Tuesday: Travel

I'm on the road again this week (Baltimore, MD), traveling with work. Work travel is a good thing and a bad thing, I think. Some of my buddies tell me I travel a lot.

Honestly, I don't travel as much as some of the people I work with, but it is enough for my kidlets to notice how often I'm gone. That part makes me sad, but sometimes you have a sacrifice a little for the experiences you gain out of it. Aside from the interesting people I finally get to meet for the day job, people I spend hours / days / weeks working with via phone & email, I've also had the opportunity to go to some really interesting places.

Over the course of the last 10 months I've been everywhere from California to New Jersey, Puerto Rico to Mexico. And from all these places, I've been able to gain some insight into the way things work in the regions, find inspirations in the locales. Everywhere I go I take my camera with me, you just never know when you'll need to snap a picture of something to take home as a reminder of somewhere inspiring.

With that in mind, I've decided that when I get home from this trip, I'm starting a new little snapshot book, of sorts. One that will contain all the random locations that I want to use eventually. A Settings Diary if you will. I'm hoping this will also help me with learning how to outline and finding another way to organize my thoughts.

My experience traveling with the day job has allowed me an opportunity to visit many places I wouldn't otherwise go and find inspirations where I would never have known it was.

Thursday Thought: Location, Location, Location

Last Thursday while I was in Mexico City with work I brought up the thoughts about settings in stories. Real or make-believe, I think where a story takes place is as important as the characters the story is about. The setting is almost another character itself, because places have so many facets that make them what . . . where they are. All locations have a personality and that's something to keep in mind in your writing.

In my recent travels, I've found that being out of my element really helped keep my creativity refreshed and introduced me to a few places with very different personalities.

So, I'm continuing last Thursday's Thought to share a some pics from a few places I've been in the last few months.

The view out my hotel room door in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

This is the view out my hotel room balcony in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

A definite Yin / Yang situation here.

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A couple pictures of the amazing Utah / Nevada desert. Don't mind the glare, that desert sun is HOT!

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A couple pictures of Mexico City. So different from what I imagined, but exactly what I've seen in movies and on TV.

So there you have it, a few places that have inspired me.

What are your inspirations for your settings? How do you pick your settings? Or do your settings pick you?