Today I thought I’d talk a little about my previous blog life, which also intersects with my writing history, so you’ll get some links to some of my short, sometimes flash, fiction writing!

A loooooong time ago, someone talked me into getting a Livejournal account. I had no idea what to do with it, but some of my work friends were there and not-yet-wife was there so I caved. I posted occasional random thoughts, did memes and the little survey-style things everyone was into at the time, met a couple people, but never really got into it cause I never knew what to say or do there. I’m like, hermit level introvert, so enthused banter about myself and what I had going on was completely alien and not gonna happen.

Then, two different people I knew there posted about a “writing” competition thing they were going to participate in called LJ Idol. It was a bit of a cross between American Idol and Survivor, if the focus was writing instead of singing or physical contests. Each week, everyone got a topic, or a couple topics to choose from, and you had several days to write an entry for that topic. In theory you could do anything, from personal accounts to fiction to an informational piece, sometimes people included pictures or video or did music. And that’s why I put writing in quotes, in theory it was anything Livejournal. In reality some seasons fiction did better or personal stories did better, and the more esoteric options didn’t survive as long. Because at the end of the week once everyone got their entries in, there was a vote and people were eliminated! Eventually it worked it’s way down to a final head to head with the last 2 or 3 people, and a season winner was declared.

I had written maybe two tiny stories my whole life, so I wasn’t “a writer”, but it sounded interesting so I gave it a shot. Some seasons I lasted longer than others, but I learned that I really liked writing and I met a lot of wonderful people along the way! One entry I used as a starting point to win NaNoWriMo and write a whole (small) book about! I pretty much participated every other season, timed writing with deadlines and competing and sharing with everyone at the time had a level of stress and anxiety attached to it, and a lot of times I was banging out an entry at the last minute, so I needed downtime between seasons.

Looking back thru all I did there was fun tonight, and I thought I’d share links to some of the ones I liked the results of. As mentioned they were written in a short time off the cuff, so yeah they could use a lot of editing, redevelopment, expansion, etc. Think of them as initial drafts and be kind! :D

I’m skipping ahead to Season 8, I had some fun fiction this season:

8.1: As We Gather Here To Prey was my first entry of the season, for the topic “when you pray, move your feet”. I loved playing with misinterpreting the topics, so a pray/prey replacement was an easy jump. Then with “move your feet”, I got the idea for how the hunters interacted with their prey, and from there it was a matter of style and fleshing out the scene. Writing too long of a piece was sometimes dangerous in competition so I didn’t go too long on it.

8.3: Westleigh Facility Coprolite Exhibit was two weeks later, and I went a little silly with it, and a bit crude. BUT, the topic was Coprolite which is fossilized poop, so I don’t feel at all out of like with a little crudity. It was a lot of fun, it has a cute element and an unexpected twist and was really well liked for that week, so I’m happy with it!

Week 21 of Season 8 was a special one, Intersections! You had to pick a partner, and there were TWO topics that week. You each took one of the two topics (so person A took one topic, person B took the other), and you had to write entries that interlinked somehow. I teamed up with my love Tigrkittn and we had a lot of fun coming up with our entries! giggles! Her entry came first in the pair, and was the topic “The Straw That Stirs The Drink”. My entry was the second half with the topic “Bridge”. This entry of mine is the one that eventually turned into a full fantasy noir novel :D

Season 9 I had a fun entry, I don’t even know what the topic was now because I just noted it as a huge acronym. So We’ll just say 9.4: No More Rides was a super silly and fun entry where I got to write from the point of view of several ponies :D

One final entry is a two-part one, and I really love this world concept and I’m planning to come back to it to write a novel in. It’s cyberpunk dystopia but I wanted to work a spiritual aspect into how the world works, and explore how chroming up affected the soul and what you were as a human. And also have a little fun mixed in, I love having at least one character than adds a bit of levity into a story. In this case Gregor is the foil to the ever-serious Jonni. Resolution is the start, and tells a longer story that sets the world scene and gives us a feel of what’s going on. Gregor Has A Plan is a shorter piece but one I love, cause we get a bit of life philosophy from the echo of a person inside a piece of war machinery, and as expected it’s not the best life advice! :D

If you enjoy any of that and want to see more, I did do a summary post at the start of one season of all my older entries, ones marked in bold I think were better than others.

Feel free to leave comments or discuss things at my Mastodon toot about this entry :D