Dammit, Jim, I'm a writer, not a doctor!
Whether you're from a strange galaxy--even this one--or from a Quantum Accelerator, you've come to the right place.
Here you'll find fan fiction about TV shows, often crossed universes; a rather persnickety guide to grammar, spelling, punctuation, and general good writing--with examples from on-line stories; links to aphorisms and wisecracks and to genealogy gathered by Little Calamity herself; and links to whatever I feel like putting up. It's my page, and I'll link if I want to.
Read fan fiction about QUANTUM LEAP, THE INCREDIBLE HULK, RIPTIDE, MAGNUM P.I., BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER, FRIDAY THE 13th--THE SERIES, THE SENTINEL, GILLIGAN'S ISLAND, and other TV shows.
Learn from Ms. Nitpicker herself HOW TO WRITE ALMOST READABLE FAN FICTION--especially fun if you enjoy being scolded mercilessly for your grammatical imperfections. See actual on-line fan fiction errors. Afterward, take a test and see whether you recognize a badly written sentence when you read one. (Ms. Nitpicker does hope you don't recognize one of your own there.) Now includes the CHEAT SHEET INDEX, with helpful details about TV shows for aspiring fan fiction writers, and a brief FAN FICTION GLOSSARY.
Enjoy aphorisms, proverbs, and quotations sorted by a number of interesting categories; you'll find things both witty and wise there.
Enjoy a collection of bawdy, sarcastic, sentimental, pessimistic, or silly poetry bound to make you laugh until you cry, or perhaps just cry.
Interested in genealogy? Snips about my Adkins, Beard, Goodwin, Leavell, Marshall, Osborne, Perkins, Sailors, Staggs, and Tyner relatives are found here.
Research the Irish ancestors of Burl Leavell's wife Rita Louise Ward.
Do you have an attitude (particularly after reading the rules for semi-legible fan fiction) and want me to just get lost?
Send copious praise to
but remember that I am absent-minded, a terminal procrastinator, and prone to bursting into tears. Don't flame unless you want to be responsible for massive psychotherapy bills. On the other hand, feel free to offer constructive and helpful critique; I do love to improve my pages.,
For (among other things) stories about THE SENTINEL and advice from Holy Mother Grammatica, visit Susan William's Stories
Visit
FANFICTION.NET for a ton of links to fan fiction. Lots of it stinks. Some of it glitters.
GENEALOGY LINKS (OTHER THAN MY OWN PAGES)
FIND A GRAVE is free. The search engine is very limited—if you put in “James Wilmer Leavell” and the person who posted the page called it “James W. Leavell” you’ll never find him. Use just the first and last name, or try to wife’s first name and husband’s last name. If you find the dead ancestor, you may find a photo of the tombstone, biographical info, an obituary, links to the spouse and children and parents and siblings—it’s a wonderful aid. However, be aware that some amateurs have guessed at relationships and linked people who don’t belong together, or made up grave sites. Some descendants have posted modern tombstones in the place they ASSUMED their ancestor was buried. Some people were buried in one place, then moved to another, so duplicate memorial pages abound. Use this site to get you started, but verify what you find.
CYNDI'S LIST; I thought with distaste when I first heard of this place that it sounded like some yuppie airhead site. Now I'm stuffed with humble pie. This is the best genealogy directory on the Internet, leading you to thousands of useful sites--nay, hundreds of thousands. Don't pass this up!
A great place to begin genealogy surname searches is provided by the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-Day Saints at FAMILY SEARCH. A lot of the family trees are incorrect, because they were submitted by amateurs who weren't always very knowledgable, but you can search the 1880 U.S. census for free!
Although it's a commercial site and pushes its money-making avenues, FAMILY TREE MAKER also provides free indices and links to web sites and family home pages.
Genealogy.Com now appears to be owned by Familytreemaker, but seems to have slightly different databases.
Although it's a commercial site, ANCESTRY.COM , it does have the totally free Ancestry World Tree there. Family trees are OFTEN wrong, but can give you a start—just verify what you find. Anyone can post anything on the Internet, true or not. The actual data costs a big yearly fee, but check to see if your local library carries the free library edition.
