloween

Last night I was listening to an episode of the Doctor Who radio series called "Sisters of the Flame". In this episode The Doctor (played by Paul McGann) and his companion Lucie (Sheridan Smith), avoiding an urgent summons from the Doctor's people, the Time Lords, find themselves on a space freighter where The Doctor is immediately kidnapped by aliens and Lucie is arrested by the ship's security as a stowaway. However the Doctor soon discovers that suomeone is illegally using Time Lord technology and encounters an old enemy. It was pretty good. After that I listened to the first of a new radio series of The Man in Black, in which each week the sinister "Man in Black" (played by Mark Gatiss) introduces a one-off horror story. In this week's story, "Phish Food", a retired man gets his first computer and sets out to explore the internet, only to be plagued by on-line scams which he soon discover want much more from him than just his money.

I watched the 2008 movie Choke, directed by Clark Gregg and based on the novel by Chuck Palahniuk, on DVD. The film tells the story of Victor Mancini (played by Sam Rockwell), a sex addict who works as an actor in a historical recreation park themed around Colonial America, and operates a complex scam based around choking in restaurants on the theory that the people who save him will for ever afterwards feel responsible for him and send him money. He also visit his delusional, dying mother (Anjelica Huston) in a nursing home, and discovers a surprising secret about his origins. It is a pretty funny movie but it is neither as dark nor as funny as the book.

Later I was watching the original version of Halloween, directed by John Carpenter, in which a group of babysitters are stalked by masked psychopath Michael Myers, who has escaped from the institution where he has been confined since killing his sister when he was six. It is still a really powerful and often pretty scary film. It has inspired countless sequels, remakes and imitations and pretty much set the template for the whole slasher movie genre.

Today is really, really cold and very wet and so dark that when I woke up this morning I had a moment where I honestly felt that it was night and that I had slept through the day. I'm going to be making a start on my NaNoWriMo story today.

Dracula

Late last night I was watching the 1931 film of Dracula, directed by Tod Browning. In the movie, a young solicitor named Renfield (Dwight Frye) travels to the remote Castle Dracula in the Carpathian Mountains of Transylvania, where the mysterious Count Dracula (Bela Lugosi) is planning to move to England. The movie does not stick closely at all to the original Bram Stoker novel, and it hasn't aged very well by modern standards, but it is still a classic. Hungarian actor Bela Lugosi ended up forever typecast as Dracula and his performance has been imitated and parodied countless times since, but the perfrmance is still a really powerful one.

Today I went along and did some shopping. I got the film Choke, based on the Chuck Palahniuk book, on DVD, and a video game called Batman: Arkham Asylum for the PlayStation 3. I'm going to chill out and relax this evening until NaNoWriMo starts tomorrow.

Happy Halloween!

Quiet Thursday

Last night I was watching another episode of True Blood, which was really enjoyable. Sometime I'll have to check out the books that the show is based on. I was also working some more on the story that I have been writing over the past couple of evenings.

It was yet another really dull and depressing day in the office as usual. I am looking forward to the weekend. NaNoWriMo starts on Sunday so that should be good.