Day 28: Do You Believe in the Supernatural?

This is probably going to be the most controversial post I make, potentially ever. People are either strongly one way or the other, very rarely will you get people in the middle.

The short answer to this question is yes, I do.

The long answer isn’t quite that clear cut.

First, to explain myself I’m going to need to talk about my family.

My dad is a firm skeptic. He does not believe anything having to do with the supernatural or the paranormal or anything like that. Whenever someone brings it up he’ll either roll his eyes or he’ll dismiss whatever they have to say. And this is despite the fact that my Nana, his mother, was an adamant believer. I can’t speak for my Poppy, I didn’t really know my grandparents because they died when I was young. But from my understanding, they were both believers as well.

According to my mom, he used to believe, but then something happened and he refuses to believe it. What exactly happened, I can’t tell you because he refuses to talk about it.

My mom is a firm believer in the supernatural and paranormal. She believes in ghosts, guardian angels. I’m not sure if she believes in cryptids but it’s not something that genuinely comes up.

My sister is a firm believer in it all as well. Cryptids included.

My brother is a skeptic. He’s not quite as narrow minded as my dad but he’s always trying to find a logical and scientific reasoning behind something. Most of the time if something happens he can chalk it up to one of our pets.

My reasoning goes back a little further because on both sides of my family we sort of have a connection with it. There’s a string of Wicca and paganism on my mom’s side. On my dad’s side, there’s also a bit of Wicca from my Nana. From my Poppy, his family had practiced the religion of Voodoo and Hoodoo I believe.

There’s a lot of unexplained things that have gone on in my family. Something I’m trying to explore now that I’m older and capable of understanding it.

When I was younger I was more sensitive to the supernatural world around me. Talking to my sister about it, she’s still quite sensitive to the world around her, she thinks that I might have blocked out part of my ability to see the supernatural world because it terrified me as a kid.

Thinking about it, it makes sense to me. I’ve always had an overactive imagination that terrified me, I didn’t need that as well. And I had blocked out a lot of things from when I was younger due to bad memories. I got bullied a lot, I don’t want to relive it.

Beyond all of that, I do believe that there are things that cannot be explained. I’m not going to immediately jump to it’s a ghost. But there are stories about creatures like black dogs, Wendigos, skinwalkers, vampires, werewolves, etc. A lot of them span over various countries and continents, there is at least a thread of truth in them somewhere. There are creepy and crazy and disturbing things that we already know about, that terrify us. Why can’t a ten foot tall, ape-human creature exist?

But that’s my opinion. What do you guys believe?

Thank you so much for joining me for day 28 of my Blogtober challenge, which is where I post a fall or Halloween themed post every day for the month of October. So, if you liked what you saw here you can come back tomorrow and see what I have for you then. Or, if it’s after the 31st then all of these are up and you check them all out if you’d like. Thank you again for joining me, I hope you have a great day/afternoon/evening/night, and I will see you next time.

-T.R. Flynn.

Day 21: Fall Obsessions

Perhaps I’ve overstated what I mean in the title, however, I feel as though I’ve done too many fall favourite and least favourite lists so far. This is just going to be me going over some of the things that I’ve been using so far this season that I really like and sharing them with you.

Most of these are going to be writing/editing related, as that’s mostly what I’ve been exploring the past few months because I’ve been trying really hard to get my works in progress readable.

1. Writing Excuses- Podcast.

I’m sure if you’re a writer you’ve either heard of this or had someone recommend this to you. I actually find it to be a really good resource. It’s hosted by Brandon Sanderson, Howard Taylor, and Dan Wells; all of whom are very prominent and successful authors.

They go over everything from basic writing techniques and building blocks, to quiring agents, presenting your manuscript, marketing, self-editing, and more. I have found this very useful as I try to find my legs in this industry. I’m presently in season 5 of 13 at the time of writing this if that tells you how much I like it.

I particularly like their podcast because, for me, it really shows that no matter how high on the ladder and successful you get, we all start somewhere. And, sometimes, they are just as clueless as I am. Which makes me smile and really makes me feel like I’m not alone in my endeavors.

Link here—>>> https://writingexcuses.com/ 

2. Grammarly- Writing/Editing Program.

I’m sure most, if not all, of you have heard of Grammarly. It’s a free editing software that helps you with your spelling and grammar in real time. I’m actually using it right now as I type this up.

You can have it in your window/browser and use it there. You can also download it to your computer and have it in a regular document if you’d like. Which I might end up doing.

I do a lot of my writing and editing in my own word documents right on my computer because my internet has the tendency to lag and drop at the most inconvenient times.

I’ve only been using Grammarly for about a week or so now, but I’m very happy with it. My one complaint is that it uses American spelling, whereas I use Canadian/UK spelling and it doesn’t seem to recognize the difference there. Maybe in the future, they’ll fix it. But overall, very happy.

Link if you would like to check it out —>>> https://app.grammarly.com/

3. Neffex- Musician.

So, recently I’ve been creating playlists for my works in progress to help get me into the mood and my character’s headspace. For my newest pieces, Trials for the Princess Ryanne and War for the Good King respectively, I’ve wanted a lot of anthem sounding songs. Songs that make me feel powerful and the world is at my fingertips.

In my search, I came across Neffex. While I’m not a huge fan of all their songs, I rarely am of an artist or band, there were a couple of songs that I loved and that resonated with me enough for me to add them to my playlists.

Watch Me

Fight Back

The music style kinda blurs the line for me between techno/dubstep and rock, which I really like. I’m not a music person, so I can’t say what they do to make me like it so much, but I do. And, that’s good enough for me.

4. Hemingway Editor- Writing/Editing Program.

I think I found this through Tumblr, but I’m not certain.

What this is, is a program that will show you where your writing is weak. It has a colour coded highlighting system that lets you know if certain words are redundant if there’s a better word option if your sentences are run on or fragments. It can identify passive voice.

I’ll be honest, I’ve only used it in small samples so I haven’t had the full experience of it yet. I tried to implement a full chapter at one point, but it didn’t format right, so I think that’s my one issue.

So far though, this is a Godsend. I suggest this to anyone who’s looking for a little more in their editing programs or has issues in identifying passive voice or are having editing issues on a line level. I will most certainly be exploiting using this in the future.

Link here if you’re interested —>>> http://www.hemingwayapp.com/

5. Comparing Heights- Measurement Program?

I’ve been using this as a guide. In my newest works in progress, I have a decent sized cast, but they are all drastically different heights. I have two who are like six feet tall, I have one who’s like five feet tall, I have another who’s the average height for a girl. Heights and body types are all over the place for me here.

And, it gets rather difficult for me to picture it in my head when I have such a diverse cast and they’re, say, trudging through a swamp and I need to know how high up the water will come on all of them.

You can have up to six figures/silhouettes, each a different colour from the others. And you can name them all too in case you get confused by the colour, or some of your characters are the same heights. You have the option of female and male silhouettes too, which I think is really nice.

I don’t know how useful this could be to the rest of you, but just in case you’re interested.

Link—>>>> http://www.mrinitialman.com/OddsEnds/Sizes/compsizes.xhtml

6. Shakespearian Insults- Resource.

This is very circumstantial to me, but in one of my pieces, a character of mine is very theatrical. She’s incredibly over the top, so as a character quirk I made it so when she spews insults they’re all Shakespearian.

It is so hilarious to write, and sift through to try to find the best ones that suit the person she’s insulting. I love it so much! And it’s even better because she’s the shortest one in the group, but she has the sharpest tongue.

It’s very circumstantial, but I find it incredibly useful so I really wanted to share.

Link here—>>>  https://homelessphilosopher.wordpress.com/2013/02/08/thou-beslubbering-fat-kidneyed-clotpole/

Alright, I think that’s all I have for you right now. I hope you find this useful, at least a little.

Thank you so much for joining me for day 21 of my Blogtober challenge, which is where I post a new fall or Halloween themed post every day for the month of October. If you like this come back tomorrow to see what I have for you then. And, if it’s after the 31st all of these are up for you to check out if you like. I hope you are having a great day/afternoon/evening/night, and if it’s not great, I hope it gets there. I will see you next time.

-T.R. Flynn.

Day 16: Least Favourite Monster

And we are back for yet another installment of my favourites and least favourites. If you haven’t checked out my previous post where I talk about my favourite monster I would suggest going and checking that out first. Or, if you liked hearing me complain here, you can check it out afterwards.

Monsters can be defined two ways. The first is by horrendous deeds done to the innocent. The second is by their strange appearances. By our modern definition a monster generally ticks both boxes, especially if they want to be featured in a horror movie or video game.

Now there are countless monsters out there, some are scarier than others. Some of you might not even like monsters in general due to them scaring you as a child. And that’s fine. The monsters that scared me most as a child are the ones that continue to scare me today, now that I’m in my twenties.

But, when I say least favourite, I don’t mean the ones I don’t want to run into in a dark alley in the middle of the night. Or woods. Or my basement. Or pull me out of bed when I can’t sleep and hear a strange noise. I’m talking about the ones that have either been over done, poorly written, or were just plain made lame by Hollywood.

If you are curious about the creatures that do genuinely scare me I will be doing a post later on in the month about that. But, without further ado, I’ll address the question.

My least favourite monster?

Vampires.

I can probably leave this post here and people will understand why that is, but I feel the need to further explain. And get a little bit of a higher word count going.

You can thank Stephenie Meyer for the reasoning of this.

I will be honest and say that I have not read Twilight and I do not see the appeal of it.

But I will also be honest and say that what she herself had done alone, just in her own works of Twilight, has not ruined vampires for me. It’s the mass wave of sexy, bad boy, overbearing vampire boyfriends and cardboard cut outs of dishrag heroines that came after its success.

I can’t necessarily fault her for taking creative license and making her vampires sparkly, like that’s fine. But the fact that it became the standard. And how now if you have a vampire in your novel people automatically assume that it’s either wish fulfillment, a fanfic of the original, or a carbon copy.

Vampires initially were dark, disfigured creatures that shunned the sunlight and other people. Kinda like writers. And I have no problem with vampires being immune to sunlight, or some of the folk tales being complete make believe. It’s your story, do whatever the hell you want.

But it’s gotten to such a point in fiction that when I wanted to write a vampire character in a wip of mine that revolves around witches, demons, werewolves, fairies, goblins, wendigos, etc., I really struggled to write him the way that I wanted because I didn’t want people to think it was in the same vein as Edward Cullen, or any of the other countless stupid characters like that. And I still am.

If you really want to write vampires, or see more of them in media portrayed in ways you want, sometimes you need to roll up your sleeves and be the change.

I am not a point where I can realistically give that story or its characters the life they deserve, so it’s not going to be here for a while yet. That being said, I’m not giving up on it.

I would love to see more vampires depicted in media, I would actually love to see all monsters portrayed better in media. But I want to see them done well.

I’m pretty sure that the sparkly vampire phase of our existence fizzled out in 2015, 2016. There are still people who swear by books like Twilight and will probably call for my head on a spike after reading this. That’s fine, this isn’t for you. We’re in a new era of consumption where we, the average person, can decide what we like and the big book houses, movie producers, video game makers, etc have to listen to us lest they lose their market.

Well, now that I’ve gotten sufficiently real enough. Do you agree with me about vampires? Is there another monster you really don’t like for one reason or another? Tell me about them in the comments. I’d love to hear what you have to say.

Thank you so much for joining me for day 16 of my October 2018 Blogging Challenge, which is where I post a fall or Halloween themed post everyday for the month of October. So, if you liked what you see you can come back tomorrow for what I have for you then. Or, if it’s after the 31st, you have all of these posts to go through at your leisure. Either way, I hope you are having a great day/afternoon/evening/night, and I will see you next time.

-T.R. Flynn.

Day 15: Favouite Monster

We’re in the thick of it now.

Monsters have existed since the beginning of man. At first it was the big predators, and the darkness, sickness, the devil. In more recent times, when people think of monsters they think of the bogey man, vampires, werewolves, ghosts, etc. Something that makes all of these scary is the element of unknown. There have been countless renditions of each of these monsters throughout history, some better than others. But the generally consensus is that these monsters are human sized or larger, difficult to kill, crazy strong, come out at night/in the dark, and not a lot is known about them.

I love monsters just because there is so much you can do with them, both from a story telling perspective and a costume perspective.

Monsters have terrified and befriended me as a child, and I loved every second of it. And now I face the dilemma of telling you what my favourite is.

And I have to say, Swamp monsters.

 

Now, I love sea creatures, they fascinate me. But swamps, bogs, lakes. You can’t see the bottom. You can hardly see in front of your face sometimes. You have no idea what’s in there or how isolated things have evolved.

One of the things I love the most is what you can do. You can have a fish swamp monster. A lizard. It can be a skeletal creature covered in moss and algae and gunk. They can be gigantic, or human sized, or small. They can be like Muk the blob from pokemon and just a giant, anthropomorphic ball of sludge.

They don’t even have to be evil either.

I know when a lot of us think monster we think bad, or evil, or something that just wants to cause us harm. Monster can just be considered as aesthetically unpleasing. It looks different or strange to our narrow eyes.

A swamp monster could just be territorial. Or kind, but because of threats from humans remains recluse. Or has never encountered a human before.

They can be carnivorous, or photosynthesize in order to live.

One of the reasons I really like them too is because swamp monsters haven’t been over done. There isn’t a lot of media depicting them. Double edged sword I suppose, but they are a versatile creature with so much potential. And I would love to see more of them if they are done well.

It was really, really difficult for me to pick one. I know there are others that I missed, probably some really good ones. So, what’s your favourite monster? Tell me in the comments. And it doesn’t have to be like an old school horror movie monster either. Urban legends, folk tales, monsters that exist in your part of the world. I would love to hear about all of them.

That’s all I have for now. Thank you so much for joining me for day 15 of my October 2018 Blogging Challenge, which is where I post a fall or Halloween themed post everyday for the month of October. If you liked what you saw here, please come back tomorrow and see what I have for you then. And, if it’s after the 31st, you have all of these to look through if you want. I hope you have a great day/afternoon/evening/night, and I hope those creatures don’t come for you. I’ll see you next time.

-T.R. Flynn

P.S.

If you are interested in finding out where I got those pictures, I have links for you here. Some of them came from devianart, so go and support those artists there if you liked their work.

https://www.moddb.com/groups/orc-clan-and-orcs-fan-group/images/swamp-monster

https://www.pinterest.ca/pin/505599495640789523/?lp=true (This one I could only find a pinterest for, if anyone knows who the actual creator of this was please let me know so I can properly credit them here for it.)

Day 13: Least Favourite Seasonal Treat

I already talked about my favourite fall recipes, and when I was thinking about what I was going to write for this post, the original concept was ‘favourite seasonal treat’, I realized I kinda already did that and it would seem redundant to just cut and paste like that.

So, because I play both ways, I’m going to talk about some of the worst treats that come along in October.

1. Candy Corn

I know I’m not the only one who has had this iconic candy, and doesn’t like it. If you do, more power to you. But this is my list.

Candy corn always meant that Halloween was right around the corner, and I doubt I could go a single year without seeing it. But that doesn’t mean I like it. The colours are beautiful and scream fall and Halloween, but it just tastes gross to me. And I don’t like the texture.

It’s a great decoration, but I don’t want to eat it.

2. Rockets

If you’re in America, I think you call these Smarties. But where I live Smarties are something else, we call these rockets.

I don’t like rockets. They’re chalky and don’t have a lot of flavour to them. I was fine with getting these while I was a kid because, even though I didn’t like them, my mom does. So my siblings and I, as we were sorting and trading our candy, would give most of these to our mom. At least I think I did. I don’t remember if my siblings liked these, but I don’t.

They aren’t so much a staple of Halloween like Candy corn is, because we can get rockets year round here. But they always at least look fun to me.

3. Rainbow Lollipops?

I’ll be honest, I don’t now exactly what these are called. To find this picture I had to search up white and coloured lollipops.

I don’t like these things. I’m not a big fan of lollipops, or suckers as my family at least calls them, but my preference lays with cherry and grape flavoured ones. Maybe I’m weird and you like these things.

From my recollection, they don’t have that great a flavour, and their texture is almost milky as opposed to hard candy-y.

I’d rather get chocolate than suckers any day.

4. Witch Kisses

These are also called molasses kisses, or molasses toffee if I’m correct.

Basically I don’t like these because of the deception. You look at these and they scream Halloween. You unwrap them, and you think ‘Oooh! Toffee! Or a caramel!’. And then you take a bite, and it’s molasses. And year after year, I remember getting deceived by the colourful wrappers and the promise of chocolate or caramel.

I like molasses, in gingerbread, or gingersnaps. Not my candy.

Now, unlike the rest of these, I can actually understand why someone would like these candies. My mom loves them, and that’s because when she was a kid they would make them. And they were a very special treat for her that she didn’t get very often. So, it kinda brings good childhood memories to her, which makes me happy too.

Did you like any of these candies that I don’t and think I’m wrong? Are there other candies or treats that come out in the fall/around Halloween that you don’t like? Let me know in the comments, and we can talk about them.

That you so much for joining me for day 13 of my October 2018 Blogger Challenge, where I post a fall or Halloween themed post everyday for the month of October. If you liked what you saw here, feel free to come back tomorrow and see what I have for you then. I promise it won’t be a negative post. Or, if it’s after the 31st, you can check out all the posts that I have up.

Thank you so much for joining me, I hope you have a great day/afternoon/evening/night, and I will see you next time.

-T.R. Flynn.