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May 04, 2009 Did You Write? . It is that day of the week again. This note is a place to brag about your accomplishments, cry about your failures, and otherwise tell about what is happening in your life. The question, is Did you write?. Of course, there are many things involved in writing, besides the initial applying the words to "paper" as we generally consider as writing. Unless we are perfect, we do have to edit. For many of us, that does not even help, but that is something else. Because of this, Editing is definitely writing. Applying words to the "paper" also is writing, whether it is articles, blogging, writing assignments, long E-mails pertaining to writing. Poetry, and world building (as long as something gets on paper) are also writing. Just about anything you feel is writing, will count if you feel the need.
AS for me, Yes, I did write. I had one of those opportunities where I laid down for half an hour and was wide awake for the next three or four hours. After playing around for a while, I wrote 1293 words, four lines from the end of page two. That was pretty good for one session. This is a story I have tried to write three different times, once before I had a computer in the early 90s. I have dozens of wonderful scenes in my mind and have to stitch them together. This won't be a priority story, but wanted to get something back on paper while I could. I found out that last week, I did write something the previous week. It was a simple scene involving my Waxy Dragon, inspired by the cat at Mom's house. It was just on page two with 755 words. I wrote that on that Monday night and forgot all about it when it came time to report it last week.
I had a spell with few new ideas. I did get three ideas today, but that brings me up to 37 story ideas in my compost stack. I get a bit nervous when I start to dig through the stack for something to post. I have no control over where the ideas come from, and have no idea when they might stop coming forever. As long as the stack grows, I am comfortable. I ended the month of April with 30 story ideas, on Page 48, and 29,054 words. I was ready to post idea 31, but the day came apart and never got the chance to post it. I really wanted to be another idea ahead for the year. As it was, the last two story ideas really were lacking, being short and not really doing the concepts properly.
I started a little fun project which became easier than expected. I do wood-turning, which is the process of making vases, platters, round fruit, etc. I also do carving which is usually figures, but also some relief carving. The project I got into was to make some platters (plates) with company logos carved into the surface. My first one was a Pratt and Witney logo for My writing partner's husband. He works there. The second one, which I made this Saturday, was the logo for the company I work for. Getting that made took only a day. I then made a third platter Sunday, with the logo of the antique shop I have some of my woodworking on display. This last one is really bad. I will show it to him and see if I should remove the logo and apply it with separate woods. I really should do that now, but I don't have the time right now. I see him Friday and have to have it presentable then. I will see what he thinks. Anyway, I am surprised at how easy these platters are to make. I made relief carvings in the past and fought them tooth and nail to get them done. Of course, some were very difficult like an Eagle landing with well developed feathers, or a dragon with all the frills and scales. These were fun.
As to the question of the week, I get to celebrate YES, I WROTE!!!
I haven't gotten back to Book Two yet. I will. I also still have to get back to that darned synopsis of Book One.
However, I did some revisions to the end of Book One that I feel have made it much better.
And I also wrote a short story! The consensus so far is that it really, actually is a short story this time. It needs some work. But I did it! I actually wrote something that is not book length that makes sense and didn't completely fall apart somewhere in the middle. That is real progress for me.
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A little. I was sick the beginning part of the week, then bounced back on the weekend for a thousand words worth of writing, then got busy again and didn't write yesterday.
I oughta be able to slap a thousand or so words together sometime over the next couple of days...after which, I'll be out of town, away from my word processor, and taking an enforced break from the Internet. But only for a week or so.
(Meanwhile, I had my previous work bounced by one of the Big Three. I've already sent it out to another market.)
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Finally. I'm getting a story ready to send off to this quarter's WOTF. I've known for a long time my writing usually has a fatal flaw. On rare occasions I luck into a story that transcends that, but it's luck rather than skill. I am hoping that I have discovered the flaw and can make this story work the way it's supposed to. Then I can return to first CORY (which all too many people have read in its flawed state) and eventually to my lysiscan novels which have languished lo these many years.
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I wrote a story and a half for a series of short pieces (about 5,000 words.) A story for a contest on another site. I finished critiquing a novel for a Hatracker.
The exciting piece was getting a 50 page MS request from an agent query. Since the novel was written before I started my plunge back into writing and before getting tons of great advice here, I went back to the start and cut out large pieces. I probably took out 3,000 words of worthless writing and over-explanation. The best part was being able to recognize all of the fat and crud that needed to be scraped off.
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