h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

yay CC has her badge

I am also entranced with guide expecting body...

Yay!! With the help of Magwitch and Mister D, I finally landed the badge. And it looks great. I must have somehow closed all my tags. Always good to close one's tags, in life. .

Apart from the fact that during the process I re-wrote my About Me space, and added twelve spaniels.

. I said I lived a quiet life in South Devon, with my husband and twelve spaniels.

Gibbering idiocy must have affected me also. .

Now I'm missing the GuideML journey. I like the descriptions of other peoples' journeys.



Yes, who is that peculiar spirit guide?

I blame the legal high of GuideML

'I blame the legal high of GuideML '

well, that is the closest I have come to be tempted into trying it

Legal high?

Well I suppose it is pleasing when you've checked every = sign and closed all your tags and you press a button and it works!

Actually Peanut, if you like maths, you might like GuideML.

CC is right - in GuideML, as in life, closure is important.

heheh. That's it, you see! GuideML, a wise teacher. With a halo of yellow and orange question marks.

I've been finding out what it is, I never knew.

Document markup language, compatible with DNA software.

OK! That's interesting. Quite miraculous to one such as I, who still sharpens pencils.

'Which resembles HTML but is simpler to learn, and allows basically textual content to be formatted in a skinnable way.' (Wiki)

HTML, hypertext markup language. I like hypertext.

I don't want to skin my text especially if has in it, I should imagine a would be very fiddley

I feel pleasantly delirious right now.

I have had a very annoying headache for hours, I have been tying to keep it check, which made it less bad but still there

Now I have been headache free for an hour

I also feel lighter, a little bit floaty

A great legal high in fact. A paracetamol (second dose) and some de-stressing and relaxing activities

Look after yourself, Peanut.

I've got a backache, but that serves me right for spending the afternoon digging compost out of our compost bins and dumping it on our tiny vegetable plot and round the .

I keep telling myself to take it easy. As a , I ought to be sitting under a parasol sipping but I don't.

Yeah, take it easy, both of you.

MVP, I just sent you an email. I need to know what size those pics should be.

I think we all need a gallon of slow gin.

cheers! and here's kisses for the aches.

heheh, that's funny about skinning the text.

I'd like to skin my text. Just unzip it. Check our the bare bones of the text, see what's holding it together, the essence of the words, then zip the skin back on again. Hypertext. Like layers.

I think the skin of my text is kind of like fake fur, like silky creamy fur, that I can wear as a hat on cold days, and look like a very famous actress. Or not.





What pictures? What pictures? None of my business, but what pictures? Are you doing GuideML? I need to do GuideML, I'm missing it.

Go away?

OK I will But I'll be back.

The pictures are for Create.

If you want to do GuideML, we'll get Mags to teach you. You can be a Post editor, if you like. It's fun. Ask Mags.

In my attempt to get the Create challenge ready for October, I was messing around with photos, and sent them to Dmitri, but they were too big. I'm a bit of a dunce about these things. It amazes me how many pixels there are in a little photo.

CC. I like your suggestion to 'Check out the bare bones of the text, see what's holding it together, the essence of the words, then zip the skin back on again. Hypertext. Like layers. ' That's probably what writers need to do to their stories. Check out the bare bones - characterisation and the basic arc of the plot - then zip the skin on again - the descriptions, back story

Oh, never worry about those picture sizes, MVP. It's easy to change.

You wouldn't believe - some people send me the pics direct from their mobile. 300 pixels and larger. Won't fit on the screen. Still, not a problem.

I like the idea you both have there - about the skeleton and filling in.

Once you've got the structure, it's fun to 'do it again'. Go back through and add things.

Alas, the last few weeks, I've had to do the opposite with my narratives. See, I'm writing ESL books with very limited texts.

So, I'll get really happy with my character. She's a servant in ancient China, say. I'm having lots of fun describing her day. Then I look at the word count - oops! All that fun stuff's got to come right back out.

Stories are more fun. You can take side trips.

I need to add stuff to my story 'Dreaming in Stone'. It's not just that it's too short to be a novel When I read it through it seems thin. I'm beginning to go back and add back story, descriptions, all sorts.

It needs more work to the plot too. It sags in the middle. I understand what needs to happen at the beginning of a story- you introduce your characters, give them problems and set them acting. I understand what needs to happen at the end- you build up to a climax which then leads to a resolution . But middles? I'm not so clear what needs to happen in the middle. I'll and think about it.

Morning peoples!

Thank you for saying you could arrange GuideML lessons for me, Mister D, and even to help you and Mags with , what a tempting offer in fact.

It's thinking about the practical reality of spending extra time on computer that will affect my decision on that, right now. Hmm.

I'm trying to restructure my life to get out and about a bit more. I'm in a sort of pre-twilight years life review/panic.

bat smiley? twilight?



Hah! The middle bit. That's interesting, mvp. I hadn't thought of the middle bit. What about the middle bit then? Now I'm going to think about that.



Are short stories easier to write? Probably not, I guess there's still a middle bit. In fact short stories might be more difficult to write. I wonder.



I like that, Mister D, about the side trips. I guess you could borrow the characters from your ESL books, disguise them a bit, and take them on secret journeys through stories of your own. I'd like that, if I was one of your characters.

Can I be in your book, if you can be in mine?

Except I have no book.



Yesterday, I was thinking about the bare bones of a text, and I ran into a giant smoky skeleton.

He was larger than life, outside a shop that sells fancy dress stuff, weird masks and costumes. He had green flashing eyes, and smoke coming out from under his tattered black cloak.



I don't know how they made the smoke. I was going to go in and ask, but the doorway was crammed full of people coming out with carrier bags. What was in the carrier bags? Furry spider suits? Ten eyed alien masks?



Anyway, I told my skeleton friend that he looked like the bare bones of a text, and that I found the smoke quite atmospheric, potential for a plot development perhaps. He grinned at me, in the way that skulls do, and flashed his green eyes.

Oh, and he moved.

Who did?

The skeleton. His head moved from side to side, and his bony hands waved from time to time.



Actually, it's not true that I have no book. Of course I do. . More like my book is a stack of folders right now. All my photo postcards, with funny writing all over them. I make at least one a day. My medicine. My One-A-Day photo pill. . They're not like a novel though, or a short story. More like peculiar sandwiches, the text is the bread, the photo is the filling. hmm.


Looking forward to seeing your pix, mvp. I'm reeely curious.



I was just hiking in the gardens near us, and I came upon hundreds of shiny conkers, how to find words to describe them! some half in their cases, some lying loose, all scattered under a horse chestnut tree.

Usually the kids find them straight away, to take to school to play conkers. Perhaps they don't do that any more. Do kids still play conkers? Anyway, it put me into a state of rapture. I felt the same thrill as the first time I ever saw a conker. I tried to take a few photos, will they capture the rapture? I don't know yet.

Capture the rapture! Nice rhyme.

I've been thinking. Uh oh, this is worrying.

Back in a minute.

So I was pacing through the conkers, thinking about the bare bones of a creative work. Then I realised ...

An overview!



That's what I do. That's my bare bones. An overview.

So, when mvp said about the start of a story, how you introduce your characters, give them problems, and set them acting, something in my brain lit up. Ping!

Except ...

Oh, have to go do the recycling. On the bikes! Sundays are just sooo busy.

Laters...

Can we see your 'photo postcards, with funny writing all over them', or an overview of them, cc?

Create's doing NaJoPoMo again this November, and it would be great if you or Peanut could do a journal posting a day for NaJoPoMo.