Progress Update: Finding Things I Shouldn't

Hey everybody! 

Happy helluvalongwait! It's been a hot sec since the last Terry Pratchett video came out, and in fact a healthy amount of time since you've heard from me at all. Never fear, the work carries ever onward. Still, as you can see, we have a bit of a wait yet. Doesn't mean cool things aren't happening behind the scenes.

Things, that is, apart from devising my very own improv-heavy TTRPG system, traveling with my girlfriend, beginning work on a new cosplay, creating and sending out a ridiculously cool little taleoid pin, and watching the Tale Foundry discord community come together to [REDACTED].

I've been a busy Benji.

But also busy working on the show. Let's talk about it, shall we?...

Where are we now?

Look back at that lead image, and you'll see it before I even tell you: it's slow progress through the story outlining process.

It's an interesting challenge to think about how to approach a Terry Pratchett-inspired story. I often gravitate toward pain, loss, tenderness, regret, and recovery in my writing, so thinking about being a little more droll, providing a little more overt commentary, characterizing things with a little more abandon... it's a weird space.

Luckily, I also read Pratchett's non-fiction. 

In A Slip of the Keyboard, Pratchett wrote at length about the joy of undirected research and drawing inspiration from it. I'm not quite going in undirected, but I am approaching by just doing a bunch of research before I outline and letting what I find guide my hand. 

So this time, writing is preluded by outlining, and outlining is preluded by a lot of nearly-recreational research. Which is a joy. It almost feels like I've found a convenient excuse just to go wikipedia-hopping all day.

What's next?

It's a season of research for me, and in tandem with my study for the short story, I've also been hard at work plumbing the anomalous depths of [REDACTED].

Honestly, I've been a fan of [REDACTED] for years, and it only feels now, for the first time, like I'm picking up a feel for how the whole thing operates. Beyond all the good ideas the community pours into the articles and tales, there's an underlying tie that binds them all, an undeniable appeal that keeps us reading and keeps them writing.

It can be hard to boil something that effective down, but I'm gonna try my best in the forthcoming series. Whatever it is, it's worth (...)

///EDIT by Dr. Elend, (7-3-2019): The remainder of this section's contents have been archived under 03 clearance, as per RO-████████; crosslink for more information; all other data contained in this article has been cleared by ████████ for declassification.

Anything else?

Yes, actually! In fact, there is.

I'm not quite prepared for it yet, but the more regular livestreaming sessions have really been gearing me up to spend more casual time with you guys. To that end, I'm seriously beginning to consider putting together a Tale Foundry twitch stream where we can just relax, play games, chat, and nerd out about the thing we love most: storytelling.

What do you think? That sound appetizing to you? Lemme know!

—

And that's it for this week!

You may be able to expect one of my famous short-notice livestreams the weekend, if all goes swimmingly. I'll be sure to let you know!

In the meantime, a tremendous thank you to everyone who's ordered a Terry Pratchett taleoid pin! They're going to be available all month long, but after that they'll be gone forever, so if you're interested, be sure to grab yours! Aaaaand since you're here, be sure to use your patron discount. 

Great, wheeling love to all of you. Bye for now!

—Benji