(View my full list of goals for 2008)

The final update !! I stroke some more goals as achieved, although there is still some more work needed in spite of the improvements. Sadly, I lost the challenge and won't get another beautiful certificate to hang on the walls. Still, I'm pretty much happy with what I have done.
And more, I won't let thing rest here and go on with the goals I put on hiatus and even add some new ones - I'll type a wee list later on the day.

( The last update for 2008 ! )

(View the full list of goals)

It was time I updated this too ! I'm 1 month and half overdue T_T
But I have some good news though ^^ (and some bad ones too... T_T)

( The late and next to last update ! )

(View full list here)

Not much progress, 2 more abandoned goals... Could it be worse ?


( Ow ow ow >.< )

(List of BFSGs for 2008)

Very little progress - sadly...

( August update )

(Full list of BFSGs for 2008)

And one more goal achieved ! But not as much progress in the other fields... sadly...

(Full list of Big Fun Scary Goals for 2008)

Bad news : 2 goals abandoned... :(
Good news : One goal achieved ! :D
And some progress...

( Late June update )

View my full list of Big Fun Scary Goals for 2008



Too little progress overall - this was really a bad month T_T  Things should get better next month.

View my full list of Big Fun Scary Goals for 2008

Whoa ! I missed the train for the April update. OK, here goes :

( Delayed update for April (long post, hence the cut) )

View the full list of my Big Fun Scary Goals for 2008

* I'm done with The Subtle Knife and it was with a heavy heart that I closed the book. The end is so sad ! But I won't say more - major spoiler ! Before starting the tome that is The Amber Spyglass, I want to give a quick shot to an issue of Writing Magazine I bought last month and Alan Moore's Writing for Comics. It seems my interest in scriptwriting is not just a whim after all...

* The novel progresses slowly but surely. I'm working more seriously on the characters, based on the questions from No Plot? No problem!. They are slowly gaining in depth, and so is the story universe ! New characters and new breeds are coming in. This is becoming more and more exciting !

I have a clearer outline for the first part, but I am wondering if I should start writing it before drawing an outline for the second part. It's not just because I'm growing sick of planning and more and more impatient to start writing, but I have also realized that some things change or new elements come up during the writing process and it might have an influence on the following parts of the story. This happens often when I write an essay for a school assignment, and it happened during NaNoWriMo, so why not there ?

Also, I seriously need to review my writing schedule. I broke it during the holidays and ended up writing nothing. Shame on me ! I am wondering if I'd better write in the afternoon after school, because doing it in the morning often has me turned up late for class, which is not good at all. I have also decided to buy a memory stick to store the novel on, so I could use both of my laptops to write it.

Last but not least : I have a working title ! At last ! I opted for the Irish Gaelic word Riastrad, which means "body contortion" or "body warp". In celtic mythology, it referred to CuChulainn's battle frenzy, in wich he undergoes a strange and monstrous metamorphosis. I thought this word would be appropriate to refer to a werewolf transformation fuelled by rage and anger, like in Werewolf : The Apocalypse and like the one Ciara experiences. But it's just a working title and if the story had to be published, I'd go for something different, for I don't think a Gaelic word would make it.
(No Kery, it won't be "super magical lovely wolf girl" XD)

* I got two more Distinctions in Media Web Design and Film Studies :D I am waiting the results for the assignments I recently gave in Sound Editing, Historical Referencing and Computer Fundamentals, and the one for 3D Modelling is due for wednesday...

* I definitely won't go to Download Festival this year - not just because I lack the money, but mostly because it takes place before the end of the school term. That'd be quite messy to do a festival while classes are still on. What if there were other assignments due to this period ? It kinda breaks my heart when I think of all the great bands and performances I'm gonna miss, but there are other rock festivals that'll take place in England later in the summer, like Reading or the Carling week-end, so I'll check the dates and prices and see. Also, I recently met Maryline, the girl I went to Download with last summer, and she's OK to do another festival with me this summer. At least, I know I won't be alone.

* I got a letter from my English penpal and she's OK we meet up this summer. Now how to organize that with the visit to my parents in France ? And the festival - if I can afford it ? And could I afford a trip to England at all ?

* I did a bit of drawing too during the holidays, but I've started new drawings instead of finishing an old one, as I wrote in my list of goals. Most of them are sketches of my novel characters and only one of them can make a proper drawing worth of a CG finition. But it's the old ones that need working on...

* I haven't weighed in a long time, but I've let myself go in the field of dieting and exercize, although I went jogging twice during the Easter holidays. I haven't seen the gym in ages, nor the swimming pool since Stephanie left Derry. I have decided to go swimming in the afternoons, after work. That should be working...

Looks like I've let myself go too much in general... Not good, not good at all ! >.< Somebody kick me in the butt !

Now back to that bloody essay...

View my full list of big fun scary goals for 2008


* No progress in the books list. With the near-depression I was in during January, I felt like re-reading my self-help books and it did me a lot of good. On the other hand, it's quite sad to see how quick I am to forget the things that are good for me and to fall back into my bad habits. I  now have to tape my walls with reminders, affirmations and that kind of things, so many that anyone visiting my room will wonder if I'm gone nuts - wait ! I AM already nuts ! And by the way, building my confidence and my self-esteem is also one of my BFSGs :p
I'm done with my 2 self-help books and I've started No Plot? No problem!. I didn't want to wait til next NaNoWriMo to start it and I believed I could find some interesting tips. I should be starting The Subtle Knife by next week...
 
* My new writing routine seems to be working fine. As a reminder, I decided to work on my novel every monday, wednesday and friday morning before class. However, I think of leaving monday morning for sleeping in for I'm finding it hard to get up on monday mornings and I always find myself with hardly half an hour left to write. So that'll be wednesday and friday mornings.

* As I wrote in my other LJ, I got another distinction in Sound Editing (I still can't believe it !). I gave another assignment this morning in Film Studies and I will be really surprised if I don't get another good mark for that one. There are other units I'm still expecting results from...

* Given my current financial problems, I'm preparing myself to cross Download Festival from my projects for this summer. I 'm such in debt that it won't be before June that the hole will be filled up again - and Download Festival is in mid-june. That means, I have to prepare myself mentally too to lose that challenge.... unless I find a £500 note in the street or win the lottery or inherit a large sum of money from a late distant parent I never heard about... You'll never know !
Note for next year : don't take any goal that involves large sums of money !

* If I make it in France in summer, I'll have a chance to see real wolves :D Gee, I wonder why I haven't asked my parents earlier - for they know about a place where you can see a whole pack of gorgeous wolves (their words). That would have spared me all this time broswing the web for zoos in England that almost look inaccessible...

* And I definitely need to get back to doing exercise ! I've been cutting too much slack in this field. With the nice weather coming back, I can at last resume jogging and swimming. I also found an open meditation center and want to give it a shot. Yoga at the gym was nice but how can you quiet the mind with techno music blaring from upstairs ?!

Still 10 months to go... Not to lose faith...

* One book down ! : I finished Northern Lights today. However, it will be quite a while before I start The Subtle Knife, as I have lots of stuff to read for school. I'd also like to have a peek at No plot? No problem!, which I received a few weeks ago.

* I made a quick investigation on places in Ireland and Britain where you can see wolves. In Ireland, there's simply no such place. In Britain, there are a few zoos with wolves but they seem a bit out of reach (I mean, not accessible by public transport). Then I realized there was another place I should have looked at first : France ! And guess what ? There are a couple of zoos and parks in the Vosges (where my family lives) that have wolves ! Yoo-hoo ! Well, now to convince my parents to take me to one of these places...

* I haven't resumed writing my novel yet, but I have been working on it though. Well, sort of. I continue gathering information, noting ideas and working out a plot, well whenever inspiration strikes and unfortunately, it always does whenever I need to focus on more important things.
Anyway, the story is taking a far better shape. It's getting richer and goes on a far larger scale than Ciara's school and Noran City. Ciara has changed a lot too, and for good - she's no more that hopeless little whiner of the NaNoWriMo version. The other characters are getting more interesting too.
He, I dug up my Werewolf: The Apocalypse books from my cardboard boxes in France and brought them to Derry, to see what I can take from them, even though I don't intend to write a WtA fanfic. I already know that quite a lot of elements of the games won't fit in my story, but it's still worth having a look at...

* I got another Distinction in Film Studies for my work about Tim Burton. Yoo-hoo ! ^0^ Oddly, I haven't received any news about my assignments in the other units. I don't even know if I passed them. I don't want to sound like I'm boasting, but I'd be quite surprised if I failed a unit.

View my full list of big fun scary goals for 2008

Now back to that bloody essay about technological development and animation.... -_-

(X-posted in larystienli  and the Big Fun Scary Goals forum in the NaNowriMo website)





I didn't win NaNoWriMo but I hope to win this one. Here's a list of goals I've decided to accomplish during the year 2008 :

- finish my still untitled werewolf story I started in november and write at a pace of 3-5 hours per week ; ON INDEFINITE HIATUS
- go to a zoo or a natural park to see real wolves ; ACHIEVED !!
- read all the books I've bought in the last months and years (see list below) ; PUT OFF TO NEXT YEAR
- finish all the drawings I've started in the recent months and years and post them in DeviantArt ; ACHIEVED !!
- go to another rock festival ;  ABANDONED
- continue improving my confidence and self-esteem ; ACHIEVED !!
- do more exercise (yoga and swimming), eat more healthily and lose another 5 kilos ; ACHIEVED !!
- visit my English penpal ; ABANDONED
- find another part-time job (and better and more fulfilling than my current one) ; ABANDONED
- finish my college year with a distinction ;  ACHIEVED !!
- take part to NaNoWriMo for the 2nd time and meet the 50K words target ; ACHIEVED !!
- take part to a text submission or writing comp (or something like that...). PUT OFF TO NEXT YEAR

My  list of books to read :

(FR - books in French, EN - books in English)

- Philip Pullman, His Dark Materials series (including Northern Lights, The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass) (FR)
- Neil Gaiman, American Gods (EN)
- Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion (EN)
- Frank McCourt, Angela's Ashes (EN)
- Dan Brown, The Da Vinci Code (FR)
- Christopher Paolini, Eldest (FR)
- Lady Gregory's Complete Irish Mythology (EN) [reading in progress]
- The Book of Fairy and Folk Tales of Ireland (compiled by W.B. Yeats) (EN)
- The Complete Roald Dahl (including George's Marvellous Medicine, The Witches, Going Solo, James and the Giant Peach, Danny The Champion of the World) (EN)

I'll also post regularly about each of the goals listed in this blog and strike the ones I have achieved.

Now, let's roll up my sleeves and start ! >:)