#weird writer ask meme

[thatonebirdwrites]

1&4 for the weird writers ask

1. What font do you write in? Do you actually care or is that just the default setting?

Depends on the program I'm using. I use Sitka Text in Scrivener, but sometimes I'll pull out the fonts that help with dyslexia (like Comic Sans and OpenDyslexia, which by the way).

I prefer fonts that give capital 'I' the hat and shoes so that it looks different from the lower case 'l' because it bothers me so much how alike they look otherwise.

As a side note, I've had folks give me flak for using Comic Sans, and I just wanna say, it's weird the hatred of that font. It feels ableist to be honest, because it's an incredibly helpful font due to how each letter is uniquely crafted so that none look the same.

4. What’s a word that makes you go absolutely feral?

Conflagration. It's soooo fun to say. It means large (often destructive) fire.

Positive. The way it's used in physics is so arbitrary! Math for physics would be soooo improved if swapped the definition of positive and negative, then we wouldn't constantly have to add a minus sign to the vast majority of equations. Currently, positive in physics is defined as the charge of a glass rod when rubbed with silk, which is weirdly arbitrary to begin with, but that's all thanks to the 1700s. (Is this me admitting that I often forget that dang minus sign? Yes, yes it is. lol)

Thanks for asking!! :D

[somanywhatifs]

[vic-does-battlecats]

Minor spoilers for the already revealed chapters of the next A Starless Clan book Wind

[kiwiana-writes]

Hello! 4 and 18 for the weird writers questions please

4. What’s a word that makes you go absolutely feral?

Answered here!

18. Choose a passage from your writing. Tell me about the backstory of this moment. How you came up with it, how it changed from start to end.

This moment, from chapter six of With so much of my heart (that none is left to protest):

His phone chimes again, and when he picks it up and opens the message, Henry almost swallows his tongue. Because Alex has sent him a selfie, from bed, shirtless and with what appears to be a heavily-annotated copy of Much Ado About Nothing open in his lap and a smear of pink highlighter visible on his cheek and wearing glasses. He had no idea Alex wore glasses; he's absolutely sure Alex has never worn them publicly. And if Henry whimpers at the sight, that’s between him and David. Another message, right underneath the picture: do you think when i tell you while you’re in disguise ‘i am sure he is in the fleet: i would he had boarded me’ i’m lowkey talking about wanting you to rail me? because i could play it that way Henry places the phone down gently on the mattress, picks up a pillow from the other side of the bed, puts it over his face, and screams into it.

This joke went through SO MANY revisions. At first the line Alex was referencing was 'for my love some other way than by swearing on it', but that was both too late in the show and too serious for what I wanted, so then it was something else I can't remember, and then it became this. It was also in the third person for a long time: "Do you think when Betrius says X he's gunning for [sex act]" and it was pretty late in the game when I was like oh, no, for peak Henry torture Alex is definitely going to make this personal lmao.

[Weird questions for writers]

[emeraldgreaves]

For the Weird Questions for Writers please and thank you! 1. What font do you write in? Do you actually care or is that just the default setting? 16. What’s the weirdest thing you’ve ever used as a bookmark? 25. What is a weird, hyper-specific detail you know about one of your characters that is completely irrelevant to the story? 29. Where do you draw your inspiration? What do you do when the inspiration well runs dry? (#16 is kinda personal, because I used to work at a library and we had an unofficial contest to see who could find the weirdest thing someone left in a book as a bookmark! Trust me, we found some weird and gross things! lol)

[weird questions for writers]

What font do you write in? Do you actually care or is that just the default setting?

usually I go for the default when I’m just starting out (calibri on word), then switch to something that feels tonally appropriate when i need a change of pace! e.g. for the bridgerton fic, I was using a serif typeface called book antiqua because honestly how could I not, lol. also jazz recently clued me into a relatively barebones word processing program called stimuwrite, and I just use the default there!

What’s the weirdest thing you’ve ever used as a bookmark?

story time. i once signed up for a work event where a mildly popular tv chef cooks rapidly over video call while you and your coworkers frantically try to keep up. said event came with a promotional cookbook, which i flipped through most of before putting it away to look at later. it was not a very interesting cookbook, so later never really came. because i use my hands a lot, i have a habit of taking off my wedding ring and putting it out of the way on the nearest available surface. this means it sometimes goes missing for days at a time. so i’m rearranging the cookbooks on the kitchen counter and starting to wonder if I’ve accidentally knocked my ring down a drain or something without realizing, when i realize the books are sitting at a slight angle and refusing to line up. i come to realize that the culprit is said promotional cookbook, so i take it out and open it, and what is sitting nestled close to the spine?

TLDR this man ate my family jewels.

(fabio was sent to the donation pile as penance, although honestly he was headed for it anyway. it wasn’t a particularly good cookbook.)

more answers under the cut!

What is a weird, hyper-specific detail you know about one of your characters that is completely irrelevant to the story?

The following is actually for a fic, so standard disclaimer that shepherds of haven & its characters of course belong to lena, and I’m just making up things based on them. because take your daughter to work day is a time travel story that starts a generation after the main game, i had to nerf the future!versions of the inner circle somehow so they couldn’t just go back and fix things themselves. for the most part time has done the work for me—the early shepherd recruits skew so young that future!tallys is the only one who could still pass for recruitment age, and there’s obviously already a tallys running around—but there is one person who that still might not stop, and that’s our favorite planeshifting academic/mad scientist liefred antiqua. so i took a bat to his knee. more specifically, at some point he was up on the roof of their house fixing idk, their magic satellite antenna or something, when he slipped on a wet patch and fell off, breaking his leg in a couple of places. he’s healed from it, but definitely can’t run like he used to, a fact that is leveraged to keep him from joining the travel part of the time travel mission LMAO

Where do you draw your inspiration? What do you do when the inspiration well runs dry?

Mostly books, theater, and art! The scope of my life is very small and fairly boring i.e. not good creative fodder, so i have to draw inspiration by proxy. If I get stuck, I try reading something that’s tonally in the same wheelhouse, which I can usually analyze for ideas for sentence construction or new ways to advance the plot. I tend to write out of order, so I’ll sometimes reorganize my snippets to put them in the order of the story to see if that clarifies anything. And if that doesn’t work, I hop to a different WIP. While I wish I was better about not constantly abandoning stuff (and am working to change that), I’m not on any deadlines except for my self-imposed ones.

[eifnacht]

TAGS POST

⟡   ⬝   ( self. ) ┋ the great detective.

⟡   ⬝   ( aes. ) ┋ dedication to my people.

⟡   ⬝   ( thoughts. ) ┋ a freedom to choose to be better.

⟡   ⬝   ( ooc. ) ┋ sometimes you gotta just say something weird.

⟡   ⬝   ( music. ) ┋ headphones and daydreams.

⟡   ⬝   ( queue. ) ┋ madder than a hatter spinning only faster.

⟡   ⬝   ( about. ) ┋ zeal and dedication; two sides of the same coin.

⟡   ⬝   ( memes. ) ┋ world's end dancehall.

⟡   ⬝   ( asks ) ┋ won't you sit and talk for a while?

⟡   ⬝   ( mun art ) ┋ whisper your love and i'll whisper mine.

⟡   ⬝   ( v01 main ) ┋ forever entangled in a web of misconception.

⟡   ⬝   ( v02 HSR ) ┋ imagined precipice between here and nowhere.

⟡   ⬝   ( v03 fantasy ) ┋ a fine line between ferocity and frenzy.

⟡   ⬝   ( v04 wellspring ) ┋ searching for answers on distant shorelines.

⟡   ⬝   ( v05 pathfinder ) ┋ a world of possibility & probability.

⟡   ⬝   ( self promo ) ┋ love for the writer.

⟡   ⬝   ( promotion ) ┋ love for the audience.

[solitarelee]

Writer ask:

Tell us about your current project(s)  – what’s it about, how’s progress, what do you love most about it?

Oh god wait now I actually have to talk about my writing on here abort abort.

Ok so I have a (bad) tendency to have to be working on at minimum three things it once. The main projects I'm working on right now are

Scripts. I write ASMR scripts, sometimes for $$$, sometimes for trade, sometimes just for funsies because I thought of one (and then I wave it around at people until someone bites). Right now I'm working on uhhhhh *clears throat* funnel web drider nsfw where the--actually I think I'll leave the details up to everyone's imagination. What I love most about it is that it has my fetish in it, just the way I like it, because I'm the one writing about it. I won't tell you what it is but also it's not what you think (unless you're Kitty, in which case, yeah, it's that one).

Oceanside fanfiction. This is fanfiction that I'm being paid to write, and I have full fucking legal permission to say that, fuck off OTW, because I have permission from the actual creator whom I do work for anyway. ._. What I love most about it is the fact the protagonist is a complete tosser rn because it's at the beginning of their character arc(s).

*a long, deep, tired sigh* one of my friends commissioned me to write omegaverse because I said I'd never fucking write omegaverse so now I'm also writing omegaverse aliens (because the whole thing makes more sense if you just make it another species, and as a bonus you can have hapless actual humans get caught up in their horny shenanigans). This is actually the story the catholicism questions were for. I'm sorry the catholics had to find out this way. (The omegaverse aliens are not catholic if that helps.) (The, uh, space dragons are.) What I love most about it is that I'm getting paid to write it (/j). Actually what I love most about it is my absolute fucking confidence that @hawnks will go completely ballistic for it.

I write BNHA fanfic (singular) and it's good actually, more people should read it. You know redemption arcs? This is the opposite. Corruption arc, ig. My favorite thing about it is the weird little fucked up "we used to be codependent and then we were separated for a long time" familial relationship between the two protagonists. Everyone needs therapy, absolutely no one is ever getting it.

[amplifyme]

For the writer questions: 4. What’s a word that makes you go absolutely feral?

I know this probably isn't as illuminating as you might like, but I really don't have a word that makes me feral, good or bad. Words are instruments, used to provoke any number of feelings in any number of ways. They're tools, and tools are neither good or bad, they just are. It's the intent that matters. So a word that might cause me to side-eye it in one circumstance can create great joy in another. Does that make any sense at all?

Thanks for the question!

[aces-to-apples]

For the ask meme, 28?

28. Who is the most delightful character you’ve ever written? Why?

Lol Maul is always great fun and if I can swing it I'll pretty much always choose to write from his POV. He's just such a great combination of pretentious, awkward, and confused, you can have him say almost anything as long as it's ridiculous and slightly off-putting.

[emilianadarling]

34 and 35 for the writer asks?

Thanks so much for asking!!! TWO MORE I THINK TWO MORE ASKS LEFT WITH QUESTIONS AHH

Weird Questions for Writers (because writers are weird)

34. Thoughts on the Oxford comma, Go:

STRONGLY POSITIVE STRONGLY POSITIVEEEE. The style guide for my place of work does NOT include the Oxford comma and it kills me lol, I'm constantly sneaking it into internal documents where I can for that sweet sweet clarity.

As a youth, I was perhaps-too-aggressively into grammar and punctuation to the point of snobbery. I'm over that by and large, but still do feel that punctuation are the road signs that help us navigate sentences and stories. The Oxford comma is wonderful for this.

A book I did enjoy a lot in my formative years that discusses this is Eats, Shoots & Leaves. I haven't re-read it in ages, so not sure how it holds up, but it was a favourite for a long time for sure.

'who knew being a grammar nerd could be so much fun' lmao lmao, the early 2000s were a different time.

35. What’s your favorite writing rule to smash into smithereens?

I answered this one previously, but I'll give another one!!

Not smithereens, per se, but I do think there are nuances to the old "write what you know" adage. In some ways, yes, absolutely. Draw on what you know and find rhymes and echoes of your own emotions and experiences that you can channel into your creations.

But limiting yourself too strictly to "write what you know" can also be restrictive, in a sense -- and can in a way disincentivize the act of trying to imagine and depict other worlds that don't exist, or to attempt to put yourself in another person's shoes. Draw on what you know, but don't limit yourself to what you know. Being willing to explore, learn, and imagine new things into existence can be one of the truest joys of writing. It would be a shame to deprive yourself of it entirely. <3

[amethystina]

For the weird questions for Writers ask

13. What is a subject matter that is incredibly difficult for you write about? What is easy?

I'm almost tempted to say sex scenes because, man, do they exhaust me sometimes x'D But the truth is I just find them tedious, not difficult. And not tedious as in that I hate writing them or anything. Just that, during sex scenes, the timing and build-up has to be just right and that takes a lot of time and effort. Which is kind of annoying

(also, I'm pretty ace so I spend most of my time squinting at the screen going "... is this sexy? How to sexy? What IS sexy? I am so confused.")

I think, in the end, the most difficult subject matters for me to write about are things I have truly no experience of that are also incredibly sensitive or important. Like, I would find it incredibly difficult to write a story focusing on contemporary racism because I'm a blonde, blue-eyed white girl. What the fuck do I know about being subjected to racism? I would be SO uncomfortable writing about it because it's not my story to tell and I would, no doubt, offend a lot of people when I inevitably got something wrong.

I would rather write a story about things that outright trigger me than a subject I have no right to be talking about where my insensitivity and lack of experience might harm or offend people. So the "difficult" part wouldn't be my lacking skill level or that it hurts me, personally, but that I would feel so uncomfortable and afraid of hurting other people that I just wouldn't be able to do it.

That's not to say I only ever write things I have personally experienced (the stories would be kind of one-note if that was the case) but there are certain subjects I would definitely think twice about writing about without doing A LOT of research and interviews with people who could teach me more about it first.

And what's easy?

People.

How they behave, their emotions, their quirks and habits — even the dark, unruly parts. I like being able to write characters who feel human, with both good and bad sides. Which comes naturally to me in a way that's difficult to really describe. I rarely, if ever, have to plan the characters' reactions during a scene before I write it — everything usually just flows on its own as I write it, intuitively and with ease.

And, apparently, I get it right pretty much on the first try?

So yeah. People. They're incredibly easy, even when they're being assholes or little shits.

Weird Questions for Writers

[thatonebirdwrites]

for the writer ask meme: 24 and 35!

24. How much prep work do you put into your stories? What does that look like for you? Do you enjoy this part or do you just want to get on with it?

I research the heck out of things. As in, I'll even buy books to read in preparation and take notes. And I'll be researching as I write, so if something comes up, I'll research it to make sure I'm doing a good job exploring that idea/topic and showing it well.

I honestly love researching things, so sometimes I research too much and need to stop myself from spending too much time researching when I ought to be writing. A lot of the summary notes for a particular researched topic will appear in my end-notes on the AO3 fics.

For original stories, I'll do a lot of worldbuilding behind the scenes -- even to the point of creating conlangs to name things or to craft ways of thinking that differ between ethnicities.

I also interview my characters to get a feel for their voice and write practice scenes.

I have several possible ending scenes, but I will write the story and see which one the characters choose. (Sometimes they choose none of them! So then I write a new ending. :D)

35. What’s your favorite writing rule to smash into smithereens?

The so-called "write what you know" bogus rule. I stand with Ursula Le Guin. Explore the infinite wonders of our imagination, and do research to help augment one's knowledge.

I don't even consider it a rule really. Just an annoying thing teachers say to stifle creativity.

If I wanna write about superheros dancing in space with their suited up girlfriend, then dammit, I'm writing about it.

I also like to smash the 'show versus tell' rule. There's a time to show and a time to tell. Balance it.

Thanks for asking! This is fun. :D

[it-explains-why-youre-special]

taking requests for capriltello fic with these because i want to write for them 🖤💛💜

send me a pairing and one of these and i'll write a mini fic

things you said at 1 am

things you said through your teeth

things you said too quietly

things you said over the phone

things you didn’t say at all

things you said under the stars and in the grass

things you said while we were driving

things you said when you were crying

things you said when i was crying

things you said that made me feel like shit

things you said when you were drunk

things you said when you thought i was asleep

things you said at the kitchen table

things you said after you kissed me

things you said with too many miles between us

things you said with no space between us

things you said that i wish you hadnt

things you said when you were scared

things you said when we were the happiest we ever were

things you said that i wasn’t meant to hear

things you said when we were on top of the world

things you said after it was over

things you said [make your own]

inspired by this

[ravensilversea]

7, 17, 40

7. What is your deepest joy about writing?

Sharing it! I had been writing throughout my childhood, but I always use 2011 as the year I started writing stories because that's the year I fell in love with it because me and a couple of friends starting sharing stories with each and just hyping each other up. Like I very do much write for myself, but I love seeing other people love my stories too.

40. Please share a poem with me, I need it.

Choosing To have joy Is not Naively thinking Everything will be easy. It is Courageously believing That there is still hope, Even when Things get hard. Here's to living joyously And holding hope closely. Today. Tomorrow. Always.

Technically it's a greeting card message, but it's poetic and I love it. Also the card had watercolor monarch butterflies on it, which is always the best decoration choice tbh.

17. Talk to me about the minutiae of your current WIP. Tell me about the lore, the history, the detail, the things that won’t make it in the text.

Time Travel Fix-it except Firestar fucks straight over to Windclan- because it's the most self-indulgent and really fun, and I should write more of it.

The #1 biggest thing to know is that StarClan is spending this entire timeline pressing the Big Red Prophecy button over and over again because clearly something's broken

Other highlights are under the cut for length:

Brokenstar/Firestar rivalry because "Rusty" gunned straight for Brokenstar during the WindClan-getting-chased-out-of-their-territory Battle and took one of his lives, probably his first if I can swing it

"Rusty" also definitely snatches Badgerfang in the chaos and wow isn't this apprentice like really tiny? Almost like he's too young? Guess he's ours now :3

WindClan now yeets all the way to SkyClan's neighborhood and SkyClan descendents help them out. Firestar returns post-Brokenstar to help rebuild SkyClan, for reasons currently unknown Dustpelt and Sandstorm follow him

Timeline gets squished because there's no reason Arc 1 took 3 years

Out of the original 5 canon ThunderClan apprentices: Graystripe is in RiverClan, Dustpelt and Sandstorm end up in WindClan because Firestar has two paws, and Ravenpaw actually stays in ThunderClan I think

Redtail lives long enough to succeed Bluestar and become Redstar. Tigerstar then spends the time between that and arriving at the lake, whittling down his lives, which means both him and Firestar are brand new leaders when they reach the lake

Literally both Oakheart and Redtail live because "Rusty" took a walk through RiverClan territory and distracted the Sunningrocks patrol

Initial lake territory leaders are drastically different: Firestar of WindClan, Oakstar of RiverClan, Whitestar of ShadowClan, Tigerstar of ThunderClan

Both RiverClan and ThunderClan have lost a generation of medicine cats each, ThunderClan may have lost two Actually, scratch that, I'm kicking Leafpool out with her kits, so ThunderClan just doesn't have a confirmed medicine cat after Yellowfang because I haven't decided how the dominoes fall in regards to Cinderpelt yet

Also means Lion/Holly/Jay litter is in WindClan

Literally have no idea who's left to make up ThunderClan's ranks at this point (That's a lie, I do have some idea, but man they're loosing all the cool kids lol)

Kin of your kin prophecy not only still applies, but is actually given to Tigerstar as a threat

No idea how I'm getting Cloudtail into the clans

Smudge may end up a minor villain

My initial plan was for Tallstar to take "Rusty" under his wing, but Barkface showed up first and well now Firestar's probably going to have two dads

The more I think about this, the less the time-travel is relevant but also like the entire set-up needs the time travel. So clearly I just need to sprinkle in more future knowledge shenanigans

Also I think Warrior Cats should have a matrilineal kinship system because of the whole "Queens don't have to name their litter's father" but that also definitely throws a wrench into everything, so it's probably not going to get touched on for this AU

40. Please share a poem with me, I need it.

Choosing To have joy Is not Naively thinking Everything will be easy. It is Courageously believing That there is still hope, Even when Things get hard. Here's to living joyously And holding hope closely. Today. Tomorrow. Always.

Technically it's a greeting card message, but it's poetic and I love it. Also the card had watercolor monarch butterflies on it, which is always the best decoration choice tbh.

[kiwiana-writes]

1 and 21 for the writer asks

1. What font do you write in? Do you actually care or is that just the default setting?

Default setting, baby. I literally could not care less.

21. Could you ever quit writing? Do you ever wish you could? Why or why not?

Hell no. Writing is and has always been how I process and express my emotions—not to get all therapy about it but I wasn't encouraged to share how I felt growing up and so I started channeling it into writing instead, and that's never stopped. I also feel my mental health slipping when I'm unable to write, and it's a bit of a self-perpetuating cycle because of course the worse my mental health gets the harder it IS to write. Writing's all I want to do for the rest of my life, lol. Whether I succeed or not is another question.

[Weird questions for writers]

[lilolilyr]

4, 7, 12 for the weird writer's asks, please!

4. What’s a word that makes you go absolutely feral?

Uhh idk I don't think there is one? At least not one I actually use in writing. The most recent weird long word I learned is floccinaucinihiliphilificate (bloody hope I spelled that right) which means to disdain or look down on something, and I think it's an awesome word!

7. What is your deepest joy about writing?

Hard to pick just one! Putting my thoughts into writing so I can return to them later, and seeing others' reactions to my writing, and contributing to fandom communities, and just writing itself is fun to me!

12. If a genie offered you three writing wishes, what would they be? Btw if you wish for more wishes the genie turns all your current WIPs into Lorem Ipsum, I don’t make the rules

To have the time in my life to finish all the wips I care about, to never run out of new ideas and to always find joy in writing!

(Of course if I met a genie-for-writers irl my first ask would probably be along the lines of writing a book that makes me millions of € but that's more about wanting to escape capitalism than actual writing, so I thought I'd give you three actually writing related answers xD)

Thanks so much for the ask!

Weird questions for writers | taking prompts!