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NaNoWriMo novel, day 3

At this point, I’m beginning to wonder if this was really a smart thing to do. Having signed up for NaNoWriMo six days late, I now have only 22 more days to complete a 50,000 word novel. Well, novella, technically, but as they say on the Nano website, “novel” sounds much more impressive. As you can see by the word count meter on the right, I’m only at about 6,000 words, and my calculator tells me that I need just about 2,000 words per day if I want to reach my goal. It’s not impossible, certainly, but… can I do that and still have some semblance of a plot?

So far I’ve reached my daily quota, but barely, and the I’m hatching the story right off the top of my head, so I absolutely guarantee that this one’s going to be a stinker. But then, at the end of all this, I can boast that I have written a novel. A really painfully, vomit-inducing novel that’s at the same time guaranteed to be the best novel that you have ever read by a guy named “Cubey”.

Break time. I’ll see if I can squeeze out another 2,000 poopie words tomorrow.

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Virtual aircraft maker turns novelist

In a stunningly stupid move, today I impulsively signed up for National Novel Writing Month (or NaNoWriMo, for syllable-haters). Their website sums it up best: “National Novel Writing Month is a fun, seat-of-your-pants approach to novel writing. Participants begin writing November 1. The goal is to write a 175-page (50,000-word) novel by midnight, November 30.” It’s an insane writing marathon that sneers at quality in favour of sheer, overwhelming word quantity. The word count is all that matters.

It’s a daunting challenge, made even more so by the fact that I’m several days late off the starting line, and I have no clue what story I could write. I’ve tried writing a novel before, and made it to 20,000 words before realizing just how much trouble I was in, and by 30,000 words, I would rather have chewed my own fingers off than type another word.

So it’s time to pour another steaming mug of rocket fuel coffee, because here I go again!

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Tesselated cheese

I have to report that on visiting my local Subway, the Sandwich Artist was willing to tesselate my cheese, rather than overlap. Not only that, but he seemed to appreciate knowing what “tesselation” means. As would I! I can’t help but feel that I’ve truly accomplished something significant today.

Link: An Open Letter to Subway

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Can you spot the differences?

Again, today I step away from Second Life to look at food.

I’m not a picky eater. I’ll dig into Kraft Dinner as eagerly as a proper macaroni dish, and not complain that it tastes like petrochemicals. After all, Kraft Dinner has no pretentions of being more than it actually is: crappy dried pasta with fake cheese powder. But sometimes there’s a huge difference between what’s advertised and what’s actually in the package.

Take this example of Lilydale “Latitudes” pre-cooked chicken breast. I assume it’s aimed at busy professionals who enjoy a grilled chicken breast in a “chef prepared sauce”, but don’t have time to grill or saucify anything. Me, I’m just lazy, so I picked up a package of the “fajita” style chicken breast. The photo of a juicy, tender chicken breast with red and yellow peppers was irresistable to a lazy twit like me.

Well, I got my just desserts, and before the main course even. Inside the package was not a whole breast of chicken, but catfood-style chicken shreds in a homogenous goo. Was this package supposed to be in the petfood section? It looks horrible!

Obviously, this is an extreme case of false advertising. The package clearly says “whole chicken breast”, but it actually contains pulped and shredded… something. I guess it might have been chicken at some point, but then again, it might just be yak vomit.

Note to self: next time, just buy the chicken and grill it yourself. That or buy the same thing for a fraction of the price from Miss Mew.

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Avocado ripening myth

Today I set aside my Second Life endeavours to explore a myth that’s very important to me. Or at least to my stomach.

Picture this: Craving a little guacamole for your chips, you buy a couple of avocados at the supermarket. When you bring them home, your heart sinks when you realize they’re hard as rocks! Totally unripe.

But don’t give up hope. Assorted experts on the intertubes claim that you can speed the ripening process by placing the avocado in a paper bag. Some say you should put a banana or apple in the bag with it, but others say that’s not necessary.

unripe avocado in a paper bag

So today I put on my Mythbuster hat and attack this one pseudo-scientifically. I have two very unripe avocados, and placed one in a paper bag (as the experts suggest), but left the other exposed on the counter. Let’s see which one ripens faster. If they ripen at the same speed, “myth busted”, as Adam and Jamie say. According to the experts, it can possibly take only a day, so I’ll post the stupendously thrilling results later.

And yes. This is the kind of thing I do when I’m bored.

UPDATE! – Sept. 25

No changes to report. Avocados still unripe. More news on this amazing experiment later.

SHOCKING CONCLUSION! – Sept. 26

Today I removed the avocado from the bag and discovered that it was ripe enough to eat. And so is the other one. Hmm.

So what can I conclude from this fiasco? Putting an avocado in a paper bag doesn’t make it ripen any faster than it’s unbagged counterpart. Also: This was a colossal waste of time.

And now: guacamole.