Saturday, May 07, 2011

Wednesday Update on...Saturday -- 5/7/11

Oops, looks like some more days got away from me somewhere.

Well, it was another week of no fiction writing...only news, news, news.

I got smart after having to stay at the paper till 6:30 last Tuesday. This week I planned ahead, checked emails from home, and did an interview on Saturday. I also drafted the article on Saturday. Sure, doing it off the clock basically meant I didn't get paid for it. I gave myself a byline for the article and photo, though, and got out by five both Monday and Tuesday. I call that progress! I also think the article was a higher quality than it would have been if I'd been writing it during the deadline crunch. As it stands, it's a piece on which I'm happy to have my byline for the world to see. (And, since layout is also my job, it got placed above the fold on page one...heh heh heh...)

The down side of the week is that WRITERS' Journal posted the results for their Science-Fiction/Fantasy contest. I didn't make the cut, not even as an honorable mention. Time to take another look at Baggage Claim and then pick the next market to assail.

Writer's group on Tuesday was good! Only three of us showed--Pat, Leland and myself--but that made for a more intimate, productive session. We finally seem to be hitting our stride as a group. Now I need to make sure I start writing something to have critiqued every week; that's surely the difficult part right now.

My cold and cough continue to linger, as does Baby M's. Her ear is still inflamed, even after two rounds of antibiotics. I have an upper respiratory infection that's making life miserable and for which I can do nothing except use a Neti Pot. Other than that, life is not so bad.

There's my news. Happy, um, Saturday!

Currently reading Shadowmarch, Volume 1 of the four-book Shadowmarch trilogy (yeah, you read that right; that's a Tad Williams trilogy for you). I've read both this and Volume 2, Shadowplay, before. This second read-through is a refresher before tackling the final two books, which were finally released. Seven- to eight-hundred-page books, but I'm willing to immerse myself in them again. 'Nuf said.

(By the way, this set is classified not just as fantasy, but as cyber-punk. I suppose that's related in some way to steam punk. Can anyone tell me what in earth those two genres are? Time for more research reading!)