When I'm creating fantasy worlds in my writing, I will sometimes get stumped by a word. I may need a descriptive, non-modern word, so I have to search—what an excellent source of information we have at hand with the Internet. In my day, we would have to go to the local library (still a great place-please send your kids to the library). Anyway, I'm not here to show my age, but I do a lot of Internet searching, and because of that, I have found some pretty funny information. I belong to several FB writing groups, and I'm always amazed at how many people will chime in with a question that they can quickly look up. Certain things will make me crazy, and this is one of them. Other writers are great sources of information, but we are not your personal thesaurus or Wikipedia resource site. That said, don't be lazy; there is a whole world out there full of colorful words and history. Sometimes I get completely sidetracked; like that time, I found out they used to put curses in books to keep people from stealing them. I always wondered if the chained books at the Citadel in the GOT were really a thing.
Recently, I needed a word for a woman's nether region. I didn't want to use the classic V, so I searched and found a great site that featured naughty bit classifications over the past 600 years. https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/52339/35-classy-slang-terms-naughty-bits-past-600-years I'm not going to tell you what I decided upon, as it would spoil the fun. But, if you end up reading the book and remember this blog, you might get a laugh. Oh, that reminds me that Netflix had a great feature on swear words hosted by Nicholas Cage. One of my favorite names for that area was Cecily Bumtrinket. I don't think I have ever laughed so hard in my life.
There was another time when I wanted to describe a particular sound. It was right on the tip of my tongue, but I just couldn't explain it, so I found https://www.writerswrite.co.za/106-ways-to-describe-sounds/. How cool is that? Yes, even when I can crank out thousands of words in a sitting, I still get stumped on something as simple as describing a sound. So, I guess this blog's premise is that when someone thinks you are surfing and wasting time, you can look at them and say, I'm researching.
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