Another Quick Update

Well, it's coming a little faster now. I'm not quite caught up, but I'm getting there. And I think I may just make it! I took Jeff's and Beth's advice to heart, which means I've been doing a lot less tweaking and a lot more writing. Much of it will probably never see the light of day, but at least for now it acts as a placeholder for what will ultimately replace it. The total word count right now stands just shy of 92,000, and I think 12,000 words or so more should wrap up the first draft, but I guess we'll see where we are on the 30th or thereabouts.

Here's the first paragraph in the latest batch:

Friday had presented Grace with such a flurry of assignments and errands that she had barely gotten a chance to stop the Karmann Ghia on her way through the drive through, much less chew her burger properly as she headed toward the Save Tees Mountain meeting. She hadn’t even gotten a chance to take a look at the review of Bierce’s show in the paper’s “Weekender” section. She was sure she had pulled it off without being offensive, either to Bierce or to the good citizens of Teesville; she had described “The Money Shot” with as much discretion and with as light a touch as she was able. So it was with some surprise that she entered the social hall of the Fourth Church of God in Christ to murmurs, raised eyebrows, and more than a few pointed stares.

And the last:

Grace put down her coffee mug, tossed The Atlantic on the sofa, and started dancing.

The usual caveat applies: This is first draft. And yeah. I know the last graph is a sentence. So damned what? Heh.

Still It Goes Slowly...

As you can see, it's still going slowly, but at least I managed to crank out more than a thousand words today. I think I just need to keep at it. It's like trying to get back up to distance after slacking off running for a while--you're just not going to be able to pull off five miles if you haven't even run one in a while. Well--you might be able to do it, but you will be very, very sore the next day!

Anyway, here's the first paragraph of the latest batch:

Friday had presented Grace with such a flurry of assignments and errands that she had barely gotten a chance to stop the Karmann Ghia on her way through the drive through, much less chew her burger properly as she headed toward the Save Tees Mountain meeting. She hadn’t even gotten a chance to take a look at the review of Bierce’s show in the paper’s “Weekender” section. She was sure she had pulled it off without being offensive, either to Bierce or to the good citizens of Teesville; she had described “The Money Shot” with as much discretion and with as light a touch as she was able. So it was with some surprise that she entered the social hall of the Fourth Church of God in Christ to murmurs, raised eyebrows, and more than a few pointed stares.

And here is the last:

Finally, she could not stomach reading another one. She gathered up the poisoned-pen letters she had already read, straightened them into a neat stack, and secured them with a rubber band. The remaining letters she carried in a heap out to the dumpster, even though she suspected that somewhere in the pile was a positive missive from Thayer. She had read enough for one day.

Sorry... no iridescent fish costumes this go-round! And, again, remember that this is first draft. Not honed, not crafted, not adequately revised. (Or even proofread!)

And I promise--I WILL post the first of several accounts of our recent respite (I use the word advisedly) at House on the Rock very soon. I have been sorting through and uploading photos, and it looks as if it will take several posts to do the place the justice it deserves!

Writing Update

Fresh from a brief sojourn in Wisconsin, I'll have much more to regale you with in a few days once I have uploaded my snaps of House on the Rock, but I promised regular writing updates... Here we go:



That puts me, right now, at a couple of thousand words behind schedule. Sigh. I hope to catch that up in the next week or so. I didn't write anything in Madison this weekend, but I sure did read!

You may notice that, FINALLY, I have finished the ponderous (but nicely written and informative) Beatles bio. Then, within a day, I also finished a slim hardcover volume I purchased for a quarter at the latest rummage sale, Still Life with Chickens: Starting Over in a House by the Sea by Catherine Goldhammer. It was a quick read and I enjoyed it, although I got tired of the whole chickens as bridge to new life metaphor quite quickly. While we were in Madison, Jeff found a used copy of Edwin Mullhouse, and, since I had nothing more with me to read, I began that. Amusing and interesting so far.

Well, GW has asked for updates on the novel, so I thought I would offer the first paragraph and the last paragraph of the latest batch:

First:

Bierce wandered in, resplendent in iridescent polyester scales, peering out of the gaping mouth of a huge fake and shimmering fish head.

Last:

On the other side of the plate glass, Grant sat at his keyboard, furiously worrying the eraser off of his latest pencil and tapping out his latest brainstorm of a headline: “City Art Lovers XXXasperated by Do-It-Yourself Show.” He chuckled and hit save.

Remember folks--this is first draft stuff!

A Couple of Things...

First, some astonishing and wonderful news!

The house next door to my mom's house has been sold!!!

Those of you who are savvy to the Waynesboro scene may know that our erstwhile next-door neighbors abandoned the property fifteen years ago or so. They just packed up their clothes and took off, leaving everything else behind (including, according to the new owner, a refrigerator and a big freezer full of food...ewwww). The house has been falling to ruin ever since then--a neighborhood eyesore and, as you might imagine, an attractive nuisance for less-than-law-abiding youths. Once, in fact, a group of kids broke into the house and lit a fire in the living room; fortunately, the daughter of the owners was driving by, saw that someone was in the house, and called the police.

The city has been cutting the grass in the front yard at the beginning and end of every summer. They would get around to clearing the jungle that took root in the back yard only every other year or so. Saplings were growing out of the gutters. Windows were rotting. Trees and shrubs were obscuring most of the property. There was a mound of dirt on the porch near the front door that was growing weeds and such; the new owner said that most of it was old newspapers that had piled up, somehow gotten covered in dirt (squirrels? pesky kids?), and sprouted foliage.

Now, you may picture my mom's neighborhood as some run-down shanty town, but you would be wrong. It's not an overly affluent street, certainly, but it's solidly middle class. Large lawns, mostly four-bedroom homes, near the local park. Only this house, once a modest but cute Cape Cod, could claim the moniker of "shanty."

And the neighborhood folks, well, they tried to get the city to seize and condemn the property. However the city claimed that the owners were paying their taxes and all the fees and fines associated with cutting the grass, clearing the backyard, etc., so their hands were tied. Go figure. The owners remained (and remain) in the area, staying in motels here and renting apartments or other houses there. There were lots of rumors as to why they left the way they did and why they didn't just sell the place, but until they reveal the truth (and I don't think they ever will), speculation is all anyone has to go on.

Anyway, according to my mom, who heard this from the new owner, the wife of the couple is now in a nursing home, suffering from Alzheimer's Disease. Apparently they sold the house to help defray the cost of her treatment. Now, no matter how bad these folks were as neighbors, no one deserves the suffering they are no doubt going through. I hope the monies from the sale help make her comfortable and keep her well cared for.

I would be lying, though, if I didn't admit to being overjoyed that this house, so long neglected, is going to be brought back to livability. Sometimes, indeed, good things come to those who wait. And wait. And wait.

Second, it's nearly that month again: National Novel Writing Month. Some of you may recall that, although I did not sign up to write a novel last year, I did my OWN personal version of NaNoWriMo to try to FINISH the novel I've been writing on and off for lo, these many, many, many, many years.

My goal was to write 30,000 words in November: 1,000 words a day. And I succeeded. But I was still about, well, 15,000-20,000 words or so short of having that first draft. I figured I could do that by the end of the year. But no. I skived off of it yet AGAIN, only picking at it a little here, a little there... until here we are a year later, and I still have those last few thousand words to go.

And to add insult to injury, in the time between then and now, Jeff not only finished one novel, he's closing in on the last few chapters of a second novel and outlining a third.

So I really need to get on the stick.

Here's my pledge: I will write 20,000 words on the novel this month, or as many as it takes to finish a first draft.

That's only about 666 words a day. Hmmm. Maybe I should change that to 700 words a day! Heh!

Here's the counter:



Let the writing begin!