Are you a LURKER?

[Whispersecret]

Well, knock it off!

Just kidding.

Come on. I don't think we're all that scary, ya know. This is, for the most part, a supportive community of writers. Do you think you don't know enough? Pffft. So what? You're probably wrong. Plus, everyone has something of value to share. Maybe you can't write like <insert the name of your favorite writer here>, but hell, I'm sure you can pinpoint something you liked or didn't like in a story. I'm sure that you have an opinion on one of the many questions that are posed here everyday.

Come join in the conversation. I'm officially inviting you.

 

[Svenskaflicka]

Not to mention the fact that most of us who DO discuss posts on threads don't have much of a clue what we're talking about either, we just love to make our opinions heard.

 

[Whispersecret]

HEY. Don't burst my bubble, Svenska.

 

[ronde]

I lurk to learn

I have forgotten most of the jargon of grammar because I've slept a bit since the 60's. When the big guns come out (Whispersecret, Killer Muffin, Rumpleforeskin, Quasimodem and others too numerous to mention), it's a little like the first time I sat at the "big" table for Thanksgiving dinner. Usually, I lurk and learn. When I'm comfortable that I won't sound like a fifth grader, I speak up. I think I need to go dig out my old rhetoric texts.

 

[Pookie]

Lurking takes much practice. Most end up failing at it. Ooops! Oh well, I did well on an exam this week.

 

[damppanties]

Maybe you can't analyze the dramatic arc of a story or why a certain character seems two-dimensional....

I feel like crawling into a hole.

You're scaring them WS!

 

[Whispersecret]

LOL. If they saw me naked, THAT'd scare 'em.

No, seriously...okay, I'll edit it!

 

[TheEarl]

I lurked for a while, but I just like being opinionated too much.

WS, there's a flaw with this thread. If people are lurking, then they're not going to identify themselves because then they wouldn't be lurking. QED.

The Earl

 

[Quasimodem]

The 'flaw' in that argument, Earl, is that if they don't register, or if they deCookie first, they will appear as "Unregistered," and therefor not be deLurked.

They get a lot of that in the ‘Story Ideas' Forum, but this is supposed to be the ‘Author's Hangout.'

I'd say Lurkers should feel free to identify, and make idiots of themselves, just like the rest of us.

 

[tripleflip]

Re: I lurk to learn

I have forgotten most of the jargon of grammar because I've slept a bit since the 60's. When the big guns come out (Whispersecret, Killer Muffin, Rumpleforeskin, Quasimodem and others too numerous to mention), it's a little like the first time I sat at the "big" table for Thanksgiving dinner. Usually, I lurk and learn. When I'm comfortable that I won't sound like a fifth grader, I speak up. I think I need to go dig out my old rhetoric texts.

Naw, just WRITE! When I was in junior high, I was a grammar whiz. I knew all the parts of speech, I could write a sentence using the passive periphrastic, I could diagram anything, but I couldn't put two words together unless it was my name.

My English teacher was like, "God, Kristie! You talk all the time. You talk in class, you talk in the hall, you talk in the lunchroom, you even talk in the john. Why can't you write? Just write like you talk!"

I was like, (to myself), "Write AS you talk," but I tried it. I just wrote it down, just like I'd say it, with the "okay, okay's" and the "Um's" and the "It's like's" and all. So when I got to college, this girl was taking Linguistics, and she told me I was writing in a dialect, "Valley Girl (2)." So anyway, after that, I could just write for hours, on anything, and all I had to do was go back and edit out all the "Okay, okay, it's like..." stuff and fix the typos. I can type faster than I can talk, and I talk really fast, but sometimes I overrun my keyboard buffer and a letter gets dropped, and sometimes I float a key. Other times I just screw up, hey, we're all human.

Like, okay: I used to be a figure skater, and people think we never fall down. Well, even Sarah Hughes falls on that skinny little butt, I guarantee you. The first thing I teach my kids is how to fall down on the ice and not get hurt. For each big jump I landed in competition, I bet I fell a hundred times in practice. Writing is the same way, except you don't get a sore butt. Well, come to think of it, maybe you DO, unless you get up and stretch your legs occasionally...

Love,

Kristie

 

[ronde]

I have written several stories that are posted here. I just don't write a lot on the boards. My usage of English is at least acceptable, I think. It's the discussing of said usage that is intimidating. I remember all the names for stuff. I just don't remember what they mean. I don't remember which end my participles dangle from. I thought gerunds were furry little rodents from Africa. Indefinite articles are, well...pretty indefinite in my opinion. And whose to say who's opinion is right, anyway. See what I mean?

By the way, don't feel too bad about the valley girl dialect. I speak slow, country #12 in real life. Writing that is a sure cure for insomnia.

 

[Whispersecret]

Oh, heck. I probably couldn't diagram a sentence now if you paid me, and I forgot all the stuff I was taught about parts of speech, except the ones on Schoolhouse Rock. (Sing with me! "Conjunction Junction, what's your function...?)

 

[tripleflip]

I have written several stories that are posted here. I just don't write a lot on the boards. My usage of English is at least acceptable, I think. It's the discussing of said usage that is intimidating. I remember all the names for stuff. I just don't remember what they mean. I don't remember which end my participles dangle from. I thought gerunds were furry little rodents from Africa. Indefinite articles are, well...pretty indefinite in my opinion. And whose to say who's opinion is right, anyway. See what I mean?

By the way, don't feel too bad about the valley girl dialect. I speak slow, country #12 in real life. Writing that is a sure cure for insomnia.

Yeah, I like funny sounding expressions, like, "Carrying a grudge." What does a "grudge" look like? It must be small enough to carry, but is it furry, or scaley? Does it have fangs? Does it LIKE to be carried?

Or how about "Belaboring the obvious." I see this big animal at the zoo and these kids are poking it.

For me, erotic writing is about describing the images I have in my brain. No image--no words. For me, successful erotic writing puts a vivid, or at least useable, images in my brain. My filthy little mind does the rest. As long as the words don't actually get in the way, for me they are just the messenger.

Now when I write stuff for Math journals, it's all as dry and compact as I can make it, like, "Suppose 'A' is the set of all mutiply-connected domains whose elements admit of elementary sections..." It's hard to get excited over that, even for me.

Kristie

 

[Quasimodem]

Someone who carries a grudge while belabouring the obvious will sure as shooting be hoist by their own petard and wind up with their ass in a sling.

When they get it all together again, they climb up off the mat and drive away in a huff.

 

[Quasimodem]

I didn't even know that sentences had diaphragms.

Is that why there are so many run on sentences?