Pizza, Revisions and Trolls
July 6th, 2008 by --KALEB NATION--
There are many very important stages in getting a book published, and one of them is known as Editing.
Since this is my first book I’m very new to all of this, and thus parts of it are slightly painful as my body adjusts to 2AM nights, all meals comprised of microwave or delivery foods, sheer lack of outside communication besides instant messenger, and headaches from screen-staring that no amount of Tylenol will drive out. My alarm clock is set to noon, or not at all.
I’m certain that not all writers out there subject themselves to these torturous routines (if my editor knew he’d probably remind me calmly that my deadline is NOT next week or anything). Still. I’m new, and if I gain twenty pounds, earn blue circles under my eyes, and never eat another delivery pizza again, this book will be finished before deadline and it will bloody well be edited to perfection.
Speaking of delivery pizza, heard of the Domino’s Gotham City Pizza? It’s a large with crust-to-crust cloaking in pepperoni. It was on sale. I thought it would be good.
Um…yeah. I discovered something: you can have too much pepperoni. Just warning you. Next time I’m sticking with the regular: Brooklyn with a rational amount of pepperoni. Safer that way.
Anywho, what bothers me the most as I write is the fact that due to living in a college apartment, there is a certain house of trolls a few apartments over who thinks it is their duty to their fellow humans to play their music at the highest, bass-iest volume possible. It is so bloody loud it is rattling my keyboard. It angers me much. This is how writers get reputations for being violent.
I would not be bothered if this was just a party or even a multi-day celebration. But it seems that these particular morons absolutely must run the stereo from six in the evening to two in the morning, the hours in which I do my best writing (note: the future source of circles under my eyes) and even sometimes from two to past daylight (the hours in which I do my best staring-at-the-ceiling-trying-to-sleep).
In the times I can ignore their racket, I’m working hard on the edits, getting the big stuff worked out and all the word-count cuts. Thankfully my other writer friends have been through this and know how to console me. I think I nearly made one of my friends faint when I told her how much we were aiming to cut from the book. See, the number of words I’m trying to cut happens to be nearly the length of her entire novel (!).
Sometimes in the revising process, there comes a point where certain scenes must be added and others taken out (the removed scenes I’ll hopefully get to post on the website eventually). I did have a particularly wonderful revelation of a new scene which is turning into one of my favorites in the book. It involves the same setting as what has been in the scene for years, but now suddenly, Bran notices a secret door across the room. A secret door is a very, very useful device when writing. In fact, you can pretty much just throw a secret door in anywhere and it works. Example:
Pamela Pinkersnort was delivering one of those abysmal Gotham City pizzas to somebody’s apartment. She knocked on the door. It was hard to hear herself knocking, because of the horrid rock music coming from an apartment nearby, which obviously housed moronic trolls.
“Psst!” a voice came. “Over here.”
Pamela turned, and saw a secret door.
Pretty much immediately, Pamela’s gonna wonder how the secret door got there, why it’s a secret, what’s behind it, and if the person there will tip nicely or be a scrooge.
Great. As I wrote that last paragraph, the music trolls just turned it up even louder. Thanks, I surely needed that.
Sheesh.
On a side note, my publishers have a news blog. This I did not know, until this week. So someday in the next-yearsy-future I might get to see my name on it 
Posted in Bran Hambric, College, Writing
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July 6th, 2008 at 7:45 am
LOL
scrooges with loud music
unfortunately..I know how that feels T__T
July 6th, 2008 at 8:54 am
Oh, gosh. I think I’d get sick if I had that much pepperoni on my pizza. I usually only like 1-3 a slice.
Heh-heh. I wonder if that’s how my neighbors feel when my dad blasts loud Rammstein music outside, out of his humungous speakers…
Of course, he does it at reasonable hours of the day. 
Good luck with editing.
July 6th, 2008 at 10:03 am
You weren’t used to 2am nights and fast food meals from school already?
As for the “bass-iest” volume possible, if you are in building “ then I know who your daemon is lol. A guy in that building took some car speakers and modified them into a home theater system.
July 6th, 2008 at 11:27 am
this is what my story would look like:
“Kaleb, staring at his computer trying to block out the racket from the music, hears something.
‘Psst!’ Corinne, standing on the fire escape with her head sticking through the window, says. ‘Over here!’
Kaleb, who could barely hear what she said and only came over because of Corinne’s frantic hand motions trying to get him to move himself out of the chair and over to the window. He leaned in close to hear what Corinne whispered.
‘Earplugs work wonders, Kaleb,’ she says as if it’s the best-kept-secret in the world, and then she scurries off back to her yummy Gotham City Pizza.”
there is my amazingly wonderful story from Corinne!
but actually, the sad thing is, I would probably like that pizza.
good luck!
Corinne!
July 6th, 2008 at 11:56 am
God, that’s a crazy pizza, but I love pepperoni. Thank god there’s a good vegeterian version.
Good luck with the revising, that’s hard to do.
July 6th, 2008 at 1:04 pm
You’d probably need a gallon of water next to you to counteract that much sodium intake in that pepperoni pizza.
I don’t mind loud music, but muffled music really bothers me… the type that is just audible, but not loud enough to actually hear the lyrics. It gets distracting because I sit there straining my ears to figure out what song they are playing. It’s a problem.
July 6th, 2008 at 6:04 pm
Eew… That pizza looks disgusting! *shudders* I would never try that. I’m not a huge fan of pepperoni, though, so…
That noise must be awful for you. I mean, I get fed up with the lawn mower. I can’t imagine what it must be like for you!
Good luck with everythihg, Kaleb!
Abby
July 6th, 2008 at 7:40 pm
About that noise problem. You could always send out a few of your gnomes to uh…… take care of it…
=]
July 6th, 2008 at 11:59 pm
oh..pizza!!!!!!!!! I love it!!!! How come a lot of people is writing about pizza these days?
July 7th, 2008 at 12:14 am
[...] behind on email. Don’t worry: I will answer them. I’m just overwhelmed with edits, and being bothered by trolls takes up most of my [...]
July 7th, 2008 at 3:37 am
oh gah.
i’m alergic to pork.
…
July 7th, 2008 at 1:36 pm
[...] behind on email. Don’t worry: I will answer them. I’m just overwhelmed with edits, and being bothered by trolls takes up most of my [...]
July 7th, 2008 at 1:41 pm
Pamela P. and I snicker at your highly developed writing skills.
You are TOO much, Kaleb. Perky Pamela agrees!
July 7th, 2008 at 4:41 pm
Lol… I know how the music-playing-trolls thing feels. My big bro has decided that playing rock and/or rap till 2-3 in the morning is now okay. I am becoming partially nocturnal.
This also reminds me of My best friends mom. She can be very un-fun(Chores, yelling… etc.), and then turn around and be like, “Hey! Why don’t you guys have a party?” Those times rock.
They have a 2 floor garage. My dad helped them build it, cause our dads are good friends. The top floor has a pool table, 2 couches, a coffe table, a kick-@ss sound system, a sub-woofer, blacklights as well as regular lights… It is like our groups own personal nightclub, but we do it during the day. Close the blinds, turn on the black lights, make cool patterns on your skin with a highlighter…and dance.
They have parties up theyre sometimes
July 7th, 2008 at 4:45 pm
Usually it’s just a few of us. Once we tested the sound system…Turned it all the way up. I could hear it from my house, just down the road. It’s usually not that loud, though. We don’t want to deprive people of sleep. So sorry you have to live by the trolls.
July 7th, 2008 at 9:48 pm
Strange you should talk about pizza. I work at a pizza place and a guy came in today and I could’ve sworn it was you - except his voice was different and he claimed his name was Josh - why claimed? I see the Kaleb Nation/Kaleb Krew thing. Perhaps it’s all a conspiracy; you just have a thing for pseudonyms? ; ) jk
Good luck with the trolls, I feel for you, my mom’s always got the radio blaring somewhere in our house, she doesn’t understand that it does NOT help me focus.
And one last thing - the under eye circles are going to be the next big thing with the ladies, you know, the vampire look. ; )
July 7th, 2008 at 10:23 pm
I forgot to add grumpkins to my conspiracy theory list of pseudonyms…. =)
July 8th, 2008 at 3:33 pm
Just be happy in the fact that soon those trolls will be deaf. You should go up to their apartment and tell them to turn it up LOUDER, and they’ll look at you weird. But then they won’t be able to hear anymore. Bye bye hearing! I’m not that cruel, I just sympathize, I have dogs barking all the time. Poor things though, their owners don’t walk them.
You sound like me! Except I don’t survive on pizza. I actually make food. And I don’t have a book contract. But I am being reclusive and I don’t have any light and I’m on the computer all the time or reading or watching tv or organizing junk. And I stay up late, wake up late. Or go to bed early and wake up EARLY. Just depends.
But hang in there! And soon you will see your name on the news list!
July 8th, 2008 at 4:45 pm
Oh…you are not the only twilight fan. My husband has read them all and even read twilight twice! We buy two copies when a new one comes out because he isn’t willing to wait!
July 10th, 2008 at 11:47 pm
Well, obviously their pepporoni was going to expire or something. Hence the on-sale cloaked-in-pepporoni pizza.
July 11th, 2008 at 5:11 pm
Yeah im bored and i don’t know what to do… I need some good books! Any suggestions??? I have to be distracted until BREAKING DAWN comes out!!! What are some good books people?? Kaleb?? what should i read while i wait?
July 13th, 2008 at 1:21 am
[...] awful, wretched, pounding, abysmal, never-ending beat of the music from the apartment nearby (see, Trolls). Word from someone else on campus is that our resident trolls converted a car stereo into a home [...]
July 13th, 2008 at 5:43 pm
You poor thing… I’ve learned to block out talking from my idiotic classmates, but loud music that I did not have the intention of listening to is a completely different thing. As I suggested, try those massive headphones. haha Man, everytime I think about those, I picture you with these giant fuzzy things on either side of your head. The size of a chicken with its feathers everywhere. Yes, that’s what I see them as.
You should sue for attempted murder or something for that pizza. Gosh, you could have dropped dead from a heart attack just looking at it! By the way, do you just carry a camara around with you places? You have some very random pictures. I love it! As for the trolls, I’d forge some weird bill or something and put it on their door. I’ll even get some police tape for you so you can mark off their door, too. That’s the plus side of having a best friend whose parents are both cops.
The down side is that they both look like they could break me in half without breaking a sweat.
July 16th, 2008 at 4:48 am
Yick! is right
July 21st, 2008 at 2:22 pm
OME!! i no what u mean my brother gives me rides in his car and he thinks its funny when the car shakes cause the music is on full blast!! ( i know what ur thinking car stero doesnt turn up really high. well ur wrong this is a very very special radio! ) i have lost some of my hearing.. and thats kinda bad lol.. Edward forever cause hes hot… sorry couldnt help my self!
kaleb so ur writting a book? thats really cool!! i know it will be witty and funny just like you!!! well im rambiling ( ha ha good times ) well see ya! PS i puked after the photo of pizza.. were they under the influnce when they made that??? lol ok now really bye!!
July 21st, 2008 at 2:26 pm
PPS ha ha hello!! ohh and i write to!! ( it sucks and is no where close to printable ) but i feel free when i write… no barriers… well except for my mom… she is…. a mom. lol well ok now i am REALLY gonna leave… be back tomorrow!! lol ( EDWARD FOREVER! )
August 1st, 2008 at 3:29 pm
loud music at night and when writing..remins me of someone- oh, yeah- MY DAD AND HIS STINKIN’ FRIENDS AT ONME AM EVERY SUNDAY!
August 9th, 2008 at 1:51 pm
[...] I thought I had finally rid myself of the Music Trolls nearby, but that was obviously only for a week. In this place, I will never be wanting for a night full of [...]
August 20th, 2008 at 12:11 am
[...] to have a villain double-crossed, which is one of the most fun things to write, (second only to a secret door). Example: “Here you are, massster,” hissed Earnoggin, dropping a box onto Dr. [...]