Tues. June 4, 2024: Getting (and Staying) Organized
image courtesy of webvilla via pixabay.comTuesday, June 4, 2024
Day Before the Dark Moon
Pluto Retrograde
Sunny and warm
I hope you had a wonderful weekend.
Today’s episode is from LEGERDEMAIN:
Episode 195: The City’s Heartbeat
(Season Finale)
An interstellar bounty hunter is after Timothy; Fletcher finds something odd in Market Square. Shelley’s love for Legerdemain, a city of magic, misfits, and murder, only grows.
This is the final episode of the season, and the final episode of LEGERDEMAIN in serial form. You can now binge the entire 195 episodes for a limited time.
Whew! Lots of emotions around that finale today. This project has run for nearly two years, and was in prep even before that. That’s a big chunk of life complete.
Friday morning, I had some stomach issues. While I dealt with those, I wrote 9 pages of the screenplay, and adapted three more TAPESTRY chapters. I had to rearrange some material from the way I’d first set up the chapters, because it made more sense.
I only had five more episodes to adapt after that, about one or two more chapters. I wanted to end on Chapter Thirty, but there wasn’t enough material, without padding it in a way that would be a detriment.
In spite of feeling queasy, I did a quick grocery shop and picked up some books at the library.
Came home, put everything away, then adapted the last five episodes into two chapters, moving material around to hit the right chapter break, both in action and word count.
A little after 11 AM, I finished the draft! It’s around 62K, a good “category” length.
Phew! Big adrenalin crash.
I was really feeling awful after that. I turned around my one small coverage, and then gave myself the rest of the day off.
I did some research reading and tried to figure out why I felt so awful so I could feel better. By the evening, I did feel better, and cooked and ate a decent dinner.
It was so cool on both Friday and Saturday morning that the heat kicked on.
I dealt with some paperwork on Saturday morning.
I was feeling a little better, but still not great. I did a COVID home test, just to be sure. I’ve been out and about around people a lot lately, and haven’t masked in large open spaces the way I usually do (although still in stores, the library, etc.). The test was negative. I’ll test again later this week, if I’m still feeling off.
Picked up some things for the “Stuff the Bus” for Remedy Hall and headed over to Wild Soul River for their 3rd anniversary celebration. Donated my items and picked up a few things there. I spent more than I planned (mostly because I misread a price), but that’s on me, and it’s something I will use for years, so it will work out.
Headed home. Copied more episodes into the appropriate short story documents for MURDER BELLS, which will contain the three short holiday arcs from the second half of the DD season. Didn’t start adapting them yet, just setting up two of the three documents.
Still didn’t feel great, but did some cleaning and tidying up. We have company coming at the end of the week.
Read the revision of my friend’s script, which is a lot of fun.
Painted some cards for the ancestor work. June starts a new month’s worth of work.
Got the information for our upcoming first CSA box of the season. It contains beets, something of which neither of us are fond, but I made the commitment that I would try even things I don’t usually eat. I did some research and found a good recipe in one of Deborah Madison’s cookbooks that I will try, and started building my grocery shopping list around the items we’re getting in the box. Picking up the box on Tuesdays gives me a chance to build the week’s meals around whatever’s in that week’s box.
In the evening, I read a book for review, and then re-read KILLERS OF A CERTAIN AGE by Deanna Raybourn, which I enjoyed even more this time around. There’s a sequel coming out next spring, which I look forward to reading.
Stayed up reading until about midnight, and then Charlotte was wide awake and wanted attention when I got to bed. And Tessa started her breakfast demands early, so there wasn’t much sleep happening.
But it was a beautiful day.
Did the word stats for May:
New Material: 53,515
Client Work: 20.111
Edits: 68,814
Adaptation: 56,943
Marketing/Videos 7 hours
What do they mean? The new material number is pretty average for the month. A little lower than I’d like, but with the other work I had going on, it’s a decent number.
The client work is a little on the low side, but the payment wasn’t too bad; while I still want to earn more, at least I don’t feel as underpaid for the work I did as I have in some previous months.
Edits were on the high side (and these are my own edits, not paid client edits). But I did a couple of passes on THE WOMEN ON THE BRIDGE, started edits on TAPESTRY, started edits on STRANGERS IN THE SNOW, and did a few passes on “Auld Acquaintance.” So that makes sense. It makes up for the new material number being a little lower than usual this month.
The adaptation number is centered around TAPESTRY and is somehow off, because the book itself comes in around 62K, so I must have missed writing down or tallying some chapters. That’s a high number (I don’t have adaptation work every month), but, for the next few months, there will be adaptation numbers as I convert the serial material to their next life.
Marketing/videos is close to the sweet spot for marketing (it should run about 2 hours/week or 8 hours for the month. If I counted the material I wrote for the Nina Bell website, media kits, etc., and the time spent talking to the cover artist, it would be closer to 14 hours . Which is reasonable for what was done.
In June, I need to up the client work (and pay). Adaptation numbers will be a little lower, because there’s less to adapt. Wait, no, there’s not, because I’m also adapting the Cerridwen Iris Shea articles, although at a slower pace than the serial material. I have no idea what the adaptation number will wind up being. Editing numbers should be pretty high, between TAPESTRY, MUDER BELLS, and THE WOMEN ON THE BRIDGE. New material will be on the low side, I expect, although I have a 5K short story and an article to write at the very least this month.
I’ll promote the binge watching of the serials, but probably not as hard as I should, and I’ll promote “Personal Revolution” from the back list during the second half of the month until around the July 4th weekend.
But the priority this month needs to be client work, and build the other work around it, instead of the other way around, the way I usually do it.
Sunday I was tired and felt off, even though it was a lovely, lovely day outside. I did a bunch of cleaning and tidying up. We repotted the large jasmine, which was exhausting. I hope it likes the new pot.
Did some ancestor work which made sense on some levels, but not on a bloodline level – unless there’s a branch of the family I know nothing about. Which is perfectly possible.
I read the next book for review, which was good until it took an overly tropey twist into a different genre.
I started reading THE TWILIGHT GARDEN by Sara Nisha Adams, which is a lovely book. I really enjoyed her first book, THE READING LIST. This is very different, but also very beautiful.
Sent a birthday email to an old friend, who will be working on Cape for a few weeks – and thought I still lived there!
All I want to do is sleep. It’s as though my body remembers how exhausting the time right around the move was, and thinks I still need to recover.
I’m really frustrated with a project I backed on Kickstarter/BackerKit last summer. The project kept getting delayed and delayed and delayed. Then, in March, we were charged overpriced shipping, which added 20% onto the cost. And nothing has shipped. The last contact was in mid-April, claiming the creator had to wait until all the shipping fees were processed (which we all know is not true; you ship as you’re paid to ship). There’s been no contact, the creator doesn’t respond to emails, won’t update.
In other words, we’ve been screwed. There are a lot of us who are really, really frustrated. And Kickstarter/BackerKit just shrugs. They don’t care, and refuse to take any responsibility, or take any steps to make it right.
Taking money for a product and refusing to deliver it is fraud. Period. Give us what we paid for, or return the money.
Which, of course, neither the creator or Kickstarter will do, because they’re all sleaze buckets.
Learned that expensive lesson. No more Kickstarter/BackerKit projects for me. We’ve been scammed, and there’s no recourse. Although, if I don’t get either an update or a shipping notification by the end of the week, I’m filing a complaint both with Kickstarter and with the SEC (who regulates Kickstarter).
I’ve only backed a handful of projects, and the others were good experiences. But I’m not putting myself in this position again.
Very difficult to settle down and concentrate on Monday morning. Woke up with full-blown sense memory stress, as though it was June of 2021.
I did some Vaudeville research. I’m finding records that aren’t quite in alignment with family stories my friend knows, so I will have to talk to her about that.
Did a library run to drop off/pick up books.
More scripts landed in my queue for the week, which was a relief.
I started on one and was more than halfway through it when it was removed from my queue (probably because it needed more work and was pulled). But that was time that could have been spent on other things. That paid. If something is pulled, we should be paid for it anyway.
I had a ZOOM meeting with a Nightwood colleague. She’s prepping her show for Edinburgh. I gave her some advice, and suggested she push her promoter harder. She’s paying the promoter, but they’re bumping back too much admin work on her which they should be handling. I think her show is something that will do really well there. She was also really interested in SERENE & DETERMINED and has an idea for a theatre in Vancouver she thinks would be a great fit for the project.
Trying to explain to a Canadian the political mess we’re in took a lot of expletives, rolling eyes, and laughter.
Turned around one script after, and started another. I’d hoped to finish it, but ran out of time.
Cooked dinner and hung out on the porch for a bit.
Yoga is cancelled this week, because the teacher’s young son is in the hospital. So we are rallying around to do whatever we can to help.
Read a really fun book of short stories last night. It was humid and hard to get to sleep, but cooled off during the night, thank goodness.
Up early this morning, out to the laundromat. I was the only one there, which was great. Got 65 pages of TAPESTRY edited. Made some notes to check on a few details, and also some ideas to carry through in future books of the season.
Will put some stuff in the crockpot after breakfast, then settle in to work. I have to catch up on coverage work that wasn’t finished yesterday and then do what’s scheduled for today. With yoga cancelled, I have more wiggle room. The only thing I have to do this afternoon is pick up the first CSA box (I’m very excited).
I need to do some more cleaning and tidying up for company, too.
Not sure what work I’ll do this morning; maybe some more adaptation, a few pages on something else, sorting the almanac articles into their new possible eBooks. We’ll see. I need to sort project materials that have been stacking up in my office, put complete projects away, and have the current projects in easy reach.
One step at a time, right?
Have a good one!
