Come on. You drop by for a cup of coffee, and the world's not ending? Please.

Connor ,'Not Fade Away'


The Great Write Way, Act Three: Where's the gun?

A place for Buffistas to discuss, beta and otherwise deal and dish on their non-fan fiction projects.


Typo Boy - Mar 19, 2011 9:46:15 am PDT #4208 of 6690
Calli: My people have a saying. A man who trusts can never be betrayed, only mistaken.Avon: Life expectancy among your people must be extremely short.

Plot bunny I will never use - not the main plot, a really good McGuffin.

A wind farm would make a great cover for a large marijuna business. The villain (or anti-heroe?)start a wind farm that produces at peak about 10X the power their greenhouse needs. A typical wind farm will drop below 10% of peak less than 10% of the time. So 90% of the time there will be enough power to run grow lights and pumps and such. Add some flow batteries (doubling your capital costs) and it will probably give power more like 95% or 99% of the time. Occasional purchase power to fill the gap won't constitute enough demand to be suspicious. Since production is being drained for use, power sales will be lower than they should be for a plant that size but only by a third. That won't really look suspicious in "eybeballing", a little inefficient but not implausibly so. The only way to see that is beyond inefficient is to do an hour by hour analysis of output vs. windspeed - which somoone would already have to very suspicious to do. Also, it is completely reasonable to have strong security to keep trespassers out of a wind farm to keep idiots from killing themselves by stumbling into electrical equipment and such. The only thing that might be a red flag, is that if the farm was in a water constrained area someone might notice water usage was very high for a wind farm. (Wind farms use very little water, so a water intensive wind farm is an intensive thing.) This would be especially good if you wanted to have an newagey liberal uber-hypocritical villain. On the surface a "good guy" producing green power. Below the surface breaking a law many think should not be there in the first place. But using precious water for a luxury crop and (if you choose to make him or her so) being a murdering bastard drug lord under it all. Or maybe not hypocritical, maybe absolutely sincerely self-rightoues and convinced that he or she is in the right. Even show the person as genuinely kind and compassionate in between murders, make your villain a complex and rounded human being.

Again a McGuffin. But a really good one to give the villian you have in mind a scam that has not been used before and one that can be tweaked to fit whatever character you have in mind. Henchmen and Henchwomen could be colorful characters too. Being able to do the work keep a wind farm running and being able to the work to keep a marijuana greenhouse running is quite a combined skill set.


tommyrot - Mar 19, 2011 12:05:09 pm PDT #4209 of 6690
Sir, it's not an offence to let your cat eat your bacon. Okay? And we don't arrest cats, I'm very sorry.

So I took a break from the story I was working on and wrote a 1500-word story of an idea that's been kicking around in my brain for years. I've finished the second draft and completely redid the ending. Still not sure how well it works.

Anyone want to read it? Profile addy is good.


hippocampus - Mar 19, 2011 5:03:46 pm PDT #4210 of 6690
not your mom's socks.

Tommy, send it my way.


tommyrot - Mar 20, 2011 5:05:22 am PDT #4211 of 6690
Sir, it's not an offence to let your cat eat your bacon. Okay? And we don't arrest cats, I'm very sorry.

Insent, Sox.


hippocampus - Mar 20, 2011 10:52:26 am PDT #4212 of 6690
not your mom's socks.

Received!


Gudanov - Mar 20, 2011 5:09:08 pm PDT #4213 of 6690
Coding and Sleeping

Coming in a bit late, but I'll take a look at it. Profile addy is good. I might be a bit slow, I've got two stories in front of it.


tommyrot - Mar 20, 2011 5:15:57 pm PDT #4214 of 6690
Sir, it's not an offence to let your cat eat your bacon. Okay? And we don't arrest cats, I'm very sorry.

Insent, Gud. And thanks!


hippocampus - Mar 21, 2011 3:36:36 am PDT #4215 of 6690
not your mom's socks.

Insent Tommyrot!


Gudanov - Mar 24, 2011 8:53:45 am PDT #4216 of 6690
Coding and Sleeping

Finally insent, tommyrot.


hippocampus - Mar 24, 2011 4:54:08 pm PDT #4217 of 6690
not your mom's socks.

Dear 800 or so words that I need to cut but can't seem to find. Get out. Go. Seriously. I'll call you when I need you. Love, me.