November 11, 2013
"I'm leaving now. I bid you all a very fond farewell."
*sniff*
But, HEY, wait a minute! I'm not going away forever! No, no, no.
Behold.
I HAVE MOVED.
Why? Well, I think I can post more with my very own account over at Wordpress, instead of having to have my dad log in every time I want to post something or check for comments. (Believe me, it was getting old.) That's the main reason. The other reason is that I think I'd like something new.
So. What do you think?
Please, please, please follow me at my new blog. I would DEARLY love to keep you all - you're my bestest friends and I don't want to lose you!!
Also. There's a very important announcement going on over there - EXCLUSIVELY over there. (And another friend's blog. But that's all I can say.) Tune in tomorrow!
Anyway. I bid you all a very fond farewell.
AND HOPE TO SEE YOU IN A MINUTE!!!
-Eowyn-
November 2, 2013
On NaNo and Curveballs
October 22, 2013
So I was checking up on something earlier....
AND THIS.
(And it just may or may not be on my desktop....) |
Congrats, Hiddles and Hadley. You both just earned fifty awesome points.
Can't wait for Coriolanus!!!
~Eowyn~
October 21, 2013
Tveiter-tot Day!
October 12, 2013
ever had a day like this?
"But... why?" I finally managed to ask.
Meg looked up at me and smiled sadly. "I have no idea. Maybe the author just wanted to increase her word count by making something bad happen to me. Why else would I be here?"
Gracious sakes, y'all. I've had a mild case of writer's block for the past few weeks.
I can't find time to write, then, when I finally do, I can't figure out what to write! : (
So. Here's my question: What do you do to get over writer's block? Do you drink a gallon of coffee? Eat a barrel of chocolate? Follow Dory's advice and "Just keep writing! Just keep writing!" no matter how awful it is? (That's what I did during NaNo last year.... Now I'm having to go through that novel and eradicate any extraneous obfuscations.)
Leave a comment below with your tips – not just for me, but for anyone else who may be reading this!
-Eowyn-
October 8, 2013
IMHO: Junior Novelizations
September 26, 2013
Interview with Author Kendra E. Ardnek!
The text on the back of the cover reads, "Fifteen-year-old Jen can't remember her imagination. She knows she had one once, though, and honestly, she'd like it back. It's been eight years. One day she finds a young boy who claims to be one of her imaginary friends and that her imaginary world is being eaten by a hydra-like monster called the Polystoikhedron. He helps her find the Ankulen, a special bracelet that had given the ability to bring her imagination to life and together they embark on a quest to find friendship, healing, and perhaps even some family."
We could never come up with an ending that we could pull off with our limited special effects, so eventually we gave up. But the idea wouldn't go away. Eventually I decided to change it into a book, and in January of last year, I pulled up a word document, started typing, and never looked back.
7. Do you like to drink coffee, tea, water, or anything else while you write? What about chocolate??? : )
Call me a strange author, but I can't stand coffee, and there are only a few teas that I will drink. I do like some lemon tea during the winter, but that's because I get really bad sore throats. I always have water on my desk, because I don't want to dehydrate myself.
As for chocolate, I can take it or leave it. I'm more of a vanilla person. I'll drink hot chocolate, and if you give me chocolate, I'll probably eat it, but I prefer white chocolate. On another note, I really like hot apple cider, but I don't get it as often as I would like.
10. What’s some advice you would give to an aspiring author?
Don't talk about writing. Write. And read, both the classics and modern works. If you don't read, you forget how the written word is supposed to look. Classics because they're good enough to last, modern because you want to know what people want to read now.
Thanks, Kendra!
I hope you'll all go and buy The Ankulen. It's a great book!
~Eowyn~
September 25, 2013
Celebrate Musicals Week Tag!
13. Do you consider yourself a musical theatre fan in general or do you just like a few musicals?
Which brings me to
September 24, 2013
IMHO: Wicked
(Behold. The first IMHO post! Seems fitting that a series that has been in my mind so long should start with my now-tied-for-second-favorite musical, Wicked. C :)
The synopsis of Wicked could probably be very (very, very) summarized by saying that it's about what happened Before Dorothy Dropped In.
Wicked is the story of Elphaba, the Wicked Witch of the West, and G(a)linda, the Good Witch of the North, and how they became friends. They start out simply loathing each other and taking things that don't belong to them, then ending up both being changed for good. (Brownie points for everyone who knows how many quotes I just quoted!)
I had never seen Wicked before seeing it on Broadway (which is the best place to see a musical for the first time, btdubs!!), but I'd heard a few of the songs. Namely because of Ally. C : Anyway, when I heard that I was going to be able to see a musical on Broadway (then wheedled my way into seeing two, muahahaha...), I first thought of Wicked.
Before seeing it, the only things I knew about it were a) it had been running on Broadway since 2003, peeps, b) the two (give or take) songs I'd listened to from it were astonishing (excuse the quote from another musical), c) my friend saw it when she was in NYC yeeeears ago and said it was good, and d) many people who had seen it or listened to it that I knew and respected (*cough*Ally*cough*) absolutely loved it.
So I thought, 'Heyyyy.... Might as well, deeds!' (Okay, enough quoting from things other than Wicked!)
Now we come to the IMHO part.
I LOVED IT.
From the opening notes (y'all know what I'm talking about) to the closing of the curtain after the bows, I was totally enraptured in all of it.
I loved a great many things about this musical. First of all, I LOVED my cast. Lindsay Mendez (GRACIOUS SAKES.... she had SUCH a powerful voice!), Tiffany Haas (who was an understudy, by the way, and I won't go into my theory in understudies and just say that, nine times out of ten, I've observed they play the part better than the person who is actually cast for the role!), Derek Klena (WOW.... Let me just say.... his "Let the green girl go!" was allllllmost as good as Aaron's!), Carol Kane (as Madame Morrible.... Don't recognize her name? Does "Humperdink, Humperdink, Humperdink!" ring a bell???) and allll the rest.... I was literally just BLOWN AWAY.
During the intermission, my dad and I stepped out to get a drink (non-alcoholic....), my dad looked at me and said, "Wow.... That was actually.... pretty good." That made me really surprised, cuz, HELLO, this is the guy who watches most of the movies I love and hold dear to my heart and says they're "cute."
I won't go through all of the songs and tell you which were my favorite (I'll just list the ones I really like - No One Mourns the Wicked through Finale: For Good (Reprise)!), I'll just say that I loved all of them. C : The one I sing the most, howevs, is probably The Wizard and I. Just cuz. C :
Now for the extremely biased part.
I hope you guys agree with me about how amazing this was after seeing all of these videos. If not, feel free to start a comment war. I have my caps lock ON.)
The usual cast.... |
Plus one of the sweetest ladies on the planet! |
The wall was painted with the map of Oz. And everything in the theater was green, which, if any of you really know me, you'll know it's my favorite color. So I was literally in heaven. C : |
The staaaage.... |
Me and Catherine Charlebois, who played Nessarose. So good! |
Me and Derek Klena, who played Fiyero. (Stop gushing, KarMarie....) |
Me and Tiffany Haas, who played G(a)linda. She was so sweet! She stayed and talked with my dad and I for the longest. : ) |
Me and Lindsay Mendez, who played the green girl herself! |
The stuffs I got. C : |
My autographed Playbill. (Which is an ACTUAL Playbill, by the way!!) |
My autographed Playbill, cont'd. |
The cup that is ONLY sold at the Gershwin. |
I use it every day. No joke. |
Well, that's Wicked. IMHO.
Care to comment?
~Eowyn~
September 6, 2013
NYC: Day Two
Macy's. THE Macy's. I'm not a shopper, but if any of you are... be jealous. C : |
The Empire State Building! |
The Starbucks on the first floor of The Empire State Building. (I got Arwen a NYC mug from here, and she "LOVES IT!" She claims she alternates between it and her North Carolina one.) |
Grand Central Station! Celebrating 100 years. |
Sooo pretty! |
The Stage. As in, this stage. Totally totally spazzing out (to borrow a phrase that a friend uses frequently) when I took this picture!!! Aaron was here!!! |
THE PLACE WHERE THE BALL DROPS!!! (And they keep the year up there just in case the Doctor comes and wants to know what year it is or something....) |
Every major Broadway production had its own bus that they put their ads on. So excited!! Cinderella didn't have a whole bus, and it drove by before I could take a picture. : (
Okay, so then we went into the Disney Store. (I'm a child at heart. C :) It was two floors - the first one had Disney/NYC stuff (which I browsed for longer than I needed to but didn't buy) and Monsters University paraphernalia. There was an escalator to go upstairs to the (HUGE) second floor. Check out what was above it!
The Hershey Store!! To the right, outside of the frame, was the M&M Store. Heehee.... |
This is where we ate dinner. Sooooo good! |
We ate dinner at Carnegie Deli, where we had a huuuuuuge sandwich! So yummy! |
World's Largest Hershey Bar in the Hershey Store! Stopped in here to get a Reese's shirt for my younger sister, "Beatrice." |
The ads in Times Square were just.... awesome. : ) |
See what I mean??? Cinderella and Newsies!!! |
The theater for The Lion King! My grandma saw it when she went to NYC and loved it so much, she's taking us to see it next year!! (Unfortunately, not in NYC. Someday, Grandma - SOMEDAY!!!) |
After scoping out the area to find the Broadway Theater where Cinderella was playing, we walked back to the hotel, got our luggage, and went to our second hotel....
The view from our window! |
August 28, 2013
"life goes on...."
I did a photo shoot of this little cutie pie the other day. Care to see more? |
Anywhoz, I fiiiiiiinally took it today. And I PASSED!! WOOT!!! I am now in BEACH MODE. We're leaving on Monday, and I'm sooooo excited. I got a million books at the library, so, combined with a few I'm re-reading (or, in the case of The Living Room by Robert Whitlow, bought about a month ago, but haven't been able to read yet cuz of school), I'm going to have a LOT of fun. We're also planning several movie marathons - ALL of the Lord of the Rings movies (extended, of course), plus a few new ones, including Patriot Games, starring Harrison Ford and Sean Bean. Can't wait! We've been listening to the soundtrack for several months now, and if the movie is anything like the soundtrack, it's going to be AWESOME.
During my vacation at the beach, I'm hopefully going to have a lot of time to blog, so you should see at least two NYC-related posts next week. One will be for Day Two, and one is... well, that's for me to know and you to find out. : )
As I type this, I'm half-watching Melody Time. I was doing research for my new novel (eep... so excited about the way it's heading!), and found out that it came out in 1948, which is the year the novel starts in. I needed a movie for two main characters to go see, and picked Melody Time. Remembering it was in our collection of movies in the newly-finished basement, I took it upstairs and have tried to watch it for a while now. So far, Nut-Nut is enjoying it. As the opening credits rolled, I found out that Roy Rogers is in it! YAY!! Can't wait to hear him!
Speaking of my new novel.... : ) I'm really enjoying doing research for it. It's so much fun to watch movies, find pictures of people dressed in just the cutest outfits, and listen to music - all set in the late 40's. I enjoyed researching ice dancing for Becoming Nikki, but I think researching for this novel is going to be even more fun!! A lot of Arwen's favorite singers and actors were alive and in movies during this time period - Bing Crosby, Fred Astaire, Frank Sinatra, Gene Kelly, etc - so she's more than happy to watch and listen along with me. : )
I've also found a lot of blogs lately that I'm really enjoying reading! However, if you guys know of any writer blogs that you've enjoyed reading, I'd love to hear about them! I can always use more inspiration. : )
Ooh. Nearly forgot. My sister, Arwen, is turning twenty in September (sooooo oooold....), and, after much deliberation, has decided to have a Jane Austen Murder Mystery Tea Party. *nods* It's true. She's inviting about fifteen people, but there are only ten characters, so she had some trouble deciding who should be who for a while. We've got it all sorted out now, though. Can't wait to tell you guys how it goes! I'm playing Mrs. Bennet..... So that'll be interesting...... *wink* There's also Mr. Bennet (duuuuuuh), Lizzie, Darcy, Mr. Collins, Lady Catherine de Bourgh (who Arwen is portraying, cuz she's the host), Emma Woodhouse, Frank Churchill (heehee...), Marianne Dashwood, and Willoughby (heehee.....). Everybody is going to be dressed up in period attire, so it's definitely going to be interesting. I can post pictures, if you want!
I've also been listening to a lot of great music on YouTube lately - studying, y'all, studying - but I don't think I'll post any cuz I have a little something in the works. : ) It's been interesting trying to find videos the actors who were in the musicals I saw on Broadway. I found out that the annual Broadway in Bryant Park show was the week after I was there.... Figures.... *sniff* With each video I watch from it, though, I'm like, "I WAS THERE!!!" : )
Well, I think that's all I wanted to talk about. I should have called this another Random Post, but I like the title I have. Cuz it's from this song.
I guess that's it. I'll tell y'all a random quote that's been making me laugh for the past few weeks (thanks, Kate!), and let you go back to your normal lives.
"You illiterate twit!"
"I am not illiterate! My parents were married!!!"
~Eowyn~