September 2011 – Lena Corazon

Month: September 2011 (page 1 of 2)

The End of Summer: A Recap

I’ve survived the first week of school, and October is looming before me, cinnamon and pumpkin-scented, filled with the promise of chilly, cozy nights and the inevitable march towards winter.

I really wish leaves on trees changed color where I live. Autumn leaves are so beautiful!

I’ve been a bit remiss when it comes to blogging, responding to comments, and making the rounds through my Google reader, but with my mom in town for a week and a half, and the various challenges related to packing, moving, and doing lots of traveling and sight-seeing, I suppose I was being a little ambitious, thinking I could maintain the approximately three million things I took on over the summer.

Certain things fell by the wayside this month: the awesome Dice Games flash fiction challenge that I had planned on tackling; visiting my fellow #writecampaigners on a regular basis; editing and rewriting TELL ME NO LIES. On the other hand, I’ve had the chance to visit with friends and family, including my mom, my younger sister, and other extended family members.

At any rate, October is almost here, and with school is full swing, I’m reevaluating everything that I have on my plate. I can’t quite give anything up; I refuse to go another semester without writing, and social media and blogging is something that nourishes me in a way that nothing else can. I’ve come to depend on the community and the connections that I’ve made over the past few months, and I don’t plan on walking away from it any time soon.

Instead, what I’ll be doing is retooling the way that I approach my various responsibilities. I’m using Google calendar to create a detailed schedule for myself, setting aside time for writing and social media, time to deal with the mountain of reading I have for class, time to work on my thesis, and time to prep for the sections that I have to teach.

I’m also rethinking how I tackle blogging. While I like the themed days I’ve been trying out over the past few weeks, I think I’m going to have to scale back a bit, at least until l can build up a decent queue of posts. Right now the pace of trying to write and edit daily is way more than I can conceivably handle, so the plan for the moment will consist of ROW80 updates, and one or two extra posts in addition. We’ll see how it goes!

In the meantime, many fun things have happened in the past weeks. To recap:

Blog Awards!

My fellow ROWer, Em, over at Loves to Read, Wants to Write, as well as Miho Li (who I know from the writecampaign), both awarded me the Versatile Blogger. Sorry for taking so long to announce and link back, you two!

I won’t bore everyone with another list of 7 random things, but I will link back to my original post of randomness.

Writing Challenges

The 2nd challenge for the Writers’ Campaign was a doozy, one that asked us to use lots of obscure words that I haven’t seen since my SAT prep days, but overall, it was pretty enjoyable.

My entry is “Imago, Shattered,” and one day if I ever have the time, I am going to expand the scene. There’s much more that happens between Robert and Tessa that I couldn’t pack into 200 words.

I also entered Jenny Hansen’s “Dirty Fighting” contest, where we had to write a 150 snippet using any of the 23 Dirty Fighting Techniques she shared on More Cowbell (I encourage everyone to check out the list. It’s a fantastic resource for building tension in your writing).

My entry, along with 2 others, were chosen for an on-screen edit by none other than the Naked Editor herself, Tiffany Lawson Inman. Tiffany took my little drabble of a tale and kicked it up fifteen notches — so. darn. awesome. Check out the original top 3 entries, as well as Tiffany’s mark-ups — I learned a ton from all of her comments.

Rock the ROW!

Round 4 of A Round of Words in 80 Days begins next Wednesday, October 5th. To celebrate the general awesomeness of everyone who has been involved, will be involved, or has supported those who have participated, we are throwing a full-scale, 24 hour long Twitter party. Here are the details, via Jenny Hansen:

Theme: “Rock the Row”
However you want to work that in is great. I leave it to your outrageously creative imagination!
Date: October 5th, 12:01 AM to 11:59 PM ET in the U.S.
This also happens to be the first day of check-in so there should be a ton of ROW80 fun happening around the blogosphere.
Party will be held at the #ROW80 hashtag.
Fire up your Tweet Deck or HootSuite and let’s get jiggy with it.
Photo Competition:
You can start now…we won’t tell. Start digging for or taking photos that reflect the theme. We’ll do our best to gather them and decide on the best to spotlight in a post at the ROW80 blog. One the readers vote, the 1st place winner gets a copy of Kait Nolan’s latest book, Red, in e-book format!!
Friendly Blog Competition
We will also post a mash-up of favorite ROCK THE ROW posts at the Row80 blog.

For my writing friends who haven’t jumped onto the ROW80 bandwagon, I encourage you to do so. The folks who are apart of this community are some of the most supportive I’ve ever met, and there’s nothing better than having a built-in cheerleading squad, especially as November inches closer. I credit ROW80 with helping me break out of a very long, very painful period of writer’s block, and I can’t wait for Round 4 to start. I’ve got some goals that I’m eager to share. 😀

How’s everyone doing? Are you ready for autumn, or hanging on desperately to summer? (I’m part of that latter category, in case you hadn’t noticed. :p)

Writers’ Platform-Building Challenge #2: “Imago Shattered”

September 25, 2011 / Lena Corazon / 43 Comments

I’m happy to present my entry for the second #writecampaign challenge. This is the prompt:

Write a blog post in 200 words or less, excluding the title. It can be in any format, whether flash fiction, non-fiction, humorous blog musings, poem, etc. The blog post should:

– include the word “imago“ in the title

-include the following 4 random words: “miasma,” “lacuna,” “oscitate,” “synchronicity”

If you want to give yourself an added challenge (optional and included in the word count), make reference to a mirror in your post.

For those who want an even greater challenge (optional), make your post 200 words EXACTLY!

There’s no mention of a mirror in my entry, though it is exactly 200 words, and meets all the other requirements. As always, I’m curious to know what you all think. If you’re so inclined, vote for my piece here. I’m #87. Be sure to read through all of the other excellent entries as well!

-oOo-

“Imago, Shattered”

The cicada buzzed and writhed, barely-there wings oscillating with fury. Stuck fast to a corkboard, speared by Tessa’s sharp pin, it struggled in vain. She had stabbed it savagely, wishing all the while that it was Robert Elliot.

Though Robert sat mere feet away, a lacuna oscitated between them, mocking the intimacy they once shared. Theirs had been a linking of souls that transcended fortune, and rank. Robert was a penniless tutor, she the daughter of the nobleman who employed him — an unlikely connection, filled with synchronicity. While their love blossomed, such impediments seemed minor annoyances, no harder to penetrate than a miasma of smoke.

She loathed him, yet her heart was bruised and aching, a betrayal of her true feelings. She couldn’t, wouldn’t lose him.

One hand splayed over the slight swell of her stomach, Tessa lurched to her feet, the crashing of specimen jars drawing Robert’s attention at last. Wreathed with sunlight, misery in his eyes, she saw him for what he was: a fragile man, neither villain nor saint.

She charged towards him, bridging that insurmountable distance in a dozen steps. Just before their mouths crashed together, she thought she saw tears glinting on his cheeks.

ROW80: Wrapping Up Round 3

September 22, 2011 / Lena Corazon / 9 Comments

With my mom in town and school starting back today, it’s been a busy few days since our last check-in. Mom and I have been out every day except for Wednesday, I’ve been doing a ton of driving for all of our adventuring, and I had a major case of the freak-outs yesterday, when I saw the syllabus for one of my classes (so many books and articles, I think my eyeballs will roll out of my head by December). I calmed myself down by remembering that this really isn’t anything new, but yikes, it was definitely a scary moment.

But onto fun things! Today marks the end of ROW80’s Round 3, and it is both an exhilarating and bittersweet feeling. Reflecting on Round 3, I’ve come to appreciate all the more the length and nature of this writing challenge. Having 80 days to work towards a set of goals, and being encouraged to be flexible with them if necessary, has been exactly what I’ve needed.

These were my initial goals for Round 3 (I actually had to look them up, because I changed them more than once, and forgot what the original ones were):

Write an average of 500 words/day on any project. This means that I’m doubling my Round 2 word count goal, which makes me slightly nervous, but we’ll see how it goes! I found myself exceeding the original 250 words/day goal consistently, so I don’t think this increase will be too burdensome.

Complete Act 2 of Path to the Peacock Throne, and resist the urge to do too much editing to Act 1.

Move from brainstorming and world-building tell me no lies to working on the first draft.

I ended up exceeding the daily word count quite a bit when I tackled CampNaNo in August. While I didn’t complete Act 2 of PATH TO THE PEACOCK THRONE, I did write over 50k for TELL ME NO LIES, which was a feat in and of itself. I also wrote roughly 13K for STRANGE BEDFELLOWS, although I’ve placed that on the back-burner for the moment.

I had a few other goals for the summer, in particular finishing the 1st draft of my MA thesis. I haven’t finalized the draft, but I did manage to write over 12.5K, retool the theoretical framework, and outline the remainder of the “results” section. I was feeling a little down about not having everything finished and wrapped up. However, I ran into my advisor at the grocery store the other day (oh, the perils of going to school in a small town), who told me to “take my time” finalizing the project. Definitely lifts a little of the pressure off my shoulders, though I do have my own timeline (defending by December?) that I’d like to maintain.

So that’s Round 3! Lots of success, lots of challenges, and lots of surprises. The best part, though, are all of the wonderful people I have met along the way, and who have been an amazing source of support and inspiration. I’m looking forward to ROCKING THE ROW with all of you when Round 4 starts on October 3rd!

In the meantime, I’m off for a visit with my younger sister this weekend, and to have a bit more fun with my mom before she returns back home next Wednesday. After that, it’ll be back to the grind of studying, thesisizing, teaching, and hopefully squeezing in time to work on my WIPs. I haven’t actually written much of anything in the past two or three weeks, and it’s starting to make me feel a little crazy.

I have a few ideas for my Round 4 goals, and I as I’ll be taking Kristen Lamb’s “Blogging to Build Your Brand” class, I’m sure some of these goals will include retooling and refining my blog. I also need to figure out which project I’m going to tackle for November’s NaNoWriMo, but I’ll be chatting more about this once October rolls around.

That’s all for now, ROW80 friends (you can find everyone here). Hope to see you all on October 3rd!

Things I Love Tuesday: Repo! The Genetic Opera

September 20, 2011 / Lena Corazon / 2 Comments

For this week’s edition of Things I Love Tuesday, we’re changing up the vibe a bit and looking at a movie that’s received some very mixed reviews over the years: Repo! The Genetic Opera.

Sarah Brightman as "Blind Mag," via We Are Movie Geeks

I admit, I was really skeptical about this film. It first popped up on my radar around 2007 or 2008, when I heard that Sarah Brightman had been cast as Blind Mag, the aging opera singer. As a side note, I own every album Sarah Brightman has ever recorded, and most of her concert DVDs, so I was really excited when I found out that she was going to be in a movie. Still, I didn’t get around to seeing the movie till last week… but now I am obsessed.

Repo! is billed as a horror rock opera, set in a world where a global plague causing massive organ failure has led to the for synthetic organs. The solution to this scourge comes in the form of GeneCo, the company that manages to corner the market on synthetic organs.

Rotti Largo, the head of GeneCo, is a shrewd and heartless businessman — he forces a bill through Congress that allows him to repossess organs from those who have defaulted on their payments.

Repo! Poster, via cyberpunkreview

This development gives rise to the horrifying specter of the Repo Man, who is charged with repossessing GeneCo’s property. As GraveRobber sings in the opening,

Out from the night from the mist steps a figure.
No one really knows his name for sure.
He stands at six foot six, head and shoulders,
Pray he never comes knocking at your door.
Say that you once bought a heart or new corneas,
But somehow never managed to square away your debts.
He won’t bother to write or to phone you…
He’ll just rip your still-beating heart from your chest!

The trailer offers a more complete overview of the film, though as a warning, there is some Sin City-style violence, blood, and gore involved:

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MzgpU25C6fg]

Alexa Vega as Shilo Wallace

There are many reasons why I love this film. Take, for example, the cast, which includes Paul Sorvino as Rotti Largo (who played Capulet in the 1996 reboot of Romeo and Juliet); Paris Hilton (Rotti’s spoiled, petulant daughter who is addicted to cosmetic surgery and prescription drugs); Alexa Vega (from the Spy Kids franchise) as Shilo, the main character; and Anthony Stewart Head (Giles from Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Uther Pendragon from the BBC’s Merlin) as Shilo’s father and the Repo Man.

Tony Head’s role was the most surprising to me, because I somehow missed the musical episode of Buffy and had no idea that he could sing. And wow, he is amazing in this movie. He’s like Dr. Jekell and Mr. Hyde: a doting, overprotective father one moment, and a bloodthirsty “legal assassin” the next, plagued by guilt and his own personal demons.

Repo! is heavy on dark humor, but it also has an emotional core that I didn’t expect (for the record, the ending made me cry). The film also rocks a futuristic/dystopian aesthetic, mashed up with some Victorian/Goth elements that I love: Blade Runner-style floating neon billboards and women dressed in period gowns with cameo necklaces; eerie three-dimensional portraits alongside dark, creepy Victorian furnishings.

Despite the many, many bad reviews this film received when it came out, I can’t get enough of it. Netflix predicted that I’d give it 4.7/5.0 stars, which is dead on, so maybe that means that I like things that no one else does? At any rate, I can’t stop listening to the soundtrack, and I’ve watched the film so many times via Netflix Instant that I know I’m going to have to just buy the DVD.

Has anyone seen Repo!, and if so, what did you think? Are there any films that you love in spite of poor reviews?

Monday Inspirations: Mini-Mashup of Steampunk Awesome

September 19, 2011 / Lena Corazon / 3 Comments

I’m spending the week prepping for the start of the school year, and having a final end-of-summer hurrah with my mom, so I’m taking a little time off from blogging this week. To keep the steampunk vibe going for the week, however, I’m linking up some fun videos and photos.

First up are some great resources from Suzanne Lazear (who taught the steampunk writing course that I took back in July) for those interested in steampunk world-building and research.

Next, we have some amazing steampunk-themed Star Wars robots from artist Jordan Thomas (check out his work on flickr, and his robots/wine bottle stoppers available for purchase on Etsy).

Steampunk C3PO by Jordan Thomas, via Cool News

Steampunk Stormtrooper by Jordan Thomas, via Cool News

Steampunk R2D2 by Jordan Thomas, via Cool News

Steampunk is also influencing Hollywood films, including the latest reboot of Alexandre Dumas’s The Three Musketeers, co-starring Matthew Macfayden and Orlando Bloom (check the flash of the awesome airship at 1:00):

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQd3MwT2fAM]

Finally, check out this great preview of Vintage Tomorrows, an upcoming documentary on the world of steampunk. It features authors Cherie Priest and Cory Doctorow, who top every ‘steampunk must-read’ list:

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TW5trrXS1e8]

ROW80: There’s No Place Like Home

September 18, 2011 / Lena Corazon / 34 Comments

It is a strange feeling, having two homes.

My fourth year of graduate school begins on Thursday, and so I drove back to my apartment today, after spending six weeks at my parents’ house. Initially, I worried about going home to stay with my parents. I wasn’t sure if their presence would chafe, especially after being on my own for the past 3 years. However, the opposite occurred: I have realized that my parents are actually really awesome people, and I love being home with them. Leaving was incredibly difficult, and it was with a heavy heart that I drove back to school this afternoon.

There’s an odd amount of emotional work that has to be done in order to prepare for the transition: saying goodbye to my friends and family in my hometown, letting go of the coziness of my childhood bedroom, and detaching myself from the family cat. There’s also the work of adjusting to a change in roles, from daughter and sister to student and teacher, not to mention the shift in geographic location (northern to southern California; big city to small-ish town; my childhood home to my teeny but cozy studio apartment).

I spent the first couple of hours on the drive down here lamenting the end of my summer and dreading the looming specter of coursework and teaching, but once I reached my apartment, I felt the familiar longings for my school-life: the rhythm of seminars and lectures, the excitement of grad student gatherings and parties, the tranquility of my home, the beauty of the beaches.

There’s a lot for me to ponder as we reach the end of round 3 of ROW80, especially since it also marks the very end of my summer vacation. So much has happened over the past 80 days, and it will be an adventure to see how I will integrate this “writing-self” that has emerged with the “student-self” that I will become once classes begin.

And so here I am, about to begin my 4th year of grad school. This is the year when I need to complete my MA thesis, finish my last few classes, write and defend my PhD dissertation proposal, and advance to candidacy. If all goes well, this will be my last year in Santa Barbara, and I’ll be able to move back in with my parents next August, so I can write my dissertation, rent-free, in San Francisco.

“Focus” will be my middle name in the months to come, especially if I am going to accomplish all of the above, and still tackle the creative writing that I love and adore. I’ve drafted a weekly schedule that allows me time in the evenings for writing and social media stuff, as well as blocks out a couple of hours each afternoon for my research and thesis writing. We’ll see if I can adhere to it, but if I’ve learned anything this summer, it’s that I work best when I’m satisfying my left brain and my right brain. I won’t be giving up on my novel(s) any time soon. 😀

That’s all from me at the moment! I may be a little MIA over the next week or two: my mom is in town with me, and we will be busy sight-seeing, shopping, and hanging out together. However, I’ll do my best to blog-hop about in the days to come, to check in with everyone in our last few days of Round 3.

Friday Free-For-All: Fall Fashion!

September 17, 2011 / Lena Corazon / 3 Comments

For today’s Friday Free-For-All, I’m tackling a subject near and dear to my heart: fashion. I am an unabashed devotee of all things connected with the industry. Each month I eagerly devour my issue of Vogue, and I drool over the pretty photos on style.com on a regular basis. As a starving grad student, however, all of this research is even more important, because I don’t have lots of money to throw at things that I won’t wear. As a result, I commonly do lots of research on the current trends and quite a bit of window-shopping before I charge into the store and plunk down my money.

Although summer has finally reached my perpetually foggy coastal town, in the rest of the northern hemisphere, the march towards autumn is well underway. I’ve turned my attention to the fall trends, and found a lot to be excited about.

While there are a ton of awesome trends for the fall, but today we’ll look at my current favorite: color-blocking. It’s not new by any stretch of the imagination (honestly, are there any completely original fashion trends?); really, I think it calls to mind the work of twentieth century artists, like Dutch painter Piet Mondrian.

"Composition II in Red, Blue and Yellow" (1930)

When it comes to fashion, color-blocking refers to strategically placed contrasting yet complimentary colors, like this dress by French designer Yves Saint Laurent (inspired by Mondrian’s work above):

"Mondrian" Day Dress (1965) by Yves Saint Laurent

This fall, colors are bold and bright, going beyond the primary colors used above. Here are some of my favorite looks:

From the Runway

Bottega Veneta, Fall 2011 via style.com

I love this swing coat and skirt combo from Bottega Veneta, partly because the combo of orange and fuchsia works really well here, but also because it channels the 1960’s Mad Men-esque vibe that’s really popular right now. I also want to figure out how to copy that model’s deconstructed beehive — one more thing to add to my to-do list. 😉

Giambattista Valli, Fall '11 via style.com

A simple combo here: bright pink shell with a gold skirt. I’m not too sold on that big bow (I don’t need anything else adding inches to my already-ample hips), but I like the overall look.

Narciso Rodriguez, Fall '11 via style.com

I really like this outfit from Narciso Rodriguez because it seems so much more wearable than some styles that are paraded down the runway. The big blocks of black and white, popped with bright red and pink, work really well here.

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Thesis Thursdays: Back-to-School Beatitudes

September 15, 2011 / Lena Corazon / 14 Comments

For this week’s edition of Thesis Thursdays, I’m changing gears for a bit. Sadly, I’m pushing aside poor Emily once more, but with the start of my school year rapidly approaching, I wanted to share this article that I found from The Crunk Feminist Collective, one of my favorite blogs that tackles issues surrounding academia, race, feminism, and social consciousness.

Although the article, “Back-to-School Beatitudes: 10 Academic Survival Tips,” is directed towards women in academia, I think the overall tips can apply to everyone who is struggling and striving to juggle multiple responsibilities without having a meltdown. As the school year rapidly approaches, I’ve been pondering these tips, and they way that I want to enact them in my own life.

I recommend checking out the whole post, but the 10 tips, along with my commentary, are below:

1. Be confident in your abilities.

Regardless of our passions and professions, it’s easy to be bogged down by fears of inadequacy. My own internal voice is incredibly insidious. Sometimes it whispers lies about how I’ll never finish my MA thesis or be good enough to find a job; other times, it tells me that I’m a horrible writer, that I’ll never complete a novel or get my work published. That little voice also preys on my self-image and likes to tell me that I’m not pretty enough, or skinny enough.

Lately, I’ve taken to countering that voice with a constant mantra of “I know I can, I know I can,” like The Little Engine that Could. It almost feels infantile, that non-stop repetition, but it serves to keep the demons at bay.

2. Be patient with yourself.

I have high ambitions for myself, and yet I always have to remember that I won’t accomplish them in a single attempt. In his book Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell presents his “10,000 hour rule“: in order to do succeed, he argues, we need to devote at least 10,000 hours to honing, practicing, and sharpening our skills.

If Gladwell is correct, that means it’ll take years, if not a lifetime, to fully develop our talents. If that’s the case, I can’t expect myself, or my work, to be perfect. I also can’t beat myself up every time I say something less-than-stellar during seminar, or write an article that’s a bit of a dud and isn’t accepted to the journal of my choice, or stumble a bit in my quest for ~~global dominance~~ achieving success as a novelist.

I also have to remind myself that it takes time to develop an idea. I’ve been joking that writing a thesis is, to a certain extent, similar to writing a novel: both projects tend to morph and evolve in directions that one doesn’t really expect, and both require a certain amount of “brewing time” in order to work out the kinks in plot, structure, or theoretical/analytical framework. We have to learn to get comfortable with those periods where we’re not actively producing, because even then, we’re working.

3. Be your own best advocate. Prioritize your own (professional) needs/goals.

One of the most important lessons I learned in junior high was the power of being perseverance. As Mr. C, my 8th grade homeroom teacher told me, “If you want something, Lena, you’ve gotta go out and get it yourself. You have to be prepared to fight for what you want, otherwise you’ll never get it.”

In this case, the magical unicorn that I was fighting for was a list of privileges for the 8th grade class that included bathroom breaks and class sweatshirts (ah, the innocent days of my youth), but the advice still applies. No one is going to deliver our goals on a silver platter. We’ve got to chase them.

4. Be kind to yourself.

I love this one, because I find that it’s much easier for me to be unkind to myself. That niggling voice of doubt is incredibly powerful, telling me that I don’t deserve to take time off, that I should be ashamed because I had a rather large slice of chocolate cake after dinner, or that I’m not really a scholar, because I haven’t published in X-journal, like my other colleagues have. But as Jami Gold wrote in a recent post, we have to give ourselves permission to mess up, to fail, to chase our dreams, and to have a breather now and then.

5. Be proactive about self-care.

I ignored self-care for a long time in grad school, and wondered why I was getting struck down with horrible migraines every few weeks. Turns out that sleep is useful, as well as a means to manage stress. Writing is my outlet, but I’ve found that I need to find other ways to take care of myself, like going outside and getting some sunshine, taking time out to meditate and go to church, spending time with friends, or just taking a mid-day nap when I feel sleepy.

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ROW80: Where Randomness Ensues

September 14, 2011 / Lena Corazon / 28 Comments

It’s been a busy few days for me, so I don’t have too much to report. The transition to new pen name and blog seems to be going smoothly. Instead of changing my WordPress blog address, I opted at the last minute to purchase a domain name and set up a self-hosted blog instead. I’ve also set up a Facebook author page, along with a Google Friend Connect widget, so it’ll be easier for folks to follow me (links for both are in the sidebar).

In other news, I received the Versatile Blogger award from Angela Orlowski-Peart, who I met through the Writers’ Campaign, as well as charitygirl and glitterlady, friends I made through Lady Antimony’s “Seven Virtues” flash fiction challenge. I’m honored, as all three of them have blogs that I enjoy and admire. Stop by and visit all three — you won’t regret it!

There are three rules for accepting the award:

* Thank the person who gave her the award and link back to them in the post.

* Share seven random things about herself.
* Pass this Award to fifteen recently discovered blogs, letting them know about the award.I’ll have to ponder who I’ll pass the award to, but in the meantime, I’ll happily share a few random facts. Merry Farmer actually tagged me a couple of weeks ago to share 10 random things about myself, so I’ll combine the two.

1. My three best friends and I made our own “girl band” in junior high. We called ourselves Eclypse and sang in school talent shows, and I wrote amazing stories where we were a multi-platinum band that went on adventures with the Backstreet Boys and ‘N Sync.

2. I attended an all-girls Catholic high school partly housed in a historic mansion that may or may not have been haunted (that could be the basis of a novel, now that I think about it…).

3. I have a suspicion that my love for Byronic heroes may have stem from my obsession with the musical, The Phantom of the Opera. My parents saw it when I was 8 and brought home the soundtrack, which I had memorized within weeks. Raoul always seemed a nice sort of guy, but I wanted Christine to end up with the Phantom. A tortured genius who lives underground in an awesome cavern — what’s not to like? (We’ll ignore the fact that he, er, kills people from time to time, and has a penchant for kidnapping young women.)

4. I’ve never lived more than 10 minutes from the beach, with the exception of the time I spent studying aboard in college.

5. Out of all my favorite literary heroines, I’ve always identified with Anne from L.M. Montgomery’s Anne of Green Gables the most. Like her, I love school, devour novels, have the unfortunate tendency to talk far too much, and dream of becoming a famous writer.

6. I love almost everything that can be made out of ginger: candied ginger, ginger tea, pickled ginger (with or without sushi). This is a little strange, since I hated ginger with a passion as a kid.

7. I’m an unrepentant girly-girl, and I love fashion, jewelry, high heels, and sparkly things. Living on a tight budget means that I have to find creative ways to keep up with trends, so I have mastered the art of sale racks, outlet stores, and secondhand shops. If I hadn’t gone into academia, I might have become a fashion/costume stylist.

8. I’m known in my family as the “old soul.” As soon as I could talk, I preferred the company of adults to kids my own age. When I was 15, I fantasized about being 35 because it meant that I would be out of college, through with graduate school, and well-established in whatever profession I would choose, with a husband and maybe some kids. It’s only recently that I’ve learned how to “act my age.”

9. Despite loathing college-level science (I couldn’t stand all of the memorization we were forced to do), I was the co-founder and vice president of the high school science club, “The Far Side of Science.” We ran fun experiments, obsessed over Richard Preston’s The Hot Zone (about the Ebola Zaire virus), and watched movies like Outbreak.

10. I spent the spring semester of my junior year of college studying in Oxford, England. It was a dream come true, and to date, is one of the greatest experiences I’ve ever had in my life. I miss England like crazy, and I can’t wait to travel there again.

I’m not going to tag anyone to take the 10 Random Facts challenge, but I encourage all of you to participate, if you so desire. I’ve learned lots of fun and silly things from everyone who has played along so far.

One week remains of Round 3 of ROW80, so go and cheer on our merry band of writers. You’ll find the list here.

Lena Corazon

Flights of Fancy