Write scene in which protag has a peanut butter and jam sandwich and a glass of milk.

Ponder evening snack. Find oneself craving a peanut butter and jam sandwich and a glass of milk. Takes same.

I also yawn when I write about a character yawning. I yawn when I think about writing about a character yawning.

I yawn when I think about yawning.

1116 words today. This is still the new first chapter, which still needs wrapping up. I am not 100% sure that it's necessary, but I need to write it. The events happened, those events drive the story, and are important later. Folks talk about them. The place where they happen is important. So for now, the new first chapter stays.

I have of course stuck myself with the challenge of making the POV character think of less than he knows. I think I can justify it, but it will require more delicate word tweaking than I can do at this point. I am hoping that stuff occurs to me as the story proceeds, and I can keep going back and adding layers. It's one of those baklava chapters. Onion chapters. And it may not even make the final cut.

Tired now. Sleep. Monday. *blech*

The Cubs broke it wide open in the 7th against the Marlins after being down 0-2. It's now 8-2.

Chicken with pasta and wilted greens for dinner. I know many of you have been doing so for years, but there's something neat about going out on one's deck and snipping fresh oregano and thyme for use in one's dinner. If I could have used my own tomato instead of storebought, it would have been even better.

Hot day--mid 80s and dry. No rain expected through the week, and we could use some.

1157 words yesterday. I'd like to hit twice that today, but we'll see. It's not looking likely. Why is it 3pm already?

Assembling a new first chapter with tweezers, like a paper mosaic. A 12-page chapter should not take this long.

Have I mentioned that the time to knuckle down is at hand?

And I think I have it all done, and then I realize, oh hell, I need to mention *this* and *that* and set up *this*.

I hate First Chapters. This one is First Chapter #3.

Write First! Research Later!

Of course, after blogging over at SFNovelists about getting up at oh-hell-auntie-emma to write , I decided tonight to give evening writing another try. I needed to get to bed by 9 pip emma to make the 4am thing work, and it wasn't happening. Productivity slacked off. Much yawning during the day. So, 8-11 it is, at least for a while.

Negative word count today as I reworked an existing scene, cutting where I'd overwritten. It was slow going, which was discouraging, but I need to kick the metrics to the curb for the duration. Tighter is better. Save cuttings in a scrap file if necessary, but don't tack them onto the end of the wip file in order to maintain the word count because it's deceptive and well, feeble.

We'll see how long this approach works...

Last Night with No Internets saw me rooting out the suitcase for Denver, cleaning up the spare room a little, planting the remaining tomato plants, then watching the first four episodes of ANGEL. This Morning with No Internets or Cooking Shows saw me cleaning the bathroom, taking Harrison for an oil change and some other fairly extensive maintenance, which left him sounding and driving like a new truck. Then came grocery shopping. Massage followed. Needed it after this week.

( Read more... )

I'll be bringing the laptop to Denver. I'd love to be able to get some work done while I'm there.

The morning writing hasn't gone too well over the past few days. Mickey's morning meds get dosed over the course of an hour, which chops the time up. This means I need to watch the clock a little too closely, so the semi-immersion I need in order to get started doesn't happen. Add to that the general anxiety. Is he OK? Will he eat this morning? It hits me in my stomach, which means I can barely force coffee down, much less breakfast, and say goodbye to concentration. Maybe I'll try the night writing until this eases up.

Oh look--it's mid-July already.

Working on backfill, filling in the gaps in early chapters. Nasty meeting scene, in which protag is humiliated and discredited, is currently on the table. Hope I can make it nasty enough.

So far:

33,639 / 110,000 (30.6%)

Needless to say, did not make near as much of a dent in the word count as I wanted during my week off. Only 4833 words. Wanted at least twice that. I would've been better off saving the vacation days and continuing with the early morning writing.

Oh well, what's past is prologue.

1002 words between this morning and tonight. Crossed the 30K word mark, and am feeling those first twinges of middlebookitis, that good old who-the-flip-will-want-to-read-this? feeling.

8 weeks until Labor Day.

In other news. Harrison-the-Ford has been towed to the garage. The tow truck driver thinks the problem is vapor lock, likely a result of my not driving Harrison enough. I'm going to ask the mechanic to give him a good going over, which he hasn't had in a few years. Then I'll try to drive him a couple of times a week.

The Mickster continues to improve, fingers still crossed. I won't say what he tried to eat today, but it's become pretty apparent that his appetite is coming back.

Gutter covers are on both the house and garage. Only took 5 hours.

( boring gutter stuff )

( Yea! for research )

It supposed to rain tomorrow, which was one reason why I pushed to get the gutters done today. Need to go into work for a meeting--I know, vacation, but something needs to be seen to--then home to plant myself and work. If it's not raining when I get home, I will weed for one hour...asssuming it doesn't get as hot as they say it will. OTOH, Thursday and Friday are supposed to be in the 70s, so maybe I'll just wait.

A good week so far, but I really need a month.

Strange first day of vacation. Awakened by puppy who couldn't figure out why I wasn't up at 4am.

( The day... )

So next week is my staycation, my week at home during which I hope to 1) get a metric sh*tload of writing done and 2) catch up on household chores that have fallen by the wayside these last few months. One big task I want to complete is the installation of gutter covers, some cheap screen-top jobbies that should keep the pine needles from filling the front gutter every week.

There are also many weeds to pull. Mulch to spread in the front and sideyard, on the other side of the fence from King of the Mulch-eaters. Dream accomplishment would be to disassemble King's old kennel, level the ground, and sow grass seed. But that's at the Nice To Have end of the wish list. Just getting the gutters flushed and covered will make me happy.

2000+ words a day on the wip would make me even happier.

Throwing in a few treats for myself over the course of the week, but will be concentrating on tasks at hand.

So. Fingers crossed that I don't get sick or throw out my back or anything. Fingers also crossed that the Boyz don't get sick or injure themselves running after a squirrel or anything. No power outages or OMG storms or anything else that could bring matters to a screeching halt. Just a nice, dull week during which much gets done.

I checked the bank balance this morning and saw that the day job salary had direct-deposited and thought 'wouldn't it be great if I got paid like this for writing?'

To work, a little late...

1023 words.

Cubs won.

G'night.

1002 words today. 1042 words yesterday. I've had 1000+ word days during this marathon, but this is the first time I've had two such days in a row. I do so hope I can keep it up.

It's like getting back into physical shape after a long layoff. I really do have writing muscles, and I think, I hope, that I'm working them back into shape.

I haven't cut extraneous sceneage yet, so the word count is currently 22321. Edging up to the quarter pole.

I know I owe a few folks emails. Later this week...

1042 words. Still working out of sequence.

Only 631 words, grappling with a conversation that required careful wording. Maybe it's too early to worry about the wording, but I did anyway.

A milestone of sorts, given that the word count has crossed the 20K point. 20237, to be exact. It's a floppy number, though, because there are any pages of stuff to delete, old scenes and conversations that went nowhere. But I'll clean it up later, and enjoy the milestone, however ephemeral.

Cubs could sweep the Sox tonight. Can't stay up to watch it, though. Back to the grind.

Yesterday was busy--groceries, vacuuming--I think the guys are shedding because I emptied the thing 3x, laundry. Used up some ripe bananas and made some banana bread. Transplanted some grocery store herb plants into the patio garden thingie (which I hope will be able to receive the tomato plants in another week or two). Also wrote 1020 words, which made me happy.

( Sunday )
And that was my Sunday so far...

Only 612 words this morning. Got started late, then kept stopping to Look Things Up. An out-of-sequence scene that dropped into my head last night--I sketched it out, then filled in a little more this morning, including the things I had to Look Up.

I mentioned before that writing out of sequence isn't something that's proved particularly successful in the past. By the time I return to writing sequentially and start filling in, I find that the out-of-sequence stuff no longer fits.

But the important thing for me now is word count. Pages. So if an out-of-sequence scene occurs to me, I write it--it's better than staring at the screen and struggling with a sequential scene while the time ticks away. And I think this scene, or a close facsimile thereof, will be necessary. So, I wrote it. Hope to work on it more tonight.

And now King is pacing and looking out the window and Mickey is looking at me. I need to get dressed so we can go for walkies.

804 words this morning. And that was with a late start.

If I can reach the point where I can regularly kick out a thousand or so in two hours, I will be happy.

Final count: 1010 words. Always happy when I can crack a thousand.

Since I started this tomfoolishness, 10738 words. Not great, but a helluva lot better than I had been doing.