15: Things I Learned

I have been back at college for either two or three days, whether you count days as ‘twenty-four hour spans of time’ or ‘squares on a calendar’. I have learned some interesting things, but I don’t think they are really the sort of things that I expected to learn from college.

13: On Zombies

So you’ve decided to write about zombies… or is the term ‘zombie’ offensive? Well, for the term ‘zombie’ to be offensive, I suppose at least some of the walking dead in your world must be more than just rotting, mindless cannibals. At least one of them has got to have enough braaaaaains to think rationally… or maybe there are some really zealous Zombie Rights activists who don’t have the sense to see that the only right the zombies want is the right to eat arms.

So I present to you a few of the many questions that I’ve had to deal with when writing undead characters. Because Raizha is about to do something in my story I don’t want to write and I’m procrastinating here.

12: Mordecai writes my packing list.

Dear Miss… Knight…

Tomorrow afternoon you will be leaving for college. I must say that I am looking forward to that, as I am excited to be seeing Miss… Moonstone… once more. However, I do not trust you to pack all of your things correctly. Need I remind you that you still have a card to fill out? You have the physical card, and you have all of the words you wish to write typed on your magic, yet you have not written said words onto the card yet. Obviously, you cannot be trusted to do what you must, so I will be writing all of the things you must pack so that you really have no excuse.

First and most importantly, you must pack my cloak. I do not know if Miss Moonstone will be bringing her cloak, and I would be terribly disappointed if I could not come out to meet her. I do not wish to borrow Miss Moonstone’s cloak whenever I wish to come out, either. You must also bring clothing that is suitable for me to wear, but the cloak is that which is of the utmost importance in this situation.

Next, you must bring your stuffed pig for Sokola and Vaughn. Sokola and Vaughn like pigs, and it will make them extremely happy. They are my friends and I would like to see them be happy together. If you forget that pig I assure you I will never let you hear the end of it.

Do not forget to pack your books. I would enjoy it if you were to pack some appropriate reading books for this semester, not those fantasy books you enjoy with all of the killing and… other things. Furthermore, I implore you to remember your college books. It would be a shame to go to college and forget to bring the books you need for classes.

You must also pack clothing. Perhaps for your spring semester you may wish to choose nicer things to wear. You ought to take a lesson from Miss Moonstone and wear more skirts. They are more becoming on a young lady then the blue pants you insist on wearing. You may also choose to pack shirts with sleeves. It is winter, Miss Knight. It is cold out.

You must pack your various cards. These are your tarot cards, your story cards, and the horrible game cards which you are using to torment me. You have spent too much money on your story cards for them to collect dust, and imagine how your tarot would feel if you left it alone for so long. As for your horrible game cards, I have a feeling that they would be even worse if you sat down and remade them from memory with Miss Moonstone, so do remember to bring the originals with you.

Finally, remember to bring your many magic boxes. Do not forget or you may find yourself without any magic boxes with which you can write, and then Miss Moonstone would win your silly little competition. Furthermore, remember to bring all of the wires that you need for your magic boxes. I do not understand why your “telephone” (This is in quotations because I do not fully believe the thing to be, in fact, a phone.) does not need to be on a wire but then does at some times, but I will assume you understand these things better than I.

Sincerely yours,

Mordecai Richmond

6: What’s in a name?

Since I was talking about names, I got to realizing that I completely forgot what one of my character’s names was supposed to mean, and it was bothering me. And it wasn’t a name I could look up on a baby names dictionary, because it was a name that I made up… sort of… I didn’t feel like making a demon language so I mangled adapted words from Russian. After lots of searching, I’m pretty sure I found the word that name was based off of, so rather than let it go to waste I thought I would write out how I got some of my character names. That way I’d have a list of the meanings of their names should I forget again and I have some more words written today.

5: Mordecai Talks About Me

To whom it may concern:

My name is Mordecai Nathaniel Richmond, and I am one of Miss… what name are you going by on the magic?

Knight.

That is Vaughn’s last name when he has one and you know it. However, I shall call you by whichever silly name you happen to choose on the magic… I am sorry about that. My name is Mordecai Nathaniel Richmond, and I am one of Miss Knight’s characters. She and Miss Moonstone thought it would be useful were I to give my own opinion of my author to counterpoint whatever view of herself she may be giving to you. As Vaughn has said, one does not always see oneself as others may see them. So I shall briefly discuss my author, and try to be as positive as possible despite the exceedingly poor judgment which she exhibited last night.

Where shall I begin? Miss Knight is nearly nineteen and is still afraid of the dark. She, as you can plainly see, still keeps imaginary friends, myself being an example. As evidenced by her insistence to take Vaughn’s occasional surname, Miss Knight has no care for our thoughts in such matters and views us as playthings. But she will feign interest in Vaughn’s opinions, at least, and ask him for his thoughts on just about anything, because she fancies that she has feelings for him and shows no qualms about displaying such affections in front of Aria.

As for her writing, I do think it leaves something to be desired. She has the ability to write pretty descriptions and dialogue, but her ability to think logically about what she is writing is poor at best. She completely threw out one of her attempts to write our story… said story belonging to Miss Prismall and I… because she completely forgot that the use of magic would need to be investigated in my murder. In her fantasy story. She forgot the magic.

Furthermore, her attempts at poetry are laughable, though she insists that she shall be the next Shakespeare. While I am nearly certain that she is merely joking about that, such a statement borders o blasphemy and I cannot forgive it.

I don’t believe there is much else I can tell you that would be suitable in this company. She dresses in pants nearly every day as if she were a boy, and she wears shirts with short sleeves although it is extremely cold out. If any are considering a birthday gift for her, I would suggest skirts and a nice sweater. You say you don’t know when her birthday is? I shall tell you. She’s turning five this February.

But I suppose, despite all of my complaints, I do care about Miss… Knight. She is a good friend; she yelled at Vaughn when he was being unkind towards me though she was afraid of him at the time, and she did begin her attempts to nudge Dorothy and myself together when I showed interest in her so many failed beginnings of drafts ago, sometime in May or April. I do owe her for my creation as well…

If, by chance, there are any others like myself who are reading this, I shall close with a question: Have you hugged your author today?

Sincerely Yours,

Mordecai Richmond

Day Three: Reflection

I don’t know if this is other writers or just me, but I find that most of my characters that have any sort of depth to them will take at least part of their personality from me. When I really look at them I can point out what came from me, sort of like a parent noting that the child has their eyes or their hair. Mordecai’s quiet and a bookworm, Abbi doesn’t like to cry in front of people.

So it’s a little scary when I’m talking to one of my friends and I start to find out where the completely mad, broken-beyond-all-hope will-slit-your-throat-and-go-on-her-merry-way character of mine came from. Sure, when I say the sort of things that remind me of her, I’m only playing around, but it’s still weird to look at myself in the mirror and say, yes, I can see where Raizha came from.

Birthday Wishes

I would like to wish the ever-lovely Miss Moonstone a very happy birthday, and I suppose I can wish the rest of the world a reasonably decent unbirthday while I’m at it. Unless, of course, it is their birthday and they are not Miss Moonstone, because the odds that Miss Moonstone is the only one with a birthday today are probably extremely hard to calculate. I wouldn’t know, I have not yet taken Prob and Stats. Although actually I know the probability is 0 because one of my Facebook friends also has a birthday today.

Mordecai and I wished Miss Moonstone a very happy birthday already, but I decided not to let all my other characters do it on Facebook because then we’d both look crazy. So I’ll do that here. 😀 😀 😀