Tag: writing

I needed money ’cause I had none

Friday. Though Google swears otherwise, it’s raining. No, really. It is. I don’t say that it won’t quit raining, later, and the day star emerge from its cloudy boudoir to burn off the fog, but right now, it’s raining.

I have an invitation from Boskone to attend as a panelist in February, which I’ve been angsting over for the last week, trying to pummel myself into going and — I just can’t. I mean, I went down to Baltimore, because Steve would have had it so. BaltiCon after all had been our home con, not to mention that I personally owed a life-debt. But the thought of packing for a con, traveling, and arriving in order to perform inadequately on panels — even doing a reading, and I love to read to people — makes me want to simultaneously curl up into a ball and scream.

So, I’m guessing that answers that, and I had best just send my regrets.

Sarah will be by in an hour to clean. I fully expect to finish my in-depth reading of the first half of the WIP this morning and begin making Adjustments to the file. I’ve decided to pull the questionable sections for now and just concentrate on the main line, since that’s what I know, and keep on writing until I either reach the end of what I know, or the end of the book. Then I can piece in these other things. And it certainly won’t be the first time I/we built a book that way.

I am still planning to go to the Block Party this evening. I figure to go downtown earlyish, get a desert at Holy Cannoli and dawdle over a book until the festivities begin.

I had almost forgotten that today is the start of a Long Weekend, freelancers not always indulging in Long Weekends.

Who has plans?

And, once more, “I Fought the Law,” this time from the Bobby Fuller Four.

“Anything” is just a . . . suggestion

So, that’s 1,080ish new words this morning, for a WIP total of 52,570ish.

I may — that’s may — have figured out how to write two books at once, so I’ll be setting up the framework this afternoon, after I pay my tithe to the house.
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So, the cats are expecting a Chewy order, which will arrive via FedEx. While I was paying my tithe to the house, I happened to look out the window, and there was a FedEx truck in my driveway, which stayed there for, oh, four minutes? I went to another part of the house to get something, came back, and the truck was gone.

Well, I said, said I, noticing the lack of heavy box on the steps. I guess it’s in the (open) garage.

Only it wasn’t. That’s right! In a new Personal Best, FedEx not only failed to follow the long-filed instruction to leave packages in the garage, but! Failed to unload a package at all.

I? am actually Impressed.

I’ve been plodding along through the bookclub book — it’s interesting, but not a page-turner — and I just reached the part where Our Hero had realized that the actions he takes as an Official (in this case a high-level law enforcement admin) Actually Impacts people in addition to those who have fallen under his jurisdiction, and — this is the important part — that he, as a representative of The System, needed to do better. I salute Our Hero. Really, I do. And I wish that more people in positions of influence were not only able to have that insight, but gather the courage to act on it.

In other news, I think I have the method figured out for working on two writing projects at the same time. I think I’m going to be helped by the fact that the two projects are completely dissimilar. I guess We’ll See.

Taking a break now to do my duty to the cats and PT homework. Then! To the couch with me, notebook and pens in hand.
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. . . Dolly Parton and Tim Curry?

And if you lie, you will lose it

This morning’s cat census here

Tuesday. Sunny and already warm. Trash and recycling at the curb patiently awaiting the advent of the trash truck.

Back with Jethri today and writing the rest of a sticky scene. It still needs work, but, hey! First Draft, amirite? The WIP now stands at 51,490ish total words. Next scene, tomorrow, already sketched in on the pad, and ought to be more fun.  For writer values of “fun.”

I have, I think, figured out what to do with the character from Chicago, and her friends, too. Now, all I have to do is find time and energy to do it. I know — some of us wish we had such problems.

This morning, I purchased a ticket to view Coyote vs ACME on Thursday, September 3, which makes next week Media Rich, as I’m also seeing a play on Sunday.

Social butterfly, ayuh.

Crafts, this evening, and before that I have chores, correspondence, and lunch to cope with.

So! What’s on your schedule today?
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So. . .somebody just stole my recycling.

I mean, not the mixed recycling that is in the covered wheeled bin, but the broken down cardboard boxes that were in the open recycling box. I s’pose somebody needed cardboard?

I wouldn’t — well, I don’t — care, particularly, except that I’m in a very wobbly state where I’m kind of second- and third-guessing everything, and when I looked out the window, and saw the bin was empty, while the rest of the trash was still where I’d put it, and the wheeled bin was still upright and had its lid down — I thought that maybe I’d been inattentive enough to have put out an empty bin. Which is nonsense; getting that bin out is non-trivial, and I clearly remembered that there had been cardboard in the damned thing when I dragged it out to the curb earlier.

Sigh.

Speaking of which, I just read some advice in an advice book on how to remember if you’ve done one of those things that you’ve been doing daily for decades, today, and the advice was to PAY ATTENTION.  Which, while reasonable, isn’t, oh, I dunno, helpful.

Anyhow — off to do my chores.

Today’s blog post title courtesy of Eric Clapton, “It’s in the Way That You Use It”

 

Remote writing

So, Sunday. Dim and damp. Big breakfast of scrambled eggs with inclusions. Need to make something for lunch realsoonnow.

One thousand two hundred five new words written today, putting the WIP well over fifty grand — 50,570(ish), for those keeping a spreadsheet.

I’m contemplating a nap. I prolly won’t take one, ref make lunch, above, but jeezlouise is it a day for a nap.

In totally unrelated news, this morning I was thinking about Something Else, and a character wandered into my head, as they do, this one bearing the conviction that she’s from Chicago. Well. Everybody’s gotta be from someplace, I guess.

How’s Sunday treating you and yours?
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Bread’s in the oven. Remote arrived. I have achieved a kludge blu-ray system by which I need to start the disc playing manually, but once that happens, I can use the remote to start the movie, fast forward through previews and all like that, which is to say!

I will, indeed, preorder a copy of Hadestown, and when it arrives it will be more than a pretty ornament.

I would like it noted in the log that my test disc was Jupiter Rising and that I did not watch all of it.

I am a Tired Woman, for whatever that’s worth.

Everybody have a good evening. I’ll check in tomorrow.

Dance with me, I want to be your partner

How does that dance go? One step forward, two steps back?

Today’s writing session saw me delete one of the two scenes I wrote yesterday in favor of a better scene that I will write, um . . . *squints* probably Monday? Because! Today’s writing session also saw me making Meticulous, Step-by-step Notes for the next five scenes. No, I don’t know how many words that will be.

The WIP currently stands at 49,370ish words.

And I really do need to go to the grocery store.

After lunch.

How’s your day progressing?
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Back from the store. Groceries put away. Strawberries over ice cream et. Desk cleared. Duty to the cats dispatched. Got some pots ‘n pans to wash, after which it’ll be Coon Cat Happy Hour, and I’ll be pouring a glass of wine and finding someplace comfy to sit and read.

Everybody have a good evening. I’ll check back in tomorrow.

Today’s blog post title brought to you by Orleans, “Dance With Me,” recorded in a Simpler Time.

Friday’s cat

This morning’s editor was paws-on:

Friday. Sunny, breezy and cool as I type here in Steve’s office, both sliders open to the day, and sleeping cats all around me.

Sarah has been and gone, leaving a clean house behind her.

I’ve written about 1,150 new words, but stalled because I have to Figure Something Out. The WIP right now stands a bare 170 words from 50,000. Well. Maybe I’ll Figure It Out and not only finish the scene, but cross over into Half Done, Optimists Edition.

For right now, and what will be a good assist in the Figuring Out Department, I need to put the house back together and decide whether or not I want to go to the grocery store. Actually, I don’t have to figure that out — I don’t want to go to the grocery store. What I have to decide is do I need to go to the grocery store.

First thing, though — put the house back together.

So. Are you going to the grocery store today?

Where were we?

Earlier today:

To the best of my knowledge, it’s Thursday.

It is definitely sunny and breezy. The weatherbeans are calling for warmer than it has been, but not Stoopid Hot. Windows and sliders are open at the moment, but the pest control guy is due in an hour, so I’d best close up before he gets here.

Only about 820 new words today, finishing out the scene I was working on yesterday. Did some tweaking, which lost me some words, there, but that’s writing for you. The WIP currently weighs in at 48,680ish words, and 207 manuscript pages. Or, short form: progress is still progressing. Jethri’s got a meeting with the Combine commissioners coming up, and there’s some other business elsewhere that needs to be checked in with, so I’ll just be puttering around the house, and letting the backbrain work.

I ordered in a drag-behind cart that goes up and down stairs! It’s supposed to be delivered today, and I’m excited. Also, go! me! for thinking ahead of time about how I really don’t want to do my back the favor of carrying my Stuff to class in a bag over my shoulder.

I have a ticket for Unabashedly at the Opera House on August 30, but I haven’t yet been able to nail down tickets for Coyote v. Acme. I also need to decide if I actually want to buy the Hadestown DVD. In theory, I should be throwing/giving Stuff away, not acquiring more. Well. Maybe I ought to make sure that the DVD player still works before I get out the credit card. There’s a plan.

So! What do you have to decide, today?
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My teaching cart arrived, and has been constructed (go! me!) I am now officially ready to rock ‘n roll.

 

People are strange

Editor Talizea Kennebec on duty:


Tuesday. Mizzling and cool. Trash and recycling are at the curb. The lawn guy arrived, did his thing, and vanished into the grey day.

Wrote a little over 900 new words, tweaked other words. The WIP Entire now weighs in at 46,275ish words, and it’s really feeling like A Thing, even while I feel like I’m channeling more than usual. I sit down at the keyboard thinking, “I got nothin‘,” and a thousand words later . . . Well. The fingers know, I guess. Or, like I said before, maybe Steve finally worked it out.

Regarding the genders and alikeness of numbers (yes, I’m still on this), someone at another place where I hang out said that when they were asked as part of an autism test how 7 and 9 are alike, their answer was “Seven and Nine are nothing alike” (implied, “as anyone over six can see). “Seven is (one color) and Nine is (another color). Seven is all angles and Nine is curvy, and they’re just not alike at all.” The suggestion being that this was, perhaps, a Bad Question for an autism test.

Frankly, I don’t think there are any Good Questions for an Autism Test, once someone has gotten to An Age, and made the accommodations that allow you to function Good Enough.

Honestly, if someone asked me, right now, in any context, how seven and nine are alike, I’d say that both are odd numbers. If I’d been asked when I was a kid, and before I knew the . . . I hesitate to say the “correct” answer, so let’s go with “the answer that would get me in the least amount of trouble”, I would probably have said that both were larger than five, or something along that line, this by way of trying to figure out what the adult wanted me to say. And to stay out of trouble. Kinda the driving force of my childhood, staying out of trouble. Not that I managed all that often.

I’ve managed to skin by in the Functioning Good Enough Competition by being an artist. People expect artists to be weird. Better, it’s seen as a Feature. Except by those people who haven’t thought it out, of which there are a surprising number, but even then, I have My Art to back me (as in, “You asked me here to give you a Creative Answer. Well, you got your wish, whether it ‘sounds crazy’ or not.”) Everyday Life is still an occasional challenge, but by this time in my life, I’ve had a lot of practice, and a Really Impressive Store of answers that will get me in the least possible trouble.

All that said–gotta do some chores.

How’s everybody feeling today?

Today’s blog post title loosely brought to you by The Doors, “People are Strange“

Sunday

Coon cats first:  The Breakfast Club

Sunday. Looking like it’s trying to make up its mind, is it going to rain.

About 1,000 new words on the morning, bringing the WIP to 44,150. Ish. May or may not write tomorrow, depending on how early I get up, I guess. Book club at 1; PT at 2:30. Lunch sometime or ‘nother.

The cats tried to tempt me back to bed after breakfast and I won’t say they weren’t persuasive, but — work to do. They finally came in to keep me company about the time I knocked off, and there they are all still.

Got mundane tasks to get rid of, some research to do, and some lunch to rustle up. Enough to keep me occupied, but not enough to be overwhelming. I’ll take it.

What’s doin’ at your place, today?
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Sigh. All the old war wounds are aching tonight, which is my cue to back slowly away from the keyboard and pour a Wine Venti.

Everybody have a good evening. Stay safe. Remember to hug the people you love.

See you tomorrow.

Nobody told us it was gonna work out this way

Saturday Cat Census here
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So, that was fun. Decided to make hummus. Got a lemon out of the freezer and left it to thaw. Went to the pantry — and there were no garbanzo beans/chickpeas. Well, damn. Went to the grocery, which alert readers will recall I just visited yesterday. Bought four cans of garbanzo beans, which for some reason are cheaper than chickpeas. Came home and made hummus.

So, yanno — yay! Hummus.

By the time I clean up my mess, it’ll be Happy Hour.
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And before I forget, I want to give the author of the following excerpt from Carousel Sun a gold star. And somehow “this terrible thing” is so much more terrible, for not being said out.

Have I mentioned how much I love Vassily?

“It is simple.” He glanced at me. “Understand, I did not think that; I did not believe my uncle, the priest, when he said to me that it is simple. Worse than this, I did not care. I was . . . very bad. I did bad things. I hurt people.

“Then, on a day, I met my Alisa. And I stop being bad. I am . . . transformed, you see? It is her. She makes me good.” He paused.

“I was new, but the past . . . it follows. Bad deeds want blood for balance.”

Another pause; and a tiny sigh.

“My Alisa, she says, there is a program. We will get jobs in America. We will lose the past, she says. I say, yes, we will do this. And so we sign the papers and are told that Samuil will come for us on a day, to bring us here, to America, with all the rest.

“Two days before Samuil is to come, the past . . . finds me. I had, before my Alisa transformed me, I had hurt, you will say, a wrong person. I did it for money. That person had . . . a protector, a lover. He found me. He found Alisa . . .”

He bowed his head abruptly, shoulders stiff. I wanted to tell him to stop, to not go there, that I hadn’t meant . . .

He raised his head.

“So, this terrible thing. My Alisa is dead. I am . . . It is . . .” He catches his breath in what sounds like a sob.

This evening’s blog post title brought to you by Mr. John (Cougar) Mellencamp, “Lonely Ol’ Night.