test - Colin for Lupin? - Death - How do I write?

[Catlady]

Keirsey and Meyer-Briggs have come up again. I remain too satisfied with
my 1986 result INXJ (just what I would have predicted, if I had been
arrogant enough to claim a Mixed Type (T/F) for myself).

Catherine wrote:
> I chose Colin Firth as Sirius, as, besides the fact that he is
> undeniably sexy, he is also very good at the tortured soul/enigmatic
roles.

Even tho' some people haven't noticed that Remus is sexy, no one could
deny that he is a tortured soul and enigmatic. Sirius is much more
likely than Remus to say whatever is on his mind, or at least show it on
his face.

Dinah wrote:
> We (= school choir) are going to sing at his Requiem-Mass, but
> I really don't know how to sing there without starting to cry.

I can't believe that anyone (except maybe the choir director) would
criticise you for crying in that circumstance. The child's poor parents
will be more comforted by the shared tears than by the music. Not that I
deny that music can be very spiritual, or that prayer and faith are a
great comfort in times of death.

> I guess you never get used to death, even if you don't know
> the people involved.

Uh, Dinah, you're 19 or 20?  Be glad that you live in a civilised world
where you have not encountered enough death yet in those few years to
have gotten used to it. Alternatives include all those horrible wars in
Bosnia and Sudan and Rwanda and so on, and places with no vaccinations
nor antibiotics and all the time fatal diseases....

Scott asked:
> My question is how do you write? Can you compose better
> at a computer letting your fingers fly over the keys, or in a
> notebook scratching erasing and marking things out with
> your pencil or pen?

I write two ways: 1) with computer and word processing program, 2) with
a ball point pen, on the back of one-sided printouts or xeroxes, in
'printing' rather than 'cursive' handwriting.

I absolutely cannot use a typewriter. I spent years of frustration and
no success struggling with various typewriters trying to type school
essays that were required to be typed and fanzine articles that no one
would read if they weren't typed. It was like entering into Heaven when
I was introduced to a real-time line editor. 'Line editor' is a computer
program like TSO's ISPF EDIT except only one line at a time is on the
screen. Real-time means you edit your text on a videoterminal, not by
inputting punch cards into the card reader. I am just almost as bad at
keypunching input cards as I am at typing. Microcomputers hadn't been
invented yet in those days - 1977 IIRC.

I can't write in a spiral notebook or a blank book -- if one of those
pages got all screwed up, it would have to be TORN OUT. Having a screwed
up page taunting my eyes is too stressful to be endured. Tearing out a
page is unbearably destructive.  The feeling that what I write must be
perfect the first time is such a burden that it makes me fall mute.

My cursive writing is so bad that I can't read it myself. Many people
claim they can't read my printing handwriting either, even when I write
slowly and neatly.

The computer has the advantage that I can write fast enough that I can
force my thinking to slow down to the speed of my writing and I can go a
LOT longer before my hands hurt. The handwriting has the advantage of
being more private and intimate. I can do the first round of polishing
with crossing out and writing between the lines, and writing in the
margins with arrows pointing where it's s'posed to go, and even writing
on a new piece of paper and paperclipping it to the page where I would
have written it if there had been room, but eventually it has to be
typed into the computer for further polishing and (as SIMON said) that
is so boring that my Quidditch story will probably never get to that
stage. People used to do their multiple drafts by typing or handwriting
the WHOLE DOCUMENT over, not just the parts that were changed. I CANNOT
UNDERSTAND how they were ABLE to do something that BORING!!!!
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