Category: Random Author Babble

May 16

May 16, 2019

Catching Up

So I found myself with a numbing of emotions and sensation the last week or so directly after my PATB editing session. I have not been feeling talkative– haven’t been feeling much of anything, to be real about it XD but I thought I should check in as I narrow down potential sources and start to find myself again.

Firstly, I have a lineup of the covers I made for Wendy’s Foundling series to share now that they’re all complete. Expect to find them available sometime this summer. I’ll be linking when it happens. 😉

I’m really proud of how these came out. I can see my brain working when it comes to color and contrast again. These pushed me to be a better artist and I’m happy with the results of that challenge.

As for other things, such as a lack of emotion… I first suspected it was either Parkinson’s or mold related. I haven’t fully gotten free of my current moldy place, and it’s always my first suspect given the hell mold has put me through. But I think the end result might be drug related– supplement related for less of a sting. I have a damaged dopamine system from long term mold exposure, dopamine being the main neurotransmitter that is involved in Parkinson’s. My biggest worry was that I may have gained a level of apathy as a result of that being damaged even though I’ve reversed every other symptom. Apathy is a serious problem with Parkinson’s and it is one of those things where they know it correlates to the dopamine system but doesn’t always fix when dopamine levels are restored.

But just in case that wasn’t the issue, I started looking into the supplements I take daily, many to either repair that damaged dopamine system, support it, protect it, or clean the body of the neurotoxins the mold left in me. It looks like my high doses of NAC (cellular detoxifier) might be the problem after some research and experiments. It’s early, but so far so good. My feelings are returning and I’m starting to add in other supplements to see what happens.

What I find absolutely fascinating about all this is observing my behavior when I lose my emotions. It is so obvious how we are chemical beings who live off of pleasure and avoidance of pain, because when both were taken away from me, nothing was worth doing. I wasn’t burned by hot bath water, nor got any pleasure from completing tasks or interacting with people. It was chemical castration where I had to build habits because on a biological level, I had no incentive to do anything. No little thrill in creativity or touch of anxiety if a bill was looming. We are purely impulse to our environment (after being established biologically through our genetics, chemicals, and beliefs systems that dictate the conceptualization of the world that then affects those chemicals) and without chemical reaction to stimuli, we are lumps. Lumps that aren’t even necessarily motivated in not being lumps. @_@

I have literally been framing positive habits to live by because my internal motivation drive had been suffering for months now. I was once the type of person who would stay up until the wee hours of the morning, loving every moment of the creative process, reluctant to go to bed (mostly slept like the damned) and then would roll out of the blankets and get right back to the love of writing or arting or learning the moment I woke up. It is incomprehensible to suddenly lose that drive. I had to give myself a path to follow because I had no interest in doing anything, when before I loved every challenge, every new discovery just waiting for me to find.

I’m hoping that has now recovered, or will fully once I’m certain I’ve found the correct source of this issue. I miss who I am when I feel. I seriously hope it’s not related to the Parkinson’s given there are few treatments if it is. I suppose time will tell…

So a little note if you’re seeking escape from any kind of suffering. It’s good to remember full escape from suffering to the point you can’t perceive emotions is antithesis to being alive. Stress is positive — essential for motivation and drive and creation — as long as it’s in safe doses. We are reactionary beings of impulse. Even I, an introvert who can stimulate my cerebral cortex into action without needing external help, still needs chemical reactions to happen in my brain, otherwise there is no enjoyment of life.

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May 6

May 6, 2019

Neurotic writing: Clarity vs Flow

Okay, so I just spent the last 2 weeks getting Episode #1 to fit a more mainstream writing style. Short, concise sentences with a lot of adjectives removed. Direct simple sentences. And here we are. I fucking hate it.

I don’t like the flow. It’s gone. The flow is gone. But does it fucking matter if people can’t understand my long, run on sentences?

Am I fucking myself over by 1) deciding flow is more important or 2) deciding clarity of thought is? I spent days on each scene when I first wrote them to ensure that ideas were conveyed clearly with flow, and then spent a few hours for each scene to slice those sentences up to compromise with a style of writing that I don’t even subscribe to. But I’d be a fool to think my brain is anyway the judge of this shit, right?

I like decisions. I like basic answers that I can then go, okay, writing conform to this so I don’t have to overthink shit (like I am now.) I don’t even know if this is coming from a place of ‘artistic integrity’ so much as just plain fucking reality of I don’t like how I write when I write the way main stream books expect writing to be.

What wins?

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April 25

April 25, 2019

Wendy’s Latest Cover!

Did somebody say yellow? (No? Just me, I guess. >_>) OMF, I figured out how to use yellow in an image. It never happens, never. I think the mold toxicity seriously damaged some certain aspect of my brain, and color was in the mix. But no more. ♥♥♥ Something must have healed recently cuz not only do we have some lovely yellow shades in here, but it’s not covered in black either. Fucking winning. (My standards for winning, if you haven’t realized yet, are pretty fucking low. But still–Winning!!! XD)

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April 23

April 23, 2019

Disjointed for a bit

Hey babes, I just wanted to give you all a heads up. The writing flow might be a little sporadic this week. I have a book cover I’m making for the marvelous Wendy this week. She’s re-releasing a trilogy, and I want to make sure she has everything she needs sooner rather than later. And I’m also trying to get the first 50,000 words of PATB ready for the beta readers.

I feel a bit like my mother who (while with cancer) would clean the house before our super nice cleaning guy showed up. *sigh* But at the same time, I want to respect the beta’s time and energy and effort by giving them a format closest to finished. I didn’t go through and clean up my sentence structure like I wanted to the first time around. If I’m not careful, I will have these long, run on sentences that are difficult to read–big no-no in genre writing. It’s important things can be understood with ease. So, although I’ll be scheduling time in for everything, I think we’re all aware of how I fail at time management. >_< Because it’s Tuesday already. =_=

I’m currently deciding if I want to refer to the werewolf situation as a plague or an epidemic (or would it be classified as pandemic because it crossed onto another continent???) I think magical virus verse bacteria or parasite fits it best for the PATB world… unless I find a better term. Because it’s Tuesday and I got stuck trying to make sure I have the best fucking term for a fictional illness. Yeah, welcome to my insanity. Those poor betas.

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April 17

April 17, 2019

PATB Serial???

So, I might be trying something new…

The idea hit me while I was, well, not thinking about writing at all XD and it just stuck, like, being all, this is so obvious. You’re being slow as fuck with your writing, just release it as serial installments! Duh. And then I thought, well, maybe if I have a cover, but covers are going to be a pain in the ass. Like, that’s time spent. And my brain was all, bitch, you got this shit. One evening of Photoshop–Go! And now I have a cover and really, very few excuses. I mean, it’s not a bad idea. Just release it into KU while it’s being written, and if peeps want to read ahead, they can check out the website. I mean, this project has just been so slow with my health being all wonky. I feel like I’ve put nothing out there in ages.

I’m not sure how I want to break the books down. My lazy self is all, covers are a pain so just put half or a quarter of a book in each episode so shit goes faster. But my more pragmatic side sees that as having a lot of time between releases, which is what this is supposed to avoid. :/ I’m going to think on it, see how much time I want to invest in editing right now, etc. But yeah, I think this is a fun idea.

Oh, what do you think of the throwback to the first original Demon Arms cover?! XD check it!

 

Winning at photomanips lately, yeah? I’m digging the little debris that makes it feel like there’s motion even though absolutely nothing is happening. 😉

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April 11

April 11, 2019

Apathy

Dealing with an unexpected problem health wise. And it might be temporary–it might be nothing. Or it might be a sign of something permanent I’m going to have to deal with all the time. No clue. It’s a very frustrating issue though, one that, when it hits like it did the last couple days, feels overwhelming and inescapable. It’s apathy.

I thought at first it was depression, but it was too different, too distinct from the symptoms I was once consumed with in my younger years. No, this just sucked the joy from my actions and thoughts, the motivation, the enjoyment. I didn’t feel impaired in any physical or mental way, but I also didn’t feel much of anything. I could see I wasn’t myself, but I couldn’t spark the normal chemical reactions that would make me enjoy things either. It made everything very empty and dull.

I guess this is something pretty common with Parkinson’s, and it doesn’t have much correlation with how far the disease has progressed. Even though I have been able to protect myself from the mold induced Parkinson’s and regrow dopamine receptors and even remove the neurotoxins from my body and environment that were triggering the Parkinson’s, I may not have a lot of tools to fix this problem. Although increasing/restoring dopamine helps, it hasn’t actually cured the apathy, and scientists have theories but nothing really solid when it comes to answers. This may be a level of permanent brain damage, and I have little guarantee of what the hell to expect.

The last few days were an extreme hit of this lack of enjoyment, but it has been happening for a while on a less intense level. I thought it was psychological as my health returned and I found myself doing the same thing day in and day out. With my brain repairing, everything just felt so obvious, and in a way, so dull with no challenge to reveal. But challenges are all around me; I just couldn’t get my emotions to respond like they normally would. I wasn’t feeling my writing, feeling joy from creativity, feeling satisfaction the way I used to, but it wasn’t until the feelings shut off completely that I could see that they were wonky to begin with.

So, yeah, an interesting couple of days as I try to figure all this out. What I’m doing now is really trying to work around the apathy when it hits to ensure I function like a normal person even if my drive/motivation/basic impulses are lacking. I’m forcing myself to exercise since it seems to have some positive effect–although the mood alteration was limited, only a few days, so I can’t say 100% what worked and what’s mere coincidence. I’m still not fully myself even if I’m at least back to the medium level of feeling I was before. I’ll have to track my symptoms as they hit until I get enough cause and effect to get a better picture. I might be looking into stims like caffeine, look at nootropics, reward, dopamine creating behavior, that sort of thing. There are plenty of paths to run down and explore to find the answers.

And I guess I’m looking to cope with facing how things may progress, and what it may be like to live a life I don’t fully feel emotionally. I suspect it will not be an easy thing if I go by the last few days. >_> I have faced a lot of shit, let’s be real. I’m not sure how to deal with something that strips my joy away on a fundamental level I can’t escape. It is a very cruel way to live, robotic, without not just drive but no goals, no intellectual curiosity or response to stimuli. No love of life or art or creation. It’s like going through the motions instead of living a life.

I am, at my core, a hopeful person. An optimist. To think that can be stripped away with a chemical switch I have no control over is, well, fucking shitty. Will the drive that has gotten me to find the answers to my health problems be stripped away too? It is a difficult reality I may find myself in if the apathy gets worse… Or I may be worrying over nothing as I get healthier. I am a terrible fortune teller but very good at worrying. >_<

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april 2-2

April 2, 2019

Huh, way faster

One of the plugins decided to break–because computers are freaking fickle. But on removing it, the website is super fast in comparison. It was the disable right click thing. I gotta say, I will take the annoying constant theft if the website doesn’t lag like a motherfuck the way it did. What an annoying thing to compromise on.

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april 2

April 2, 2019

I hate not having money :/

This may seem rather obvious, but being broke sucks. I feel like a kid who has to wait to be able to do all the things I want to do, except I’m an adult and I’m stuck waiting because not having money sucks. Civilization needs to wake the fuck up and start implementing things like a universal income, but I suspect it will be a long wait seeing as humanity still can’t get over simple shit like equality and not murdering each other. *sigh* Fucking tribalism just won’t die.

I think of all the stuff I’d be doing full force if I didn’t have to worry about money, and it’s just frustrating. I could have gone into a ton of character creation and art for this VN already if I could just afford the full version of the cg program I’m using for reference. I could have started this whole thing sooner if I wasn’t caught up in publishing for cash instead of creating for enjoyment. And legit, I still have to go that route. I want the website to be enough, but it’s not yet. I seriously need to start focusing on publishing again before my KU income flat lines.

The pursuit of money has totally ruined a ton of my creative endeavors. My art is so caught up in the ‘will this keep me in a house’ bullshit that I just start to hate it all. Money is a shitty motivator for creative work. I have never looked at money and felt inspired to create or be a better person or do amazing things in the world. I look at money and I feel scarcity, or security, and it’s usually scarcity.

Blah. I’m just ruminating about the flaws of the world that could easily be fixed if society would just be better already. My car has over $700 worth of work I need to do to be able to use it again, my meds that sustain me are hundreds a month (and apparently I cannot beat the mold induced Parkinson’s without them yet–really painful lesson to face today,) and I just want to make cool stuff. Like, if I didn’t have to worry about money, I could have moved out of this moldy house already! Why is this shit so limiting?

Maybe I should try to convince myself to be more money oriented with the stuff I do. If I made a point to increase my income, these problems would be solved and more fun could be had. But I can’t even make myself want money, even though I can see how shitty it is when I don’t have it. It’s like I lack the basic instinct. I like to make things. I like to think about things, and I like to make things, and that’s about all I’m good at. It’s shit to realize the things I do can’t really matter unless I figure out how to monetize them well enough too. What a dumb thing to demand, society.

Blah. Guess I’ll have to make a million bucks writing. It can’t be that hard, right? *snort*

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April 1

April 1, 2019

New Awesomeness!!!

Okay, so I’m getting super excited now that I’m finally–FINALLY!–starting the Demon Virus visual novel project. I’m in the first scene, fleshing out the character of the thralls and I’m feeling so inspired! Mikey is back. Will is a total asshole who can’t help but taunt the fuck out of all the extremely horny thralls who have been forcefully changed by the same incubus who targeted Mikey. And I’m making a horny meter that, once it gets full, will decide if the thralls lose their shit or not. XD I love the idea of it. Like, how would I use something like that as a game element, and what would happen when it was triggered? It would have to change depending on which thrall, where we are in the story, who is around at the time. It’s a really fun concept all around and it’s just the first scene.

I decided I’ve been putting everything off for too long, and it’s time to figure out how to divide my time properly. This means working on PATB for an hour or so a day, and then spending the rest of my time on other projects. The projects lined up for now are the Demon Virus visual novel and Blowjob King. Blowjob King is a short story and won’t require huge amounts of detail and character arcs, etc–you know, something easy for a change. @_@ While Demon Virus is an interactive novel, although totally complicated as fuck, it’s something that needs to be tackled in small bites anyways. It’s either make a picture, or outline the plot, or create a character bio, or figure out the code, etc. It’s very step by step, portion to portion.

The main reason I’m tackling multiple projects is the hope to 1) stave off boredom, which will therefore drive me to be more productive, and 2) recover my brain function. It’s like a veil has lifted since I got the allergies under control, babes. I am loving life again, loving the world I’m in, but I’m not really living as fully as I think I can. the cobwebs are clinging. I need to ensure that I’m taking care of my brain, repairing the damage, and pushing to grow whatever might have atrophied. As complex as the visual novel appears, it has challenges that are going to help me without being terribly redundant. In a lot of ways it’s much easier than what I have to do with PATB. The writing is mostly dialogue mixed in with a bit of choreography/depictions of action. It’s far more minimalist, and requires less perfectionism as a result. It’s in the plot, the crafting of story, and figuring out the most entertaining way to deliver that story while creating a feeling of reader interaction where most of the creative requirements are going to be. And then just basic technical stuff I’ll need to learn when it comes to coding the game. Oh, and drawing, which is a breeze.

I like the idea of making an interactive comic book in a lot of ways, and I’m really looking forward to seeing what the hell I can do with this project. I’m also looking forward to figuring out how to share the WIP aspect seeing as most of the stuff I’m doing is in the planning stages and isn’t in a game form. Maybe I can make a section on the website dedicated to the ‘how to’ process as I go through and figure it all out…

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March 28

March 28, 2019

Loss and a cold :/

Just wanted to check in. So my Luci-luv passed away, and the same night we buried her in a sweet, little cat coffin, I caught the bug that’s been floating around my house. Fever, coughing, grumpy, foggy brain, headache, more grumpy, etc. I think I’m coming back to myself, and now I just need to wrangle my focus back. The fever is lingering, but eh, I’ve had worse. Also, got some thyroid tests back today and I guess my thyroid antibodies are still elevated, so I’m kinda bummed about that. But eh, for real, I’ve had way worse and I’ve got nothing to complain about.

See you soon with updates! ^.^

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