Next step preparations, among other things

[davetheanalyzer]

It’s near the end of another school semester but this one is more significant. This will be my last time at Quinnipiac. My mom keeps becoming sentimental over this being my last semester but I’m not feeling much. To tell the truth, unless I bungle such a milestone in some way, my feelings are a vague “good, I pass” and I move right along. Maybe I’ll get sentimental later when I finally leave, but until then, I’ll be focusing the short term education needs.

I’ve completed the first draft of my sample story and the second for my Statement of Purpose. My advisor and Senior Sem Professor already made suggestions based on the first few pages of the former but I want him to see the full tale so his feedback would take all the story elements into account. As of Friday, no response, but I suspect he’s probably going to package the feedback with the third draft of my Senior Sem essay.

My first Statement of Purpose was considered too vague, so I was advised that the second draft should focus on what I accomplished with my English degree, the workshop experience, and the stories I completed. Basically, I’m trying to say that the feedback in writing workshops and the exposure to other kinds of writing in my English course helped to improve my writing and I want to continue the experience. I also mentioned the kind of writing I’m interested in and I’m pretty open to many genres to give a taste of the kind of writer I am. I also sent my advisor this at the beginning of Thanksgiving week but also no reply. I hope nothing has gone wrong. When I met him for advice on the Statement of Purpose, my email request for his assistance didn’t come in until he clicked something and several of them showed up. I hope that error didn’t repeat. It must be sent to other professors who will write a letter of recommendation and I don’t want to have them rush writing the letter. With how swamped my advisor probably is, I can’t help suspecting that will happen anyway.

This last month’s going to be stressful. I’m going to have to rewrite the Statement of Purpose, my sample story, my Senior Sem Critical Introduction, the conference presentation, and an essay for my Human Rights Theory and Practice course. Fortunately for the Human Rights one, the midterm essay was confirmed to be a test drive for the final one, so I could use the same theme for the latter. There have even been one or two articles we read since then that would perfectly fit with my theme. I don’t know if they would drive me to whatever minimum page limit there is but I’ll discover how to accomplish it later.

I do suspect that all this writing will mean I’ll barely have any time for my own projects. I might have to put my watching and reading schedule on hold to make time for myself. That means I’ll be even more delayed on some of the news but the good news is I’m close to the point where I can double up on the news programs I watch until I get caught up. I get the sense I’ll be able to squeeze in editing “Familial Tour.” Reading and editing two paragraphs every four or five minutes doesn’t take that long and I’ve made some decent progress. Once I’m done going through this editing, I’m thinking I should write down more concretely what should be changed and what plot threats should be brought to the forefront. I have those points in mind but I either only partially address them or forget to as I go. Having something to reference as I edit would be useful. Hopefully I’ll have it posted at either before or after the New Year.

Most of my writing has been swallowed up by my “We Will Hold On Forever” fic. I’ve decided that would be the next multichapter story I post instead of the Godzilla one. I’m wobbling about writing and posting each chapter as I go instead of writing it all and then posting. I’m still trying to get the feel for everyone’s character arcs and how they should work. I might have to go back and change and add things, so I don’t want to jump the gun yet. Maybe after I complete the first two arcs I’ll consider starting to post them. At least I should consider experimenting with posting chapters as I write. That might be advantageous to me and I could be able to post work on a more regular basis. Oh well, that’s for 2017.

Amid all this hubbab, I did manage to see a movie. I saw the Dreamworks Animation movie Trolls and it isn’t as bad as the first teaser and some the trailers made it out to be. I had a pleasant time, though it deserved its average rating though. I have the sense this movie was one or two drafts away from being truly great. For instance, the developing emotional beats between Poppy and Branch could have been tweaked, especially when it went into romantic territory. There didn’t seem to be much buildup for that latter part. The ending did seem as rushed as some reviewers said. Though I like the plot of the Trolls being able to make peace with the Bergens and that the latter were sympathetic, the solution to their unhappiness problem being finding that happiness in themselves seems a bit too simple. Maybe something to that effect could still happen but acknowledge that being happy’s easier said than done and finding some non-troll eating solutions. Still, the characters were fine and I like how the gal characters came with a variety of appearances.

That’s all for now. When I next post, it will almost be the new year and I’ll have hopefully submitted all the documents I need to get into Southern and the MFA program. Until then, see you!