you live your life as if it's real

 "Summer of Storms"
Word count: 828 (Thurs) + 684 (Fri)
Total word count: 3,974
Finished! (Well, for some values of finished. Needs to go through the crit group, and I already can see some stuff that needs work. But the next revision will actually be just revision, not rewriting.)

Now I'm working on "Sparagmos." After that, not sure. Possibly "The Beginning of Change" which just needs a rewrite on the ending, or possibly revisions on two poems.

I figure I should put some time in now on my actual job. Since I'm being paid for it and all...

But before that, dance class today was so much fun. I love learning choreographies. And my teacher had the coolest  new cd. She's going to burn it for me. Bagpipe versions of all sorts of songs... We Will Rock You, Eye of the Tiger, Clocks... and so many others that I can't remember. I only got to listen to a couple tracks, but it is sweeeeet.

Nothing else to report really. Everything is pretty much at the status quo.

Because I don't know what else to do with this, have some melodramatic!poetry (also, by extension, shitty!poetry):

Quand T'es Parti

Je ne peut rien penser sauf
Tu me manques,
Je ne peut rien dire sauf
Je t'aime encore,
Je ne peut rien sentir
Quand t'es parti. 
 

This got me thinking though -- someday, I'd love to start up a 'zine for bilingual English-French short fiction and poetry. It would be geared towards Canadians (could probably get an arts grant for it), and would have an equal number of English and French works published in it. Not only that, but it would also encourage works that combine both languages together within the same poem/story. As far as I know (and I don't know much, since I haven't gone searching),  there's nothing like that out there currently. Who knows, there's probably something similar started up already, I hope there is. But if not, well, then maybe someday I will start it. Cause I think it's a damn good idea.

What do you guys think, crazy idea or workable idea? (Or "run a damned Google search already, Lillian, it's been done" ?) 

ETA: Did a Google search -- found this site, which will be useful for market hunting, and specifically aea magazine, which does accept submissions in both English and French. From a quick scan, though, that seems to be the only one listed there.

The feast on Monday was delicious. Beef stew (tasted like beer), garlic and bacon mashed potatoes, corned beef with cabbage and carrots and potatoes... mmm. And apple pie and nanaimo bars for dessert. Not so sure how those got dubbed Irish, but I ate them anyways. (It was quite the hardship...)

Went home at like 9:30 though, to watch Buffy with my roommate. And then yesterday when I woke up, I could barely talk and I couldn't breathe, so I decided going to school was not the best idea... and everyone assumed I was hungover. =/ I'd even done my Herodotus translation too...

Today, though, I'm quite a bit better. Not completely better, my head still feels about twice as big as it should be and stuffed with cottonballs, but getting better. I feel like Bilbo in the Hobbit after his barrel ride: "Thag you very buch".

I'm getting a bit antsy about "A Thing of Many Facets". Tomorrow will make it 60 days since I submitted. Duotrope says the average response time is 56 days, and the max is 176. I potentially have a long time to wait still. I'm just wondering, at what point do I query? The submissions page at Fickle Muses doesn't give a response time, so I don't have anything to go off of there.

I know that what I have to focus on is writing more, so that I submit more. But it's hard not to think about it... I did write a couple hundred more words of "Summer of Storms" yesterday though, before Iuliana ambushed me and demanded that I pay attention to her. 1,200 words worth of attention, and it was the fastest I've written anything in a long time. It was such a good feeling... to just let the words spill, and know that they weren't really that great but who cares, just get her thoughts and feelings and actions out there.

I'm going to try and get back to "Summer of Storms" later tonight. I think I've found the feeling of the story again. If I were more talented, it wouldn't be a story at all, it would be an interpretive dance. It has... movement to it. A sort of tug and pull. I want to get it finished in time to post for the Post the Most contest over at DII. Hopefully "Sparagmos" too, but that story is missing something and I don't know what.

Time to go switch my laundry. See my thrilling life...

 February has been kicking my butt so far. Lack of posts is a good sign of that, I think.

So many things I meant to do, and haven't done. Meant to pimp out the commendable crit contest going on at OWW, didn't have time. Hell, I meant to join the contest, definitely didn't have time. And yeah, that did start half a month ago. Where has the time gone?

Also meant to pimp out Goblin Quest by jimhines, as soon as I finished reading it. Well, finished a while ago, and still no post. Good book, read it in about four big gulps. It all started one fateful night when I decided to read "just one chapter" and all of a sudden was going "huh wha? chapter seven? oh shit." Anyways, didn't mean to get into talking about it now, no time. I'll write a proper post about it and Goblin Hero once I've finished that. (Eight hour -- if I'm lucky -- bus ride on Friday, with only a Latin composition exercise, Roman History course readings, and Introduction to Criticism readings to compete? I'll be done by roughly six pm.)

And now I really need to stop wasting my time writing this, and get back to studying. Greek and Chaucer midterms tomorrow, Latin on Friday. Just wanted to prove I haven't wandered completely off the edge of the world.

Before I go, though, it seems like a good moment to point out that somewhere between last summer and now, I've managed to ingrain writing almost daily. Okay, so a lot of it still isn't fiction. But so far in February I've written three poem rough drafts, three roleplaying things, one crit, and one flash fiction piece, and I don't even know how many pages of random journaling. Oh, and some more work on Raphael's outline. And none of that was noteworthy enough to merit a post here. So... that feels pretty good. Don't worry though, if I get back on the horse with the novel, I'll be posting about it. I'm not that used to being productive yet.

Okay, now the verb paradigms are really demanding attention. See you in two days, all you lovely Ottawa-types!!

 Well that was unexpected.

Thérèse, Raphael and Jeanette showed up again last night. Except Jeanette changed her name on me, and confused the hell out of me. Anyway, she's Josseline now. She's always been Josseline. I just didn't listen closely enough when she first came around, I guess.

Silly charaters. And she didn't tell me her last name this time around either. Her husband's last name, rather.

And Thérèse's lover definitely needs to tell me his name now.

(Come on, baby, please?)

Didn't think it would work. Oh well. Slowly. All things in time. And this project definitely needs a new title. Working title was Soldiers of Savarre, but thing is... all of a sudden it isn't about them quite as much anymore. So, new title.

I forgot how much in love I am with this world and these people. Jo, Laron, Seb and Arnaud haven't turned up yet. I expect they'll saunter in soon.

I think I will make it a goal for next term to take a lot of notes about this story. See if I can pin it down a little more. It's two and a half years since I first met these people, but their story is still quite hazy to me. Except the love plot. I'm such a sucker...

ETA: or maybe taking notes is just another way to procrastinate actually writing the damn story? Maybe I should just jump in headlong... I already have the prologue in a form I like it. First chapter is written, probably needs lots of tweaking and/or a complete rewrite. Bah, but then there's the novel I started this summer, which, having gotten so far into it, I'm loathe to just give up on, even though it's the biggest piece of shit in the world. Argh I hate decisions. Any thoughts, folks?

 Figured it was 'bout time for one of these again.

Word count: 580 on Mikko's joining post, written mostly today but some of it about a week ago; 407 on "Sparagmos" written in really tiny spurts over the past three days or so.
Total word count: 1342 words for Mikko, if you count the recycled Steve post I used for a sample; 407 for "Sparagmos"

"Sparagmos" is going so achingly slowly. But at least it's going. The last 300 words of it are shit though. At least compared to the first 100. Still. I knew it would be hard when I started. And the bloody thing wouldn't leave me alone, so.

And hurray, Mikey is joined! Soon he can meet 'vail and have all sorts of exciting and embarrassing adventures. Whee!

And my roomie is lovely and loves me and baked loaf cake and cookies tonight and gave me my birthday present. And I went out for dinner with friends, and dinner was delicious and the company was fabulous. And geoaspartamegave me my Christmas present, which was hilariously wrapped and almost impregnable, following which it was awesome and lovely. Thank you again!!

And I finished reading Tennyson for my English exam, so all I have to do tomorrow is read Malory and then review the course notes. And I have two chocolate bars, iced tea, mango juice, leftover pasta, and all the baking to get me through it.

I shan't starve. It's a comforting thought.

And Aria, Brant and Kez-baby had a really long snowball fight today, which resulted in so many moments of death by cuteness.

All in all, I'm really happy right now. It's been such a good day.

 Just finished the first half of the-story-that-used-to-be-called-Heart-and-Soul-and-now-is-called-Summer-of-Storms.

Been working on it on and off, mostly either in English class or hanging out in the lounge, since Tuesday. So the word count is spread out over those days, not really sure how much got written each day. But anyways:

"Summer of Storms"
Word count: 1,918
Total: 1,918
Word doesn't think "soulmate" is a word. Neither is "Selene," apparently, but "Helios" is. Don't ask.
Anyways, pretty excited that this version of the story came out to nearly 2k words. The first version was 1,700-odd words in total, so this has already surpassed it and it's only half done. I think I'm going to leave the second half of the story, Gabrielle's POV, for later... both because I think more of the original is salvagable and because I have a few terrible deadlines looming on the horizon.
Still. Maria's POV, revamped, is mostly done. Before sending it out for crits, I'll read through it again of course to try and catch typos and smooth out some repitition that I think snuck in there, but on the whole, I am happy. It's much better than the original. So now I just have to write my research essay on Perikles, write my Arthurian fic for English class, study for my mythology midterm, and maybe do a few dozen other things I've forgotten. Then I can copy and paste the good bits of the original version of Gabrielle's POV, fill in the blanks, attach that to the Maria POV half, hope it all flows smoothly together, and I should be golden! (Until I get crits and have to go back and fix all the things I was too stupid to see.)

But right at this moment? I'm going to make soup Chef Boyardee. And then have a shower in a last-ditch attempt not to waste this afternoon napping. I am a sore and tired bunny. But I should get some work done, not sleep.

Today feels like a day that I ought to be able to spend lying in bed reading until four, and then laze about on the computer for the rest of the day/night. Alas, it definitely isn't. Latin quiz and Greek midterm (hoshitgonnafail) tomorrow. Ew.

But anyways, I've accomplished quite a lot the past few days. And writing an entry seems like a lot more fun right now than going over the optative again, so here are my good and bad accomplishments.

- I missed the bus yesterday morning because I forgot I still had to fill up my water bottle, and as a result was late to class.
- I forgot the stupid water bottle anyways.
- Aggravated my shin splints again. Ouch. -whimper-
- I broke my roommate's mug while draining my spaghetti. (Her mugs don't have a good track record with her friends, since the one I broke was the one Steph H. bought to replace the one she broke last year.)
- I read five chapters of Greek history yesterday, which is everything from one textbook that I have to know for the midterm on Thursday. Now I just have the other textbook to go through and all my notes. OMG time management.
- I went to the drag show with Avril last night, and it was pretty damn awesome. I was just sad that there was only two drag queens, since I could wish that more people would have the confidence to do that, but still. It rocked. I'm pretty sure those boys know more about how to move the female body than I do. Definitely know more about wigs, heels, fishnets and make-up, anyways. I really enjoyed it. The one queen stole the show, though. He was so charismatic and hilarious and awesome. Watching the audience was fun too. So many gay boys. And now I really want to watch Bollywood Hollywood again... Roccini!!! ♥♥
- I've now donated something over 2K grains of rice, not really keeping track, but yay it's fun and makes me feel like a good person. And I read the FAQ and About sections on the site, and it does seem legit, so that makes me happy.

And, in writing accomplishments:

Thursday, October 18
Word count: 536
All on my Arthurian slashfic [aka English project, tentatively titled "The Truth is a Multi-Faceted Thing"], very shitty but at least it's getting my ideas in a more concrete form. Written in English class, obviously. I don't know what it is about me and English classes at university, but they're always one of my favourite classes and I can never, ever pay attention in them. It's bizarre, but it was true for the two English courses I took last year, and it's true again this year. Everything about the course fascinates me, but I take almost no notes and zone out pretty much before the prof even starts talking.
Favourite line: Round like the womb, round like the moon and the earth and the sun.

Saturday, October 20
Word count: 274
That story I thought I had running around in my head about an illegal drug trader? Turns out it's actually about a woman with depression, and her path to overcoming it when nobody believes she's actually sick. Who knew. So yeah, that one's more started now. Tentatively titled "A Love Story". Because it is. However, that is also trite. So it will probably change. I hate titles.
First line: He ran the illegal drug trade from Tetra to Espen.
See why I thought it was about that guy? But it isn't. And names are subject to change. Not sure how fantastic this story is going to turn out... might be inappropriate to have "Tetra" and "Espen". And I might decide I don't like those names, anyways. It's all very fuzzy.

You know how they say a writer has to write a million words of shit before the good ones start coming? I kind of really want to tot up all my writing saved on my computer and see just how many words I've written. Obviously I don't have everything I've ever written on this computer, but I do have most of it, I think. So yeah, that can be my fun time-waster/de-stresser after my Greek midterm is finished tomorrow. I'm going to count the roleplaying stuff I have saved, because that taught me stuff about dialogue, plot, and most of all character development, so I think it's valid.

And now I must study Greek. I just hate it cause I don't even know where to start, y'know? Like, with Greek history I have an easy and logical studying path to follow: read the textbooks, go over lecture notes. With Greek... do I memorize verb forms? Vocab? The passages we've translated as homework? The indirect statements/questions stuff we sort of went over that one time? Grammar from other terms? All of it? But in what order? And what do I focus more on?

Ugh. Here goes nothing. I wanna go back to sleep.

 

 Well, it's been a long time, but I finally have one o' these for you again.

Thursday, October 11
Word count: 221
All from a little sketch that I think will turn into a vaguely Arthurian fairy tale. Written during English class, naturally.

Monday, October 15
Word count: 450
All from Rhydian's joining post.

Tuesday, October 16
Word count: 417, also all from Rhydian's joining post.
Total word count: 867, done.

And I half-wrote a shitty poem during the bus ride home on Thanksgiving as well as half of some sort of sketch. The sketch may have promise, I haven't looked at it since then. The poem is doomed, but the ideas I think I like well enough to give them another shot at life. In prose this time, for their own sake. Actually, I kind of liked the base idea for the structure of the poem... it's just so damn much work to find all the right words to convey the right ideas in the right number of syllables.

Still, anything easy is not worth doing, and all that rot. So I suppose I should try, try again. We'll see.

Meanwhile, in academia:

That Latin quiz that slayed me? Worth something like 2% of my mark overall? Yeah, was a lot harder than my myth midterm worth 25% of my mark. WTF. (Oh, and I got the mark back from the Latin quiz today: 85% -- okay, not a bad mark, but keep in mind that I usually get 94-96% on quizzes with the exact same format. It was HARD.)

Also, I am ridiculously proud of myself for my Greek quiz from Monday. I did so, so much better than I did last week (63% last week, compared to 93% this week!). And like, it wasn't even that I knew it all completely as I was writing the test. I was making logical guesses for the most part, and they actually worked. I'm suddenly feeling a whole lot better about the midterm next Monday. Not one hundred per cent confident by any means, but a lot better.

Slept in today by mistake and almost missed Latin. By a heroic effort and the will of the gods (I knew those sacrifices would pay off) I made it mostly on time. Should make an effort to sleep early tonight nonetheless.

Should also make something for dinner. Maybe I will have a tuna bagel sandwich. That sounds yummy. Or I suppose I could make a chicken stir-fry, but I want more veggies before I do that. Or... I guess we still have some perogies that need eating, and that leftover chicken breast... Nah, tuna it is. That's the easiest. And thanks to my sister, we have about 3000059493 cans of tuna.

And that's about all I have to say for now. I feel kinda pretty today, so too bad the only guy I've hung out with today was my roommate's ex. Well, I guess I hung out with the guys in the classics lounge sort of... if translating Greek counts.

Time to read, since I have a feeling I should get caught up before midterms hit. Stupid Greek history.

Hurrah, hurrah!

Word count: 891
Total word count: 23,838
23.8%
Typo du jour: "the dangers of night hair" instead of "the dangers of night air"

Today the words came pretty easily. Illicit kissing on a balcony'll do that for you, I guess. Tomorrow there's more kissing, on the front step this time. J is going to be one confused person. That's okay, it'll be good for her. Actually, tomorrow will probably be the carriage ride where she can't escape her uncomfortable thoughts. The day after will probably be her encounter with W. Roughly 1,200 words left in the chapter... yeah, it should all fit nicely.

And then chapter five will be done, and a quarter of the book will be done, and chapter six should be fun.

I think I have to leave and go get ready now. Dinner out with friends, hurrah hurrah!

So, there has not been an update here for many a moon. Here goes, then.

A brief recap of my July.

There was time in Ottawa. Then there was time in Calgary and environs. Highlights include but are not limited to: trail ride, a bear, Lake Louise, tons and tons of family time, campfire, view from the plane, dinosaurs (!!), singing, dancing, and of course the wedding.

After that, there was more time in Ottawa, and two days with (very low) wordcounts.

July 17 - 111 words. July 18 - 70 words.

On one of those days there was also ~430 words from an Aria-Salem doodle. My first attempt at Salem! Not too bad, as first attempts go. Had a nice discussion about it with SR, I know what I did right and what I did wrong. Luckily, those were the same things I felt I was doing right and wrong as I was writing the thing, so at least I know my instincts were on the mark. Now I just have to be not quite so lazy and fix them, instead of just sliding along with what was easier.

Anyways, continuing on. Between now and then there has been little but babysitting, reading and some hanging out with friends. This weekend our internet was mysteriously busted, but mostly it didn't affect us since we were away at camp.

I'm very tired now, so I'll end with today's triumph:

Word count: 777
Total word count: 22,947
22.9% - I'm getting there!

I have extended my personal deadline. I was going to have a completed first draft by the 2nd week of September, but now I know that's going to be too cramped and rushed. I basically lost a month, and I'm not going to be able to write every day in August. So now I want 100K words by Rememberance Day. That's giving myself about a week's leeway from the amount of time it should take me, so I should be able to finish well before my deadline. That will be a nice carrot. And it gives me wiggle room to completely lose the thread of the action like I did just now, though it doesn't give me a month to find it again, like I took this time. But hopefully with each mistake I'll learn better, so... maybe this won't happen again.

At least I know what's happening in tomorrow's writing. Gasp! Kisses! Not allowed, that. Heeheehee.

I feel and look like shit. No, really. I have a stuffed up nose, a slightly sore throat, at least five bug bites in my hair, four blisters on my feet, and I haven't written in days. I have three more bug bites making a nice line of itchy doom along my collar line, and another two hanging out with the bags under my eyes. (One under each eye, one is slightly higher than the other, which makes me lopsided in my swollen-ness.) The wisdom teeth are deciding that they actually haven't come all the way through, and they're going to do that now. So my jaw hurts and my head hurts, and my poor cheek is very pinched between all this extra stuff that wasn't there before.

So. There's been no update in a while. What's happened since?

Sunday June 24: 780 words.
Monday June 25: 146 words.

Don't remember what else happened on either of those days. There have been no more words since. A week of not writing... bad, bad bunny.

Tuesday I babysat. Wednesday I went to a jazz concert with CB, watched a thunderstorm, didn't get wet, and ate gelato. Mmm, gelato. Thursday I babysat.

Wednesday I went shopping for wedding clothes, Friday I went shopping for bras.

(I'm reminded of Cyrano's gazette for Roxanne.)

On Friday, Cynd, dad and I left for the cottage. Saturday was a day of great triumph, for lo! there was a foot valve that didn't leak and then there was running water to our cottage once more. Sunday we came back to town.

Went downtown for Canada Day, but then it was crowded there and we didn't really know what we wanted to do, so we went to Chinatown. Fireworks went off behind our heads, almost entirely obscured by the buildings, around about when we got to Somerset and Bronson. Had some bubbletea and tiramisu. The tiramisu was good, but my craving for brick toast was thwarted. I'll have to satisfy it later... probably much later, after I get back from out west.

Anyways, it was fun. After we went and hung out in the park. When do we ever do anything else? I like our conversations sitting up on the playstructure, though. Somehow Rocky Horror didn't come up this time...

There was a lot of walking though. Note to self: don't wear new shoes when you know you're going to be walking a lot. I am dumb. The blisters, though, aren't as bad as they seemed last night. And no sand got in, which makes me very glad. Actually, at the moment, just general soreness from walking so much hurts more than the blisters. They only hurt when I do something stupid, like kick them.

Saw my grade 7+8 gym teacher downtown, bizarre in the extreme.

I really, really want some chocolate covered marshmallow. I should have bought some yesterday.

After today, I'm caught up!

Yesterday:
Word count: 772
Really, really close to not making quota, but I did it. Was writing the scene that is the real start of chapter four.

Today:
Word count: 2,445
Total word count: 20,259
20.2%

Excuse me now while I go do a victory dance on chapter four's dead body. Except I kind of think that it's more alive now than it was when I was wrestling so unsuccessfully with it. Damn. But anyways, it's DONE. (Until I have to edit it, and I strongly suspect that at least a thousand of its words are complete crap, but lets not think about that now.) It's DONE. Ha! Now I get to write chapter five, and chapter five will be much better to me than chapter four... I think and hope. (Though actually, in all fairness, I'm bound to point out that chapter four wasn't so bad after I went back and wrote that new opening scene. In fact, parts of it, like the rainstorm, were actually pretty fun. But it was mean to me for more days than it was nice to me. Pout pout pout.)

Hanyways, my dear friends and monsters, I take this moment to say: I have written one fifth of a book. Fuck yeah! It's a teen Regency romance, with a predictable plot full of genre conventions, but that doesn't make it any less of a book. It's going to be 100K or a little more when finished, and it's going to be the first thing over 2K words that I've finished. (Hell, most of my short stories are still in the needs-editing-like-whoa stage.)

So three weeks (tomorrow will be the start of week 4) has gotten me 20% of a novel. Why didn't I do this years ago? (Answer: because I gave up multiple times years ago without realizing how steady work could add up, and anyways anything I'd written back then would have sucked even more than what I'm writing now sucks.) Why yes, I do answer my own rhetorical questions.

And now, for some non-writing content (there is some, every once in a while)!

Yesterday was, by any definition of the word, fun. Okay, the play sucked. (As I said to xsilvan earlier, that play was the playwright going "hey, I wonder what happens when I take my pretentious prose poems, set them to sort-of music, and add some interpretive-dance-like movement and body percussion! Oh wait, a play needs a plot, doesn't it... hm... oh well, it's close enough! Anyways, it doesn't need to explain itself, it's ART!" I spent the first few minutes trying really hard not to laugh. There were some redeeming moments, but it could really have used some more coherency.) But! There were things thrown/put in people's cleavage, and there were milkshakes, nachos, fries, music, discussion of the power rangers, hanging out in the park, getting a ride home from an almost-stranger. And possibly my favourite from the night: the crazy man on the bus, who wanted to know if it was one of our dreams to go to Carleton. (Sorry, ahahahahaha.) He also informed us that xsilvan  is the Master of Confusion, which was news to us. (I thought she was the Masked Avenger...)

Oh wait, I lied. I think the whole boar conversation was funnier. How many things with tusks are there? And I don't care what Badgie said, boars do not eat intestines.

And I was named Cupcake. And made everyone cross the street for no reason. Whups! Gooood times.

Damn, now I really want a cupcake. Maybe I'll make some tomorrow.

Et c'est tout pour maintenant, mes amies. (Did I get the right sort of tout/tous/etc? I never know which to use... does anyone have a concise rule to help me out here?)

So the whole weekend I didn't write anything. And Monday I was hoping for 2K+ words to make up for that, but it sure didn't happen. In fact, I just got farther behind on the novel. So it's time to firm up my resolutions and stop slacking off.

June 18
Word count: 807 (weird, that's the number I got on Friday, too)
450 on the novel, 357 on two little drabbles.

Today
Word count: 1,289
Total word count: 17,042
17%

First day in a while that I've gotten over 1K words on the novel. Tomorrow I have to keep it up, or else I fall behind quota. And that would be a very stupid thing to allow myself to do, when I know that there are going to be lots of low or zero word count days during July and August on my trips.

But! I'm hopeful for tomorrow, because I've finally (I think) realized why chapter four has been being such a bitch. I missed the whole opening scene entirely. Ooooops. I think it was supposed to cut to EF and F for a little bit there, and instead I just jumped straight to J. So that scene should give me some good words, and I even know what's coming up next in the J's POV part of the chapter.

In other news, today I wore my shorts backwards by mistake. Oops. Good thing I was just babysitting. (Which went pretty well, despite some tears and glasses-stealing on the kids' part, and a touch of stern voice on my part). Funny/sweet snippet of conversation from the end, just as I was about to leave, as she clung to me and sat on my lap while I gave her a goodbye hug:

her: I want to go home with you.
her dad: well you can't, you have to stay here and go to bed.
her: will you come again tomorrow?
me: no, not tomorrow.
her: when?
me: in one week.
her: .... is that tomorrow?

Time is a concept that kids just don't get.

So I knew I'd learn a lot doing this. You know, actually writing a novel, instead of just falling in love with a new world, poking about in it for a few days or weeks, and then abandoning it.

The first thing I've learnt? I don't know how to do this. So I'm closing my eyes tight, kicking hard, and letting go of the pool wall. First time in the deep end. If I start to drown, someone throw me a lifesaver?

On second thought, don't. I'd probably learn more drowning. It just might not make for very good conversation.

Chapter 3 is getting towards done, should finish it tomorrow. About 500 words to go. All making W uncomfortable, mwaha. Unfortunately, that sucker is a pretty good improviser and an even better liar, so he won't be bothered for long. Take your wins while you can, W. You don't win in the end. That's just what you get for being the "bad guy".

Anyways, word counts from the past few days, since I haven't updated this baby in a few.

June 12:
Word count: 833.

June 13:
Word count: 753
500 from a flash fiction piece: On the Edge of the World. Features a parrot, and questions about sanity and insanity, and which is which where. I like it. But then again, I wrote it.
253 from the novel, lowest word count yet on the novel. Got stuck, didn't even want to write today at all, but thecityssummer  helped pull me out of that. <3

June 14:
Word count: 794
Total word count: 14,494
14.4%

In other news, am very very excited for the rest of the summer. So much travelling! So much seeing friends! I bought my ticket to Amsterdam today =D. It's a good life.

Man alive watching a huge storm roll in is fun. So this is how it went:

I'm sitting on the bleachers in back of the brother's high school, watching the sister's touch football game with the parents. (Missed a lot of the game due to running back home to fetch ice packs for a girl who had broken her finger -- even though I heard the coach's son say he was going for ice and he had a car so he'd clearly be faster but anyways I was mostly going to reassure my mom -- but that's just an aside, not the real story. I did miss the only touchdown of the whole game though, which was kind of sad/annoying. We won, which makes us undefeated, hurrah hurrah!) Anyways, so there I am, with all the family minus the brother. Someone makes a comment to the effect of "ooh it's gotten a lot darker all of a sudden" and this is true. Thunder boomies are heard in the distance, and the ref is trying to hurry up the start of the next game. In the space of about, oh, thirty seconds the sky in front has gone from cloudy and threatening to dark and looming, and the bank is coming closer all the time. You can tell that it's raining farther away, by the way that bits of the clouds are being stretched down, like someone pulling strings of cotton candy off the bunch.
We start to walk home, the mother making noises about how she hopes we get inside before it starts raining, and me (walking backwards to better watch the clouds, since we had to go the other way from them) telling her fat chance of that, just look at those clouds! They were huge. And rolling in really fast. We hadn't even fully crossed the parking lot before the wind started up, strong. The sister on her rollerblades was pushed on ahead of us fast enough that I ran up and grabbed her hand to slow her down enough that she didn't break herself in one of the many potholes that parking lot is full of.
The clouds were awesome, the leading edge sort of outlined and defined, the storm itself a bit further back and unforgivingly grey. The wind blowing bits of dust and pebbles and the first few drops of rain was exhilarating, but not quite as awesome. The rain started slowly, and we got about half way home before getting too wet. Then the skies opened up with a vengeance, and we all got thoroughly soaked. I haven't been out in a downpour like that since... since the day I biked to say goodbye to Michelle, what, two summers ago now?
It was a lot of fun. The rain was cool, but not cold, and home was only three blocks away by this point, so it was a wonderful adventure. And after a day that was supposed to hit 40 degrees with humidex (don't know for sure what the actual high of the day was), it felt damn good.
It was lovely.

Anyways, after that came drying off, tea, ice cream, and watching a movie (why, yes, another Fred and Ginger, how did you guess?) with the sister and the father. Then, inevitably, writing. Which brings me to...

Word count: 1,397
Total word count: 10,025
10% done! Finished chapter two!

Not quite as exuberant about finishing chapter two as I was about chapter one, but I am still very pleased with myself, never you fear. The novel's gone and sprouted another POV, go figure. I like him though, I approve his choice to take control of the story for a while. It does mean re-jigging some of the following chapters, though. Oh hey, it also means I can actually describe that other scene as it happens instead of just by word of mouth later. Now that is intriguing.

Another day, another word count. =D

Word count: 819
Total word count: 3,189
3.1% done.

63% done Chapter one. I had a moment of panic before I got into today's writing that there wasn't enough stuff in chapter one to take up 5K words, but then today didn't even get me to the "only thing" I thought was left to say in the chapter. So... I think I'm okay, since that bit is going to take up a good thousand words I would say, and then there's some saying goodbye ("don't worry my dear, we'll meet again! After all, this is only the first chapter!") and then some daydreaming.

I really do have to research Regency poets, though. I know some that were popular, Walter Scott especially comes to mind, but I need to familiarize myself with at least four or five I think. After all, J loooves poetry and reads very little else. And it will be really hard to write the next bit without researching the poets, since there's no way J can be stopped from quoting her faves.

I think there was something else I meant to say, but damned if I can remember it. Ah well. That's what the edit feature is for.

Oh yeah! In rping news, Sael got the same ward as Machi♥  ^^ this makes me very happy.

Well I've managed to keep progress going forward for another day!

Word count: 1401
Total word count: 2370
2.3% of the way to a completed first draft.
About 6K words away from getting farther on this than on anything else I've ever started.

The first 400 of that word count went sooo slowly. I'd do like 200 and it would take forever, and I'd go off and do something else. Then I did another 200 and watched the marathon. Then I started in again intending to just do 350 more words to give me the daily quota, and those went slowly too for the first 100 or so, and then all of a sudden I'm going "what? page 8? since when! I'm on page 6!" So I'm guessing it'll take me a bit to get back into the flow of the story every day. It was a pretty cool feeling though. I'm excited for everything I'll learn, assuming I can keep with this project until the end.

I also missed lunch at some point in all of that. Soooo hungry.

Maybe I will write more later today... but I don't think so. I think instead I'll work on the chapter outlines some more (been putting them on to cue cards instead of typing them up). I have 1-6 done, but only very sketchy ideas for what happens in most of the other chapters. Except chapter 13, that one is going to be fuuuun. I think I'll also finish off the letter to Shanice that I started yesterday. I can do that while babysitting though, after he goes to sleep.

This is the third day working consecutively on the same project. It's the fourth consecutive day of writing, which is good news. Usually I'm so haphazard with writing, but maybe this will finally learn me some self-discipline.

So, today I spent most of the day naming characters (Laurie is the reigning Queen of Awesome for her help).  I named B1, B2, and B3 so now I don't think of bananas in pyjamas every time I look at my outline. They are W, EF and F respectively. J's mother got named, her father already was named, and her aunt and uncle got named too. E's parents got named as well, though she has an older brother who's nameless. I don't think he'll feature at all, he's far far away somewhere. I'm not too sure, but I think EF is E's cousin. Need to ponder that one some more.

After dinner, I went to Cyndy's football game, which was nice. They won -- hurrah, hurrah! She has a game tomorrow too, but I'm not going to that one. Too far away.

When I got back from that, I did a little bit more outlining, trying to pin down some of the more elusive plot points, and met with limited success. So I decided, to hell with that, I might as well just plunge in. After all, I can outline 'til I'm blue in the face but it does no good if I never just sit down and write the damn thing. So I did. Well, I started.

Word Count: 969
All from Chapter One!

Word surprises me sometimes with its words it doesn't know. Today's sampling: charmless, unchaperoned, Agatha, Westley.

And now, my battle with photoshop continues as I learn its ways. I want (a) new icon(s)!

So how many of those goals I set yesterday did I actually accomplish? The answer is fairly miraculous.

Name at least one of the nameless characters
Research English presence in India
Research titles (well, I'll need to look at it again since it's too much information to remember all at once, but I have the reference now so that's the main thing).
The only thing I didn't do from that list was research Regency poets, but I even said that might be too much researching for one day.

And, not only that but I also outlined like crrazy. Okay, so B1, B2, aunt, uncle and mother don't have names yet -- oh, and B3 joined the club and he's nameless too -- but, BUT they all have as much character info aside from name as I need about them written down (B2 is the only exception, I'll tackle him tomorrow). Also I did a chapter outline which took hooours... (My first attempt at a chapter outline, I think it's a good idea and I should do it for more projects. After this one, I will.) But the work paid off I think since I now have quite a clear idea of how the whole thing shapes, with the exception of a little gap about three quarters of the way through... I actually suspect that gap will be filled with things from previous chapters that will take longer than I thought at first. We shall see!

Unfortunately that outline is still all on my whiteboard (where it's looking very pretty with my new coloured markers, if I do say so myself), so no word count is to be had from it -- yet.

Still, even with hours of work not going into this, I can write smugly:
Word count: 1,394
All from the outline which is now at a grand total of 2,393 words.

Haven't quite decided yet whether tomorrow I'll finish off the outline (transferring chapter outline to computer and elaborating on it; writing down what I need to know about B2) or just plunge right in with chapter one. To stay on schedule, I need 750 words of chapter one done by the end of tomorrow. I think I can manage it all... or I can decide that it's worth it to postpone actually writing to finish the prep work. And I really should name those characters... man alive, E's name was so hard. I had it perfect, and then turns out that's the name of the green party leader. Very annoying. I was tempted to use the name anyways, but I was persuaded that it would be better not to.

Should sleeeeep now. I am pleased with myself.