Companion to Day 2: Tricksy Pirates
If you’re wondering what the island looks like – look up. I based it off the island in the home page photo (although Sol and Ulandin’s perspective is rather different).
On to today’s topic.
Pirates were infamous for using their wits and sheer bravado as much as their cutlasses at times.
In 1719, Captain Rackham’s pirate ship was trapped by two more respectable vessels. He managed to last the day by sheltering behind an island, but the two respectable ships places themselves overnight in such a way that he couldn’t sail either forward or back. All the pirates could do was wait until dawn to be slaughtered.
What’s a pirate to do?
They left their ship empty and managed to take over one ship (the best of the three!) by climbing aboard in absolute silence, and taking over the whole thing without a single scream for help or alarm rung.
Then they quietly sailed it away.
The next day, the remaining good guys set the pirate’s ship on fire. Too bad it was empty – and their companions captured along with their VERY pretty boat.
Pirates win!
(This story is taken from the book, “A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the Most Notorious Pirates” by Captain Johnson – an obvious pseudonym – first released in 1724)
Companion to Day 1
Oh no! Captain Sol is barely alive and our main character is unconscious! What will happen next!?!
Some of my friends predicted the following:
Day 2
Dead.
Day 3
Still dead.
Day 4
Starting to bloat.
Twiction, flash, drabble, dribble, and hint fiction
Novels are tiring, partly because you have so much freedom – whole worlds to invent and so on. So every so often I take a holiday into the world of the weird. Stories without the letter ‘e’. Stories with just dialogue. Stories inspired by a picture. More often, I go to unusual lengths – unusually small lengths.
Twiction: twitter fiction (can be any length, but 140 characters at a time). Join my piratical twitter tale by clicking on the link at left (it’s located above the story so far – read upward from August 1).
Flash: 1000 or less words
Drabble: 100 or less words
Dribble: 50 or less words
Hint fiction: 25 or less words
Hint fiction also has the quality that’s it’s not MEANT to be a story – not meant to show the reader who the character is; not meant to have a beginning, middle and end. It’s just a moment – and all the rest is just hinted at. The creepiest story I’ve ever read was hint fiction, which you can find here with the title “Progress” (not suitable for children – but everything is implied, of course):
http://www.robertswartwood.com/?page_id=78
There’s a really cool hint fiction competition getting run at the moment. Those who were at the flashmob yesterday would have read “Risk” which is one of my entries. If you want to know more, go here:
http://www.robertswartwood.com/?page_id=8
If you have an idea, the story is almost finished.
Flashmob a success
Yours truly
I am exhausted and still psyched (and aware of how lucky I have to be for this twittertale to succeed), but the launch did go well. The full report is at twittertales.wordpress.com
And I’ve edited and uploaded a 1.5 minute video on youtube, with the title, “Pirate Flashmob Canberra”.
Flashmob: Report
I’ve just returned victorious from the bizarro launch of the twitter tale – a pirate flashmob at Lyneham local shops in Canberra.
I’ll upload some videos (much edited) tomorrow.
We had quite a number of midget pirates, and one girl who insisted on coming as a dragon. A cutlass-wielding dragon.
Picking on someone her own size
Our attempts at looking normal were going well until this girl and her mum showed up, when we gave up the game and turned pirate ten minutes early.
At least two video cameras were filming, and one was deliberately skulking about 100 metres away. My father-in-law spotted them (a three-person crew) and the most logical explanation (unless those fiendish ninjas had HEAVILY described their nunchucks) was that it was WIN television.
The crowd was about fifty people, as I’d hoped, with about three groups of people I didn’t know – so yay for advertising.
We had lollies left over 🙂
These are DINOSAUR pirates (yes, that's what they're doing. No, I don't know why).
Pirates Required
Amazingly*, the flashmob is on tomorrow!
(*Not that amazing if you subscribe to the time-space continuum.)
Who wants to help hand out free lollies (you’ll need to be someone I know and trust) and/or short-short stories?
Please bring digital cameras for still photos to send to various media.
I’d like someone to come with a video camera – all flashmobs should be recorded, since they’re basically performance art (although you’ll need to check with parents if you’re filming kids).
How to spot me on the day (eg to check who are the okay people to take lollies from): 175cm in heels, black corset, green lacey wrap, full-length red skirt. Probably shivering (also probably wearing a loose white undershirt). I will be there from about 1:00pm.
I’ll be handing out eyepatches etc to anyone who asks.
See ye on the morrow!
The details:
Lyneham shops (Canberra) outside Tillies and the bookshop.
Be piratical from: 2:00-2:30pm (ideally showing up disguised as a normal person beforehand for maximum effect).
Enjoy lollies, short-short stories, conversation (piratical or otherwise), the bookshop, and the two neighbouring cafes as long as you like!
One example of how it's done
Happy Potter 6 review
Funny (even more than the rest). Pretty (the castle). Sad. Scary.
In that order.
I REALLY liked what they did with Malfoy. He became a 3D character for the first time.
The acting is a bit sketchy at times, but Daniel Radcliffe deserves his pay (which is saying a LOT).
Slightly too long – but not to the same extent as the book.
You know you’re gonna see it anyway, so just go.
Summing-up-most-of-the-movie quote:
“These girls are gonna kill me” -Ron.
I survived Year Five (and also Year Six)
Today I visited a primary school and took over two Year 5/6 classes for about an hour each. I met Aiden, Riley, Andrea, Nathan and many others.
Teaching is a little bit like getting executed and a little bit like having God-like powers. The combination is confusing, to say the least.
The kids were startlingly responsive, and I enjoyed myself. I think they did too. It’ll be interesting to see if any of them start following me on twitter over the next few days (or comment on this!)
I had them write character sheets and story outlines. The influence of “Twilight” was clear by the large numbers of vampires, and of very emo immortals. I had this conversation a few times:
“Your character sounds interesting. So what makes him happy?”
“Nothing.”
“Does he enjoy anything?”
“No.”
“So. . . he’s trying to be happy?”
“No. Not really.”
—————-
Clearly Edward Cullen, yes?
A lot of the story ideas were BRILLIANT. In one class, we had a character who could fly. Her problems were that (a) She couldn’t stop – even when she slept (b) SHE WAS CONTAGIOUS! (I am definitely stealing that idea.)
In another class, our character had psychokinetic powers (since when do kids know what that word means?) They gave him the problem that whenever he used his powers, he fainted. What a great problem!
Conclusion
Pirates: 1
Ninjas: 0
Oh! I almost forgot! It’s just two days until the pirate flashmob this Saturday.
How to join: show up at the Lyneham shops (outside the second-hand bookshop) at 2:00-2:30pm this Saturday in a pirate outfit (or just show up, and I’ll give ye an eyepatch). Bring your friends!
United States of Tara: review
United States of Tara is a comedy drama about a family dealing with the fact that the mum (Tara) has multiple personality disorder (it has a completely different name now, but I just can’t remember it).
Yes, it’s a real illness. It just SEEMS made up.
In the first episode, two of Tara’s other personalities emerge – “T” who is incredibly skanky (and her daughter’s best friend) and “Buck” who is a redneck male and utterly selfish (or is he?)
All of Tara’s personalities are played by Toni Colette. Every bit of acting is brilliant from beginning to end (not just Toni – but it can’t be easy to play so many people who are all fully realised characters inhabiting one mind).
The first scene both impressed and scared me – Tara is making a video diary, and from the first second she looks like someone struggling with a mental illness (which makes me cringe because I am one). The show is incredibly tragic – can you imagine having such little control over your own actions? – but also utterly hilarious. The last two lines are:
Tara’s daughter: Buck’s left handed, even though none of the others are. Isn’t that strange?
Tara’s husband: Yep. That is the one strange thing.
——————————–
The two things that blew me away about this show:
-Tara’s multiple personalities make her own character deeper. The weirder they are, the more we relate to the “real” Tara.
-The family dpes actually function – they’re used to all the Taras, and they love all of them (for different reasons – they even have a special boys’ activity for when Buck shows up). So there’s an infusion of hope that lifts this above almost every comedy (especially those set in families) ever written.
It’s on ABC at 9:30 (definitely not for kids) on Wednesdays.
Watch it if you like laughter, hope, or gaining an understanding of mental illness. It is VERY funny – the funniest show on TV, I think.
PS I reported on today’s classroom adventure in my other blog, twittertales.wordpress.com
The Fear
I love the old farmer’s idea of how to get things done when you’re scared of them: “Throw your hat over the fence.” There’s a metaphorical dog on the other side of the fence, but you’re determined – so you throw your hat over. Then you have to face the dog to get your hat back.
My hat’s thrown.
So far I’m committed to teach short story writing at four different Canberra schools. I’ve advertised a flashmob on radio, in newspapers, and (hopefully) it will end up being on TV (particularly if people show up). I have over a hundred followers on twitter, and more who will be following the story on my twittertales.wordpress.com blog or elsewhere.
Scared now.
Meh.
PS Not following me yet? Join twitter (it won’t spam you – not even with my story) at:
http://twitter.com/Louise_Curtis_ (you have to manually add the underline at the end due to computer and/or my own stupidity)
