Random Questions Thread

I mean one way to keep it short is to have her telling how the date went to someone else, then we get the highlights reel.

Or you go the harry potter route with Harry and Cho, and write out the entire thing in every last awkward detail.

Yeah I'm thinking about a highlights reel with the Fw B (there will be anyway- they've always run to the other whenever their relationships failed, and are constantly being shipped) but just that feels lazy. It will probably be 'flashback from her telling him, but I don't know how much to write to show its not clicking - part of the problem is I'd have to know what the date was saying!

edited 30th Nov '15 3:28:26 PM by Last_Hussar

Questions involving Girl Scouts and their cookies.

• How many boxes of cookies would a GS or two would be capable of carrying? The main character offers to buy all of them (simply because he was about to kill himself and figured he might as well try something really stupid) and he comments how he has more cookies than he knew what to do with.

• As an ideal GS, what should you do or say when you knock on someone's door and that someone comes out with a noose tied around his neck?

They don't sell them right away. They have a piece of paper where you make your orders and then you get them later. Usually mailed to you.

Otherwise, they tend to have wagons or parental cars to carry them. A kid could probably hold like 4-5 though.

Do they still carry those cookie wagons, or is it just fiction now?

@peasant: (sorry for the delay, RL intrudes sometimes)- a "Ghost Forest" is just that- the ghost of a forest that vanished long ago. The Fey might live there.

@dRoy (re single parent job)- a dentist fits your requirements (they have really high suicide rates, despite making decent money).

@dRoy (re something that might break under pressure): a ceiling light fixture. They are not designed to hold much weight.

@Last Hussar: the requirements of your story should dictate that. Does something that happened during either date help drive the plot along? Establish the tone of the story? Act as a vehicle for character development? If so, then enough detail to accomplish those things.

@dRoy (re cookie wagons)- that's a fictional trope now. I've never seen one.

edited 30th Nov '15 5:43:59 PM by DeMarquis

@deMarquis: Thanks. That actually sounds really, really cool.

Aw, darn it.

Another question.

What kind of achievements or career would be appropriate for a woman in early thirties who is considered an overachiever?

Afraid the sky's the limit on that one. You could very easily go down any career path and still make sense; the key being they are driven to excel in said career, possibly to the detriment of other aspects of life if you want to play to clichés.

Good point.

All right, let's narrow it down to the career of a general practitioner.

Then you should probably look up fancy unis with good med programs (Rice I think is one), give her a few academic awards, and then have charity awards from spending time with the homeless or something like that.

I'm using a police interrogation of my main character as a Framing Device for my story. They're investigating the murder of a fellow police officer. But as the story unfolds, it's revealed that said officer was a supernatural being and serial killer; hence why my main character had to kill him.

As such, what would cause the two (Muggle) detectives to drop the case and cover-up the incident at the end of the story? Just looking for general ideas.

Thanks ahead.

edited 1st Dec '15 6:10:43 PM by peasant

Maybe the search for clues and evidences got too complicated and took so much time without visible progress that they just decided to give up.

At the moment, I was thinking to keep the detectives' appearances limited to the prologue and epilogue chapters; with the remaining chapters in between consisting of the main character's account of what happened.

edited 1st Dec '15 6:25:26 PM by peasant

Hmm. I remember that the textbox at the top of page used to say something on the lines of "this thread is designed and much better suited for details and technical questions instead of discussion of major plot/character elements", which I would definitely argue this is.

Because you're asking for the kind of thing that you could and presumably would build an entire story around, and not something that could be answered with a throwaway detail provided by people (us) with little or no investment in it.

Perhaps. But I was only looking for plot seeds/basic ideas in the utmost general sense (i.e. what would cause the police to cover up the murder of one of their own). The actual figuring out of how to put that into effect/foreshadow/integrate into the story is isn't really what I'm looking for at all.

So, to refresh, the question is: "Why would cops cover up the murder of one of their own?".

For context, the dead cop is secretly a supernatural being who is also a serial killer and the cops already have the murderer (the story's protagonist) in custody though they release her. Basically, I'm looking for a motivation for Muggle cops to continue The Masquerade upon learning about it.

edited 2nd Dec '15 5:41:03 AM by peasant

Just strong evidence the cop was corrupt? They might back off to avoid tarnishing their memory (if they were friends) or avoid making their force look bad.

Or maybe just the risk of a Contagious Cassandra Truth?

edited 2nd Dec '15 5:42:40 AM by Bisected8

For "The die is cast" in the original Latin, is it supposed to be "Alea iacta est" or "Alea jacta est?"

Classical Latin didn't have a J (it sort of evolved from drawing an i slightly differently when it made a J sound).

@peasant, perhaps they realize that they won't be able to explain the supernatural part of the whole story, or maybe over the course of the story it turns out that there's some sort of Masquerade in place that would kill them if they spoke up about it?

@HallowHawk, definitely "iacta".

@Bisected8 @Kakai: Thanks for the ideas.

Moving onto another question:

How well known is the rivalry between West Ham and Millwall and are the Millwall Bushwackers sufficiently well known to be name dropped/referenced without further explanation? Mainly asking for a British audience.

If not, what football team rivalries are particularly recognisable?

edited 3rd Dec '15 10:55:14 AM by peasant

You could go for the Genius Reader angle, or make reference to it.

Otherwise Spurs v Arsenal
Liverpool v Everton
Liverpool v Manchester United
Man Utd v Man City
West Ham v Spurs
Chelsea vs London
Southampton v Portsmouth
And thats just those I can do off the top of my head in ELP! You can do that for most teams in all 4 leagues - Did you know Crewe v Stoke!? Scottyland Celtic-Rangers (Who ;) )

Of course there is always Rich Mans Plaything (City or Chelsea at the moment) v everyone - especially those whose 'fans' are rich glory hunters. Sir Alex's Utd v everyone, because of suspicions of bias (Suspicions?! huh - that was never a goal against Spurs - COYS!)

edited 3rd Dec '15 11:26:51 AM by Last_Hussar

Any knife experts here? Time is around mid 1600's. How would a knife (with scabbard) typically be carried by someone in that time? (assume person carrying knife is male, European and exploring a jungle)