The Weekend Novella

This was the plan: To write an 18,000 word first draft this weekend and write the second draft next weekend for a market that's closing to unagented submissions next Sunday night.

I've never written that much in two days. Some people can knock that out without too much trouble, but I've never been one of those. When things aren't distracting me, I'm shaking them violently and shouting, "Distract me, damn you!"

This weekend's results: An incomplete first draft of 11,496 words.

I'm not down about it, though. For me, that's a lot of work. And much of what I have worked out is great. The first two chapters, in fact, are very close to what their last drafts will be. The plot's all worked out. I've got some completed chunks of scenes, the characters are coming to life, and the major players have their arcs. Best of all, it's fun and funny, which is what I was going for from the get-go.

I probably won't have time to work on the manuscript this week, between work and Mango obligations. But I'll do what I can next weekend and if I don't have an awesome manuscript to send out next Sunday night, I'll make it awesome later and send it to someone else.

Love Or Fear

I get lost at metaphorical sea on a regular basis. I just woke up after much too little sleep over the last twenty-eight hours and I was pep-talking myself with the thought that you can either choose love or choose fear and your results will reflect your choice. This idea is ancient, not mine, and I don't consider it new-agey in that "universe provides" sort of way. I see it, instead, as a way one's subconscious mind categorizes one's possible decisions.

Anyway, I told myself this as I was washing up: "You can choose love, or you can choose fear." And then I walked back into my bedroom and saw what my uneyeglassed sight took to be an enormous freaky spider on my floor. I didn't panic, but I did say to myself, "Well, I guess I'm going to have to choose fear this time." Bending in closer to this unmoving mass, I realized it was not an enormous freaky spider, but two lizards wrapped up in each other, not getting it on, but just chilling. I'm cool with lizards. The universe threw me a softball and let me choose love after all. Now that sounds horribly new-agey, but it's just anthropomorphization. I believe the universe is unintelligent and uncaring. It feeds with the same hand it kills with and is unaware it even has a hand. The best we can do is soak the universal hand in a bowl of Palmolive (with love) and hope for the best.