The postillion was struck by lightning

I am totally stress eating my way through my last few thousand words with pickles and diet pop. And crudites and Catalina dressing!

In related news, crudites is a way better word for raw vegetables than raw vegetables. Which is why I use it all the time. Crudites, crudites, crudites. Crudités, crudités, crudités. See, the spell checker in Firefox totally thinks that the é is pretentious, because it doesn't recognize that spelling.

In further related news, the knights in my novel have become these sort of terribly crude frat boys. Whenever I need the heroine to feel frustrated or distanced from the hero, the knights show up and fart and burp their way into her ire. Like, I just wrote this:

_{[Context: Their manor house is all beat up and in pieces, the only bedrooms that are really liveable are their bedroom and the soldiers' barracks, and the hero's parents have just shown up for an unexpected visit. So, ring the doom bells, her in-laws are on her stoop.]}

"We cannot put your mother in the barracks. Your father perhaps would not find it such a hardship, but we cannot house a countess with those . . ."

"Those what?" he asked.

"Those men you call knights!" she practically shouted, gesturing toward them.

Luc looked at them and saw what she was on about. The men were currently engaged in a game of . . . well, he was not sure what, but he supposed it could be called wrestling, though a less astute observer might assume they were beating each other.

I have been spending way too much time with my brothers and their friends, who are not knights, but who do stuff like that all the time. So, they'll be talking to each other, one of them will fart, the other one will fart louder, and it spontaneously turns into a brawl -- only they're laughing.

I think I gave up any pretense that I'm writing a romance novel about five thousand words ago, and it's now more of a Judd Apatow film set in the middle ages.

_{My despair, she is deep! My sense of humor, she is weird! I think I'm a little punch drunk.}

Which name do you guys prefer as a replacement for Lady Maisry's name? Given that Maisry appears to be from the 18th century and Scottish, I don't want to use it in 13th century Wales.

I'd really prefer it if I could find something that still sounded pretty but actually meant "horrible person with a black heart", but girls don't tend to get named things like that.

So, the two choices I've discovered are sound-alikes, but Welsh. They might not be 13th century or even medieval, but they're a heck of a lot closer than Maisry and also avoid that whole "Isn't that a ballad?" thing.

Mairwen -- Combination of Welsh form of Mary (Mair) with gwen, which means "white, fair, blessed". I guess it could mean anything from "blessed virgin" to "white sea of bitterness", so there's a range of meanings there.

Meinwen -- Means "slender and white", from the Welsh main, meaning "slender", and gwen. I'm sort of imagining Lady not-Maisry as a sort of cross between Lady Macbeth and Galadriel from Lord of the Rings. Ambitious and social climbing, but tall and slender and fair. Also a mega-bitch.

[Poll #1298278]

First things first: koshka_the_cat, I got the taffeta the other day in the mail and it is MAGIC! It's draped on my dummy like a plastron right now, and I cannot wait to finish NaNo and start sewing. (After I make my little cousin's steeple hennin for Christmas, of course!) There will be pictures.

Next things next:

I've decided that I can't read anymore about Welsh/English history, because it just makes me feel bad for having the hero of my novel be English and the heroine be Welsh. I mean, how the hell can you fall in love with someone who is the oppressor of your people? Who have been oppressed since long before you were born?

It really just means that Not-Luc has to be the most amazing man to ever walk this earth, but also realistically flawed and thoroughly medieval. But not too alpha male, because alpha males leave me feeling kind of icky. And he can't be too touchy-feely, because then he's a girl walking about in a man-suit*.

That's not what I intend to write about here, though. All this reading about oppressed Wales has got me thinking about how political I am. Except I've suddenly decided I don't want to go into too much soul-searching right now, so short version:

Oppression of people is wrong. I kind of feel like I'm writing a story where a slave falls in love with her owner in the antebellum South. I believe in democracy. Bowing to nobles/royalty at SCA events makes me slightly uncomfortable, because I realize that the system that the group is based upon comes from a system of government that's based on divine right and warfare, and I'm not big on either of those things. You guys, I am too liberal for the SCA. (And, yeah, I'm probably being a trifle too serious about it, but still.)

What I need is a reenactment organization that focuses on the lives of non-nobles. There's another thing that makes me uncomfortable: the classism and sexism inherent in a lot of history and historical research. But nobody wants to play at being oppressed.

I think the reasons I'm having so much trouble with this is that a large part of me is idealist, and I want my writing to reflect that, but then there's also a large part of me that is a realist, and kind of sneers at the idealism. I can't bend to the "fantasy" part of literature, because fantasy is by its nature unrealistic, but I really, really want this thing I'm working on to be both realistic and have a happy ending with decisive resolution. Unfortunately, comedies must have happy endings, the villains must be punished, and the problems must be resolved. There can't be any plot "hangnails" bumming around to irritate the reader. And realism, by its nature, is inconsistent and irritating. Unpleasant. It points out the disadvantages of a situation.

Can individuals overcome social boundaries? Overcome them happily?

You guys. Perfectionists shouldn't do anything.

OK, writing for word count now. I swear!

_{*Dude. Please don't anyone start the "sensitive men are still real men" argument with me. I'm writing a romance novel, here, and . . . agh. I am brain-melty enough right now. Let's just say that I'm trying to write something medieval that doesn't offend my modern sensibilities overmuch, OK? This novel is just not the right forum for that argument.}

So, I kinda spent a lot of my writing time tonight doing something data entry-ish, and it was incredibly soothing. Like, there was no pressure to follow a plot or characterization, and I just go to type. I enjoyed it. But then it got boring.

I think I might be eerily OK with a data entry job.

And now I'm going to write 500 more words so I can break 13,000 words. I'm guessing this is going to take me a half an hour. And tomorrow afternoon, all I'm going to do is do laundry and type, because I have to work on Thursday and Friday, and will probably not be motivated enough to write those days.

Ha ha. I've no idea if I'll hit 50,000 words or not. Probably not.

So, I've got an hour and a half to get out 1500 words, which I think might be doable. Unfortunately, I no longer have malted milk balls, which really did work well as a motivator. Apparently getting me to sit down and write is exactly like potty-training a toddler. Only I generally don't go running out into the living room with my pants down, screaming, "I wrote! I wrote on the 'puter! Gimme candy!"

You guys know how I arranged all those medieval-ish songs to put me in a medieval-ish mood? Well, apparently what puts me in a medieval-ish mood is Patrick Wolf and the Vitamin String Quartet covering Red Hot Chili Peppers. I am not even joking. I cranked out 2000 words last night, listening to that. I wrote about nuns.

There is something about "Dani California" and "Tristan" that just does not say "nuns" to me.

Whatever! I'm not going to question it. I'm just going to crank it and make like a monkey with a typewriter.

I'm also trying this thing where I write longhand on the cheapest paper I can find, because what I write on there doesn't count at all. I can illustrate a scene with stick figures, and it doesn't matter. I'm just writing. It's about breaking expectations and getting out of the habit of always writing with a certain pen on a certain kind of paper or needing a computer to get the thoughts out. By changing your environment, it's supposed to make you less fearful of what you're tossing up on the page. In theory. I might just feel silly for writing a romance novel in a notepad that features an anthropomorphic bear wearing a shirt but no pants on the cover. Writing that in blue scrapbooking pen, no less. I'm shaking it up!

AND! FURTHERMORE! I've been outlining a scene that happens way in the future of where I'm writing right now, and I cannot get the lines that Benedick speaks to Claudio in "Much Ado About Nothing" when the former confronts the latter about Hero's death. Something like, "You have wronged a fair and gentle lady," except I can't find that scene in my version of the play. Maybe it's just in the Kenneth Branagh version, because it is his delivery on it that's stuck in my head.

I'm sitting here, typing up what I wrote on my breaks at work today, and my rough draft is cracking me up.

I haven't decided on a lot of the names for characters and places in the story. I don't even really know what part of Wales it's set in, other than that it's somewhere in the southeast*. Why the southeast? It's what seemed right when I thought about it. My heartsong told me! *tear* I'll probably end up changing my mind.

Anyway, I haven't decided what a lot of the castles are called and what the "last names" of any of the characters are. So there's a lot of "Margarethe, daughter of Rhys WELSH GUY" in my writing. Or "Gwillym has promised his niece UNCLE GWILLYM'S CASTLE as a dowry. You will marry at RHYS WELSH GUY'S PLACE. But first you need to find your brother Nicholas to act as a witness. He's in WELSH TOWN WITH A WHOREHOUSE OR AN INN WITH WHORES." All this all-caps, no name stuff is making me giggle. I get bizarrely detailed with it, and it often acts as a placeholder for plot ideas and intentions.

That last one isn't a direct quote, by the way, though it is paraphrased from actual occurrences in the writing. Which is really goddamn bad writing, by the way. Reading what I've written is a little bit like dragging your face against a cheese grater -- it's a relief when you stop, but the pain lingers.

So, I need to figure out what Welsh town, with a whorehouse or possessing an inn with whores, Nicholas can be kicking his heels up at. I already have a scene where Luc discovers him at the inn (whorehouse?), and is all, "You know, Nick, you're going to use yourself up on these prostitutes, and you're not going to be able to do your knightly best, because you'll have the ladies on your mind instead of hacking your foes into tiny bits." Nicholas's response is basically, "She's got a tongue like an electric eel, and she likes the taste of a man's tonsils. Woof!" And Luc is all, "Oh, Jesus. Don't make me get the hose, little brother."

Oh, god. Nicholas might be a more interesting/entertaining character than Luc. He's totally not based on Hal in "Henry IV, Part 1", by the way. Or Lord Flasheart. Trouble!

What I'm trying to do with the characters is set up Luc as the responsible, dependable brother, though he doesn't always like having to do that. His older brother, Benedick** has hared it off to a monastery where he spends all his time rooting in a garden, though Benedick was intended to be their father's heir. Nicholas is free to whore and drink and be wild, and Luc never got that opportunity because when he was Nicholas's age, he was getting a crash course in lordship after Benedick "defected". Both Benedick and Nicholas are free to follow their own whims, and Luc is saddled with responsibility and duty. The marriage and babies for politics thing is only the latest and most extreme manifestation.

<sub>*I've been Googling up a lot of pictures of Wales lately, because I don't really know what Wales looks like, as I've never been there. I know it's not arctic or desert or tundra, but I don't know much apart from it being hilly, stony with little mountains, and green. So it's coming as a big surprise to me that a lot of the pictures look a lot like southwestern Wisconsin. A lot of the pictures on this page could have been taken in our pasture or a little bit farther north, where it's hillier. (Apart from the fact that most of our hills are all-natural, and not mottes.) I'm considering making a "Wales or Wisconsin?" post, but I'm not sure if the similarity extends much past that temperate climates start to look the same when they've been farmed continuously for 100+ years.

A friend of mine from Gays Mills mentioned the same thing when she got home from a walking tour of Ireland, England and France, though, so maybe it's not just me.

**I still need to find a new name for Luc, as he's the odd man out. Benedick, Nicholas and . . . Luc. It doesn't really fit, does it?</sub>

Given the goodness and glory of Wikipedia, I have just discovered the Welsh marcher lords. And a little light in my head went ping! Could my hero's family be marcher lords?

The only thing is, I feel kind of weird creating a marcher lord that never existed (though I'm apparently all right with creating a family of knights that never existed, and not all right with inserting historical figures outright into my story as principal characters; my brain isn't just a gray area because it's my brain). Would I be more OK with it if the marcher lord family weren't earls?

I dunno. But at least I can start reading up on motte and bailey castles!

Random interjection: Have just remembered that I own a Welsh/English pocket dictionary! On the off chance I should ever find somebody wandering through southwestern Wisconsin who speaks only Welsh, I guess.

Am still searching for a source that will tell me about convents in and around Wales, or really about convents anywhere in England. I have lots of sources for monks and monasteries, but apparently nuns are boring or something. Of course, I have all these books about the sex lives of nuns (and monks), but that doesn't tell me anything about the rest of the lives of these half-nuns I just read about. Half-nuns? Yeah, apparently if your family wanted you to become a religious, but you didn't want to, you could become a half-a-nun, meaning you didn't take the full vows of poverty and chastity and whatever else was required of an all-the-way nun (or monk). And the convent still got all the land and money your parents would have given them if you'd become an all-the-way nun! And you still got to eat cakes and drink wine and maybe sleep with somebody without feeling so guilty about it.

Unfortunately, my heroine wants to be an all-the-way nun, and the only reason she hasn't is because her father is too negligent to give the go-ahead and sign away her dowry. He's all, "Oh, I'm too busy doing stuff . . . with my awesome second wife. Like, we hunt and go for long walks on the beach and I kind of forgot I had a daughter until she became useful as a bargaining chip with this English guy who is seiging her uncle's castle and needs to marry off his son. So, my bad!" Margarethe (er, Welsh-girl -- Cymraeg bachgennes?) is basically in the convent, waiting for her father to send permission and moneys, without which she cannot transition into . . . nunnity. The other option is for her father to send someone to fetch her home, but he hasn't done that either. Because her mother died when she was born, and she wasn't male, to provide a failsafe in case her older brother kicks it. So he's got the second wife, who is basically a doormat. Good firm baby bucket, but still a doormat.

Re-reading the way I have written the father's bit of character, I think I might be re-writing Clueless here.

AGH. I have to do so much research. Is it possible to write a riveting story about textiles? With only the knowledge I already have in my head?

"And then the fuller collected the jars of stale urine from the villagers, to the eternal disappointment of his daughters, who would be forced to dance across the wool until the fibers had drawn together. But they were not so unlucky as the dyer's daughters, whose hands were always blue and who smelled faintly of rotting leaves."

It will be like "The Song of the Shirt" but without the social commentary and with more bad smells.

Today has been sort of pathetic. It's raining and cold and I slept on my hip all weird so it hurts and Dad broke a lightbulb in the bathroom and I got to spend half an hour picking up glass off all the soft things in the bathroom and BLARGH. And my sister is still not returning my emails, which leads me to believe that she changed email addresses, because the one I'm sending the emails to is her maiden name. And she's simultaneously absentminded and Type A enough to forget to tell anyone that. (We are not exactly alike! Shut up!) Otherwise, she's pissed at me about something. And I have no idea what that could be.

So, yeah. Today has been a day.

Random: Does it bug anyone else that Mediaeval Baebes say their name "Medieval Babes" instead of "Meh-dee-eh-vahl Behbs"? Because it's starting to bug me a little.

On the NaNoWriMo front, I have come to a decision. Since the poll was absolutely inconsequential, because everything was tied everywhere (which might have been my fault for setting it up the way I did -- who knows!), I made the decision in the face of everything everyone told me. In other words, I used golf scoring, and will be writing a tale of love and war and jokes about boobs on the Welsh border.

Yes, I will be writing the novel I tentatively titled Smells Like the Holy Spirit. Unfortunately, it will probably be a lot more serious than the title implies, but it is a working title.

And there might be ninjas. I don't know yet.

I've been trying to harness Google for my nefarious research needs, but to no avail. I tried the library, but some monster got there before me and checked out all the books on the middle ages. Of course, there were only two, but I still felt thwarted. So I'm going into this blind, really. I know next to nothing about medieval Wales, unless we want to go counting what happens in "Henry IV, Part 1". And Glyndwr is pretty hocusy-pocusy, mystical, magical in that. Fairly confident the Henry plays are not an accurate reflection of 14th century Wales, to say nothing of the English bias.

Stupid toaster burnt my bagel! Blargh.

Anyway, why medieval Wales? ( Let me tell you, and some stuff about 'historical' novels )

In closing, my soundtrack for the next month will be Mediaeval Baebes (Mirabilis and Undrentide) and Garmarna's Hildegard von Bingen, which is, yes, a recording of plainsong written by Hildegard von Bingen in the 12th century, set against some subtle electronic stuff. I also have Love's Illusion by Anonymous 4, for that authentic touch.

The Garmarna album is excellent, and I recommend it to people who like Delerium and other similar groups. Maybe Mediaeval Baebes, though the Baebes have a more medieval sound, really. Emma Hardelin, Garmarna's vocalist, has an absolutely haunting voice.

Which Historical Lunatic Are You?
From the fecund loins of Rum and Monkey.

( You guys, this is so me. )

And now for some info about my three possible NaNoWriMo novel ideas. I really don't know which one to go with, which may be a good or bad thing. It might just be that I find all three equally interesting or that they're all equally uninteresting. We'll see.

( The ideas in detail )

I will admit that the medieval romance novel was born out of the fact that all the other medieval romance novels are so poorly written. I'm not even joking. So anachronistic it's disgusting and very cliché. I mean, I can get the desire to have medieval romances be fairy tales, but there's also a lot to be said for medieval people acting like medieval people and not storybook characters in trews. I'd like some recognition of the fact that these knights had their squires scouring out their armor with urine and sand, you know?

So, now the poll.

[Poll #1279562]

When I started writing this entry, it was supposed to be about costume plans for CC28, which is going to be in Milwaukee. I can do Milwaukee! But somehow NaNo took over. So, another post? Maybe. I think I might actually go to sleep at a reasonable time tonight.

_{*Did you guys know that Edward I had in excess of fifteen children? Seriously, like 19 kids, 16 of which were with Eleanor of Castile.}

I am extremely disgruntled that I just wrote a scene straight out of a romance novel for my NaNo. Two thousand words worth of scene.

It's a good scene, too, just for a romance novel, not for a mid-19th century romance. Totally different bagels, people. Like garlic'n'onion versus poppy seed.

Where is my head?

What's a goddamn surtout?