#travel advice and tips

[thatsbelievable]

[writingwithfolklore]

Getting Characters from A to B

Oftentimes a plot requires the characters to get from point A to B. They need to cross the wilderness to get to the next town, or climb to the top of the mountain, or take a boat to the other continent. But long paragraphs of just walking or moving is obviously not that interesting to read, so here are some elements to add to your travelling sections that accomplish the A to B and more.

1. It’s about the characters

If you’ve ever travelled with someone, you know that everything about your dynamic is amplified after spending like 72 straight hours with them. Use this with your characters—every little hidden grudge or flame or annoyance comes out when things get boring or stressful. This is a great time to really delve into character conflicts or even romance subplots, or any other way you’d like to develop the group dynamic. Also, there’s no better place to get the truth out of someone than being trapped in a car or on the road with them for days on end!

On another note, the slower parts of travel also allow for more quiet moments where your character can process what's happened so far. Especially in fast paced stories with lots of conflict, you may opt for a uneventful section of travel where they have time to grieve or plan or otherwise unpack things.

2. Switch up group roles

Travelling tends to carve out the same roles. Usually there is the leader who is driving the group forward and making decisions, the navigator who knows which way to go, the snack/food provider—who may be rationing or even hunting depending on the survival situation--and the one who has a hidden motive that is making them be difficult or drag their heels and provide conflict. These roles are a great way to force a change in dynamic between characters, and can inspire conflict between them.

3. Increase the stakes

A trip isn’t really a trip until something goes wrong. Whether the navigator was reading the map wrong, a bag of rations falls over the cliff side, someone gets injured, or there seems to be some creature stalking them, an increase of stakes raises the tension and creates opportunities for the group to work together or fall apart. For more tips on how to increase stakes, check out my post here:

4. Don’t be afraid to skip past the boring stuff

Once you’ve done what you wanted to do with the trip—broken a friendship, or a leg,, or both—don’t be afraid to skip in time for when they reach their destination. In fact, you’ll likely skip time for several parts of the trip in between interesting scenes between characters or moments where they’re facing against some conflict. We as the readers will assume that they continued on with their travels and just that nothing of note had happened in between.

I hope that helps!

[troythecatfish]

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[lloveliayork]

welcome to upper east tumblr

hi! i’m lia york

-> she/her. 18. nyc

pink, nyc, lana del rey, charli xcx, sex and the city, upper east side, gossip girl, frank ocean, outer banks, rafe cameron, leopard print, gilmore girls, black opium, gold jewelry, find me at the beach, aesthetics, frantic planner, stylist, tips and tricks, big sister, warm vanilla. reader. writer. visionary.

currently taking requests for any writings, proofreading, style tips, or advice in general! think of me as your nyc big sister <3

[amethystfairy1]

Do you have any tips for writing fics?

I've recently decided to get into writing again, but I've been struggling a bit with it widhwkdj-

Do you have any advice on it, how to improve, or just any tips that have helped you?

Thank you in advance, i absolutely love ur fics btw :D

I'm so glad you love my fics!

Writing tips are sooooooooo tricky for me...hmmm...well I think the main thing is the unfortunate truth of just writing. Don't overthink it as you go, don't try to make every detail perfect, just WORD VOMIT and then you can always go back and edit!

I also think that you should always write what you feel like writing. That's why TTSBC and TT are written the way they are, so I can bop around. And I know most of the time it's like 'but it's fanfic you don't write what you don't feel like writing!' which is true but if you write in long form you can get hung up on certain scenes and then not finish anything.

Ramble ramble ramble...something about how you should just WRITE! If you need to skip scenes, skip them, if you wanna just do dialogue, just do dialogue, just get words on the page!

As far as any technical help...hmmm...I mean, one thing I find always helps is to keep in mind how immersive little details can be!

For example in Handshakes and Headaches, when the story switches to Hypno's POV, he only refers to Scar and Grian as 'Professor Goodtimes' and 'Professor Slab' because of course he does. He's their student, he would never consider them by first name even internally, so the narrator when in his perspective also doesn't do that.

Keep in mind what your POV character knows and what they care about!

Another example I like is with Scott and Jimmy in TTSBC!

If we're in Scott's POV, you're going to find him noticing a lot more about peoples body language and expressions, very small details that don't come up as much in other POVs from TTSBC.

If we're in Jimmy's POV, you won't notice those things as often, but you're definitely gonna know what the weather is like, how bright the lighting is, if it's hot or cold, because of his love of the sky and fresh air. Those are things that matter to Jimmy as a character, and therefore they matter to the narrator!

I hope that helps some! Happy writing!

[writing-for-whoever-listens]

How do you write time travel. I have a general plan, but yeah...

Hi!! Sorry this took so long to get to, but here's some advice!

know the main events of whatever time you thrust your character into. do some research on what happened in that year you sent them to.

if your character causes a big change, try to research what that change would cause. like if they prevented the burning of the Alexandria library, what would have changed in their current time from that?

don't just look up history facts either; deep dive into clothes commonly worn for each class, what the conversations were like, living conditions, etc.

how the time travel happens is up to you, but if it is science based, do some basic research on how that could be potentially possible and expand on it.

if the time travel is magic-based, have a detailed magic system!! it makes everything better and more believable.

have some rules for you mc to follow. can't just have them running around willy-nilly through time! give them things they can and can't do, and consequences.

basically: research everything you could possibly need to know about the time they are going to be in. it'll help flesh out the world building and make the scenes more realistic.

This feels pretty bare-bones, but I think that covers the big topics. I hope this helps!!

[daimonpriestess]

Astral Travel or Imagination?

How to tell if your mediations are real- Via telepathic communication with King Asmodeus.

I sometimes have trouble trusting my intuition on what I see or conversations I have while in meditation. So Asmodeus helped me come up with ways to know, I thought this may help others if they have similar experiences.

Do they feel real? (mentally or emotionally) If you concentrate hard enough can you physically feel something. (like a chair perhaps the texture, the coolness or warmth of it ect)

Do you lead the meditation or does it lead you? Unlike lucid dreaming where if your in control then it's not just a dream. In the astral alot like the 3D you can't control everything, yes you can control your actions and to a certain extent the environment. (like your safe space) But you can't control other beings or what happens around you. If you feel like you are it's probably imagination & not actual astral travel.

If you're walking (or flying) around and it looks like areas you've never seen before or beings you've never come across (That you didn't know about in the waking world but find out they exist after) or a word pops into your head that you aren't familiar with but upon researching you find out it's real and it's connected to the meditation, then it's probably an accurate astral (or Underworld) meditation.

Communicating with other beings or deities and making sure it was an accurate conversation is a bit trickier. Since you cannot read another's mind (human or not) at least not the one's I work with.

Some ways though would be, are they telling you what you want to hear? Is everything great and you never have issues (unless you create drama on purpose)

Who leads the conversation? Did you learn anything new or are you just feeding your own ego? Do you agree on everything? Probably not a real conversation then.

Do they tell you things you don't agree with? Things you may not know or haven't considered?

Things that may even make you uncomfortable? (Especially in working with Demons, Angels & Trickster Gods.) That was probably a real conversation. Really if you gain something from it then it doesn't really matter.

Ways to know or confirm once you wake in the 3D.

Ask whatever beings (if you can) if what you experienced was true! Where they really there? Was it an accurate conversation? What were they trying to show you?

You can do this through channeling (via another person or yourself) Tarot or another form of divination.

Do not wait months (like I did) for confirmation or signs. If one does pop up (an actual image of an item you saw in astral and thought it didn't exist, A quote, a video that correlates.) months, weeks later. Then it is probably significant.

That item is important or the entity it is tied to (if you know there is one) is probably trying to reach out and remind you of something.

In conclusion there is not definitive way of proving your meditations are real so just be aware, follow your instincts and don't jump to conclusions!

@inner-viper

[emotional-otter]

Quick question for people with disabilities that require a walking aid or my fellow ambulatory wheelchair users. I really want to travel more and me and my family are thinking of booking a holiday for next Christmas but as I'm sure many of you are aware of alot of the world simply isn't accessible for wheelchair users or disabilities in general. So I've been thinking of investing in a walking aid but the issue I'm having is would it be better to get a cane or a crutch? I was hoping anyone might have some advice on this choice maybe share some advice from their own experience?

Have a happy new year! 🎉

Also, if anyone has any advice on travelling as a disabled person, it is greatly welcomed

[travelingtwentysomething]

That stretch when you've been scrolling on your phone for God knows how long and you've been contorted into whatever weird neck/back/hip configuration you scrunched into and all that tension finally releases and your brain goes into warp drive and you have like a tiny orgasm and you sigh like your lungs haven't felt real air for 1.5 business days and your spine feels like it was finally plugged into your brain properly almost like a charger that's half in a loose socket and you hear that little ding that lets you know you're actually plugged in and charging now and you open your eyes realizing you don't know when or if you actually closed them or you may have blacked out for just a second

[thatsbelievable]

[rebel-wrath]

How To Write Satire: Part 2

The first post on why to write satire can be found here. The first post on how to write satire can be found here.

The last post ended on a cliffhanger. I said that satires are improvised, structureless, spontaneous, wildly unpredictable, and asymmetrical, and then raised the point that this doesn't fit with what we know of how books, with their tightly plotted structures, work.

Okay, here's how we do it.

There. That's a good first step.

Okay, basically, the point of all other fiction is to tell a story. If you want to write a horror, you are telling a story that will scare the reader. If you want to write a romantic comedy, you are telling a story that will make the reader say aww and laugh. Drama, tragedy, adventure, mystery, are all about the story. Some stories will have moral messages, some stories invite emotional reactions, but the overwhelming thrust is always the story.

In satire, the story is secondary. The point of satire is to satirize. To expose and criticise people’s stupidity or vices for the benefit of society. This may or may not be best achieved through a story, but ultimately the story is only the bucket that carries the water, and the water is the important part.

In Voltaire's Candide the main character goes through a series of events that are both fortunate and unfortunate. He makes money, he loses money, he gains prestige, he loses prestige. There is no underlying structure, no point that it is building to. There is no rising tension, no climax, just the capriciousness of fate in an uncaring world. The book aims to show that sometimes things just happen without a reason by having lots of things happen without reasons. Apparently dead characters return to life with flimsy excuses. The improbable and the unexpected constantly intrude, and the rules of narrative structure are... not disregarded. They are disassembled.

Life is chaotic and messy and, like life, satire is also chaotic and messy. The urgency and immediacy of real life is conveyed through the lack of narrative structure, and improvisation seems to be provided by having anything happen.

But the unexpected isn't just conveyed through the plot (there is a plot, it just isn't bound by the normal narrative structures. Plot is defined as the main events of a play, novel, film, or similar work, devised and presented by the writer as an interrelated sequence. Satires that are plays, novels, films, or similar works have these) but also through discourse, emotional tone, vocabulary, sentence-structure, and patterns of phrase.

How do you use unexpected sentence structure, patterns of phrase, and vocabulary? Terry Pratchett provides some excellent examples.

The night was dark like the inside of a cat Terry Pratchett, Wyrd Sisters The Moon hung in the night sky like a giant ball of rock Terry Pratchett, Soul Music They landed. It's a short sentence, but contained a lot of incident Terry Pratchett, The Last Hero

Other things often included in a satire are parody, irony, mild and subtle humour, weird paradox, antithesis, colloquialism, anticlimax, topicality, obscenity, violence, vividness, exaggeration, and snatches of foreign languages. The next section breaks down what these are.

Parody is defined as an imitation of the style of a particular writer, artist, or genre with deliberate exaggeration for comic effect. Satires can use parody to great effect but not all parodies are satires. Scary Movie is a parody of Scream, but not a satire. In my previous post I quoted Anatomy of Satire and said satire is (...) for the benefit of society. Parody is a comedic commentary about a specific work. Satire is a commentary and criticism about the world. Satire will use parody if it is the best way to get across the satirical message: Menippean satire will often, but not always, use parody.

Irony is defined as the expression of one's meaning by using language that normally signifies the opposite, typically for humorous or emphatic effect and is included in the standard definition of satire. There are three forms of irony, situational, dramatic, and Socratic. Situational irony is, obviously, when a situation is ironic, such as in Gulliver's Travels, when Gulliver visits The Country of the Houyhnhnms, a race of horses that are rational and refined and keep humans as brute force. Dramatic irony is when the reader or audience knows something that the character doesn't, and the most well known example of this is when Romeo finds Juliet, apparently dead, and kills himself. Socratic irony is a feigned use of ignorance to prove an argument erroneous, and is difficult to find an example of in fiction. One example I can point to is in Attack of the 50ft Trans Woman, where there is a gender critical character called Karen who claims to have no pronouns. Because the narrator respects other people's pronoun choices, in narration Karen is only ever referred to as Karen, Karen's, or occasionally Karenself. However, because Karen has no respect for pronouns, Karen refers to Karen as "I" in dialogue and tweets. By feigning ignorance of how pronouns work and going by Karen's avowed word, which Karen constantly breaks, the idea of a person having no pronouns is ridiculed.

Mild and subtle humour is best conveyed through Discworld, which has some humour so subtle most readers might miss it. I certainly missed the humour in the band name Surreptitious Fabric in Soul Music, which is a Discworld version of the real world band Velvet Underground.

Weird paradoxes are statements that don't make logical sense. Whilst an oxymoron is a paired word group, a paradox is an entire phrase. A famous paradox from George Orwell's animal farm is "All animals are equal, but some are more equal than others." Nothing can be more equal, or it isn't equal, but the point of the phrase is that when governments say they have equality, they are lying. Or perhaps it is that people have a skewed view of equality. Or perhaps it is both. If Orwell had stated his meaning clearly, the readers would have been told what was intended. By hiding the meaning in a paradox, the readers must determine the intent for themselves, and the perceived intent gains more importance in the readers' minds.

Antithesis pairs opposite or contrasting ideas in a parallel grammatical structure, for example in An Essay on Criticism, Alexander Pope wrote "To err is human, to forgive divine."

Colloquialism is the use of informal words or phrases. This includes aphorisms (a short statement or catchphrase that contains a well known general truth such as pride goes before a fall), idioms (similar to aphorisms, but with a figurative meaning, such as under the weather, which has nothing to do with weather - only astronauts are ever technically not under the weather in a literal sense), and profanity (fuck I can't be assed doing another goddamn shitty definition, here's a bloody example instead). It also includes slang (which is used by social groups), jargon (which is used by professional groups), and dialect (which is used by geographic-specific groups). As stated in the previous blog post on this subject, satire aims to reflect reality, and by using language that has a more free, easy, direct, and conversational feel, reality is reflected.

Anticlimax is a disappointing conclusion to a climactic series of events, such as in The Hunger Games, which satirises American capitalistic society, reality television, and the cultural hunger for violent content, by having the main character refuse to partake in it. From an emotional viewpoint, it is a fantastic ending, and from a satirical viewpoint, it is also a fantastic ending: it shows that we can step aside, the story builds up the things that are wrong with society and the ending shows we can refuse to partake in them. But within the narrative structure that builds violence on top of violence the ending is anticlimactic.

Topicality is defined as regarding events that are happening now or of interest at the present time. Of course, when exactly the present is can be hotly debated but with satire it is important to be relevant. No one now should be satirising David Cameron and pig's heads, because this isn't culturally relevant anymore. Books do take a while to produce, of course, so it's best to pick a topic that is going to be around a while (like climate change), or a topic that is always relevant (Noun of Noun and Adjective has the parent-child relationship when a child is transgender as one of its main topics).

Attack of the 50 ft Trans Woman has Boris Johnson as Prime Minister, and he no longer is, so it's lost a little topicality, but this isn't the main theme, which still applies.

Obscenity is often thought of as swearing or porn, but that's not what's meant by obscenity in satire. It's most famous use in satire was in Swift's A Modest Proposal where he suggested resolving poverty by having the poor sell their children to the rich as food. The use of obscenity, of pushing taboos to an extreme level, creates a visceral reaction in the reader and hopefully entices them to examine more than just the idea, but also their reaction to it, and even their culture. Common taboos in our culture include menstruation (there's a menstruation scene in Noun of Noun and Adjective), sex, sexuality, reproduction and abortion, death especially including suicide and state-sanctioned murder, food including cannibalism and veganism (look at the reactions to someone saying they are vegan on social media - people react extremely to what is, essentially, a personal choice).

Violence doesn't really need a definition, but satirical violence does. Satire ridicules folly and vice through irony, sarcasm, etc, and can have a variety of tones, from light to extreme. Violence in satire refers to the severity of the attack on the subject.

Vividness refers to the descriptions that place us wholly in the world of the text. One of the main descriptions of satire is the use of vivid imagery that clearly depicts painful, wicked, or foolish people and events. Ursula K LeGuin's The Ones Who Wallk Away From Omelas uses incredibly vivid descriptions and is worth reading.

Exaggeration comes with its counterpoint understatement, and both are great ways to make satire work. By exaggerating a situation we can see that it is ridiculous - Attack of the 50ft Trans Woman exaggerates the idea of England having a huge trans problem to show that, actually, it has a huge transphobia problem.

My love is as a fever, longing still For that which longer nurseth the disease, Feeding on that which doth preserve the ill, Th’ uncertain sickly appetite to please. My reason, the physician to my love, Angry that his prescriptions are not kept, Hath left me, and I desperate now approve Desire is death, which physic did except. William Shakespeare, Sonnet 147

Snatches of foreign languages are often also used in satire, such as in John Skelton's Speke Parott:

My lady maystres, dame Philology, Gave me a gyfte in my nest whan I laye, To lerne all language, and it to spake aptely: Now pandez mory, wax frantycke, some men saye; Phroneses for Freneses may not holde her way. An almon now for Parrot, dilycatly drest; In Salve festa dies, toto ys the beste. John Skelton, Speke Parott

In Noun of Noun and Adjective there is a character called Torta de la Taza del bárbaro. He is a very colourfully tattooed and massively muscled warrior with gleaming oiled skin who only wears a loincloth and sandals, and has fantastic hair. He fulfils much the same role as a female character in an action movie, essentially being there only for eye candy purposes.

Because he is eye candy, it never really matters what he is saying. As such, he speaks a fantasy language which is represented in text with Spanish. For English readers, he makes statements they can't understand. For bilingual English and Spanish speakers, however, his words still don't make sense as they have nothing to do with the scene he is in.

[wordswithloveee]

[penofglen]

Navigating European Etiquette: A Traveler's Guide to Avoiding Common Pitfalls in Croatia

Planning a trip to Croatia? 🇭🇷 Before you go, check out my latest blog post on European etiquette and tips to avoid common tourist traps. Trust me, it'll save you some euros! 💶 #TravelTips #Croatia #TravelSmart #vacation #holiday #travel #euro #money

Following my last post, I received quite a few requests to share more about Croatia and my experience in Split. I understand that many of you, especially those from the US, may not be familiar with this beautiful part of the world, and that makes sense given the distance. However, what did surprise me during my trip was just how many American tourists I encountered—by far the largest group in…

[katystraveltips]

15 top tips for travelling in Japan

1. There’s only a small chance of seeing Mount Fuji in summer – check the Mt. Fuji visibility website before you travel long distances to try and see it2. Taxi doors open automatically don’t pull them3. Take a small shopping bag out with you as there are not many rubbish bins/trash cans around4. When you create your itinerary check when tickets are released for each attraction as they’re all…

[ironwilledf-up]

Doing a road trip from Vegas to all the Utah national parks and multiple state parks and national monuments next month. Anyone got any tips or any places I should check out? I probably have most of the open spaces saved but lesser known places are good to know and even more so I'll take some food recommendations or just general tips :)

We are renting a jeep so dirt roads are fine ❤️

Just a photo of my cat watching travel videos with me in preparation, for visibility's sake.