Poll: Select Poetry Themes for Early 2017

I have winnowed the themes from the previous poll, dropping out those with 0-3 votes.  This reduced the cumbersome 45 topics to a much more manageable 25.  \o/  Now you get to pick your favorites.

Everyone is eligible to vote in this poll.  I will keep it open until at least Monday night.  If the answers are clear then, I'll close it.  If not, I may leave it open a while longer.  I'll use the votes to help decide which themes to use in the fishbowls for early 2017.  Bear in mind that some of the supporters are not on LiveJournal, so not all votes may be visible.

PLEASE READ THE RULES BEFORE VOTING!

( Read and vote ... )

New verses in "A Hope and a Promise"

The pool from the Holiday Poetry Sale didn't come out perfectly even, so I put $10 into "A Hope and a Promise" for 4 new verses.  Aidan and Saraphina discover a new toy.

Bingo Badges

I won some bingos!

Fandom Snowflake Challenge

Fandom Snowflake Challenge Day 2

Day 2

In your own space, share a book/song/movie/tv show/fanwork/etc that changed your life. Something that impacted on your consciousness in a way that left its mark on your soul. Leave a comment in this post saying you did it. Include a link to your post if you feel comfortable doing so.

My mother read me The Hobbit when I was four.  This is an early benchmark for several things that have spread throughout my life:  I associate reading with love and intimacy.  I love xenolinguistics, and I still like referring to a museum as a "mathom-house."  I learned the mechanics of hurt/comfort from Master Tolkien, so if you like the way I write it, make your bow to him.  I observed that by providing moments of comfort, it was possible to crank the tension much higher without burning out the author, the characters, or the audience.  I learned worldbuilding and poetics here too.  I love creating detailed landscapes and characters, then just watching what happens.  I love the sound and the mouthfeel of words, twining them into intricate shapes like dwarves making treasures out of metal.  I don't think reading this book "changed" me, but it did resonate deeply and leave a mark.  It was more like a reminder of who I am.  Oh yeah, I remember that -- I'm a storyteller, a worldwalker, an adventurer.  Yes, when I was four.

If you want to see some of where this has gone ...

A Conflagration of Dragons is directly inspired by an analysis of the economic impact of Smaug on Middle Earth.  I multiplied the intensity by about 400.  I also used many of Tolkien's worldbuilding techniques, which you can see in some of the notes I have published for this series.

Love Is For Children is one of my spectacular hurt/comfort series, Avengers fanfic.  The Moon Door is original, about lycanthropy as a chronic disease.

Path of the Paladins is an example of my fantasy writing in a rather messed-up world.

Some of my lyric poetry:
"Folk Tales in 4/4 Time"
"Salt from a Dead Woman's Table"
"Like Jewels on a Ring"

Pillows Perfect for Stimming

I saw these things in a mall recently.  They're pillows covered with bicolor sequins loosely sewn onto a cover, so that you can drag a hand over them and change the pattern.  Like all things made of sequins, they are kind of crunchy and scratchy, which means they're ideal for sensory-seekers but probably not for people with sensitive skin.  I like playing with them in the store but I wouldn't put one on my couch.  Definitely a must-have for people who collect pillows for tactile stimulation, though.  

Also like all things made of sequins, they will eventually come apart.  Sequins tend to be sharp inside.  If you use cheap sequins and thread, they'll fall apart fast; if you use sequins with sanded holes and tough thread, they could last quite a while.  These seem to be available in a range of prices, so you'll probably get what you pay for.  Look at the price and consider whether you'll get that amount of fun from the pillow while it lasts.  Also if you get bored fast, you might be happier with a $10 pillow that lasts a month, and then you buy a new one in a different color, than a $60 pillow that lasts a year but you're tired of it after three months.

Monday Update 1-2-17

These are some posts from the later part of last week in case you missed them:
You Get What You Support
Dark Fantasy Bingo Card 1-1-17
Rubik's Cube Robot
Poetry Fishbowl Report for December 6, 2016


The next Poetry Fishbowl will be on Tuesday, January 3 with a theme of "a glitch in the matrix."  Please mark your calendars and come give me prompts tomorrow!

Voting is still open for fishbowl themes to be used early in 2017. If you have not yet voted, please do so now. I'm hoping to close the poll late Monday night.

Nominations are now open for the 2017 Rose & Bay Awards.  Come nominate your crowdfunding favorites in these categories:
Art
Fiction
Poetry
Webcomic
Other Project
Patron

I have finished posted poems from the Holiday Poetry Sale. Finally. Dreamwidth and LiveJournal have been misbehaving this week, so many poems did not echo properly. Please check the sale page to make sure you get to read and comment on all the poems that interest you.

Regarding year-end perks: I haven't forgotten about them, but have gotten nothing  done on them yet.  The holiday sale took up literally the entire second half of December.  (Some problems are nice to have: it was a stupendous boost to our bank account and greatly reduced the backlog of unpublished poems.) I will do my best to get to these in the foreseeable future.


Poetry in Microfunding:
"Holding Hope and Love" is now complete. Sunny takes Cheersquad to the beach.  "A Hope and a Promise" belongs to Polychrome Heroics.  It has 4 new verses, in which Aidan and Saraphina discover a new toy.  "The Sharpest Dose of Reality" belongs to Polychrome Heroics: Shiv.  Pain's Gray attempts to take care of Shiv and Shiv continues to freak out over the intimacy.  "Become Music Again" is now complete.  Watch Shiv try to figure out how to play a saxophone.  With two of the previous four completed, there is one slot available if someone wishes to open a new epic during the fishbowl on Tuesday.  \o/


The weather has been cool and wet.  Today it's raining again.  This week at the birdfeeder I have seen many sparrows nad a small flock of mourning doves.  Not much action over the last several days; wet gray weather makes birds want to hide.  However, the seem to like the new birdseed.  We bought a bag of premium songbird mix, which is mostly sunflower seeds with a little safflower and peanut.  I've been mixing a little of that into the cheap seed.

New Notes in "Securing Progress"

Based on reader discussions, I have added a bunch of new notes to "Securing Progress."  We're talking about why Lawrence really feels uneasy in that meeting, and how the boys could work on fixing that.  It's more complex than simple social phobia or stage fright -- and you can't fix a problem if you don't know exactly what's causing it.

Bingo

Here is my banner for the iPod Shuffle Music Bingo.

Call for Prompts: Dark Fantasy

nsfwords has made a Dark Fantasy bingo card and is inviting folks to choose a square and provide more ideas on what to do with that prompt.