5 August 2002

One of these days I'm going to have a weekend that's long enough, and I'm going to come in on Monday morning and think, Wow, that was a great weekend - relaxing and productive! Now I'm ready to get back to work!

Well, okay, maybe not.

Friday was very productive for the novel. K.T. and I worked out the events of the whole second half in pretty minute detail, including motivations we hadn't been sure of before, and started working out the cultures for our non-human groups. (It drives me crazy that most fantasy books treat non-humans exactly like humans, but with pointy ears. Crazy crazy crazy.)

So we got a lot done. That was cool. The things we worked out made certain scenes very vivid in my mind, and that was cool, too. Except that the scenes all jumbled on top of each other, so the bits I'd see started in medias res and ran for a few lines of dialogue and then stopped, to be replaced with another scene already well underway.

So after our hours of extreme productivity, I got no writing done this weekend. Alas. Double-alas, because I've actual got some work to do at work this week, so I don't think I'll get any writing time during the day. It's going to make it difficult to meet my writing goal.

(K.T. set herself a goal of, I think, 5,000 words per week. I do a lot of revising and editing, so I didn't want to make a word limit goal. So instead I set myself a time goal of 8 hours a week spent working on it. I haven't been tracking it religiously or anything, but if productivity falls off, I might start.)

Of course, it would help if I could stop getting ideas for other books based in the same world. We were talking about it last night, and aside from this novel - which very well might turn into two if it keeps growing at this rate - we have at least five other ideas floating around. We're rather firmly refusing to do anything with those ideas yet, except to tag them and say, "Yeah, that's an idea for later." If we start writing over that huge a span, we'll never get finished. One book at a time.

(But before you accuse me of Robert Jordanism, let me assure you that each book is self-contained. They wouldn't have to be read in any particular order, and you wouldn't have to know any of the events or characters of one in order to read the others. I promise. I'm not doing any damned cliffhangers. I refuse.)

An amusing anecdote from the weekend:

Matt and I went out to dinner last night, just the two of us for a change, to Outback. In the middle of dinner, for no reason other than it was what popped into my mind, I told Matt that I thought the designated hitter (in baseball) was stupid.

(Well, it is. Second basemen have to bat. Catchers have to bat. Why should pitchers get a special dispensation? It's cheating. Copping out. You don't see basketball players calling in a specialist when they have to shoot free-throws, do you? If you're going to separate your offense players from your defense players, then go all the way and have completely separate outfield and infield squads.)

I said all this to Matt, and then looked up at him across the table. His eyes were practically glowing. He reached across the table to take my hand. "Sweetie," he said, "I love you so much right now..."

Baseball and romance. Who knew?

Aside from the fact that I don't really want to be at work at all, I'm actually kind of looking forward to the project I'm doing for the next couple of weeks. It involves working with prototype hardware (which means it will only do what it's supposed to do about a third of the time) and an interface I have no idea how to use.

It'll be a challenge. I'm looking forward to it.

Unfortunately for everyone around me, when I'm challenged by my work, I tend to get irritable about it. I curse a lot. I've been known to throw things. (Thank goodness for the supply of squishyballs in my office.)

It's hard to explain - this dichotomy between enjoying a challenge and acting frustrated and irritable. I do love this kind of work. The cursing and temper tantrums are part of it, though. Maybe it's cathartic for other frustrations? Maybe it's that once 've successfully tackled something that irritating I get an enormous feeling of satisfaction? I dunno. I just love it.

But I apologize in advance if I bite any heads off over the next couple of weeks. It isn't personal.

--Liz