Ais's Blog, page 5

Recommendations?

I've been disappointed by the last several series/books I've read. There are things that I keep wishing I was seeing in stories that I'm not. Because I want some awesomesauce back in my life, I figured I'd check if anyone has recommendations based on some specific hopes.

Anyone have any recommendations for the following?

(For all below, bonus points if the series/book is LGBT but super bonus points if it's m/m. Also I'm assuming there aren't many stories that encompass all the points so I'd still like recs for anything that fits one point but fails another.)

**THE LADIES: books/series that don't treat women like they're some awful harpy, only good for sex (or, depending on the style of the series, rape), a one-dimensional foil for the main couple, or otherwise the inherently weaker gender that is only good for babies and families and being superficial or emotional on the sidelines. You know, a book that assumes women don't suck and might (gasp) even be capable of kicking ass in whatever form fits that plot.

**THE CHARACTERS: books/series where you just straight up love the hell out of the characters. I don't care if the rest of the series is poorly plotted or written-- I'm talking series/books where you love the character(s) SO MUCH that everything else doesn't matter. Memorable characters who don't leave your mind the second you finish the story and walk away. Bonus points if it actually does have good plot/writing besides.

**THE SUSPENSE: books/series that kept you guessing in some way up until the end. Stories where you can't tell where it's going a mile away or, if you can, that turns out to be done on purpose to throw you off. Stories where you don't spend 80% of the book wondering why the hell the character doesn't just tell the other xyz right away, or why the hell they can't figure out the thing that's so obvious to you as a reader.

**THE MISCELLANEOUS: anything else you would feel remiss not to mention.

PS: I should clarify that I'm not saying all the authors I've read lately suck because they don't. I've just been once again smacked in the face with the knowledge that somehow I'm almost always not in the mainstream on my opinions and interests, which means things a lot of other people love often are things that feel lacking to me. I guess it's just a case of us all seeing the same diamond from a different facet.

Although it's frustrating as hell to always be the one seeing it from that little chink of a thing on one side while everyone else is fascinated by something larger on the other.

That's actually what got me started writing in the first place, not being able to find books that told the stories I wanted to read, so I've been percolating in the back of my mind trying to identify the things that I, as a reader, want to see more of.

Questions! They're not so bad, right?

My friend and I went to one of our favorite restaurants today. We've gone there maybe 10-15 times altogether, if that, but we've come to recognize the staff who generally works the hours we appear. We sat down and the server Sunny handed us the menus, to which I sheepishly said we didn't need it, and she stopped and looked at us.

"I remember you." And rattled off the exact thing we always order. We agreed and thanked her and things were dandy.

When leaving later:

me: I think it's funny that so many people seem to remember us-- me-- at these restaurants even when we don't go there for long periods of time. That happened at ABC with Kathy, remember? I'd seriously only gone there 3 times with several months in between and she still remembered exactly what I wanted.
A: Yeah. And your girlfriend at whatsitplace.
me: That's right! XYZ! Jesus, I hadn't been there many times either and there were huge gaps of months in between there, too, but that one time I sat down and said I'd get the Happy Farmer she was all, "What, not the mock duck cashew dish?"
A: I remember that.
me: *pause* I think it must be because I'm such a ridiculous tipper. And I always get the same thing.
A: That, and the first time you go anywhere you ask about 7,000 questions about the specifics of any dish you see on the menu.
me: *laugh* That's... true. I don't think there's any place I've been where I haven't asked at least one question.


That conversation made me laugh even more realizing that I'd recently asked a bunch of questions about the specifics of requirements for an anthology I'm considering submitting to, and I asked another zillion questions of another person who recently asked me for help on something, and generally speaking if I'm talking for any length of time I'm probably asking at least one to twelve questions along the way.

Clarification! I must have it!

In retrospect, that makes me laugh because sometimes that shit drove Sonny insane when we were writing ICoS XD He'd write some one liner and I'd be following it up with five, "So by that does it mean A or B or C and if C then does that mean also D or E?"

It's also that inability to take things at face value that make me research the hell out of anything that I've determined I might write about. And that made me figure out stupid details like exactly what the moon will be like in the sky on February 7, 2023 in China.

Mostly, I just find it to be a ridiculous and amusing quirk about myself, and it amuses me even more to realize how appropriate this quote from ICoS (Fade 20) ends up being to my life too:

"You ask a lot of questions," Adam observed.

"I'm a curious person," Boyd replied with a shrug.

Adam's mouth quirked slightly although it wasn't really a smile.

Speaking of ICoS, it's looking more likely I will write a Tayla and Liani story after all, seeing as I wrote about 5,000 words in the start of a potential novella or novel yesterday.

current projects

In case anyone is curious:

fantasy story
I've been doing world building on the fantasy story I first started when I was 13. There was a time when I thought I should have pushed the story out sooner so I could have fully finalized it when I was young, but since then I'm glad I waited. The world has been growing steadily more detailed and intricate, and it's been making me excited to write it.

I've always loved doing complicated plots, and I love the idea of leaving details in a story that people only notice later in rereading. And god knows I love torturing my characters. (lol sorry guys. I hear the beginning of Fade was especially hard on some people XD And let me tell you, I look forward to doing some evil in my future books, too <3)

I'm going to have fun being able to write whatever way the story (honestly, probably series) needs to go while also exploring the nooks and crannies of some characters who have been with me for nearly 2/3 my life. Although, truth be told, my favorite characters were only created 10 or fewer years ago.

And thanks to the lovely Lena, my world map is getting some help too!

Incidentally, the fantasy series also has some LGBT themes although it won't be the focus.

I wish I could do an excerpt but I don't feel like anything can be released at the moment, especially at this early of a stage. That's the part that sucks the most about going for publication. I feel like I can't share things as I go, but sharing things is what keeps me enthusiastic when I start to lose focus.

Anyway, I don't have a timeline on this but I've been trying to work on the background.


lesbian cop story
Currently stalled until I can do more research.


Any ICoS-related items
Also stalled, mostly because I really want to try working on a solo project first. But we all know how inspiration can hit out of nowhere, so I'm definitely not now (or any time in the future) striking all options off my list of possibilities.


The Memory Remains
This is a story I actually wrote around 6 years ago and recently have been editing/revising. There are some pieces of it that are too embarrassing for words, but I think the basis of it is interesting, and there are some ideas I want to use. However, I stopped editing it when I realized skimming past all that magic was getting me interested in writing my main fantasy story instead.


Other assorted stories
There's another story that I think would be fun to write that has LGBT themes and involves lots of magic and dark energy and things getting fucked up. I have not yet decided whether I want to keep this as its own thing or merge it with TMR into a larger, more complex story. Their worlds complement each other nicely so it's a definite possibility.

I'm pretty sure there are other stories I've mentioned at some point and forgotten, too.


blah!
I have nothing else to add, I just felt like this needed another heading.

So many AIS, so little time

I bought a belt buckle months ago at a secondhand store that randomly said AIS on it. I don't know what it means in that context but I thought it was funny and I finally decided I should switch out my Lindsey Wixson profile photo.

Check it out:



(If the pic doesn't show above, just look at my profile photo)

Anyway, I tried doing a google image search of AIS logo to see if I could identify this (anyone know what it is?), and while I didn't find this particular design, I was surprised to see how many AIS logos there are.

Seriously, check it out or if that link doesn't work, go to images.google.com and search ais logo.

It's actually really cool... All sorts of different meanings and a surprising amount of variation in the designs considering it's all based on the same short three letters.

Apparently my name is shared with, among many others:

**Thailand's leading mobile phone operator (whose new logo has a cute "With you, ALWAYS" on it that I now want to walk around saying)
**an association of Italian wine professionals
**engineering services
**a business member of a cyber security alliance and which, according to its logo, promises "devastating capability; revolutionary advantage" (another thing I want to walk around saying)
**IT professionals
**a one-way drayage company
**an Australian sport training institute
**an association of international students at a university
**an English-based school in Kuwait
**a Russian car site? (PS: I was pretty proud of myself for being able to sound out автоинвестстрой as avtoynveststroy even though I didn't know what it meant)
**an Indian website design company
**a commercial electrical product company
**I think there was some sort of nerd association from a Spanish-speaking country too but I accidentally closed the window before I could read it and now I don't know which logo it was


It's funny to me since someone else is the one who nicknamed me this. If not for them, I'd be Mika, and missing out on all this Ais action. (Be glad I didn't do the super cheesy "gloriais action" like I wanted to do, and be SAD that I did it anyway in parentheses)

What this all means is that I am most certainly never going to appear at the top of someone's search engine just by checking 'ais.'

Ohoho~ Ninja cloak activated.

Update-- charity: water campaign

A few months ago I set up a fundraiser at my.charitywater.org to raise money to help fund a clean water project somewhere in the world where it's really needed. At the time, I said I'd give updates as I received them since several people donated anonymously.

The fundraiser ended this month and we raised $210! That's $10 over what the goal was!

THANK YOU to all the donors!!

It will be several months before we get any specifics, and at that time I will do another post.

The email I received from the charity on June 18 at the official end of the campaign is as follows:


SOON, 100% OF YOUR FUNDS WILL BE PUT TO WORK

Materials will be purchased, communities will be selected and trained, and the construction process will begin. Stay tuned, you'll get two progress reports emailed to you along the way.


YOUR PROJECT WILL TAKE 18 MONTHS TO COMPLETE

We send funds to our partners quarterly, so your money may take up to
three months to be sent to the field.


1-3 MONTHS
We send your money to the field.


3-6 MONTHS
Our partners get permits, supplies, pick
sites & begin the work.


6-9 MONTHS
Our partners collect midterm reports & send us the information.


9-12 MONTHS
Our partners finish the work & train the communities to manage their water point.


12-15 MONTHS
Our partners collect final photos, GPS & community information.


15-18 MONTHS
We receive completion reports, verify the data, assign your dollars to projects & send you your report.

f/f story excerpts

f/f stories have been on my mind lately. There are several ideas I have but one in particular I plan to write first, involving law enforcement. I just haven't finalized the plot yet.

I recently saw someone else mention f/f stories so I figured, what the hell, may as well share two excerpts from the few scenes I've written so far. Neither of these are edited so there are probably improvements that could be made.

Oh and PS: lots of swearing ahead.



Excerpt #1: the bar

"We sat on that motherfucker for seven fucking hours at the hospital to make sure he got booked, and you know what the jail does? Let him out the next morning on twenty-five bucks bail."

Taylor's venomous ranting paused only long enough for her to pull a long drink from her beer.

Kasha snorted. "He's already in again. Got busted smoking dope."

"No shit?"

"Who nabbed him?"

"How long'd it take this time? Two minutes?"

The questions piled one atop another as Naomi, Bust and Wats all spoke at once.

"Would've been two," Kasha said with a smirk and a tip of her beer toward Wats, "but the 23 takes ten to get from jail to the Nexus."

A mixture of snorts and harsh laughs erupted from the table.

"That's not the point!" Taylor snapped as she slammed down the now-empty bottle. The heavy wood table rattled. "The point is, what the fuck's the point?"

"Of what?"

Taylor's hands spread out, encompassing the dinghy bar, filled with cops and badge bunnies and the few civilians who had been accepted into the fold. At least, it seemed that was what she meant but as she spoke it became clear her gesture extended far beyond the Fitz's walls.

"Of any of this! We bust our asses taking down a fucker everyone knows just went on a metro-wide crime spree, and the jail lets him out like it's kiddy time at recess. We get people screaming all sorts of fucked up shit at us while being arrested for destroying some poor fuck's life, and that's all fine, but the second one of us says so much as an 'asshole' in return we're written up. Fuckers sue the city, and they win in court and we look like jackasses. We stop for two seconds to get coffee at a gas station and we get the evil eye from dumbfucks who've got nothing better to do than demand how we spend their taxpayer's money. We go to peoples' houses a billion fucking times when they call 'cause their man beat the shit outta them, but they won't leave the fucker. They keep going back and making us come out there again to pull their bloody ass to the hospital, and we all know someday we'll be there on a homicide but we can't do shit about it because it's up to the vic to snap out of it. What's the fucking point!"

No one had an answer to that, because they'd all thought the same thing more than once during their career. They stared down at their drinks with narrowed eyes, and the silence made Taylor scoff so derisively a group of Transits two tables over looked at them. Taylor's hands slammed on the table and she stood so quickly she nearly knocked over her chair. She was storming out the front door before anyone knew what she planned.

The women groaned, but Kasha was the only to stand, waving the others to stay seated. She grabbed a wad of bills from her back pocket and threw it on the table. "I got it."

She rushed out into the light, and searched for her former partner. It wasn't hard to find her, as Taylor hadn't gotten far. Presently, she was scowling to the right.

Two women, a blond and a brunette, wearing outfits that screamed 'casual business attire' eyed the two of them. Neither Taylor nor Kasha were in uniform, and the day had barely shifted toward mid-morning, so at the sight of two women stumbling out of a bar so early, the office women eyed them with poorly hidden disgust.

Taylor glowered at the brunette's back. "I'd like to see those pansies do our jobs and not need a break or two at the end of it. What's the matter, they never heard of Dogwatch?" Almost as if she heard Taylor's mutterings, the blond woman glanced over her shoulder with pinched eyes. Taylor's hackles visibly rose, and with a storm overtaking her features she started to stalk that way with her hand already curling to flip them off. "I'm gonna--"

Kasha snagged Taylor's wrist and shoved her hand back down between them while her other hand snapped over the shorter woman's mouth. She leaned in and hissed into her ear:

"Taylor, I swear to God if you get IA on us I will beat your fucking ass."

Taylor managed a scoff and an unfriendly smirk even between Kasha's fingers. Her dark blue eyes rose challengingly to Kasha's dark brown ones. "Why?" she drawled when Kasha pulled her hand away. "Got something to hide?"

"Only my ungodly need to keep your troublesome ass in my life."

"That's what partners are for." Taylor's tone shifted; a dark version of what might have been planned as brevity. Her squinted eyes sweeping the street only made her look angrier.

Kasha didn't bother replying.

"You two gonna be okay?" Naomi asked as she jogged to catch up to them.

"I will be," Kasha said with a snort. She pointed at Taylor. "The jury's still out on this one."

"I'll give you a ride--"

"I don't need a motherfucking ride!" Taylor snapped at Naomi. "I don't need motherfucking babying! Leave me the fuck alone!" Taylor glared hatefully at the two of them and stalked ahead, as steadily as she could.

Naomi looked at her wavering back and sighed heavily, followed by exchanging a look with Kasha.

"I'll get her," Kasha said quietly. "Thanks for the offer."

"She knows I lost my mom too, right? I could help."

"Yeah." Kasha's face was all dark shadows and tight lines even in the bright summer morning. "She needs time."

"She's going to fuck herself over before the time's up, at this rate."

An even heavier sigh than Naomi's gusted out of Kasha. Her entire body seemed to slump. "I know."

"Didn't Brandt tell her to take some time off?"

Kasha's lips twisted. "You ever knew Tay to take good advice?"

A short scoff answered her, and Naomi clapped Kasha on the back. "Nope. Starting with when you tried to talk her out of joining."

"Yeah, well. Guess I've never been as persuasive as I think I am."

"You were with Bronco. All have heard tell of how you were the only one to ever get him in the back of a squad without bucking all over the pavement first."

Kasha snorted out a laugh, and this time a grin overtook her features. "Now, that was a day I shoulda bought a lotto ticket..."

"No shit. You ever win, share some with me, yeah?"

Kasha scoffed. "Bitch, I ever win, I'm getting the fuck outta dodge and you'll never see me again."

"Kasha!" Taylor roared from ahead, fury driving the wind from her lungs in an impressive boom. Kasha looked over at her former partner and found her to be half leaning on her car's hood with her hands flat against her pockets. "Where are my goddamned keys!"

"Good luck with that one," Naomi said humorlessly, and with one last slam on Kasha's back, she pivoted to leave.



Excerpt #2: rain

Lights were flashing in her eyes. Her gaze slid past the faceless people, and hardly acknowledged the familiar sight of flashing blue and white. Sound was muffled. Someone was holding her arm. Leading her.

Cotton filled her head, and lead her chest.

Movement was five steps off from reality.

Someone spoke but the words didn't filter through. A hand gently pressing down on her head, guiding her into a vehicle.

Glass blurred by raindrops. Lights rolling in a circuit; whiteblue, whiteblue, whiteblue, and red on the other side. Rocking of the vehicle as someone got into the drivers seat in front. Light flashed in the car briefly as well but she hardly saw it.

Her eyes were drawn again to the raindrops, distorting the rush of people outside, and the faded white of the news vans.

The view out the back window. Where the criminals sat.

Predictability in storytelling

I don't consider myself to be any smarter than anyone else. If you listen to my 5th grade test scores I have above average intelligence, but that was 5th grade and if you ask me nowadays I'd say I'm pretty much just an idiot.

Which is why I can't figure out why it's so easy to predict the supposed plot twists of so many stories. I'm not talking just books. I'm talking all storytelling-- tv shows, movies, books, manga, anime, you name it. If it's fiction and someone's starting to tell a story, all too often I can figure out where it's going from the first poorly hidden clues.

It's why I didn't like Sherlock Holmes as much as other people do, because in the first half of the anthology I read, I either figured out what the big reveal was in the stories from initial clues, or there was no way TO figure it out because the key information wasn't given to the readers at all until Holmes explained he'd noticed it ages ago. But that was partially due to the times the stories were written and they got more complicated as time went-- about the time I stopped reading. I wouldn't ever claim to be smarter than the bad ass fictional hero Sherlock Holmes, because I'm definitely not, but in the end I still stopped reading the stories because I lost interest.

I've had the same thing happen with a number of tv shows. I noticed the subtle things they showed and extrapolated what the end game was going to be. Then in those particular shows, I stopped paying as close attention or they started making things less obvious, I'm not sure which.

It's really not hard to spot. In so many stories, details are not included except when they're important. So if you get a tidbit of information that seems out of place and random, chances are that's going to be part of the big reveal. But you're not supposed to know that ahead of time because I guess you're supposed to ignore the information they're giving you until they present it to you again at the end, this time with flashing neon signs and a pat on their back for a job well done.

Recently I watched a Hollywood movie and as happens all too often I had a running commentary in my mind of what everything was leading to while I watched it. "This guy will be the bad guy" because the music was dramatic and they zoomed in on his face. "He's going to force a nice guy to do something bad" because he smiled tightly as he offered help. "This random thing is going to be what saves the good guy at the end when something terrible happens in the process of redeeming himself for his flaws" because they showed something 'miraculous' happening, and other clues along the way, including conversations about what was wrong with the good guy.

In so much storytelling, if people stand around outright listing what's wrong with the hero you know it's going to be directly (and often obviously) addressed by the end to "redeem" him, and remove from him anything that could be the quality of a "bad guy." If something random and miraculous happens, you know it's going to come back to the advantage of the good guy. The bad guy doesn't even have to project what he's planning (although oftentimes he does, especially in superhero stories) because so often it's so completely straightforward it's a wonder how he ever got to be as powerful as he did.

How hard is it really to analyze a bad guy? If you have all the information at your fingertips, why would you not project his future moves and be there to stop it before it happens? It doesn't take a psychic detective to figure out if an unstable guy holds a grudge that he'll get revenge for it.

Reading a manga series today, there were other so-typical-it's-becoming-boring clues. The hero randomly mentions some mysterious savior from his childhood, who appeared briefly to put him back on the right path and has been missing since. Not long afterward, the Big Bad is shown cloaked in shadows. Gee, I wonder if it will turn out to be that past savior? Oh, look. It did. Cue the emotional turmoil within the hero to decide whether he can hurt his childhood savior in the name of his current altruistic goals. Yep. He can. But because of this storytelling style, no one is REALLY hurt in the end. The savior is vanquished as the Bad Guy and gets to stick around redeeming himself back to the good guy of the hero's memories.

Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

All these dramatic moments that are there to test the resolve of the hero are only superficial. They don't have lasting consequences. They appear and are resolved as casually and insipidly as someone watching the weather and planning for it to rain, only to learn they can take off their rain jacket after all.

Sometimes, it bothers me so much.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not writing this blog as a writer. I'm not saying AND AS YOU SEE, ANYTHING I WRITE IS ABOVE THIS BY FAR! because I highly doubt that's the case. I'm quite certain that if you were to analyze things I've written, I've probably done similar things. But I've also never written anything for the purpose of publication, and had it go through all levels of analysis that SHOULD be happening along the way including multiple editors and proofreaders and many eyes looking over the same work to ensure its quality.

And even if I wrote something that did go through all those checks and balances and a piece or two slipped through that fell into these lines, that's human fallibility.

Instead, I'm saying it as a reader and consumer. And as a reader/consumer, I'm not saying I'M SMARTER THAN ALL THESE CREATORS because that, too, would be completely false. That, in fact, is exactly the issue I have with all this.

I completely understand how insidious it can be to let simplified plot mechanics slip through into a story. I get how you can write something without thinking it through at the time because you just need to get past this damn scene that's been holding you up forever. I get being lazy on some parts of an overall story because you're focused on other, more impactful pieces.

I totally get that so even as a reader, I don't mind it when I see predictability showing up on the side lines. It's probably quite difficult to make NOTHING predictable in any storytelling, particularly since there is such a long history of people producing different facets of the same human stories over and over.

But what I don't understand is when that's the main focus. When the main plot is flat and straight as a Midwest highway, and when no attempts seem to be made to come up with red herrings along the way. It's not even that difficult. You could write the same archetypal characters with the same downtrodden-hero-saves-the-day-and-is-loved-in-the-end as anyone else, but introducing one small twist (the person introduced as the villain turns out to be a good guy) could go a long way in redeeming an otherwise copy/paste piece of work.

And what I don't understand is when they do that in movies, because those are extremely expensive to make. Are they just banking on the weight of the names of the actors or producers or characters to push through a large initial run, and to hell with the repeat traffic that could have gained more traction with an interesting story line?

In these predictable story lines, do the creators honestly believe that no one will see what's coming a mile away or do they just not care? Are they relying that strongly on the predictability of human emotions compensating for any gap in logic or intrigue?

I just don't understand what the goal is. And as a consumer, sometimes it simply perplexes me, sometimes it annoys me, but mostly is exasperates me and makes me lose my interest quickly.

Because the thing is, I'm not particularly intelligent. I'm not any smarter or quicker in thought than the average creator or reader out there. So what I don't understand is how so many things are produced that are obvious from the start even to someone as average as me.

What makes you love (or hate) a story?

I've been thinking lately about the way people can view the same thing so differently. The same work can be something one person loathes, another is completely ambivalent toward, and a third loves so much they fall all over themselves to tell everyone how incredible it is.

Maybe it's because I come from an anthropology background, but that is bloody fascinating to me. It's so interesting to think about what it is that leads people to their different subjective views, and even more interesting to think about what the actual "quality" of the work itself is since no one's opinion is more accurate or true than another's.

I've tried to analyze my own preferences and I think it probably goes, in order of what's most important to me in a story or series:

1) characters I connect with
2) character development
3) good plot (bonus points if it's intricate or keeps me guessing)
4) grammar/other editing accuracies

For me, it's about the characters. Period. If I don't like a main character or don't understand/connect with them, it's really hard for me to get into a story, no matter how brilliant the plot or world or writing may be.

I used to think writing style was at the bottom of my list because if I love the characters, I will even read things that are difficult to understand due to being written so poorly-- but I think that wouldn't be accurate if I did. I've since been met with stories that sound like they'll have a good plot but the writing style isn't one I normally gravitate toward and I don't feel a strong enough connection to the characters to carry me through it.

So once more it probably comes back to characters for me.

It's probably about the characters for everyone to some extent, because isn't that why we spend so many hours reading and watching stories about fictional people doing fictional things? But I'd be curious to see if everyone else would put their Must Haves in the same order I do.

Is grammar more important than characters or character development for some people? Do some put plot above all else?

And actually while I'm at it, what kind of character stereotype is your favorite? I've started to realize that I tend to gravitate toward quieter, bookwormy or misunderstood characters often with dark or complex pasts, and often on the sideline.

Research related to Fade ch 40

*****NOTE!!!! This entry contains major spoilers for Fade ch 40! Don't read if you don't want to be spoiled!!!*******





I'm on a livejournal group called little_details -- it's a pretty cool place where you can go and ask questions about specific things you haven't been able to find answers to in your research so far.

I noticed a request today that I happened to know a lot about due to recent research (about medical procedures that would follow the injury Boyd had in Fade 40).

I wrote a long reply with a compiled timeline of information based on what I'd learned in my own research and included some of the many sites and links I'd found. After I finished, I realized I didn't want to lose the information for the future, and thought it was possible someone out there might be curious about what DID go into the follow-up that isn't covered between Fade 40-42, and the epilogue.

Here it is below if you're curious.







SPOILERS BELOW! SPOILERS BELOW! SPOILERS BELOW! The spoiler tag isn't working for me for some reason so I can't hide it!!!!










ENUCLEATION. Note that the person was asking about what medical procedures would be expected following the loss of an eye. This was my response:



I was recently researching this actually and this is what I found, along with links to sites that have photos. The term you need is 'enucleation' for removal of an eye.

Once the person's eye is injured, the doctors will determine whether they can keep the eye or whether it has to be removed. I think the preference tends to be toward keeping it, however depending on the severity of the injury they might remove it. One reason they sometimes remove is people can have sympathetic reactions with their other eye, in which their good eye will go blind due to the bad eye being blind. Also, some people experience pain in their eye that never fully goes away. After a point, they have to determine whether quality of life is worth keeping their eye, when they can't see out of it anyway.

If enucleation is the way they'll go then this is the timeline (compiled from timelines/info from various sources)

**enucleation surgery takes 1-2 hours
**at the time of the surgery, they place an orb implant in place of the eye into the socket. This will never be removed. It is basically an orb which is about the size of the eyeball but doesn't go out as far as the normal eyeball did, so that a person can't fully close their eyelid on its own, and you can see a bit of white/red of the orb (depending on how recently their surgery was, I believe)
**most patients have a bad headache for 24-36/48 hours after surgery. they have to take a Tylenol every 4 hours to help

Note: He may have bloody tears for a bit after the surgery-- this is normal.

**the patient has to wear a compression bandage over his eye for 5 days (I have seen one or two sites that say 48 hours but I think that was for kids)
**he will have to have his eye checked 5-7 days, 1 month, and every 6 months after surgery.

what he's NOT supposed to do following surgery for 10-14 days:

**lift more than 10 pounds
**strain or rub his eye for up to 14 days following the surgery
**run the shower on his operated eye for at least 10 days
**bend forward to do things
**wash his hair with his head bent forward
**sustain any knock to the eye

he SHOULD wear glasses or an eye shield for protection when going out.

he will not be able to see full eye movement of his artificial eye in the mirror with monocular vision. the only way he could ever see that is if he videotapes himself straight on, looking in all the directions.

**He will have to take oral antibiotics for a week as well. also, later when he gets the pressure dressing off, he'll have to use eye drops and other medications for awhile-- including oral and topical antibiotics.
**2-6 weeks post surgery (and honestly most places said 6 weeks), he would be able to look into getting a prosthetic eye. those are usually painted to look like the normal eye. when a person is wearing it, typically people can't tell or might think they have a lazy eye. minor movement of the eye, like during conversation, works well, but larger eye movements like suddenly looking to the side might have a lag in the fake eye responding.
**the fake eye is basically like a really giant, really thick contact lens which is placed over the orb implant. that orb implant will never be removed.

Note that most places say to remove the artificial eye as little as possible, so as not to contaminate it. As far as I can tell, most people leave it in for long periods at a time. As a result, for instance when he wakes up from sleeping, it would still look like he has both eyes.

However, for times when he does remove the eye, it functions like a contact lens. The artificial eye includes the iris and pupil but also a large portion of the white of the eye-- it's larger than the opening in the eyelid and fits over the orbital implant. I would have to check again how it's stored when not in the eye but I think it was something similar to how contact lenses are stored.

((Note for ICoS readers-- Boyd leaves his artificial eye in a lot so in the epilogue, for instance, it was in when he woke up and walked over to Hsin. However, for similar reasons as are highlighted below, he often wears the eye patch when he's going to be in crowded areas or when he just feels like it. He does have scars on and around his eye from the knife wounds.))


ADDITIONAL NOTES:

some things people mentioned who have lost an eye and/or what the sites say is common:

**while enucleation is actually a very safe surgery, emotionally it's difficult for people to first get used to the idea of losing an eye
**eventually he will be able to drive-- outside of 20 feet, everyone sees as if they have one eye anyway
**he may experience some weird things at first, like thinking someone else is there when he sees his own hand reaching into sight from his blind side
**he will have to learn to turn his head a lot more often in order to account for the lack of peripheral vision on his blind side
**it's pretty scary/upsetting for people at first but they grow accustomed to monocular vision within the first few months
**some people take several months or a year to adjust to monocular vision, and have a hard time doing things like even going up steps etc because of lack of depth perception, but some people said they had zero problems and adjusted immediately
**some people never get over feeling upset about it but most people said that after awhile they don't even notice they have one eye, and most people who meet them have no idea they have an artificial eye either
**one guy said that usually he wears his fake eye when out but he will accidentally bump into people on his blind side-- he's found that wearing an eye patch makes people more sympathetic/less of a jerk because of this. (as a side note he mentioned he found it is surprisingly popular with the ladies. but usually he doesn't wear the eye patch)

There was also one teenager on a military site forum I found who said that he'd been fired from his jobs before because people learned he had one eye. He had stopped telling people about it and they assumed he just had a lazy eye and would get hired, but then later when they learned the truth he would suddenly "not be needed anymore." Whether there are extenuating circumstances to his situation, I don't know, because there are protections in place for those with disabilities, however we all know there can still be violations of peoples' rights regardless of said protections.


RESOURCES:
This is a really good blog entry by a woman who lost an eye-- she has visuals to show how she puts in her artificial eye: http://preppymeetsredneck.blogspot.co...

This explains what I said in more detail and also has pictures: http://www.rbsociety.ca/ntreatment.html

Check also http://www.beltina.org/health-diction... which, again, has photos and explanations of the surgery etc.

I recommend also artificialeyes.net for post-surgery information

Regarding stab wounds:

Article: http://lubbockonline.com/stories/1029...
Stab wound to the left eye and surgical repair: http://www.anatomicaljustice.com/cmi_...

These are stories of people who have had eye loss and could help you get a better idea for what your character would be going through: http://geelen.com.au/stories-of-eye-l...

The American Foundation for the Blind also has a message board which has a lot of information from people: http://www.afb.org/messageboards.aspx

This is a previous little details question which was related to stab wounds in both eyes and had good comments: http://little-details.livejournal.com...

There's also http://www.losteye.com/driving.htm -- that's where I got the information on driving but you can find more information at that site.

In addition, there are a number of sites out there which are for companies that make artificial eyes or eye patches, and they might have more forums, message boards, or About pages that have even more information. And there are a lot of surgical sites that show you in detail how enucleation surgery is performed, what to expect, and so on. I left out a lot of the links I had for miscellaneous real life stories and articles because I thought it might get to be too much.

Shh, don't tell our password!

We were having a serious discussion about things but then THIS happened, and I couldn't stop laughing.

sonny: okay ill just change the PW
to like
something
sonny: to the same pw as our email
Ashley: slutslutslutboydcockslut222
Ashley: that's your password right
Ais: XD
sonny: yes lol
Ais: yeah but add a ! on the end
because they require that nowadays
Ashley: lmao
Ais: it was hsinscock@boydsass4eva before but then we had to change it
Ashley: LOL
boydtopsh5sin
Ais: hsincriesallnight
Ashley: lmao
HAHA
hsincriesafters3x
Ais: hs1nwetsth3bed
Ashley: emi1iosgotabiggerc0ck
Ais: zachmeasuresthematnight69
Ashley: LOL
or just 26
Ashley: which is the number of men Emilio and sin have shared
Ais: LOL