'Tis Done · 1:17am Mar 6th, 2019
Blog Number 54: Return of the Statistics Edition
As of now, Blue Chameleon VI no longer exists.
With the past finally buried, what the future holds for me is now finally coming over the horizon with the dawn light. Spoilers: it involves lots of biding-my-time. 
Taking Current Stock
An explanation is in order, for those wondering what I'm at these days (all two of you 
). I can honestly say I'm preparing for a comeback, but that it'll take some time. My abstinence from writing since 2018 has made it clear to me that, despite a few small-scale successes here and there that I can rightly look back on with a satisfied smile, the larger "campaign" - so to speak - is still working far below expectations. And it's not just the lack of novel-sized productivity over the years (which - I make no secret of it - has always been my target).
If anything, I'm coming to realize that, years notwithstanding, I'm still effectively a beginner at this. There's just more and more stuff - literary techniques, stylistic moods and subtler shades of emotional "colour", psychological concepts and broader social concerns - that I've barely started scratching on the surface. In short, I'm not pushing the envelope enough, as Fluttercheer once suggested in a previous blog. There's still so much to learn about the craft, and not just "learn" - intellectually - but "experience". "Practise". "Master".
To pick an example at random, it's shocking how many genres there are out there, even beyond the site's own designated list of maybe two dozen. These aren't just genres to dabble in; every single one has its own requirements and plot structures, and it's unlikely, say, that I'd master any just by doing it once. Some of these genres still defeat me (I have no genuine idea what to do with "Random", for instance, and despite my occasional forays into "Romance", I still feel relatively unequipped to deal with it, especially compared with, say, "Slice of Life" or "Drama").
Of course, I can't just jump into these genres armed with nothing. Preparation is the name of the game. That's why I'm spending my time trying to study them, get an idea for what they're like, watch them in action, read about them, and probably one or two other things I'm overlooking but will need to do. You don't attempt a marathon without a run-up, after all! 
The Curse of Originality
Although that said, I must admit one aspect is giving me some trouble. The requirement for originality is proving to be a bit of a stumbling block, even a curse, for three reasons:
1. It's nigh-impossible to achieve.
By definition, originality requires thinking in unfamiliar ways. Strictly speaking, nothing should prepare you for it, and worse still, there's no way to practise or improve it for the simple reason that there's no standardized yardstick. That takes an already difficult task - wrangling something effective and convincingly complex out of thousands of carefully orchestrated words - and pushes it further into the difficulty zone.
2. There's an awful lot riding on it.
Everywhere I look, people seem to set great store on originality. "It's nothing new, but..." "It's not exactly original, but..." "It doesn't do much else with its setup, but..." There's definitely a sense that a failure to do something different is just that. A failure. Even if only a partial or minor one, it still counts for something. Genre fiction, stock characters, stereotypical responses, not thinking outside the box: these all bespeak of something undesirable, even pejorative. Paradoxically enough, the default state of a writer is a constant effort to not have a default, lest they be lazy, unimaginative, comfortable, taking the easy way out.
3. It automatically devalues itself after the first try, making it ephemeral.
The first person who writes something truly original is, in effect, the only winner. Everyone after that is a copycat following the leader and jumping on the bandwagon. Therefore, there is no resting state for a writer trying to be creative. As soon as lightning strikes once, a writer has to find some way to make it strike again. They found gold in the desert, they have to keep finding gold, only next time the gold won't be the same colour, same shape, same chemical signature, probably not even a solid or something called "gold".
For someone more comfortable planning structures or making useable lists, this is easily the hardest thing I've had to come to terms with. It's still a forbidding cliff face, (and me without a rope...), and something tells me I might be on a hiding to nothing in this particular sport. 
So in short, that's where you find me as of this current moment in time, with my alt account down and all eggs once again in one basket. Expect a hiatus for a while yet. I will jump into the fray again - I can't deny I'm itching to be productive again - but since a lot of this is going to be me making sure I know what I'm doing as thoroughly as possible, that comeback won't be anytime soon.
Until then, why not try the other rides located on-site? Oh, and don't forget: sit back, relax, and enjoy the show. 
Impossible Numbers, out.
And since I haven't done them since Thursday 1st November 2018, here are the statistics, restored to their former glory now that this Impossible Numbers account has claimed the alt account's stories for itself:
Statistics (including Retrospective Blue Chameleon VI Statistics)
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List of Reviews
Four Impossible Numbers reviews since last time, plus two reviews of Blue Chameleon's work which, since I was hiding the alt at the time, were never recorded here. Full list below:
IMPOSSIBLE NUMBERS
- Story Reviews » SA Reviews: Round 139 (As Winter Dies, So Spring Is Born)
- Fic recs, January 10th! (Why the Gift is Given)
- Story Reviews » SA Reviews: Round 145 (Diminished)
- Read Again #9 (One Apple Short (In Which Twilight Learns Never To Underestimate An Apple Tree)) [shudder]
BLUE CHAMELEON VI
- Fic recs, June 8th! (Limestone Pie Meets Petunia Paleo)
- Fic recs, December 8th: Sunset Shipping edition 2! (Quenchless Fire)
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Fics Accepted By Equestria Daily
IMPOSSIBLE NUMBERS
- Eldritch Fun Times
- Why the Gift is Given
- The Icing on the Hearth's Warming Cake
BLUE CHAMELEON VI
- Limestone Pie Meets Petunia Paleo
- Everyland and Nothingland
- Fire Burns Both Ways
- Mistmane and the Torii of Time
- Quenchless Fire
- One Storm at a Time
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New Stories?:
IMPOSSIBLE NUMBERS
- Growing Your Own Legacy
- Team Quantum
BLUE CHAMELEON VI
- Limestone Pie Meets Petunia Paleo
- Fire Burns Both Ways
- Everyland and Nothingland
- Room for Improvement, Methinks
- Mistmane and the Torii of Time
- Rockhoof's Dilemma
- One Storm at a Time
- Quenchless Fire
- Keep Pretending, One of Three
- Keep Pretending, Two of Three
- Keep Pretending, Three of Three
***
New Updates:
N/A
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Story Count: 93.
0 in 2019.
29 in 2018.
26 in 2017.
16 in 2016.
2 in 2015.
0 in 2014.
8 in 2013.
9 in 2012.
3 in 2011.
***
My Total Story View Count: Rendered obsolete due to new site changes.
***
Age: 2,640 days, or 377 weeks and 1 day.
Working: 19 days in December 2011, 2x366 days for 2012 and 2016 leap years, 5x365 days for 2013 and 2014 and 2015 and 2017 and 2018, and 64 days for 2019 so far combined.
***
My Follower Count: 225.
***
My Followed Count: 230.
Good, gooooood, the merging is complete...
...
What I mean to say is new chapter of writing career is new chapterish, and I hope you do well with it!
Don’t feel bad if you can’t master a technique or genre. And definitely don’t get upset if you can’t master all genres. No one masters all genres. No. One. And some people just can’t do certain types, just like how some people can’t do logic-based math problems. *smashes mirror* The real trick is to find what you like and what you are good at, and then to focus on those so that you excel at them. The vast majority of authors pick one genre that they like and are good at and stick with it. Good example: Stephen King is not known for his steamy romance novels. So have fun with it, otherwise, what’s the point?
5023572
Quoted for truth. What matters is that you write stories that you (and, optimally, readers) like. It's cool to be versatile, because different genres can teach you different things, but there's nothing wrong with just writing what you enjoy making.
Ayyy, the stats are back!
There's a real dichotomy where in the more general literary world, you're counted as focusing on your strengths when you stick to a single genre, but in this corner of the interwebz, doing so more often nets you accusations of playing it too safe and not pushing yourself enough. There's some value in expanding your capabilities, but if the interest level isn't there, it's not that useful.
Wow, reading what you wrote here, it makes me shiver in anticipation..... Not just for your future writing, but mine as well. What you said here largely applies to me too. Even more than it applies to you, because I'm a less experienced writer than you are.
There are still so many things I haven't done; genres, finer nuances of writing, styles, ect., that I still have to discover. Heck, I'm even still struggling to meet my productivity goal, which is writing every single day for five hours straight from 2 PM to 7 PM. I began to write regularly and to establish that in 2016 when I started writing "Princess Flurry Heart, Destroyer of Worlds!", but it is very hard to bring up the discipline to do that, especially with unexpected and undesired setbacks along the way.
It's a very dear goal I have, I shiver when I imagine how many stories I could write in one week alone if I manage to get there, but it's also a very basic goal, even the most basic goal for an author: A truly consistent output. And I'm still struggling with that most basic goal alone.
And then there are all the things you just said..... I want to experience those, all of them, every single one, and I'm itching to do it after reading this and can't wait to progress further as a writer!
I'm a very slow learner and I can't wait to get there, but I know I will with time.
Maybe I can add a different perspective again..... One that might look contradictory to what I previously said, about writing more unusual ideas, but read to the end:
The requirement for originality is actually only one requirement. For a little while now, a few months, I like to say:
Originality is overrated.
Now I know, I am the guy who told you to be more daring with your writing. To think up unusual ideas, to be more bold with scenarios. And that advice is still true, for a writer, it is important to come up with original ideas to make yourself a name and to progress further in your writing and use your potential. But there's a finer aspect to this, still.
Something I already realized a long time ago, even long before MLP: FiM managed to finally lure that writer inside of me out, is that originality can be overdone. Overdone to the point, where the story you're writing develops from "Original" to "Bizarre". Maybe even "Illogical".
Which is something that isn't bad if you actually want to go and write a bizarre story. If that is the intent, then you can go wild with ideas. There are a couple of genres that bizarre ideas are really good for, like Horror, and I think "Bizarre" can even be its own genre if you play your cards right.
Not all stories are meant to be bizarre, though, but can become bizarre if you end up being forcefully original while trying to write something that no one else has ever written before. If my memory wouldn't betray me about them, I could name a good number of japanese anime series that didn't look like they were supposed to be bizarre, but ended up bizzare anyway, because, as I guessed back then already, the writers tried too hard and ended up squeezing too many crazy ideas into these shows.
I could see what these shows could have been, but weren't, because the writers emphasized on originality too much.
What I'm saying is, originality is an important aspect of a good story. But so is using ideas that fit together. Every story, no matter how old or how popular, has familiar ideas, things that everyone knows and that have been used to death in creative writing. Clichés, yes, even stereotypes.
If I were to write a love story (I suck at romance, but with my current writing project, I feel I'm getting slightly better at it), I would totally have a scene in it where one pony climbs through the window of their loved one to meet them. It's clichéd and overused and it feels like every love story does that. But it's also so fitting and, at the same time, so charmingly romantic and exciting that there is barely something that can beat that. One of the best shipfics I read has as final scene the couple snuggling on a ferris wheel of all places, another cliché.
I would write that window scene into it, but, I would try to come up with a unique way of getting there. A more unique reasoning for the love-dazed protagonist to do that, more than just being full of butterflies, or a more unique journey that leads him there. Or, I would try to make it look like that won't happen, but then let it happen anyway in a twist of events.
I would write something familiar with that, but at the same time, present it in a new light.
And this is what is important: The fusion of Originality and Familiarity.
A completely familiar story, with no new ideas, will be boring and no one's going to read that, because most people have read that a thousand times before.
A completely original story, without zero familiar elements, will quickly alienate a reader and leave them wondering how that scenario is supposed to make any sense. And unless a particular idea isn't supposed to make sense, because the protagonist itself doesn't get what's going on (again, very popular in the horror genre, as example), it will be confusing for the reader and thus, not likely find many readers, either.
But if you fuse these two, Originality and Familiarity, then you have the success formula for a great and outstanding story that people will cheer about and love to read.
So, when you wreck your brain for new, creative ideas, don't wreck it too hard. Think of ways to revolutionize familiar clichés and tropes and to invent them anew, but make sure to keep some familiar elements and to hit the brake before you enter the rail tracks to Bizarro Land.
If you make sure to use both Originality and Familiarity, you will always end up writing something great.