Fanfic Ideas and the Creative Process... (was Quidditch!Ron)

[Trina]

Ebony wrote:

> 
> Exactly... in my experience, writer-types are daydreamers.  

I have a very rich inner life, so I am never really bored.  I do a 
mental character sketch of the people around me, or spin fancies 
about them, make up completely new stories to entertain myself.  I 
don't necessarily write them down later, but I've had the fun of it 
in the first place.

> Sam, have you ever had what I call a "paper jones"? <snip>   I've 
written on envelopes, on credit cards, on theatre programs... once at 
> the doctor's office it happened, there was no paper *anywhere* to 
be had, so 
> I actually BOUGHT A DOUGHNUT just so I could get the paper bag... 

I have a Taco John's napkin with an essay on decadence and comfort I 
wrote in college while eating a very large ice cream concoction.  I 
copied it onto "real" paper later, but tucked the original into 
Volume 5 of my journals for safekeeping...
 
> Parker wrote: "I carry notebooks around with me everywhere.  If I 
see something that intrigues me, or get an idea, I write it down.  
Right then and there. (those memo thingys would work the same way--
please don't write and drive!) That way, I don't forget ideas. "
> 
[Ebony] LOL about the writing and driving!  Your notebooks are a 
great idea!  Carole  suggested this to me when I first thought about 
writing fanfiction but complained about a lack of time during the 
school year... so now I have a five-subject notebook and two stenos 
devoted to my HP AU alone (and also  random other stuff I jot down--
grocery lists, kids whose parents I need to  call when I get home, 
etc.)

I used to carry little memo books in my pocketbook in high school to 
record my day as it happened (with private shorthand in case it fell 
into the wrong hands, after all I *did* describe teachers and fellow 
students!)  I got out of the habit in college, but now have picked it 
up again.  Perhaps I should have used it last night when I had a very 
interesting dream that seemed like a story about to happen (involving 
false witches and incantations, if you want to know). Dreaming in 
verse in fact... 


My problem is that what I imagine in my head sounds, well, stupid 
when I put it down on paper and I quit, even though I know I 
shouldn't.  Or I lose the train of thought when an outside 
interuption happen... And then there are days when the words pour out 
like water from a pitcher and I have found the elusive random word...

Trina