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#this is 6 weeks in a row probably the most consistent i've been with running in the past 5 years
nicistrying · 3 months
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Sunday 11th Feb
Snoozed all my alarms and didn't wake up til 9am today and initially I was disappointed but I remembered my sister called at like 11pm to say my dad had been rushed to hospital and I was on the phone until after midnight. I didn't go to bed til 1am so really 9 was probably about the right time to get up. Went out for another rainy walk with Maggie and felt a little bit better. We saw lots of deer and a couple of foxes playing in the woods 🥹 Got home and did some chores, then dragged myself out for a run knowing it would cheer me up. I was only planning to run the 3km or so down to the river and back but I managed a good pace and wanted to try to get a 5K under 32 mins which I can never seem to beat. Which is frustrating in itself but let's not unpack that now lol. I run purely for pleasure and endorphins and I'm not about to ruin something I love so much by being too hard on myself. Anyway because I didn't plan to run that far bc I fslt so gross, I had to improvise a loop at the end to get up to 5K but we live on a really fucking long steep hill and I ended up running up it like 3 times so my pace sucked. If I'd stayed down on the flat by the river I might have managed it but never mind. I got it in 32:20 which is slightly better than usual and it's still an achievement that I ran further than I had planned.
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Did 3 sets of KB squats, KB lunges, grasshoppers and plié squats when I got home to feel strong and in control bc my running form was terrible. Stretched with support from Coach Maggie, ran a hot bath in the meantime and had a soak at 2pm with a protein shake and all my nice bubble bath and body scrub and moisturiser from Christmas. I smell like candy floss and I love it 🍭
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Had lunch and just chilled for an hour watching tv, feeling too full and heavy. Went back out for another little walk before it got dark to stretch the legs and get us both some fresh air (Matt is working today). Called my dad while I was out and finally got an answer after his wife keeps hanging up on me. He was okay, just said he was exhausted understandably, and that the doctors still have no idea what's wrong with him. So we are no further forward ☹️
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And now snuggled up reading my book. Mac & cheese for dinner soon and Matt will be home in a couple of hours. Happy Sunday ❤️
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Finished reading Sanderson Secret Project 4! Thoughts below the cut (mostly copied from me messaging my friends on Discord)
the vibes are so scifi. Like it's still Breaths and Shardblades but he's being so science about it
Spren in Stormlight: magical girl fairy companions. Spren in this: AI companion built into your scifi augments
Ooh, Nomad's been to Ashyn? That's the only planet with floating cities near Roshar, iirc
I love that Rosharans always specify shade when they mention eye color. She doesn't just have green eyes she has light green eyes. That adjective is important
Man on the run for his life hasn't slept in a week no way out keeps getting distracted by the urge to do anthropology
Another thing that's very funny is Nomad is talking about how unbelievably low on Investiture he is and it's still, like, unfathomably wealthy by Nalthis standards
Actually I'm gonna look this up. Nomad has 1500 BEUs in chapter one. He had at least 18750 shortly before that.
In Warbreaker, Vasher starts off with around 50 Breaths, which he considers low while acknowledging that many people would not. Most Returned have the equivalent of 2000. This is enough to be worshiped as gods.
Ah okay looking at the coppermind for the Heightenings this makes sense. It's all very consistent
Fifth Heightening: 2000 Breaths: fast healing, high durability, casual magic Ninth Heightening: 20000 Breaths: oh, you know ;) Tenth Heightening: 50000 Breaths: now that's just excessive
Now I will exit the coppermind before I have another "let me just check Rayse's species midway through reading RoW" moment [Fun fact: vital status is listed right next to species!]
I'm sorry did this man break his radiant oaths and then Mayalaran his shardblade back to pseudo life? Is that what's happening here?
Chapter 6 "No. Even in my head I will not admit Rock is right about the airsick lowlander thing"
I thought part of that phrase sounded like Nazh's name!
Gonna be honest, given how very dead He is, I somehow doubt that Adonalsium will remember their plight eventually
Love that "one of them is secretly a dragon" is a legitimate possibility
Huh. I wonder if they're Ghostblood Scadrians, Harmony-sent Scadrians, or just random people
Chapter 9: "Walking into a storm wasn't something usually done on [Roshar]" Unless you're in the middle of dinner and you really need a knife, of course.
I really wonder how confusing it would be to read ssp4 without reading Stormlight Archive
Oh boy. Wit's here!
Like if you only read the secret projects as if they were a standalone series how long would it take to realize that the cabin boy, the coatrack, and the hologram are the same person
"back before God died" You mean before you and your friends killed God? It didn't just happen there was a whole 17 person conspiracy
Hoid has two modes: "I am a silly little man" and "I am older than your planet and I will weep as I allow it to burn". No in between
"Adonalsium will remember our plight eventually" Man who just got off a skype call with one of the people who murdered Adonalsium ten thousand years ago:...
"Can you fly?" "Who told you I used to- oh you mean fly a ship. Yeah probably."
"The Chorus tells of our old world..." "Yes, yes, the forests of Hell, we've all been there"
The implication that there's a thriving interplanetary job market for specifically bronze Mistings...
If there's one thing that I've learned from Homestuck, it's to never turn your back on the body
Every new hint about what went down on Roshar in the back half of Stormlight just increases my fear about what's going to go down in the back half of Stormlight,
"I was destined to unite all of my people" Man who used to work for Dalinar Kholin: l, and I cannot stress this enough, ol
"Your planet shouldn't have different countries. You should have conquered and unified it all" Sir I cannot stress enough how Big Roshar is. They can barely keep the Alethi Princedoms unified there are so many more people on Roshar than here and they are so much more spread out
Now I'm just picturing that Ron Swanson meme. "I laugh at who I want - Wit"
It feels appropriate that this guy's ancestors are from the planet most closely associated with Ambition
It also feels appropriate that Mercy was there, tbh
Love that this guy is not a particularly soldier-y guy by Rosharan standards, but he's got so much soldier energy in comparison to Canticle that no one has yet noticed that he physically can't hurt anyone
Love that they talk about actual rocket science but it's interspersed with phrases like "raw investiture" and "zephyr aether" and "why take all the effort to travel the void of space when you can just walk through another dimension to travel between planets?"
Yes, yes, the plot to kill God, we've all heard of it
Khriss's Second Law :D
I'm really wondering how newbie friendly this book is. Like, they're explaining everything, but they're also throwing a lot of terms around and all of them are things I already know. For me, who read Warbreaker, when he mentions Commands as a thing on Nalthis that's just a refresher. If that's all the context I have...
The fact that this book includes both hoverbikes and a room full of angry ghosts in the same town
Oh that is a very different perspective on the whole lighteyes/darkeyes thing
Ah. Hemolurgy. From Threnodites. He's right, the cosmere is an increasingly small place
Highspren????
What did he even swear to?
I mean "Auxiliary" isn't a very Honorspren name and obviously not all of Bridge Four are Windrunners but Most Of Them Are
262 "You threw out your conscience years ago, I know, though I never had a chance to meet her" Seriously what is going to go down in the back half of Stormlight
Roshar Man: yeah you can totally go into the murder storm my friend Kal does it all the time lmao
They're called Skybreakers because they break you. Storms yeah Bridge Four!
Yessss He did the thing! I was hoping he'd do the salute!
Oh, that's who Zellion is
Hoid, Zahel, etc: I'm changing my name just for fun. Just for the vibes. New planet new me :) Also same planet new me :) Aliases are so fun :) Elegy: I'm literally not the same person anymore but I am keeping the name because it fits me really well. Dead me can change her name idc
Yeah something really bad goes down in the back half of Stormlight. They should not be that surprised to see a Rosharan.
Awakened Steelmind? This tech is so fun
"I like to think that this is all part of God's plan. That He made before He died :)" -- Tootsie Noodles, Starship (2011)
"God had nothing to do with it it was all Auxiliary." "And what's Auxiliary?" [Zellion remembers that spren are fragments of Honor and Cultivation, who are/were themselves Shards of Adonalsium] "..."
"Sigzil was a capable fighter, but far from the Order's best" -- Rhythm of War chapter 6
I'm done btw
Also I didn't talk about her much but I love how down for murder Elegy is. She loves her sister and she's learning all about different kinds of strength but she was so happy when she had that shardblade
Also, speaking of Stormlight, didn't love Nomad mentioning that glowing red eyes remind him of his friends! Hope he just meant Renarin and Rlain but I'm worried he didn't!
In retrospect it makes perfect sense that they already know about the Shattering. They fled Threnody, which is only Like That because of the Odium/Ambition/Mercy fight that killed Uli Da and Splintered Ambition. Those three only existed as Shards because they had already killed Adonalsium.
Also I hadn't realized or had forgotten that Shades are a "being from Threnody" thing, rather than a "dying on Threnody" thing
Fascinating that Auxiliary's corpse can still change forms even when his consciousness is completely gone. That implies that Maya and the others did something on purpose to lock themselves into sword form, rather than it being a direct consequence of the spen dying.
Also don't think I didn't notice Sanderson deliberately dancing around exactly what Sigzil's oaths were. He was Fourth Ideal in two different Orders and everything past Second is personalized
Of course the Scadrians don't interfere except to ruin things. That's so Scadrial
Love Nomad repeatedly going "Okay... I'm Azish, though." Man isn't Thaylen or Alethi it's a completely different culture that happens to share a planet. The Cinder King has no concept of this. The Greater Good doesn't even understand the difference between Roshar and Scadrial
I was laughing at the Cinder King for thinking that you could just conquer all of Roshar (it's so big), and then I remembered the Voidbringer reveal in... I think Words of Radiance? And just started laughing harder. They literally did conquer the entire planet, other than the Shattered Plains and a few other remote areas. That canonically happened
Adonalsium is literally mentioned more in ssp4 than all the other Cosmere books combined lol
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Evading eternal gloom and chaos in general | November Goals Update
Hey People of Earth!
Today is December 1st. Which means, November (death) is over, and I can officially restart life during Christmas break in 21 days. November as a whole was much better than October (so much, we don't even compare the two) which is strange, as November is the month of death usually because school gets crazy. Regardless, I’m very pleased that I somehow evaded eternal gloom (for the most part) in November.
Some cool things happened this month, including two university open houses in two different locations in Ontario (London + Windsor = two road trips, two weekends in a row), that high school dance life (my first hs dance when ur last year is next year and this is the first social occasion you’ve attended haaaa lol rip) and Literally The Worst Case Of Writer’s Block Ever I Kid You Not. (Which I will definitely go into in this month’s writing update!)
Overall, November was this very chaotic amalgamation of busy, but cumulatively, was pretty darn memorable. Darn.
Onto the goals.
(Also, I don't know if I’ve ever explained this in recent years, but I work with goals in a very strange way. As in, I don't really work with them, as in, I write these posts every month with goals, then never refer to them for the entire month, then come back a month later ?? and ?? for some ?? reason this ?? works ?? it’s also very entertaining to laugh at my failures is that morbid that I enjoy this very much oh no)
(I enjoy writing these posts a lot though, they give me some time to reflect on the last 30 or 31 days I’ve lived and they act as a great routine. :))
Anywhoozies, onto the things I did and mostly did not do:
1. Hit 15k in FOSTERED #6
So. Let’s just talk about this goal very briefly, shall we. As I mentioned above, November and I did not get along in terms of writing, as in, November served me a big ol’ slice of Writer’s Block and left me to choke on it. I wasn't really expecting this block to be so severe, but it was a thing, and it was very real. I mentioned this in DtWT #66, and I know writer’s block is controversial (some people thinks it’s a bullshit excuse, some people don't care, some people strongly believe in it, etc). I stand on the side of ‘in creative fields, every artist is bound to run into some form of a challenge at some point in their career’. As a creative person, I've experienced tons of creative block. In some cases, yes, this block is caused by fear, lack of ideas, sometimes procrastination, but ohhhh myyy, November’s writer’s block was none of these things.
Initially, it was straight up fear, I’ll admit that. I was just starting this book, didn't want to screw up the beginning of the *very last* book, couldn't piece together ideas that I thought were good even though @sarahkelsiwrites​ was very honest about them and had good feedback, etc, etc. I would say the first week and a half of this block were straight-up fear based. And then weeks 2 + 3 came and it sort of wasn't anymore. I wasn't scared to write this book because at this point, I was pretty fed up with my moping and fear, and just wanted to get some words out.
*and then the words stopped coming and they just stopped coming*
(which isn't entirely the truth, but let me elaborate)
In this time period, I was still writing. I was still hitting my 250 goal almost every single day, and there wasn't one day I didn't go about writing, or go about figuring out how to go about writing. To me, writer’s block doesn't mean I’m not writing. It just means there’s this disconnect that prevents me from immersing myself into my work, thus holding me back from creating the best thing I possibly can, OR making me think I’m creating something of unsubstantial standards. Does this make sense.
So yes, I was very out of it, and I really do think this block was triggered by fear, and once I got over that fear, lingered. BUT I’m doing MUCH better now, let’s not jinx this, AKA I hit 15 587 words this month and when I made this goal literally didn't think I would haaaa bless.
2. Outline more of ALANNIS, and like maybe try to finish it, though I mean this isn’t going to happen, so yeah, just work on it pls
No. lol. So. I’m going to count this as a half win, because I did complete this goal, but not by much. In October’s post, I mentioned I wanted to go through this outline to see if I could possibly shift some of them into the POV of my boi Matthew. This novel is narrated by Chris, and while I love my girl, something was missing from the story, and so I was like, yanno, screw it, let’s see if I can find some chapters to give to Matt just for the hell of it. Overall, I found about 12 or so chapters I could give to him (excluding new ideas that I haven't gotten, but yes), which is pretty good. Not sure I even want to do this dual POV thing, but I mean, I worked on the outline sort of so. (I really need to get on top of this thing I’ve been outlining it for like a year oops.)
3. Upload cover making video
So abridged version of this disclaimer: basically, my hard drive died on me this month, it had all the footage for all my upcoming YouTube vids, including all the speedpaints and cover making vids, lol sigh back up your stuff kids, didn't listen to myself, rip my data, you will be missed (didn’t lose anything personal and my documents are always protected because they’re the most important) SOOO that happened. HOWEVERRR, this is not an excuse for why I did not finish this goal because I literally had another cover making video exported and ready on my computer BUUUUT I’m vERYyyY extra and wasn't liking how my THUMBNAIL was coming out so yesterday when I was scrambling to actually get this goal done because good job time management, was like yo okay imma redo this tomorrow, and so here’s the thumbnail:
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And here’s the ugly shit it was before:
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AND ACTUALLY, the only reason I never got this vid up like I dunno THREE WEEKS AGO WHEN IT WAS READY, was because of this THUMBNAILLLL WHICH HAS BEEN LIKE A 2 WEEK PROCESS.
(why do I take these things so seriously)
(this thumbnail took me longer to make than the goddamn book cover)
(I digress so sorry for that rant)
(th u mb n a il)
I did get the video up today, though, and you can watch it right here:
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4. Read a book yo.
I actually did this, lol. I finished Kristen Martin’s Shadow Crown this month and started History of Wolves by Emily Fridlund, but I’ve been reading that one at school and like, so far, I’m getting the vibe that I need some hardcore tea and snow and a fire log and some peace and quiet to just appreciate this book because so far I’ve read it in math class and while I do enjoy my math class, i’m getting the feeling this book ain’t no math class aesthetic. (so, the answer is, no I didn't finish this book, but yes, I really really want to because i’m liking it a lot so far and the voice is nice as fuuuuuuuuh and dooooon’t get me started on the writing clapz for dayz)
5. Finish another character portrait
I actually did four portraits this month, two of which are Christmas gifts so I can’t share those at the moment, but here’s one I did of @sarahkelsiwrites​’ character Simon:
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(and you can watch the speedpaint HERE)
And then one I did of Quinn, my MC for THIS IS WHERE THE END STARTS:
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(which might be my favourite piece of art and you can watch the speedpaint HERE)
6. Find and finalize an ALANNIS epigraph
I dunno why this is still a goal because I’m literally not going to do it if I’m hardly working on the darn outline, but yes, no, fail.
7. Work on FOSTERED #5′s book cover
Epic fail, XD. I don't like the design of the re-designed FOSTERED covers, but for the sake of consistency, I’m going along, and that's serving for some unenthusiastic cover designing but I do need to get this done so I can order copies. (WHICH, by the way, I have a new copy of I’M DISAPPOINTED to order, a copy of my sister’s novel, A HAPPINESS TO WONDER, a copy of my novelette sort of thing THE TREATED and on top of this FOSTERED #5, you can totally call me cheap for realllyyyy not wanting to pay for that shipping twice, lol. Point is, I’ll be doing an unboxing because those are literally my favourite videos ever and I’ve watched every single one on YouTube no lie. ;))
So those were the goals. Finished 4ish/almost5 out of 7 goals this much which is pretty ass, but the ones I didn't finish (with the exception of one AKA THE OUTLINE) weren't super important. Some shtuff I’d like to get done in December:
1. Hit 25k in FOSTERED #6 (aka REWIRED)
2. Outline more of ALANNIS, and like maybe try to finish it, though I mean this isn’t going to happen, so yeah, just work on it pls
COME ONNNN
(it’s literally been so long since I actually outlined this book)
3. Upload a video
4. Read a book yo.
I really do doubt I’ll get this one done, but it’d be real nice.
5. Finish another character portrait
7. Work on FOSTERED #5′s book cover
Probably also won’t finish this oneeee haaaheeaahahe
8. Make a character aesthetic
(this is sort of a cop out because I have to make one for Lonan this month since his birthday is on the 9th and for those birthday posts I need one but also I've been telling myself to do this since the start of November and ohhh noo I’m running out of time oops)
So that’s it for now, folks. I hope your November was great. :) Keep an eye out for the monthly writing update! That’s it for now, thanks for reading!
--Rachel
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