Something Wicked this Way Comes!

So I wanted to do a lil’ shout-out to my homeboy, William “the Bard” Shakespeare.

I went w/ my brother and my friends to an outdoor production of Macbeth and my oh my! Was I in heaven or what? I had more fun than you could "shake-a-spear" at! So because I’ve got the Bard on the brain, here’s some attempts at describing his awesomeness:

My favorite History: Richard III

My favorite Tragedy: Macbeth

My favorite Comedy: Twelfth Night

Some grand quotes:

"You speak an infinite deal of nothing." {The Merchant of Venice}


"My purpose is, indeed, a horse of that colour." {Twelfth Night}

"I am a Jew…If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we die? And if you wrong us, do we not revenge? If we are like you in the rest, we will resemble you in that." {The Merchant of Venice}

"Do you bite your thumb at us, sir?" {Romeo & Juliet}

"By the pricking of my thumbs, Something wicked this way come." {Macbeth}

"Our doubts are traitors, and make us lose the good we oft might win, by fearing to attempt." {Measure for Measure}

Lady Macbeth--bold, brash, and Scottish

"Do you not know I am a woman? When I think, I must speak." {As You Like It}


"Love sought is good, but given unsought is better." {Twelfth Night}

"Though she be but little, she is fierce!" {A Midsummer Night’s Dream}

"{Thine} face is not worth sunburning." {Henry V}

"What’s past is prologue." {The Tempest}

"Let me be that I am and seek not to alter me." {Much Ado About Nothing}

"Beweare the green-eyed monster, my Lord. It doth mock the meat it feeds on." {Othello}

"If this were played upon a stage now, I could condemn it as an improbable fiction." {Twelfth Night}

"Confusion now hath made his masterpiece." {Macbeth}

"Thy wit is a very bitter sweeting; it is a most sharp sauce." {Romeo & Juliet}

One reason why I love Shakespeare: Okay, like I can narrow it down to just one, jeez. I can’t narrow anything to just one. But I like that all of his characters have brilliant personalities, has strong female characters even though in his time, women were taught to be lesser then men. He took the common stories of the day and made up his version which was fresh, bold and better! His imagery is luscious and to die for! His wit, intelligence and expertise on the ways of humanity are spot on. And above all, he’s taught me that characters—as well as people—reveal who they truly are by what they say…and what they don’t say.

“In black ink my love may still shine bright.” William Shakespeare

Characters: They're [Supposed to Be] People, Too

So here's another little something for the novice writers out there.

How many times have you read a novel and thought: okay, plot was great. Writing style--liked that. Characters? meh.

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6407514-forest-born

That's actually what I thought while reading Shannon Hale's Forest Born this week. Don't get me wrong, I ADORE her books (5 stars for Goose Girl) and have since high school. It's just that syndrome where the first book is your all-time favorite and the other books don't get quite as much love, they just don't seem as great. Which is why I don't really like the idea of writing series, because I don't know if I could trust myself to undo such a dangerous thing as that.

Anyway, it's her last book, and I thought she sort of painted herself in a corner. She has Isi, Enna, Dasha, three powerful, fun, and witty female characters (think fun bantering and threats from Enna, I've got a sassy character like her). And then she has Rin, a character who's motif throughout the book is that she's someone else's shadow. Did I mention Rin is the main character?

I'm not trying to bash Hale's story, because when one reads the book, they do get a sense of wanting to become your best self and learn who you are and refine that image. That's all fine and dandy, but Rin sounded so depressing the whole book, wanting to sacrifice herself to dangerous events to protect others--basically telling herself others' lives are more valuable than her own. If the main character thinks that she isn't worth reading about, shouldn't that be a red flag? Main characters should never think like that!

I understand readers come into the ring w/ different backgrounds; I've been very fortunate to never have been in Rin's mindset, so a lot of her reasoning and doubts I couldn't sympathize with. I say that because I know every person has weaknesses, we can't all be the best all the time. But when you have a character that has growing moments and passes w/ flying colors--and then tear themselves up afterwards, it makes reading on that much more difficult.

It turns out that Rin holds herself back because she has this power that she thinks will hurt others--but Isi, Enna, and Dasha do, too and seem to handle themselves just fine. All the characters regret something they've done w/ their powers as well, but Rin holds herself back almost the entire novel while the others get over it and lead on interesting lives. Rin doesn't forgive herself when she's been multiple instances to do so, which again, maybe I don't understand. I honestly hope I don't ever have to understand. But it doesn't seem normal.

So I decided, that in many cases, instead of arguing or venting, why not just avoid this altogether? These are my personal feelings, so I invite anyone to let me know if I'm way off the mark:

1. I feel like, if you can't write about such things as guilt, shame, insecurity or things like that w/o appearing fake, maybe you shouldn't write about them. Some people have vivid stories to tell and they should tell them, and there are people out there that can tell happy stories, and we need those, too.
2. But if negative motifs belong in your story (c'mon, you can't have a war novel w/o things like guilt, shame, hate, ect) for Pete's sake do some research! I've got lots of injuries in my story like bashed heads, stabs, twisted ankles, and I've never broken a bone, but luckily I've got a dad who knows his stuff. There are plenty of sites out there that would have information on ailments both physical and mental. When making the non-existant look real, you can't have someone stumble out of a burning house fit as a fiddle doing cartwheels.
3. I'm mainly referring to the main character when I say: if they're going to have self-esteem issues, give them some sort of redeeming value that makes you at least sympathize. I don't know how many books that I've read where the main character says "oh, I'm horrible at singing, and dancing, and riding, and I don't look pretty, and I can't cook, I'm shy, I'm weak, I'm useless..." uh...why should I keep reading? Give your character something they're good at, heck, even something they know they're good at and enjoy doing. I admit, a character that thinks too highly of himself is borderline witty or annoying. But if their personality is bland and colorless, you could cripple the other elements of storytelling.
4. Have someone read your work/read it out-loud. Editing might reveal some cliche' wordings (it sure has for me!) and especially w/ someone else reading--I tell you, if someone is willing to read your stuff and critique it--worship the ground they walk upon and take that offer. If their perception of what's going on is what you intended more or less, that's a good sign. If they don't care and don't hit the emotional level a scene is supposed to have, touch it up.
5. If it helps, map out your character: make even a mini autobio. That's right, autobiography. Have them summarize themselves, their likes, dislikes, what makes them cringe, what embarasses them, you name it. If you can draw a circle around their personality, it makes it easier to capture their essence better on the page.
6. People-watch. It's stalking but research all at once. And it's entertaining!

I don't know, maybe someone should read the book and tell me if I'm off. But as my Creative Writing professor told us in her class: every rule in creative writing can be broken, just as long as it's on purpose and for a good reason. A bestseller reason.

I know that I'm not saying all this to complain, but as self-critiquing, too. With my first drafts, my main character was rather whiny and pathetic, which is kind of what I wanted: I wanted to write about a girl who goes from not lifting a finger to really being combative, powerful and fan-flippin'-tastic.

But I realized when editing, I needed to hook my readers from the get-go that this girl I invented is worth reading about, that she has problems to overcome, but she's special, she's unique, and worth their attention and affections and above all, she feels real.

So this isn't me being mean about someone else's work (I promise, I love Shannon Hale! Forgive me!)--this is me seeing what someone wrote and deciding for me & my work, it isn't my style, it isn't what I like to read, so I'm taking an alternative route.

"21-year-old Me", Meet "high school Me"

“I was outnumbered, unarmed, weak, and screwed. In that order.”  Jennifer Lynn Barnes' Raised by Wolves

Well, it’s sort of been a while since I’ve written, and I have a very good reason for stalling! It’s a big under-construction post that will be coming your way, I promise! Just a reminder, the poll is still going until July 1^st! But…I’ll probably just extend it anyway.

With such a long time here at home away from school, I’ve been cleaning through my things to get rid of things that I don’t really use anymore, while having a very interesting experience looking at the middle school/high school me. I’ve already blazed through 3 years of college and it’s amazing how much I’ve changed and it’s sort of weird; time can feel so short and so long at the same time.

One of the things I found was this silly book called The Totally Righteous, Awesomely Cool, Simply Outrageous List Book. Yeah, blast from the past, huh? It’s a book where they have a bunch of lists of like top 10 this, all-time favorite that, most of which, if not all of them are just as corny as the title of said book. No wait, it gets better! It comes with stickers—with phrases like “the bomb!”, “as if!” “phat!” and “not even!” Let’s just say I never got around to really filling out every last list.

It just floors me how much pleasure I get out of making lists—and if it’s a “to do” list, I get a kick out of crossing things off! Woot! One list that sort of floored me was this list I wrote in the back of things I wanted to be when I “grow up” or really, things I wanted to accomplish while I’m alive and ready to live. Here’s the list:

I want to be a:

• novelist
• mother/wife
• world traveller
• graduate
• musician
• missionary
• artist

These goals sure haven’t changed!  It’s crazy to think that I’m getting really close to accomplishing all of these things! Heck, I’m going on a mission to Berlin in less than 6 weeks!  Every time I think about it, I feel so grateful that I’m finally accomplishing one of my biggest goals I’ve ever set for myself. Granted, it seems a little scarier than I imagined as a kid, but I’ve spent so much of my life telling others that I had what it took to serve and that I could handle the pressure and reach out to complete strangers, and here’s my change (finally!) to make that possible and make the ones I love proud of me.

However, now that I’m thinking about it, I feel like I need to update this list to make it slightly more specific and yet things I’ve been thinking about adding to the list. They’re not in any particular order, just in order of subconscious thinking:

• be the best sister missionary I can be
• not be frustrated while re-learning German
• publish DS [my affectionate nickname for my novel]
• be a [published] writer
• get a job as an editor, somehow wheedle myself into the publishing business
• graduate from college!
• keep this blog going
• get married/be an awesome mom & wife
• keep in touch with as many friends as I can
• keep travelling! I just cannot stop!
• be the best hip-hop dancer I can be
• go to a renaissance fair WITH a homemade costume!
• choreograph a full song’s worth of MOVES.
• Huske danske efter min mission, ellers lærne igen!
• try to not compare myself to others (there’s gotta be a plus for being a “jack-of-all-trades”)
• host more parties (when I get back to Provo)
• get far enough as a writer that people actually know who I am and yet don’t berate my work like so many people have with Twilight.

I think that’s a good start; I’m good at adding onto these sorts of things. Just after writing this past sentence, I added 2 or 3 to the list! I’m tellin’ you, it’s like a crazy twitch! Do you have a bucket list? If so, share it w/ me, it might give me some great ideas! It’s amazing that as kids we dream so big, and what’s even more amazing is how willpower can really get us there, despite how crazy the world and life can get.

P.S. I couldn’t end this blog w/o sharing a ridiculous list I wrote in the back of this book. I wrote it w/ a great friend of mine Karin Allred (affectionately called ‘Charlotte Blackwood’ as well) and it’s called:

Things NOT to do on a Plane:

1.  Move your seat back and forth when the person behind you has food on their tray.
2. Open your carry-on and whisper loudly, “got enough air?”
3. Get up frequently to go to the bathroom if seated by the window.
4. “Test” the help button—just to make sure it works.
5. Claim to your neighbor that you made the plane and keep saying, “it’s not supposed to do that!”
6. Laugh constantly during the in-flight movie.
7. Remind your neighbor, “As my mom always says, what comes up must come down!”
8. Make a point of showing your neighbor your fake gun in your pocket.
9. Constantly open and close the small tray in front of you.
10. Bring a hamster
11. Mimic the safety procedures
12. Steal others’ bags of peanuts.

I'm not sure if we actually came up w/ all of these or were under the influence of the internet, but we were rather creative back in the day [if not still to this day!]

Let Your Voice be HEARD!

Readers, I'm lending you my ears. Only temporarily. I made a cute lil' poll on your right-hand side of your screen, because I'm floored by how many page views you lovely people are adding to the tally, and I want to know what makes you tick, why you're following lil' ol' me.


So please let me know what you like so more fun posts can come your way! Blogging is so much fun when I see how many people are viewing my work. I'm giddy just thinking about it! Thanks, danke shön, and tusind tak! I know how to say thanks in more languages, but three's pushing it.


Have a great week!


{Whitters}

P.S. I set the poll to last for 17 days, so time's a-wastin'!

Dinner of a Lifetime? Ja Wohl!

So here’s a great dinner idea; I’ve shared some great recipes, but I don’t want you readers to think all I make is sweets!

This is a mix of two cultures: German and Indian.

I introduce: Schnitzel and Curry.

Isn’t that lovely? I’ll try to take it step-by-step w/ hopeful hints. Along w/ schnitzel and curry, you gotta have rice, preferably white rice because white rice + curry is an irresistible friendship. I’ll walk through the schnitzel because that’ll take the most time. And the most patience. Schnitzel technically is made w/ lots of different kinds of meats: chicken, pork, veal, you name it. For this we’ll do it w/ chicken!

Snazzy Schnitzel

Thawed, boneless chicken breast(s) {the flatter the better}

2 eggs

Cooking Oil (whatever you like to use!)

The biggest cooking pan you can get your mitts on

Breading crumbs—the brand doesn’t matter, but go for “Italian” or something tasty-sounding.

1. You’re gonna set up a sort of assembly line for the schnitzel. You’ll have your thawed chicken, eggs and breading. Wisk the eggs in a bowl. If you’re cooking for one or two people, 2 eggs will be more than plenty, but you might need a few more if you’re doing some dinner group activity. The last station is a plate with a little mound of the bread crumbs.
2. Put a couple of tablespoons of oil on the pan, swish it around. Do NOT warm it up until I say so! You’ll thank me later.
3. Take each piece of chicken at a time and submerge it in the whisked eggs. Icky but necessary.
4. Take the eggy, raw meat (haha) and cover it in the bread crumbs. I like mine to have as much breading as possible, so it’s really up to you how much you want to follow this advice. I just lay the chicken on the breading on the plate, and pat it gently so every inch gets covered. Flip it over to get the other side and repeat; I even sprinkle more on each side for extra coverage.
5. Place the breaded chicken on the pan! Set the temperature on medium when you’ve filled the pan or whatever. When I did this before, I heated the pan up before the chicken was on the pan and ended up burning the breading to a deathly crisp but the chicken wouldn’t be cooked all the way. Waste of time and money, right? When you put the chicken on THEN heat the pan, both the breading and meat will be cooked right.
6. Chicken is a BEAST to cook, so don’t throw a hissy fit right away. The best way to cook chicken is just flipping and flipping and FLIPPING. Schnitzel is going to be that traditional golden brown, but it will get dark. And DELICIOUS. You just let both sides of each piece cook and when you feel it’s done, cut each piece in half. Now raw chicken is a sickly pink color; cooked chicken is bleached-teeth white. You’ll know “cooked” when you see it. The meat will be white and firm, and the whole process will make the kitchen smell pre-tty good. And that’s pretty much it! It took me a few tries to get it just right to let other people eat safely, trust me.

Classy Curry

1. It's SO easy; you're gonna face palm yourself on why you didn't think of this sooner. Go buy a box of “Golden Curry” curry. You find it by the awesome Asian delicacies. It’s a small box, the lettering is metallic and most of the box has Japanese letterings. Be not a-feared.
2. This box will have solid blocks of ALL the seasonings you’ll need. You just need water! There’s a recipe on the back you can follow, but if the Japanese has got you hyperventilating, here it goes:
3. Bring the water to a boil in a small pot—y’know, that means you see bubble constantly coming to the surface?
4. Put every last bit of that curry goodness into the water. You can turn it down to low or simmer. It’ll dissolve and take on the consistency of gravy. Delicious, delicious gravy. Once it’s finished, keep it on low, so it’s warm but not fusing into the pan or anything. No crusties!
5. I’d suggest doing the curry once you’ve got the schnitzel cooking at the same time—curry takes little to no time to cook, so yeah, when the stove’s on for the schnitzel, get the curry starting, too.

Rice...I am, NOT an expert on rice. If you’re like me, you’re a pro at instant rice, if anything. So I think I will do the right thing and let you decide how you want to cook your own rice. I just like instant rice, because it works, and takes 5 minutes!

So there you have it—if you need veggies to complete the meal, do so. I’m no expert at veggies, isn’t rice healthy enough? If you need healthy-food advice, this…ISN’T the blog you’re looking for. If you like yummy food, keep reading for sure!

So yes, this is a great meal. The curry goes SO well w/ both the schnitzel and rice, so slather it on! Curry is even quite awesome in “leftover” format, too. This Golden Curry stuff is really good, but it’s not extremely spicy, until you’re into that thing, I think they have different spicy levels, but the normal stuff is great.

I hope you like this dish! This is something that my mom has made for us, and something I love to treat myself with as a college student. Be sure to leave questions and comments below!

P.S. I'm soo excited to eat/make some legit German schnitzel in a few months! <3

My Silly Scribbles from ENG 218

It's good to be back! If you've been starving for some ridiculousness from me, I'm sorry I made you wait a decent 2 weeks. We were supposed to go on a trip of a lifetime back to visit Germany, Italy and Denmark but because of stupid weather, unlucky circumstances, and no wiggle room to rebook our trip we had to cancel. It meant a lot to our family, especially to visit family in Denmark.

Vader isn't what you would call a "people person."

So the next best place we could think of was, naturally, DISNEYWORLD. and HARRY POTTER WORLD. if you're FB friends w/ me, go see the 80+ pictures that were taken by your's truly.


Tagent= almost over


I bring this up, because on this trip, I brought a writing journal w/ me to fufill my writing goal of writing everyday {which I would give myself about 3.5/5 stars--but I read 5 books! Holy whuuut??}


And because I brought it w/ me, it brought back memories and I decided to post some of the ones that I enjoyed writing, and reading over again. These posts are unedited, how they are seen in my journal. The journal entries were part of a class requirement--I just had to have a certain amount of writing but I could write about anything--which I did. The freewrites were timed and I had about a max of 5min to write.

Journal Entry 9/3/10

A list of interesting sentences created with fridge magnets (mostly if not all credited to my roommates):

• *Her hair felt gone.
• I am raw gorgeous sweat.
• Delirious women scream and use knives.
• Bitterly rips gown after swimming club.
• We white boys live have purple smooth language.
• We produced one in the hot spring.
• Me feet is languidly moaning.
• Boil and smear beauty but iron shadow.
• Worship puppy love, please.
• I must like life after death.
• Stop chanting at me luscious forest.
• This mad man moons their mother.
• He is staring as she sleeps in water.
• Incubate our pink eggs and they will blow up.
• Whisper a sweet symphony.
• Some enormous chocolate fluff is under the TV.
• Trudge beneath the garden and fiddle.
• I want black lust.
• I shot him.
• Frantic meat spray.
• Think about my ugly blue tongue.
• Lick a juicy pole.
• Winter is the cool of summer.
• Watch your falling blood.
• She shakes her butt delicately.
• Lie those out next to the sordid bed.
• Honey you’re behind rocks.
• You could run away but I will crush you.
• His elaborate apparatus drools.
• My milk eat a girl.
• Me want her rust like skin goddess.
• Drunk though essential.
• Wax my bare smelly legs in the misty wind.
• Mostly we cry but manipulate men easy.

Freewrite 9/10/10
{describing a childhood home/setting}

Germans. Everywhere. Mountains faced us on the east all covered with thick evergreens. The Tree of Life is the left, probably the tallest and biggest tree I’ve ever seen in my whole life—taller and thicker than a mansion, with a handsome bird’s nest on the highest point. Some of our crazy neighbors are herding their flock of sheep; those buggers always manage to break out and graze by the Tree as though it’s a magnet to all living creatures. Depending on the time of year, the grass is tall and bends like waves on a windy day, or the field gets a buzz cut and hay bales that look like giant marshmallows take its place. Germans are staring at me through their windows.

Journal Entry 9/21/10

What I am good at: dansk, writing, making up/finding names, cooking/eating, ping pong, reading, talking, clarinet, piano, singing, dancing, drawing, photography, laughing/getting people to laugh.

What I am not good at: sports (Frisbee/Capture the flag, volleyball), eating veggies, break-dancing, math/chemistry, thinking realistically, remembering names, focusing on homework (especially boring homework).

What I want to be better at: writing, racquetball, working out, sign language, listening, being assertive

{There are some things that I’m not good at that I don’t really care to improve. Good or bad?}

Journal Entry 10/4/10

List of Problems I’m Glad I Don’t Have (or hope not to have):

• a crazy/psycho ex
• mean roommates
• food allergies
• car/motion sickness
• divorced parents
• switching majors
• abuse (of any kind)
• debt
• unemployment
• death of a child/stillborn (this is what initially started the list; I could’t fathom how hard it would be to be pregnant only to lose a child that’ll never grow up.)
• illegible handwriting. 

Fast Freewrite cir. September '10

Smells remembered from childhood:

1.       Fudge—Mississippi

2.       Grandpa’s farm

3.       Mormor’s house

4.       Homemade rootbeer

5.       Camping

Unusual people I met recently (this week)

1.       Bree’s sister

2.       New coworker

3.       My bishop

4.       RS stake counselor

5.       Oskar

Earliest Memories

1.       Kindergarten naptime

2.       Getting a “bad apple” card to take home

3.       Heart-shaped sunglasses

4.       Playing at the beauty salon w/ Polly Pocket

5.       Singing to Lion King.

Things that make me mad:

1.       Lies

2.       F’s

3.       “holier/cooler than thou”

4.       Obama/politics

5.       Mormon haters

Calming places:

1.       Temple

2.       Art museum

3.       Pool

4.       Bookstore

5.       Bed

Things that hurt:

1.       Migraines

2.       Braces

3.       Tight pants

4.       Burns

5.       Soap in the eye

Things I’ve ignored:

1.       Messy room

2.       Dishes

3.       People on FB from high school

4.       Practicing clarinet

5.       My journal

Things I wish I could do again:

1.       White water rafting

2.       Be in a relationship

3.       Live in Germany

4.       Travel

5.       Speak German

{the thing that I love about this list, is that I’m currently happy because I’ve got a #2 again, and on August 3^rd, I’ll get to have #3-5 back in my life. WHUUUUT?!}