research ramble!

[rivendellrose]

Last night, on the way home from work, Kendra and I stopped off at Cedars for appetizers, chai, and some coconut-pistachio ice cream (yum!), then to Trader Joe's for groceries... and then to Half Price Books. I was absolutely fine at resisting everything (everything!), until we got to the anthropology section. Old ethnographies are my greatest weakness. I love them! I can't help it! And sure enough, I was weak. Despite the fact that I'm still picking through the ton of books my mom gave me, I now am the proud (if bemused and slightly terrified) owner of not one, not two, but three books on Gypsies / the Roma. And a book of articles on the anthropology of the supernatural. My two most insidious research hobbies of the moment.

I'm trying to convince myself this is okay - for one thing, it's my degree! I'm allowed to do compulsive research into subjects that fall within my degree! Because... it might lead to graduate work at some point... if I were somehow transported back to the seventies when these subjects were in vogue, whereas now they seem to be either completely forgotten or well-handled by established academics. I'm not bitter. Really. Because the other thing this kind of random-ass research is good for is the writing of fiction. As presumably distinct from fan fiction (we hope), and presumably at some point hopefully going to become my Calling in Life (tm). Or at least my 'thing I do to supplement my income and keep me from going totally bugfuck.'

Alas, I'm still lacking books on the specific angle I want to take this whole thing - I thought I'd gotten lucky last night, but it turned out that although the time period of the research was correct, it had been undertaken in the complete wrong hemisphere. Argh. That does me no good whatsoever. So I'm back to square one, pretty much. Maybe I'll stop by the UW library sometime this week and see what I can do about that. There has to be something out there. And if there isn't... then I guess I know that I'm meant to go back into anthro and do graduate research in it?

That alone ought to be enough to scare me into finding those books.

I have, however, written out the basic concept for a novel. *Gasp* Add this to the random science fiction plot that's been brewing in the back of my head, and the fact that I started (once again) reworking one of my old plots (this time on the assumption that maybe I was wrong about the POV and maybe it should be a short story instead of a novel)... and I think I might actually be getting back on my game with the whole original writing thing. Go me. And one of the books managed to save me from an embarrassingly misremembered word in the fic I've been writing (next time I do library research, remind me to take my notes in something easy to find, and do so in handwriting that's slightly more legible), so... it's all good?

Now if only I can actually write all the damned things I've got in my head.

Comments

[mahala.livejournal.com]

Yay, go you indeed! :)

Don't you hate it when life cuts in for a while, or perhaps something else needs writing, and then you go back and your characters say, "Sorry, while you were gone we broke up/got married/had children/caught a strange disease/got run over by a truck/had adventures that will completely ruin your plotline"?

Or does that even make sense?

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Thanks!

*Laughs* Yeah, that sounds oddly familiar. I had the interesting experience once of leaving a character alone for a few years and, when I returned, having him inform me that, yeah, he still had the original problem I'd been dealing with, but he was totally traumatized by an illicit attraction to his much-younger sister.

Gee, thanks, Character. That makes this so much easier to write... :P

[mahala.livejournal.com]

Yeah, heh, but also more interesting.

Characters, wine, and cheese...all get better with age. :)

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

At the time, I was completely appalled. By now, I've gotten over it enough to accept him with some degree of equanimity. He was always insane... now he's got more reason for it. And, bless him, he's good enough never to do anything to her, which saves me from having to abandon the whole thing on the "dear god I can't have this guy as a main character" complaint.

Heck yes!