Nathan Bransford - The Forums

Chantelle.S. wrote:Monsters and Aliens.
Now Cowboys and Aliens.
What's going to be next? Vampires and Aliens?

Wombats and Aliens.

Claudie wrote:

Chantelle.S. wrote:Monsters and Aliens.
Now Cowboys and Aliens.
What's going to be next? Vampires and Aliens?

Wombats and Aliens.

So I should scrap my new WIP: Werepires and Cowboy Aliens?

I'd love to see a good alien/pirate/cops and robbers mashup. Maybe alien raiders who rob the planet and take off and then alien cops show up later to track them down. And some humans help the cops by leaving the planet with them.

AnimaDictio wrote:I'd love to see a good alien/pirate/cops and robbers mashup. Maybe alien raiders who rob the planet and take off and then alien cops show up later to track them down. And some humans help the cops by leaving the planet with them.

An intergalactic posse riding titanium horses chasing graviton cutters from one border colony to the next.

See if you can figure this out (hell make something up) without looking it up: “Buying a pig in a poke” and “letting the cat out of the bag” have the same origin.

Watcher55 wrote:See if you can figure this out (hell make something up) without looking it up: “Buying a pig in a poke” and “letting the cat out of the bag” have the same origin.

See, back in ye olde Europe, they used to buy livestock-animals to butcher in bags (some silly superstition about looking the soon-to-be-dead in the eye...). To "buy a pig in a poke" means that you purchased sight-unseen with just a casual check to make sure the animal was still alive (hence, the 'poke'). Merchants would try to cheat their buyers, however, by capturing roaming cats and placing them in the bags instead. So to "let the cat out of bag" is to reveal the secret of the cheat and learn that you should have done more than poke the pig.

How'd I do?

dios4vida wrote:

Watcher55 wrote:See if you can figure this out (hell make something up) without looking it up: “Buying a pig in a poke” and “letting the cat out of the bag” have the same origin.

See, back in ye olde Europe, they used to buy livestock-animals to butcher in bags (some silly superstition about looking the soon-to-be-dead in the eye...). To "buy a pig in a poke" means that you purchased sight-unseen with just a casual check to make sure the animal was still alive (hence, the 'poke'). Merchants would try to cheat their buyers, however, by capturing roaming cats and placing them in the bags instead. So to "let the cat out of bag" is to reveal the secret of the cheat and learn that you should have done more than poke the pig.

How'd I do?

Too many commas; other than that, perfect.

Watcher55 wrote:

dios4vida wrote:How'd I do?

Too many commas; other than that, perfect.

Wait...was I right? I thought I remembered hearing about the cat in the bag I made the rest of it up.

I'm sitting here staring at a speck of some kind on my floor and I find myself wondering where it came from. Not the kind of where it came from like "who might have dropped it there", or "how did it get there." No. I'm wondering what it was before it was a little speck on my floor. What has its life been? Was it a piece of lint from a sock, and therefore originally came from a piece of cotton out in a field in northern Alabama? (Or where ever they grow cotton in this country) Perhaps it's not lint at all. Maybe it's a crumb of food. Was it from the cookie my son ate earlier? And if so, what were all the events in its "life" that led up to it being discarded on my floor?

I'm also wondering why I would even spend this much energy thinking about a little speck.
But if I don't think about it, who will?

I saw a thread where everyone can post the first line of their Nano's for critique from our fellow Nanowrimoers.
I'm glad I read through the thread before blindly posting mine.
Good grief. Talk about ripping it up into a million tiny little pieces, chewing it, spitting it out and crushing it into the dirt with a heel. And that's only for ONE line. I thought the general idea was to crit whether it's a good opening line. It either catches you or it doesn't. There's no need to go into explicit detail about why the line won't work for so-and-so's novel, given that no one but the poster knows whether it's a good start to their specific novel or not.
And then there were people who posted a whole first paragraph. Are they suckers for punishment?
If you can't get a decent and polite crit for ONE line, what are they thinking posting MORE than one line?
Anyway. At least now I know to avoid posting anything for critique on the Nanowrimo forum. Unless I want a herd of bitter and cynical writers to stomp on the little confidence I have. I wonder if they realise that just because they completed their manuscripts for x amount of years it doesn't give them the right to be so hard on the writers who haven't made it. I noticed that they were the loudest in critiquing. Yet none of them posted their own first lines.
Just...wow. And the kiddies used to think that I'm a harsh critter.

It appears to be possible to send yourself a Private Message on these forums. No I know what to do on a slow day at work

In "The Big Lebowski", what ended up happening to the rug that got peed on? I mean, I know he wanted to replace it after it got peed on, but I'm a little surprised he didn't just keep the old one; we're talking about a guy that didn't clean off his sunglasses after he lost them in a toilet. Did he maybe throw it away when he stole the new one from Mr. Lebowski's house?

Oh, and as related to the above conversation, I'm hoping for "Pirates & Aliens", or maybe "Sparkly Vampires Vs. Voodoo Robot Ninjas". Or "Dracula Vs. Godzilla", as I may have mentioned before.

Zombies and Aliens.

Beethovenfan wrote:Zombies and Aliens.

That totally reminds me of "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies." Stick a Zombie in there, and you're good to go.

MattLarkin wrote:It appears to be possible to send yourself a Private Message on these forums. No I know what to do on a slow day at work

Ahh yes. The possibilites of having a quiet conversation with yourself are just endless. "Why, writer x, you're work is so brilliant." "You don't say?" "You deserve a publishing contract and loads of money." "I know, right?"