Author: Minerva Zimmerman

Minerva Zimmerman

Not A Drop To Drink

“So, there’s some water downstairs,” said Les. “Should I just mop it up or is there some kind of procedure?”

“Like, seepage?” asked Minerva.

Les looked ponderous. “More like, leakage. I think it’s coming from the ceiling.”

“I’ll be right down.” Minerva sighed and drank as much of her caffeinated energy water as possible in a few gulps and headed to the basement exhibit space.

At the bottom of the steps, water was everywhere; it pooled under objects and rust-tinted water dripped from dozens of points in the ceiling. Minerva did the mental geography to make sure the bathroom wasn’t above this part of the building. It wasn’t, just a drainage pipe. It was going to be a very long day.

Soon Minerva was on hands and knees sopping up dirty water with rags and towels. Les mopped at the larger pools but it was hard to tell if he was making any sort of positive changes or just spreading the water around. Minerva worked her way backwards toward the outside wall trying desperately to get water away from objects and displays.

“I’m going to go empty the bucket,” said Les. “It is getting kind of dirty.”

Minerva nodded, even though she was internally rolling her eyes. It wasn’t like the water they were mopping up was going to get any cleaner. Neither was she. Her khaki pants were already smeared with grime from the floor and she could tell her hair had already frizzed out in an impressive halo from her ponytail.

It had been raining a lot recently and apparently a drainage pipe from the roof had backed up and run water back into the building. At least that was the theory and the plumbers were going to blow out the drainage pipes. Minerva had her doubts. There seemed to be a lot of water.

A drop of rusty water hit her on the nose, then another. She moved as the drips became a steady stream and then the floor above gave way in a torrent of water from the broken pipe.

Minerva Zimmerman

Fountain Pen Friday #3

Did I mention that I absolutely love cheap colorful pens? How about how I have really tiny hands? Well, this week’s pen is both!

IMG_20140403_183845_030
Purple Petit1 with pink ink cartridge and White Petit1 with green cartridge. Quarters added for scale.

The Pilot Petit1 Mini Fountain Pen is cheap in the best possible ways. Seriously, it is like a comfortable dive bar of pens. Normally I try to give a couple different buy links but for this one you really should buy it from Jet Pens where it is less than $4. YES YOU READ THAT RIGHT. And you know what else? The refills? Less than $2 for three of them.

closed pen next to open pen with cap on back.
closed pen next to open pen with cap on back.

I have two of these pens cause I mean, zomg… so cheap, so handy, so portable. I keep one of these in my purse all the time and it is totally not a big deal. Not only does it not leak, but it also keeps writing even if you haven’t used it in a really long time. Seriously, my cat used the white pen for a hockey puck last night and it was totally fine. No leaks and just the tip needed wiping off. 

IMG_20140403_183911_367

I wrote an entire novella with that purple one. It is absolutely the perfect size to just clip to the the elastic band of a Moleskine notebook and go.

cap on the back
cap on the back

So let’s assume you don’t have freakishly small hands like me. I mean, I could be a hand model for value menu burgers. That’s how small they are. WELL NEVER FEAR NORMAL SIZED HUMANOID– just stick the cap on the back and it is pretty close to a normal pen length in the hand.

writing3

Now if you are a mini-humanoid hand size, the pen without the cap is a very comfortable length and very light. I can write with this pen for a really really long time without fatigue. I like that.

writing2

writing

 

Writing sample in pink and green. Sharpie in aqua, G-2 gel pen in green at very bottom.
Writing sample in pink and green. Sharpie in aqua, G-2 gel pen in green at very bottom.

And the cartridges come in these tubes that are about the same size as a pen so they fit in pencil cases and pen cases/pen pockets TOTALLY PERFECT.

refills

IMG_20140403_185250_989

Also, the cartridges themselves look like tiny little mad scientist test tubes! I may cackle a bit maniacally to myself as I put them in… *coff*

green cartridge
green cartridge. Subtle nail polish this week is Ma.nish.ma Beyond Opal

The Good

  • Lightweight.
  • compact
  • round grip
  • secure snap on cap for traveling. Have never had a leak.
  • Cheap
  • writes nice.
  • writes FAST
  • smart packaging for cartridges
  • cute cartridges for evil geniuses (also good color selection)

The Bad

  • hard grip
  • proprietary cartridge

Overall grade: A

Cheap. Fast. My go-to travel pen. Buy two, they’re small. If you are looking for a fancy writing experience this won’t work. If you are looking for a functional pen for slap dash writing, you can’t beat it.

Minerva Zimmerman

Music and Writing: How I use Pandora Radio

Everyone uses music differently in their writing. Some can’t deal with lyrics while they write. I used to work for a music-related .com company where we did a lot of music data entry in a big open space filled with workstations. So we all got pretty used to making our own little bubbles of space with music and headphones. I use music to help me focus in general.

Since I do use music throughout my day, I try to make Pandora Radio stations that embody the mood or theme of the story I’m currently working on. That way I can seed ideas in my head throughout the day while I’m working.

How do you use music while writing?

Minerva Zimmerman

Museum Mishap Monday: Vectors of Virus

Seventeen pairs of tiny hands dragged along the railing into the museum. Four pairs were attached to sniffly noses. Two sniffly noses were just allergies. One pair of hands carried H1N1 and their nose showed no symptoms at all. Quiet voices argued over who got to hold the door. A child with brown hair in pigtails eventually became the designated door holder.

Inside, Minerva waited to greet the class field trip. “Hi, I”m Minerva and I’m the Curator here at the museum. How many of you have been to the museum before?”

Nearly every hand went up.

“Awesome. I want to welcome each and every one of you to our museum today. Does anyone have any questions?”

The children looked suddenly shy.

“Well, we’d love to answer any of your questions and please don’t hesitate to ask us if you think of one while you’re here.”

Mrs. Walker reminded the students about using their inside voices and split them into groups between the adult chaperones.

Minerva smiled as seventeen pairs of hands held the railing as they descended into the basement.

Minerva Zimmerman

Fountain Pen Friday #2

This week’s pen is the Sailor Clear Candy Fountain Pen (Jet Pens, Amazon). I got this one as a gift from my brother-in-law and his wife. (Sorry the pictures didn’t turn out better this week, we’ve had a lack of natural light and an abundance of rain.)

Pen in my hand with the cap on the back.
Pen in my hand with the cap on the back.
Pen in my hand with the cap off.
Pen in my hand with the cap off.
Sailor Clear Candy Fountain Pen with a correction tape dispenser, Necco Wafers, a Pilot G-2, and a Sharpie
Sailor Clear Candy Fountain Pen (bottom) with a correction tape dispenser, Necco Wafers, a Pilot G-2, and a Sharpie

 

This is another clear plastic fountain pen. Not too heavy, more of a standard sized pen. Screw on cap for traveling.

Pen with the cap off.

 

This pen does use a proprietary cartridge and converter. But the cartridges come in great colors and the converter means you can use any ink you want.

Various Sailor Clear Candy Cartridges in packaging, converter with box, green cartridge by itself
Various Sailor Clear Candy Cartridges in packaging, converter with box, green cartridge by itself above pen.

 

This pen is described as having a medium fine nib, and it’s about equal or slightly finer than a 07 ballpoint.

All but bottom line written with Sailor Clear Candy Fountain Pen Medium Fine Nib green cartridge, bottom line by Pilot G-2 07 in green.
All but bottom line written with Sailor Clear Candy Fountain Pen Medium Fine Nib green cartridge, bottom line by Pilot G-2 07 in green.

Because it does write with a relatively fine line, it can be hard to get started sometimes, and doesn’t do too well if the ink starts to dry out and thicken. Also you won’t get too much color variegation in inks that have it due to the thin line. It is however, very good at writing in pocket moleskines and other narrow writing spaces.

I love the star on the cap. I love it so much.
I love the star on the cap. I love it so much.

I have used this pen through two brown ink cartridges and I do have some ink staining on the white plastic parts but not bad.

Theres some staining on the white edge just behind the nib.
Theres some staining on the white edge just behind the nib.
some staining just on the inside ring of the cap
some staining just on the inside ring of the cap
Cap closeup. Also my nail polish is China Glaze Skyscraper in case anyone cares.
Cap closeup. Also my nail polish is China Glaze Skyscraper in case anyone cares.

The Good

  • Lightweight.
  • GOLD STAR!!!!!
  • round grip
  • cap screws on for secure traveling
  • uses bottled ink
  • writes nice fine line

The Bad

  • hard grip
  • plastic edges seem to stain
  • proprietary cartridge and converter
  • can be harder to start writing with sometimes

Overall grade: B+

I like this pen. It travels well and works particularly good for writing in small notebooks.

 

 

 

 

 

Minerva Zimmerman

Self-study Project: Short Stories

Rating System

 

I absolutely devoured media in my youth. I read hundreds of books a year and saw several movies a week. I was an avid gamer and once shipped a 130lb steamer trunk full of comics rather than leave them behind in a move. (I later learned that it is way cheaper to send books via Media Mail if you don’t care when they get there. However, if you send 13 different ~60lb boxes media mail ahead of an interstate move and then show up to collect them explaining you’re an anthropologist you will end up with the post office assuming you have been shipping dinosaur bones. This will greatly annoy you especially when years later they still ask you if you’ve heard about recent dinosaur finds and you’ve never found a polite way to explain anthropologists don’t know the ass end of a dinosaur from a mammoth behind.)

I recently realized that I’ve let my reading fall too far behind. There’s always a balancing act with writing and reading. I’ve basically stopped playing immersive video games. There are no current TV shows I’m following (though I am looking forward to season 3 of Korra). I still play puzzle games, and watch streaming shows, but those are things that happen on my terms. Reading has to be balanced with writing time, and it’s hard not to feel guilty about one or the other. If I’m not reading, my writing can’t advance. I know that. There are some things you can only learn by reading and some things only by writing. I’m holding myself back by not reading enough.

I decided to start rebuilding my reading habit by working primarily on reading short stories. To give myself a Master Class in genre short storytelling both present and classical. To do this, I need to also analyze the short stories in some form. I dislike doing in-depth fiction reviews, especially when there are intangible things like emotional impact and voice involved. Since I’m doing this for my own benefit I decided to go with a 1-5 star rating.

 

  • * = has potential but has technical, cultural, or voice problems.
  • ** = Good story that didn’t quite live up to potential or could have used light revisions
  • *** = Good story, I see it as publishable quality even if it didn’t work for me.
  • **** = Great story, does some really neat things
  • ***** = I would nominate/vote for this story. Excellent quality, builds a full world, drags you into it for the full duration of the story and leaves fingernail marks on your soul.

 

Since March 1st I’ve read 76 short stories which break down on the ratings as such:

 

  • one star = 4
  • two stars = 12
  • three stars = 29
  • four stars = 31
  • five stars = 2

 

I think this will be an ongoing thing for a while, and in a few months I will go back and do more analysis of the 5 star stories. I’m at the point right now with my writing that I pretty much know what NOT to do, I just don’t always succeed with what I was trying to do. So it makes more sense for me to focus on the top-tier of stories and figure out why stuff knocked it out of the park.

I was a little surprised to realize there wasn’t really a correlation to how much I enjoyed reading the story and if I gave it 3 or 4 stars. There were 4 star stories I did not enjoy at all and 3 star stories I greatly enjoyed. There were even a couple 2 star stories I really liked and enjoyed. The difference between two and three stars in some cases was asking myself, “If my name was on the cover as editor and I had a slot this story would fit, would I have published it as is?” The ones I said, “Yes” got 3, the others got 2. I’m only reading published stories for this, so my opinions might be different if I was finding some of these stories in slush. There were a lot of stories that didn’t work for me that still rated 4 stars.

As a result of this, I of course had to rate my own published works on this scale. Most of them were in the 2 to 3 range, with one maybe 4. I have not written a 5 star story yet. Not by my own scale anyway. That’s a very motivating thought. Anything that makes me want to get better and write more is something I need to keep doing.

I think I’ll periodically put up a post with this same breakdown in it, and any thoughts I’ve dredged up in the process. What do you think?

Minerva Zimmerman

Spring Cleaning

http://www.flickr.com/photos/chrishunkeler/9612970424/
Cropped from “Oar Splash” by Chris Hunkeler

2013 was simultaneously a really awesome and really terrible year for me. I hit a lot of cool personal milestones and major personal lows. The details don’t really matter to anyone who isn’t me, but basically I became aware that I was and had been in a long-term depressive episode that had gotten past my ability to cope. It was kind of a relief to figure out, “Ohhhhh right, that’s why everything is difficult and meaningless.”

It takes a really really long time to climb out of an episode like this.  It’s now 8-10 months after stuff started getting better, and I’m only now willing to say that my depression is in remission again. It had started getting worse so gradually I was like a crayfish sitting still in a pot as the water temperature rose. I really couldn’t tell you when it started, I can only tell you when I noticed I was getting cooked. With this in mind I want to be very proactive about retaking control over various things in my life to put myself in the best possible position to keep it from happening again.

I’m tackling a lot of things simultaneously, but in small bits. One of the main ones I’m working on currently is “40 Bags in 40 Days”. The idea is to de-clutter your house one area at a time over 40 days (coinciding with Lent, but really you could do it at any point.) The idea resonated with me and where I’m at right now. I have no idea if I’ll do it another year, but it is the right thing for me right now. As I’m writing this I’m on day 18 and so far have cleaned out 27 bags of stuff for trash or donation. Mostly trash.

It might sound like I’m waaaay ahead of the goal, but I’m ashamed to admit that I haven’t even cleaned out three full rooms. I still have 3 sets of shelves and my pantry to go through in the dining room, and I’m still sorting linens in the laundry room. The only room cleared of unnecessary clutter and items is the bathroom and I sure as hell haven’t given that a good scrubbing in the process. Stuff not grime being currently tackled.

This is helping me mentally and emotionally. It feels really good to be ABLE to tackle this. It’s cathartic even as it is somewhat saddening to realize it’s been easier to “do it later” for so long. I’m getting a lot of exercise, according to my Fitbit, while I clean so it’s helping me get my physical activity back up slowly. Also, I work in a museum, so I’m never really not surrounded by immense amounts of stuff. It feels amazing to work on getting rid of stuff.

Being in the middle of depression feels like being a champagne cork bobbing in the ocean. As I’ve come out of it, I’ve gone from cork to crate to toy boat, to being a human shaped object, to being on a raft, to being in a boat, to being in a boat with oars.  I’m not sure I’ll ever really get the outboard going for more than short spurts (it is a wonky terrible engine) but it’s great to feel like I have control over the direction I’m heading and the ability to keep moving myself in that direction.

So, don’t mind me as I keep on rowing.

Minerva Zimmerman

Fountain Pen Friday #1

I draft by hand and tend to use fountain pens because I can get better ink colors. I’m also a bit of a cheap-ass so if you’re looking for recommendations for $200 pens, you’ll be disappointed. I generally buy pens in around the $20 range though I do have cheaper and more expensive pens than that. I buy for writing in a pocket notebook for extended periods of time.

The pen closed with its cap on.
The pen closed with its cap on.

Today I’m going to talk about the Kaweco Ice Sport Fountain Pen (Jet Pens, Goulet Pens, Amazon).

I like it because without the cap, it is really small and light so I can write for long periods of time without hand fatigue.

Pen how I use it most, without cap, with cartridge inserted.
Pen how I use it most, without cap, with cartridge inserted.

It fits international cartridges and can also be used as an eyedropper pen (which I haven’t personally tried yet.)

Parts of the pen and a cartridge.
Parts of the pen and a cartridge.

It has a plain round grip, which works best for me, though I do wish it had a little bit of cushion since I tend to clench my pen.

Writing with pen cap on the back.
Writing with pen cap on the back.

I have really tiny hands. I wear extra small garden gloves (or kids sizes). So to show you the true size of this pen I’ve shown it with things that are more standard in size.

The closed pen with assorted items for scale.
The closed pen with assorted items for scale.
My hand holding a highliter for scale of me.
My hand holding a highlighter for scale of me.

It is made of plastic which makes it light and loses about half its weight without the cap. I really like clear body pens because I hate guessing at ink levels. Also, I think being able to see the ink LOOKS really cool.

writing sample with pen and with same colored gel pen. Notice the gel pen skipped more.
writing sample with pen and with same colored gel pen. Notice the gel pen skipped more.

Here’s a writing sample. Line one is all caps, line two is how I normally write, line three is all cursive. Line 4 is with the G2 gel pen below. As you can see even though this is a medium tip, it writes closer to fine. I find it writes a good size in the pocket notebooks (moleskine, ink and pen, etc.) I normally use for drafting stories.

The Good

  • Easy to write with.

  • Lightweight.

  • has pointy metal button on the top of the cap you could possibly break a car window with if trapped in a river

  • uses standard cartridges

  • round grip

  • compact for travel

  • cap screws on for secure traveling

The Bad

 

Overall grade: A (the bad things are hackable)

 

 

 

Minerva Zimmerman

Three Freezers Full

fridge

 

Three Freezers? Uhm… yes.

We live in a reasonably remote rural area and have not only a large house, but a detached garage with wood storage and a barn. One of our first major household purchases was a chest freezer so we could store seasonal berries and stock up on frozen items from outside our geographic area. Then one day Aaron bought a used fridge with an ice-maker cause he wanted to swap it in for the fridge we had. I was originally against this idea but then he convinced me because he’d have it delivered and the old fridge picked up. So… due to complicated reasons I don’t remember, the old fridge wasn’t cleaned out when the new one arrived. So it was decided the easiest thing was to pay $20 for a pickup of the fridge the next week. And… then we never did. So yes, I started 2014 with three stocked freezers.

So, when I decided we were only buying fresh fruit and veggies until we’d made a significant dent in the stores, it wasn’t terribly hard to start with. Then as we started eating through things it became sort of a personal challenge to see what I could still make. Eventually we got down to one inside freezer and a half-full chest freezer (I do still have a turkey carcass that’s 4 years old I need to do something with, but at this point I might as well save it for evil).  About two weeks after this point, the fridge with the ice-maker died in an unscheduled defrost puddle of doom. (And no, we haven’t moved it yet or called someone to come get it. And we can’t just take it out to the barn to use it as a storage cupboard for cans of paint, poison, etc. because there’s already a dead one out there with an anarchy symbol spray-painted on it that came with the house.)

So, it turned out to be serendipitous that I had already whittled down the fridge and freezer food down to one fridge worth. Almost like I was eerily prepared for things to go terribly wrong…

*gasp*

Minerva Zimmerman

mostlydead

Westley: And our assets?
Inigo Montoya: Your brains, Fezzik’s strength, my steel.
Westley: That’s it? Impossible. If I had a month a plan, maybe I could come up with something, but this [shakes head]
Fezzik: You just shook your head… doesn’t that make you happy?
Westley: My brains, his steel, and your strength against sixty men, and you think a little head-jiggle is supposed to make me happy?
Westley: I mean, if we only had a wheelbarrow, that would be something.

I’m a planner. Specifically I’m constantly planning for everything to go wrong in predictable ways. I don’t EXPECT them to go wrong, I just spend a lot of energy planning for them to, so I don’t have to spend energy worrying about it. I hate worrying. I like being prepared.

Being prepared requires a lot of resources the vast majority of which never get used. You end up ceasing to think of them as assets until you’re faced with a locked castle gate guarded by 60 men and a mostly-dead man starts throwing out a hypothetical wish list of items.

So, recently I got to thinking; if I have a lot of assets that have or will soon outlive their usefulness, am I really being best prepared? So I decided it was time to go through and figure out what my true assets are, and what is just taking up space. I’m a museum collections professional, I know the true cost of keeping items more than most people. Time to: Use. Give. Sell. Dispose

I have a lot of writing assests. I have longer stories on the verge of being submit-able. I have a couple unfinished shorts. I have a large list of ideas. I have a ton of “To Read” to go through in print and digital. Sometimes it is easy to get stuck on how far you have to go and you lose track of how far you’ve come and what assets you have around you.

I’ve got more than a wheelbarrow and a holocaust cloak, and it is time to use them.