Not Fucked, But Fucked-Adjacent

I'm an Edoro, this is my blog. I'm crazy and I talk about it a lot. They/them. Current fandoms: ASOIAF, Fargo (FX), Girl Genius. Talk to me about stuff. Theme by tumblr user noidboid.

[e-doro]

also, for those of you who both appreciate (’appreciate’) the works of stephen king and want to read my writing, here are some things i’ve been working on lately:

the first of two fics in an ongoing ed-style dark tower series rewrite with the premise “what if alain and cuthbert didn’t die at jericho hill, and also it was significantly more gay and had more and better porn”: walk on off to a whole new plan

a stand-alone smutty tdt adventure ft al, bert, and an extremely minor but canonical character who is not, technically, an oc: between two hands held

[e-doro]

have spent a long time without internet and then without working computer and, tbh, i am not really On Tumblr

just another reminder that you can either find me on twitter at e_doro42 or on discord, just message me if you want my usertag

i’m taking an informal social media hiatus because my life has actually been going very well and i think “not constantly being on this hellhole timesink” has really contributed to me using my time in productive ways

if you want intermittent life updates, follow me on twitter.  if we are vaguely familiar with each other and you want to chat (including if you’ve sent me a message or commented on my posts or whatever) message me about that usertag.

[noc10-moved]

executive dysfunction

[worldwithinworld]

When you are writing a story and refer to a character by a physical trait, occupation, age, or any other attribute, rather than that character’s name, you are bringing the reader’s attention to that particular attribute. That can be used quite effectively to help your reader to focus on key details with just a few words. However, if the fact that the character is “the blond,” “the magician,” “the older woman,” etc. is not relevant to that moment in the story, this will only distract the reader from the purpose of the scene. 

If your only reason for referring to a character this way is to avoid using his or her name or a pronoun too much, don’t do it. You’re fixing a problem that actually isn’t one. Just go ahead and use the name or pronoun again. It’ll be good.

[roane72]

Someone finally spelled out the REASON for using epithets, and the reasons NOT to.

[futureevilscientist]

In addition to that:

If the character you are referring to in such a way is THE VIEWPOINT CHARACTER, likewise, don’t do it. I.e. if you’re writing in third person but the narration is through their eyes, or what is also called “third person deep POV”. If the narration is filtered through the character’s perception, then a very external, impersonal description will be jarring. It’s the same, and just as bad, as writing “My bright blue eyes returned his gaze” in first person.

[cimness]

Furthermore, 

if the story is actually told through the eyes of one particular viewpoint character even though it’s in the third person, and in their voice, as is very often the case, then you shouldn’t refer to the characters in ways that character wouldn’t.

In other words, if the third-person narrator is Harry Potter, when Dumbledore appears, it says “Dumbledore appears”, not “Albus appears”. Bucky Barnes would think of Steve Rogers as “Steve”, where another character might think of him as “Cap”. Chekov might think of Kirk as “the captain”, but Bones thinks of him as “Jim”. 

Now, there are real situations where you, I, or anybody might think of another person as “the other man”, “the taller man”, or “the doctor”: usually when you don’t know their names, like when there are two tap-dancers and a ballerina in a routine and one of the men lifts the ballerina and then she reaches out and grabs the other man’s hand; or when there was a group of people talking at the hospital and they all worked there, but the doctor was the one who told them what to do. These are all perfectly natural and normal. Similarly, sometimes I think of my GP as “the doctor” even though I know her name, or one of my coworkers as “the taller man” even though I know his. But I definitely never think of my long-term life partner as “the green-eyed woman” or one of my best friends as “the taller person” or anything like that. It’s not a sensible adjective for your brain to choose in that situation - it’s too impersonal for someone you’re so intimately acquainted with. Also, even if someone was having a one night stand or a drunken hookup with a stranger, they probably wouldn’t think of that person as “the other man”: you only think of ‘other’ when you’re distinguishing two things and you don’t have to go to any special effort to distinguish your partner from yourself to yourself.

[undertailsoulsex]

This is something that I pretty consistently have to advise for those I beta edit for.  (It doesn’t help that I relied on epithets a lot in the earlier sections of my main fic because I was getting into the swing of things.)  I am reblogging this so fanfic writers can use this as a reference.

A good rule of thumb: a character’s familiarity with another character decreases the need for an epithet (and most times you really don’t need one at all).

[rehlia]

Good writing advice.

[poinsciuri]

an educational graphic about critical thinking for tumnblr

[jkl-fff]

The all important journalist questions, and then some.

[nuclearspaceheater]

A missing line from Why:

“If you really want to be a critical reader, it turns out you have to step back one step further, and ask not just whether the author is telling the truth, but why he’s writing about this subject at all.“

[shinelikethunder]

That is an excellent addition.

One other one for How: “how could this be exploited by someone acting in bad  faith?” Closely coupled with a What: “what are the limits on the ill-effects this could produce?”

And a quick check for double standards: “who, or what, is the speaker not applying this principle to?”

[feminesque]

(This is also a great guide for interrogating historical documents such as, say, a constitution, a press release, a speech, a letter, a diary, a bill of rights, political policies, &c)

[fthgurdy]

I need to grab this and adapt this for my little filmmaking courses. 

Because these questions are equally indispensible when YOU are the author of the script, the book, the story, the speech.

[e-doro]

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[e-doro]

im sure the Bad Times are waiting just around the corner but lately ive been a) keeping up reasonably well w housework and b) actually enjoying writing, like, the entire time im doing it, and looking forward to continuing, so thats been fun

[e-doro]

my current hobby project is a for-fun, zero quality control, full steam ahead self-indulgent rewrite of the dark tower series except significantly more queer

im like 10k words in, somehow, despite mostly writing the shit on my phone, and finished up a 2k/five page chunk today which also is the first smut scene ive managed to finish in a long, loooong time

im feelin generally good about it and also about the fact that no matter how weirdly self indulgent i get, i cant get weirder than stephen fucking king

[e-doro]

i hate listening to men talk about/explain things holy shit

[gettingitwrite]

Me: Alright, here’s how the scene will go

My characters: No

[retrogamingblog]

the classic gameboy trilogy

[threnodinen-blog]

@focsle

[e-doro]

i am e_doro42 on twitter if anyone wants to follow me there and receive an endless stream of my unfiltered bullshit thoughts

[poetsass]

staff after dec 17

[e-doro]

OKAY like

tumblr appears to have majorly shit the bed, so, like

im not deleting or anything but in case strikethru 2.0 happens, im gonna… idk, check out some options, probably try and get on twitter, see abt a dreamwidth or pillowfort or smthng, AND i have a discord

so

if anyone wants to keep in touch in case shit gets real fucky, message me or send me an ask and we can exchange discord handles

[e-doro]

if i get a new thing i will probably post it publicly, if you want to add me on discord we dont have to like rly know each other for you to ask me BUT you do have to request it off anon unless you literally do not have a tumblr blog

[e-doro]

OKAY like

tumblr appears to have majorly shit the bed, so, like

im not deleting or anything but in case strikethru 2.0 happens, im gonna... idk, check out some options, probably try and get on twitter, see abt a dreamwidth or pillowfort or smthng, AND i have a discord

so

if anyone wants to keep in touch in case shit gets real fucky, message me or send me an ask and we can exchange discord handles

[e-doro]

so when i started working at target they had this dried mushroom wreath available for $44. i coveted it desperately, but was obviously unwilling to pay forty-four fucking dollars for a wreath.

as time passed, it was discounted bc we were trying to get rid of our fall stock. still too much (28 bucks instead of 44), but a steep reduction.

and then, finally, a few weeks ago, i saw it had been discounted yet again, this time to thirteen motherfucking dollars, also known as A Reasonable Price I Ed Can Pay For A Decor Item. i waited my whole work day and snatched it up... moments before a customer came in looking for it.

and now it hangs on my door, the Glorious Fungus Circle, announcing to all my neighbors exactly what kind of weirdo i am.

[noidboid]

I’m a dandelion again!