Katherine Nabity's Blog, page 254
July 10, 2011
#RoW80 Check In, General Notes
#RoW80 progress:
I expected the first week to be a bit slow. How Not To Write had a post a while back on returning to writing. Good advice, I'd say, even if I haven't been following it to the letter.
This past week: I rewrote the gambling scene, changing the game of choice from blackjack to roulette.We've kind of finally decided on what sort of interstitial bit properly shows off Aleister's luck. We had thought about news-report-style epigraphs (but I can't write journalistically to save my life) or iterations of Aleister's decisions. Instead, I'm writing bits showing how Aleister's actions affect other characters, often very minor characters. I wrote/rewrote about three scenes in this manner. Not sure how it'll work on a large scale. Eric's only comment thus far was on the details of one scene, not on whether it works.Submitted 4 queries/short works. Got a rejection on one Friday, so that's a slam-dunk #5 for this week.I wanted to get though a fifth of the novel, but only got through about a tenth.
This week:20 hours of work on Luck for HireContinue adding scenes/doing rewrites on certain scenes where applicable.I'm getting to the point in the novel where I need to start paying attention to my things-to-be fixed notecards.Shoot for getting through a fifth of the book.Tessa sent me preliminary artwork for Lucinda at the Window's new cover. I at least need to write a new blurb this week and start doing sone ebook research.
Check on my fellow writers!
I meant to do a non-writing post Friday and didn't get to it.
I posted some thoughts on Let Me In and Let the Right One In over at Taming of the Queue. Haven't gotten much reading done lately.
Tess has sent me the art (or at least some of the art) she wants included on her website. I need to get moving on that.
Wednesday disc has gone on hiatus. Sadness. But it will set us up for a triumphant return in September. In the meantime, we're gearing up, slowly, for fall league. Keith will be running a small coed league in August in Scottsdale. Laura is hosting a Women in Ultimate forum Monday night and has asked my to talk about leagues. I haven't done any public speaking since senior year in high school.
With the lack of ulti, I need to make a concerted effort to get more exercise. I didn't exercise at all this past week. Of course, I haven't been eating much either. Or sleeping much. I weighed in this morning and found that I was below 125 for the fist time in three months.
I expected the first week to be a bit slow. How Not To Write had a post a while back on returning to writing. Good advice, I'd say, even if I haven't been following it to the letter.
This past week: I rewrote the gambling scene, changing the game of choice from blackjack to roulette.We've kind of finally decided on what sort of interstitial bit properly shows off Aleister's luck. We had thought about news-report-style epigraphs (but I can't write journalistically to save my life) or iterations of Aleister's decisions. Instead, I'm writing bits showing how Aleister's actions affect other characters, often very minor characters. I wrote/rewrote about three scenes in this manner. Not sure how it'll work on a large scale. Eric's only comment thus far was on the details of one scene, not on whether it works.Submitted 4 queries/short works. Got a rejection on one Friday, so that's a slam-dunk #5 for this week.I wanted to get though a fifth of the novel, but only got through about a tenth.
This week:20 hours of work on Luck for HireContinue adding scenes/doing rewrites on certain scenes where applicable.I'm getting to the point in the novel where I need to start paying attention to my things-to-be fixed notecards.Shoot for getting through a fifth of the book.Tessa sent me preliminary artwork for Lucinda at the Window's new cover. I at least need to write a new blurb this week and start doing sone ebook research.
Check on my fellow writers!
I meant to do a non-writing post Friday and didn't get to it.
I posted some thoughts on Let Me In and Let the Right One In over at Taming of the Queue. Haven't gotten much reading done lately.
Tess has sent me the art (or at least some of the art) she wants included on her website. I need to get moving on that.
Wednesday disc has gone on hiatus. Sadness. But it will set us up for a triumphant return in September. In the meantime, we're gearing up, slowly, for fall league. Keith will be running a small coed league in August in Scottsdale. Laura is hosting a Women in Ultimate forum Monday night and has asked my to talk about leagues. I haven't done any public speaking since senior year in high school.
With the lack of ulti, I need to make a concerted effort to get more exercise. I didn't exercise at all this past week. Of course, I haven't been eating much either. Or sleeping much. I weighed in this morning and found that I was below 125 for the fist time in three months.
July 6, 2011
#RoW80 - July 6th Check In
Well, I haven't gotten 4 hours a day in yet, but progress hasn't been bad.
I've gotten through about half of the material I want to review and identified some areas that need improvement. Eric and I had a nice little conversation yesterday morning that opened up the intent/consequences aspect of the novel. Wrote/rewrote a scene to emphasize some of that. I still need to familiarize myself with roulette and rewrite the gambling scene.
Got one query out. Received a rejection on "Personal Trust" which doesn't have great prospects.
Complicating factor? Our internet was out Tuesday-Wednesday afternoon. I should have done more writing during that time, but I couldn't do research on roulette or agents/fiction markets.
Distraction? Headed to the library yesterday to check my email and, well, spend time at the library. Then, last night, I discovered Calibre ebook management software. It is so much better than the Sony software that it isn't even funny. I spent too much time organizing and tagging.
Check on my fellow writers!
I've gotten through about half of the material I want to review and identified some areas that need improvement. Eric and I had a nice little conversation yesterday morning that opened up the intent/consequences aspect of the novel. Wrote/rewrote a scene to emphasize some of that. I still need to familiarize myself with roulette and rewrite the gambling scene.
Got one query out. Received a rejection on "Personal Trust" which doesn't have great prospects.
Complicating factor? Our internet was out Tuesday-Wednesday afternoon. I should have done more writing during that time, but I couldn't do research on roulette or agents/fiction markets.
Distraction? Headed to the library yesterday to check my email and, well, spend time at the library. Then, last night, I discovered Calibre ebook management software. It is so much better than the Sony software that it isn't even funny. I spent too much time organizing and tagging.
Check on my fellow writers!
July 3, 2011
Bring It, Summer Round!
Finished adding that scene to Divine Fire. Well, sorta. I kind of rewote/added to an existing scene. I hope I didn't get myself into too much trouble doing that. Eric's been reading through, but unless he has some big problems, I'm putting Divine Fire to bed. Tomorrow, Luck for Hire! My bravado-filled motto for RoW80, round 3 is "Bring it, summer round!"
Received a rejection on "Eaters of Dust." It's going back out the door today.
Yesterday was the hottest day of the year, thus far, at 118. The low was 91 due to some cloud cover that kept in the heat. I stayed up to watch the Wimbledon final, then took a nap. So, about 1.5 hours of sleep in the past 30. And I'm feeling surprisingly okay.
My crocheting is...going. I'm on Scarf Object, v. 4, using the same skein of yarn. I'm going to have to learn to live with flaws, I think.
Received a rejection on "Eaters of Dust." It's going back out the door today.
Yesterday was the hottest day of the year, thus far, at 118. The low was 91 due to some cloud cover that kept in the heat. I stayed up to watch the Wimbledon final, then took a nap. So, about 1.5 hours of sleep in the past 30. And I'm feeling surprisingly okay.
My crocheting is...going. I'm on Scarf Object, v. 4, using the same skein of yarn. I'm going to have to learn to live with flaws, I think.
July 1, 2011
2nd Quarter Summary, #RoW80 Goals
2nd Quarter Summary
The nice part about RoW80 is that it's pretty much a quarterly challenge. I like splitting things into easy to manage chunks. Second quarter wasn't as good as I wanted it to be. I've gotten most of the way through an edit Divine Fire. The last quarter of the novel is still rough and I still need to write that scene, that scene I should have written in June.
On the submission end:
Submitted 9 queries to agents, received 4 rejections this quarter.
I currently have 5 short works subbed to various markets. Two rejections from that front.
Finished reading 7-8 books and a handful of short stories. Ill-advisedly started a new blog.
And this quarter has been hard on me socially. There's been a death, a friend moving away, and another friend's abrupt marriage. These kinds of changes are tough on a hermit.
#RoW80, Round 3, preliminary goals
I'll be moving back to Luck for Hire.
I definitely need to give it a read-through. I'm not sure that it will need a 10% cut, but I'll read with that in mind. Considering changing Luck's first gambling scene. Eric also has an idea for showing the uncanny nature of Luck's luck. Aside from those two things, I have 22 note cards with things that need to be addressed (not to mention going though my list of banned words and getting rid of them). How does that break down into daily/weekly goals? Hmm.
I am considering making a time goal. This is not something I usually do. Usually, I set a goal and a deadline and work/procrastinate toward it. But maybe a time goal with definite sub goals, like:Four hours of work daily on Luck for Hire.During the first week:writing a new version of that gambling scenewriting the first proof-of-concept on Eric's idea (which might be the gambling scene, I guess)reading through the first fifth of the book duringThe return of #2QueryTuesday (subbing to agents/markets at least 8 times in a month).Other goals for this round/the immediate future:Write new blurb for LucindaGive Lucinda a read-through and formatGive Pas de Chat a read-through, edit, format, write blurbThis is my preliminary plan. Ambitious! Especially for July/August.
One thing that strikes me as a little funny about #RoW80 lately is the unofficial motto, "A writing challenge for normal people." And I get the meaning. A Round of Words in 80 Days is the diametric* of National Novel Writing Month. For most people (myself included), writing 50K in a month requires an inordinate amount of time spent on writing. More than most people can give without shutting out much of life. RoW80 lets you set your own goal and even change it, so you don't have give up life for writing. But for me, my RoW80 goals are actually geared toward putting "life" stuff behind writing. Writing is my life, or should be. I am maybe not the "normal" for Round of Words.
RoW80, round 3 participants!
*Can I use diametric that way? Seems like it should be correct.
The nice part about RoW80 is that it's pretty much a quarterly challenge. I like splitting things into easy to manage chunks. Second quarter wasn't as good as I wanted it to be. I've gotten most of the way through an edit Divine Fire. The last quarter of the novel is still rough and I still need to write that scene, that scene I should have written in June.
On the submission end:
Submitted 9 queries to agents, received 4 rejections this quarter.
I currently have 5 short works subbed to various markets. Two rejections from that front.
Finished reading 7-8 books and a handful of short stories. Ill-advisedly started a new blog.
And this quarter has been hard on me socially. There's been a death, a friend moving away, and another friend's abrupt marriage. These kinds of changes are tough on a hermit.
#RoW80, Round 3, preliminary goals
I'll be moving back to Luck for Hire.
I definitely need to give it a read-through. I'm not sure that it will need a 10% cut, but I'll read with that in mind. Considering changing Luck's first gambling scene. Eric also has an idea for showing the uncanny nature of Luck's luck. Aside from those two things, I have 22 note cards with things that need to be addressed (not to mention going though my list of banned words and getting rid of them). How does that break down into daily/weekly goals? Hmm.
I am considering making a time goal. This is not something I usually do. Usually, I set a goal and a deadline and work/procrastinate toward it. But maybe a time goal with definite sub goals, like:Four hours of work daily on Luck for Hire.During the first week:writing a new version of that gambling scenewriting the first proof-of-concept on Eric's idea (which might be the gambling scene, I guess)reading through the first fifth of the book duringThe return of #2QueryTuesday (subbing to agents/markets at least 8 times in a month).Other goals for this round/the immediate future:Write new blurb for LucindaGive Lucinda a read-through and formatGive Pas de Chat a read-through, edit, format, write blurbThis is my preliminary plan. Ambitious! Especially for July/August.
One thing that strikes me as a little funny about #RoW80 lately is the unofficial motto, "A writing challenge for normal people." And I get the meaning. A Round of Words in 80 Days is the diametric* of National Novel Writing Month. For most people (myself included), writing 50K in a month requires an inordinate amount of time spent on writing. More than most people can give without shutting out much of life. RoW80 lets you set your own goal and even change it, so you don't have give up life for writing. But for me, my RoW80 goals are actually geared toward putting "life" stuff behind writing. Writing is my life, or should be. I am maybe not the "normal" for Round of Words.
RoW80, round 3 participants!
*Can I use diametric that way? Seems like it should be correct.
June 29, 2011
Summer Habits
As happens in the summer, when I'm aching for a change of pace, I've created a new blog: The Taming of the Queue. The conceit: documenting my attempt to clean out my Netflix queue, with the occasional review. Now, I do not need another blog. I will probably can it within a year when I have better things to do.
Eric and I have talked about Luck for Hire. I'll have a kinda-sorta goal-run-down RoW80 post some time later, probably Sunday. I've been working somewhat on Divine Fire. I mulled/procrastinated yesterday. Need to write today. Started using Duotrope on Monday. I had occasionally used it for market info, but I signed up for the tracking aspect since I've been subbing more short works lately.
No morning/lunch Freescale disc today, which makes me sad. 'Course, my hands do feel like they belong to an 80-year-old today, so that might be for the best. Maybe we'll go out to Intel disc tonight.
Eric and I have talked about Luck for Hire. I'll have a kinda-sorta goal-run-down RoW80 post some time later, probably Sunday. I've been working somewhat on Divine Fire. I mulled/procrastinated yesterday. Need to write today. Started using Duotrope on Monday. I had occasionally used it for market info, but I signed up for the tracking aspect since I've been subbing more short works lately.
No morning/lunch Freescale disc today, which makes me sad. 'Course, my hands do feel like they belong to an 80-year-old today, so that might be for the best. Maybe we'll go out to Intel disc tonight.
June 27, 2011
Insane and rising in my own weird way...
I have a week to get back into the swing of things before round 3 of RoW80, and I'm feeling better than I have in a while.
I did some work on Divine Fire on Thursday and Friday. Not much, but it's some momentum.
I also retrieved the rights to Lucinda at the Window. Its publication happened at a very bad time for the publisher, and I always felt that I was at the end of a very long queue. What attention was given to the project was always a little second rate. I'm not entirely faultless. I could have gotten out and pushed, but my dissatisfaction bred apathy. My sister, Tessa, is working on a new cover and after a revision/formatting, I'm going to re-release Lucinda as an ebook. There is work associated with this that will doubtlessly go at the end of a long queue, but at least it will be my long queue.
Over at Reading Notes, I've posted about Michael Lewis' Moneyball and Joe Hill's Horns as well as a wrap up of Spring Reading Thing. Amazingly, this means I finished reading four books in June and achieved my #ToBeReMo goal! Huzzah!
I did some work on Divine Fire on Thursday and Friday. Not much, but it's some momentum.
I also retrieved the rights to Lucinda at the Window. Its publication happened at a very bad time for the publisher, and I always felt that I was at the end of a very long queue. What attention was given to the project was always a little second rate. I'm not entirely faultless. I could have gotten out and pushed, but my dissatisfaction bred apathy. My sister, Tessa, is working on a new cover and after a revision/formatting, I'm going to re-release Lucinda as an ebook. There is work associated with this that will doubtlessly go at the end of a long queue, but at least it will be my long queue.
Over at Reading Notes, I've posted about Michael Lewis' Moneyball and Joe Hill's Horns as well as a wrap up of Spring Reading Thing. Amazingly, this means I finished reading four books in June and achieved my #ToBeReMo goal! Huzzah!
June 24, 2011
Women's League 2011, Finals
Women's league finals were last night. Sno-Balls, my team, was the considerable underdog, but the majority of our players showed up and played hard.
We traded points for a while, but the undefeated Lucky Charms took the lead and went up 6-2 or so*. Somewhere in there I threw a Callahan, effectively giving Charms a point. I cursed, cursed some more, removed myself from the game, offered some beer to sideline spectators, and by the time I reengaged, Sno-Balls had whittled the lead down to about 6-4. The points were long. We probably didn't get started early, but at 6-4, it was already 9:20pm. The game was also pretty chippy. There were probably more foul calls in this game that there had been all season.
I believe we traded points, more or less, and Lucky Charms took half. When soft cap was called, the score was 8-6 Charms, game to 10 points. We rattled off a couple points and it was 8-8 when hard cap was called. Universe point! Pretty much the same situation as the first game of the season. We pulled to them, got a D and marched it down the field. Monika threw a score to Marnie...and there was a call about whether Marnie was in or not. Discussion ensued. It was decided that Marnie wasn't in, no game-winning score. There were a couple more turn-overs, but eventually, Lucky Charms threw a clean score. Lucky Charms won, 9-8, taking the championship.
I had joked on the way to the fields that I didn't want another 17 point game against Lucky Charms (referring to our 2-15 loss to them a few weeks back). Well, it was a 17 point game, a much better game, but the outcome was the same. We lost by one and, whatever the controversy regarding the last point, I am kicking myself for throwing the Callahan. One point gave them the game.
But! It was a really fun season. Last night, we had a great group of spectators and plethora of drinks and food. It was Betsy's last game in the Valley and I'm super glad that she and Sarah drafted me and the rest of team. Everyone on Sno-Balls played hard and had such great attitudes. That's ultimate at its best.
*It should be noted that I have a terrible memory when it comes to ultimate (and many things). This is a rough approximation of what actually happened.
We traded points for a while, but the undefeated Lucky Charms took the lead and went up 6-2 or so*. Somewhere in there I threw a Callahan, effectively giving Charms a point. I cursed, cursed some more, removed myself from the game, offered some beer to sideline spectators, and by the time I reengaged, Sno-Balls had whittled the lead down to about 6-4. The points were long. We probably didn't get started early, but at 6-4, it was already 9:20pm. The game was also pretty chippy. There were probably more foul calls in this game that there had been all season.
I believe we traded points, more or less, and Lucky Charms took half. When soft cap was called, the score was 8-6 Charms, game to 10 points. We rattled off a couple points and it was 8-8 when hard cap was called. Universe point! Pretty much the same situation as the first game of the season. We pulled to them, got a D and marched it down the field. Monika threw a score to Marnie...and there was a call about whether Marnie was in or not. Discussion ensued. It was decided that Marnie wasn't in, no game-winning score. There were a couple more turn-overs, but eventually, Lucky Charms threw a clean score. Lucky Charms won, 9-8, taking the championship.
I had joked on the way to the fields that I didn't want another 17 point game against Lucky Charms (referring to our 2-15 loss to them a few weeks back). Well, it was a 17 point game, a much better game, but the outcome was the same. We lost by one and, whatever the controversy regarding the last point, I am kicking myself for throwing the Callahan. One point gave them the game.
But! It was a really fun season. Last night, we had a great group of spectators and plethora of drinks and food. It was Betsy's last game in the Valley and I'm super glad that she and Sarah drafted me and the rest of team. Everyone on Sno-Balls played hard and had such great attitudes. That's ultimate at its best.
*It should be noted that I have a terrible memory when it comes to ultimate (and many things). This is a rough approximation of what actually happened.
June 23, 2011
#RoW80 Round 2 Wrap-Up
The plan was:
April: 10% cut edit on Divine Fire .
May: Finish an assortment of Divine Fire.
June: Moved back to working on Luck for Hire before the round ended.
With some leeway for our trip to Omaha.
Got through April with no problems. Got through the first week of May on schedule. Then I had to go to Omaha a week earlier than I planned and the wheels came off. Today is the end of the round and I haven't even finished what I need to get done on Divine Fire.
I've managed to cross off a couple more things off my June list:
Market sceneRewrite beginning of scene following market scenePropagate changesBalito lead-inDanielle's partySend out 5 6 4 queries/submissions (by the end of this week)
Eric has pointed out a couple more changes that need to be done as well. I'm going to continue working on Divine Fire until the beginning of next round.
Catch up with RoW80 writers!
April: 10% cut edit on Divine Fire .
May: Finish an assortment of Divine Fire.
June: Moved back to working on Luck for Hire before the round ended.
With some leeway for our trip to Omaha.
Got through April with no problems. Got through the first week of May on schedule. Then I had to go to Omaha a week earlier than I planned and the wheels came off. Today is the end of the round and I haven't even finished what I need to get done on Divine Fire.
I've managed to cross off a couple more things off my June list:
Market sceneRewrite beginning of scene following market scenePropagate changesBalito lead-inDanielle's partySend out 5 6 4 queries/submissions (by the end of this week)
Eric has pointed out a couple more changes that need to be done as well. I'm going to continue working on Divine Fire until the beginning of next round.
Catch up with RoW80 writers!
June 20, 2011
RoW80 - June 19th Check In
My "to be done by the end of the round (Thursday)" list is becoming a "to be done by the beginning of the next round" list.
Market sceneRewrite beginning of scene following market scenePropagate changesBalito lead-inDanielle's partySend out 5 6 queries/submissions (by the end of this week)Not doing much has not made me happy. One would think that that would be enough incentive to change.
Eric has threatened that, if I don't show him two scenes by Wednesday, he's going to require me to add a subplot to Divine Fire involving my favorite characters. The carrot: it would be fun to write about my favorite characters. The stick: adding a subplot would be a large amount of work. Don't try to puzzle through this deal. It only makes peripheral sense to me. Sadly, as twisted as it is, it will probably work, thus reinforcing Eric's screwy deal-making behavior. Plus, since he's somewhat bored with what he should be doing, there's a good chance that he's going to come up with a devastatingly good subplot that I will really want to write. Such is the nature of our relationship.
Catch up with RoW80 writers!
Market sceneRewrite beginning of scene following market scenePropagate changesBalito lead-inDanielle's partySend out 5 6 queries/submissions (by the end of this week)Not doing much has not made me happy. One would think that that would be enough incentive to change.
Eric has threatened that, if I don't show him two scenes by Wednesday, he's going to require me to add a subplot to Divine Fire involving my favorite characters. The carrot: it would be fun to write about my favorite characters. The stick: adding a subplot would be a large amount of work. Don't try to puzzle through this deal. It only makes peripheral sense to me. Sadly, as twisted as it is, it will probably work, thus reinforcing Eric's screwy deal-making behavior. Plus, since he's somewhat bored with what he should be doing, there's a good chance that he's going to come up with a devastatingly good subplot that I will really want to write. Such is the nature of our relationship.
Catch up with RoW80 writers!
June 17, 2011
Friday Randomness
I'm teaching myself to crochet. With the help of the internet, of course. For a while when I was growing up, my mom and grandma crocheted everything. Scarves, afghans, pillow covers, doilies, hats, warm socks, shawls. Both were quite good at it. Both stopped around when I went to college. I never learned. I came across Oma's crochet hooks when we were searching for some important paper or another, so I took them. I bought a skein of "painted desert"-colored yarn on Monday and have been turning it into something scarf-like. It's easier than I thought it would be, meaning that I haven't tried to do anything difficult and my scarf-like thing is pretty uneven in quality. So far, my hands are okay with the activity, and my scarf isn't yet large enough to make crocheting in Arizona in the summer a really stupid idea. I think I'll work toward making a Jayne hat, crocheted version.
Sno-balls, my women's league team, made it to finals! We edged out Push Pops to take second place. We'll face Lucky Charms next Thursday night for the title! Our record against Lucky Charms is 0-2 with a 14 point differential, but that doesn't really tell the story. The first time we played them was the first game of the season. Lucky Charms is mostly a tight-knit group of ASU girls. Sno-balls is a good mix of savvy vets and new talent; it's taken a little time figure out what we do well. We lost by one that first game, but it didn't feel like a loss. The second time we played them it was a full squad of Luck Charms against very few Sno-balls. We had two subs and most of the nine players were newer girls. Considering that, the score wasn't too surprising. But if most everyone shows up on Thursday, I think we have a chance.
A while back Grooveshark started offering surveys that paid in "points" that could be redeemed for their premium service (with last.fm scrobbling). I don't mind online surveys so I jumped in. And quickly found that I rarely fit the demographic that they want to survey. Grooveshark: not for childless women in their late 30s with no income. Don't get me wrong, I'm not offended. I find this pretty amusing actually, only annoying because it's taken me about six months to get one month of premium.
Sno-balls, my women's league team, made it to finals! We edged out Push Pops to take second place. We'll face Lucky Charms next Thursday night for the title! Our record against Lucky Charms is 0-2 with a 14 point differential, but that doesn't really tell the story. The first time we played them was the first game of the season. Lucky Charms is mostly a tight-knit group of ASU girls. Sno-balls is a good mix of savvy vets and new talent; it's taken a little time figure out what we do well. We lost by one that first game, but it didn't feel like a loss. The second time we played them it was a full squad of Luck Charms against very few Sno-balls. We had two subs and most of the nine players were newer girls. Considering that, the score wasn't too surprising. But if most everyone shows up on Thursday, I think we have a chance.
A while back Grooveshark started offering surveys that paid in "points" that could be redeemed for their premium service (with last.fm scrobbling). I don't mind online surveys so I jumped in. And quickly found that I rarely fit the demographic that they want to survey. Grooveshark: not for childless women in their late 30s with no income. Don't get me wrong, I'm not offended. I find this pretty amusing actually, only annoying because it's taken me about six months to get one month of premium.
