Board Thread:General Wiki Discussion/@comment-34823985-20180312175253/@comment-26475800-20180313034513

I'm socially inept, which I think comes through in my writing. A lot of my characters will say or do things that are just kind of stupid. I don't know if you know, or care, but if you know anything about the Myers-Briggs personality types, I'm an INTP. The description fits me damn near perfectly, although there are some things that aren't true, but psychology isn't the most credible field of science in my mind anyway. I could go on a rant about that, and that's why I have written a story about a lousy shrink before, but that's getting off topic.

Some of the things I do in real life are:

Constantly making sound effects for most things that happen in my life.

Telling really bad jokes to people I probably shouldn't. It's a wonder I haven't been sent to HR more, but I work on the road and I never have to talk to any office type people.

I embarrass people without knowing that I'm doing that, because I don't get embarrassed by things most people do, and do by things that most people wouldn't, like singing and dancing.

I have a hard time dealing with and recognizing my emotions, which makes it hard for me to write emotions for my characters. That is why most of the emotions that my characters show are via thought, or actions. Actions mostly because I'm able to watch how other people react to things and remember it.

Here's a quick little story about that: I was driving through a canyon with my ex, when we passed a dude that got killed on a Gator. He was hit by a Jeep, and the body was just laid out on the pavement. We could see this dude was dead, he head was twisted damn near completely backwards. My ex got really upset about it, and to this day I don't really understand why it affected her so badly. It took her weeks to get over it, and her dad, who was in another car in front of us was also a little shaken up by it. However, I didn't feel anything about it, I didn't hurt the guy, I didn't know the guy, so to me it was just some dead dude. After a couple days, her dad and I started calling the place where he died Dead Man Canyon.

Oh, another good example of me saying things to people that I shouldn't, because it upsets them, would be that I used to call my ex's mom's boyfriend: Dan the Sausage Man. Even made a little jingle about it, Dan, Dan the Sausage Man. Serving up sausage whenever he can. She didn't like to think about her mom getting laid, so it made her uncomfortable.

I also am quick to bring up politics, religion, or asking someone how much they make when I first meet them. If I try to open up to people, which most people I don't in real life, I want to find something interesting to talk about. If you're going to try to talk to me about the weather, sports, celebrities, or any other small talk bullshit, I'll normally just walk away from you.

My writing has a good tendency to hide most of that stuff. But I know it comes across with certain things, sometimes dialogue, sometimes emotions. But for the most part, I just write what I've seen people do and that can hide most of it.