Robynettely

First Draft “Fairfax”. Around 115K, approaching climax.  I also have a couple of scraps of planning for this year's NaNoWriMo novel, and a lot of notes for various short stories I'd like to have time to do. More on that next month.  Editing The editing was going really slowly, so I took an idea from music – leave the instrument out. I’ve probably mentioned before, my oboe teacher told me to practice 10 minutes per day. If you take the instrument out every day, you’re bound to practice more than 10 minutes some of those days (or quit because you really do hate it). Anyway, so I left my editing project open to the page I’m at on my work table, just to see what would happen.  Lo and behold, I would sit down with 45 spare minutes and mark up 20 pages or so, and stop when I got to a hard bit, and then come back and that hard bit would suddenly have a solution the next day, or a couple of days later.  Next problem was data-entering those markups....

Sometimes it's fun to have something to suck at. You know, when you're striving so hard to be good at your job, and karate, and parenting and stuff, it's pleasant to be absolute crap at something and not care. But at a certain point, if you keep doing something, it behooves you to develop an amount of competency. To this end, after 15 years, I have learned how to use the brake on my rollerblades on small-to-moderate hills.

First Draft “Fairfax”. Around 110K, approaching climax. For a few days there I was having a really rough time, but things are moving again now. I may have to put in a few marathon days if I'm going to finish before November, but we'll see.  Editing (That which I don't talk about) . Yes.    “Apophis”. I seem to have entered a strange cycle with this story, where I rewrite it and then put it away for a month or three, and then rewrite it again. I did that this month, again.   Circulating 2 things. The same two things. To the same two places. So I didn’t send anything out. Knitting “Bome” (night garden) fair isle cardigan. I just divided for the neck.   Rhombus socks. Second one finished. Button Up Socks. Second one finished. Outside socks. Both done. I used entirely leftover yarn for these, so I pretty much can’t be unhappy. These will be great with leggings in the fall and winter. Inserting the zippers was a nightm...

“Goliath” by Scott Westerfield. The boy got it for Christmas. Ed read it after he did. I read it after this giant stack of other books. I had no trouble reading 100 pages of this at a single sitting. It was not a slog. I would pick it up to fill ten minutes while my tuna melt was melting, and have to drag myself away to eat. This really nicely wrapped up the series and the ending was satisfying. Plus, pictures! “The Pattern Scars” by Caitlin Sweet. Her name had been on my to-read list since I saw her on a panel at Ad Astra 2010. Then there was this CBC voting thing where I voted for this book a whole bunch of times. So, at Ad Astra 2012, I bought a copy of this (from Matt Moore actually who was manning the Chizine table) in order to legitimize that vote. Not really sure if I would have picked it up otherwise. I really knew nothing about it, I’m sure I read the back and the web synopsis, but I didn’t have much of a sense of plot before I started reading. So glad I did. This ...