Cam 's Ego Swells and Pink Wank?

[misscam]

East of the Sun, West of the Moon has been updated with ch. 33 here (CSI Forensics) and here (ff.net). Only three more chapters and an epilogue to go... He. He. He.

And it figures that coming off a week with me involved in YTDAW wank, I am this week's featured author. (Thank you, teenwitch77!) If you're registered there (or do register) you can ask me questions starting here *bats eyelashes* Please? (Though if I get an OFUM question, I will have to inflict some pain.)

And I also got my secret desire fulfilled to be quoted in the Quotable Quotes thread. Yes, I know, I'm a vain little writer with an ego in need of petting. Shut up.

Arg, why has Fandom Wank gone pink and fandomlove? I'm disturbed. PIIIIINK! RUN AWAY! (Aha! I see. Oh dear...)

But that does give me a meme idea - if I were to go as deeply wrong as F_W to fandom_love, what would I do? What would be my layout, my usericons, my comment tag or whatever else you imagine changed...?

In other news, I am once more housesitting and watching the cat for my parents starting Friday and lasting two weeks or so. I shan't be on any of the IMs (unless maybe AIM), but you can reach me here, at the various messageboards I hang at and e-mail me, so it's not like you'll miss me terribly.

Comments

[colorstoobright.livejournal.com]

Housesitting?! Blah. :P How many cats do yoour parents have? Are they nice? Do they eat mice?*

* these nagging questions brought to you by a stalling Drea. Bleeeeeeep.

[meeta.livejournal.com]

He he he, good ol' YTDAW. I used to try and be so cool on there. I don't know, I only ever posted in the Catherine, Warrick, and misc. section where I lead several YoBling parades. Maybe sometime I'll visit there, since I'm getting back into CSI. Is it still mostly Geek Love?

[misscam.livejournal.com]

Hoo yeah. But we have a multi-shipper thread there now, found here. There you'll find C/W likers - and there are quite a few of us on the board.

*snickers at icon*

[misscam.livejournal.com]

Just one, and he's originally mine, I just now live somewhere he would not be ash happy. He's called Ismael and is very lovely and yes, he eats mice when he catches them. And birds. And squirrels.

I love that icon.

[meeta.livejournal.com]

I shall go visit!

Hee hee. Isn't it wonderful? I found it and it was love. It's almost as good as my BrassandCatherinearelove icon (because they so aren't).

[misscam.livejournal.com]

It would be a union of snark and sex, truly.

*lays out re-welcome mat*

[meeta.livejournal.com]

Dude, it's weirder than weird being here. I remembered my user name and password, for some odd reason, and I was looking at all my sent messages from like.. two and a half years ago. Oh, and my signature and user info and everything was all about Geek Love. It's so weird. But I'm back, at least. :)

[misscam.livejournal.com]

I know the feeling - I returned there myself after after years away. It's such a "ah, so this was me?" moment.

But yay for being back - jooooooooooooin the dark side. Beeeeee the dark side.

[colorstoobright.livejournal.com]

Aw, yay! I like cats, although I admit i'm more of a dog person.

Love this icon more.

[lotus79.livejournal.com]

well, noone's answered the meme yet, so I'm free to state the obvious ;)


OK, well, your background would be the republican flag, and your username would be Bushloveslave.

Your journal would be called "Cam's tribute to the best president ever" with the subtitle "and John Howard is so sexy I could kiss him"

All your icons would be of Howard and/or Bush, sexily squashing the free peoples of the world. Oh, and there's be one with the nazi symbol for the people that you really like.

And... these thoughts are making me feel sick. I must stop now.

[misscam.livejournal.com]

Yes. Yes.

I'm a cat person through and through. Whole family is. Even my dad. It's cats, cats, cats.

[misscam.livejournal.com]

Now that's so scary I'm almost tempted to do it for an April Fools' or rabbithole day.

Also, you're sick.

[briasoleil.livejournal.com]

I've asked you some questions. I hope I didn't come off too much like an idiot.

The one question I wanted to ask but didn't is about betas, because I didn't want to seem overly coy or self-absorbed. I'm relatively new to the whole beta process. I've edited for years - for profs and students - but I've not betaed a lot of fic. What do you expect from a beta? What makes a good beta? How could I improve and be of better service to the writers for whom I edit? (other than a better command of the English language) What do you find helpful?

Tonight, I'm going to go through the next two chapters. Tomorrow, the last of them. Is that okay?

[misscam.livejournal.com]

No worries there. I had to really think on some of them. And yay, Warrick question. I love getting questions that make me think. Thank you.

Well, what I expect from a beta is not neccesarily what someone else would expect, keep in mind. But I expect someone to weed out my mistakes, tell me if plot/characterisation/imagery is off, give a little encouragement and a little spank. What makes a good beta is someone who can edit and steer a fic away from problems without making it the beta's story. I've had betas who wanted to rewrite me. Ick. Not good. How to be better - you know, I think you do a pretty good job. You explain what you pick on and you offer comments now and then. Though it may be helpful sometimes with a sentence or two at the end of a chapter with what you saw in it so the writer may know some of what he/she is trying to communicate is coming across. This isn't always needed, but when the author is unsure, it might be a good idea.

I gotta admit I find the little "I don't get this, but I think what you meant is..," comments helpful even when you guess wrong because it often tells me how I described it wrong. And the encouraging comments are very lovely too especially as one is groaning about making yet another verb-subject agreement mistake. (So. Much. Hate.)

And that'll be lovely - I won't post them all at once anyway, so pace them out all you want.

[briasoleil.livejournal.com]

Thanks so much for the extra information. I honestly don't know what writers expect. I mean, I know what I expect when I ask for someone to beta for the very few fics that I've written. This helps me a great deal.

Verb-subject agreement is one of those things that presents such a huge challenge. Alas, my bane is verb tenses. I get conditional and subjunctive, but consistent use of verb tenses is not something I've ever mastered. Which may explain my partiality to non-linear narration.

[misscam.livejournal.com]

Tenses in general are evil in English. Every language has its pains, I find (Norwegian has gendered nouns. Run away!) Don't think tenses is neccesarily my biggest problem though. I have to struggle with the evilness of syntax. Woe.

[immoralilly.livejournal.com]

What on earth is going on in fandom_wank? Why are they suddenly filled with remorse? I've lost all confidence in them. Fandom_love? NEVER!