Sunday, 22 April 2001

Wasted a chunk of time today dealing with a dead car battery. Apparently left the lights on. It was no big deal--got a jump, then went out and ran errands, arranging them so I could stay with the car and keep it running while Jackie went in and did what needed doing. Mostly quick. During the one long wait I got out the laptop and did some writing.

Making good progress on the story. Went back and added a short bit about other people in our hero's situation who don't do so well as he'll do. That helps raise the stakes by showing how things can turn out quite badly. I think I'll augment that a bit with a quick follow up showing one of these people. I don't want to over do it, though. Ideally something bad enough to make you shiver, but not a caricature--someone the reader can identify with.

I've written a piece of that "showing" scene. It's not done yet. There's one tricky technical bit--the hero sees some he recognizes and hasn't seen in a long time, but he's in the middle of doing something important that can't wait. I'm not quite sure how to convey the information about who this guy is and I'm not sure how the hero behaves regarding learning about this guy versus continuing with what he's doing. On top of that, it lacks focus. Sounds like a good place to quit for the night.

These new scenes also add length to the story, which isn't a good thing. The idea for this story can't really support much more than about 3500 words, and it is up to 3430 words already, without the last two scenes. Still, it is too early to worry about what to cut. First I need to get a first draft done.

I got my two mile run in. When starting a run from home I've usually been running to Kaufman Lake, running one lap around the lake (0.825 miles, according to the sign) and then running home. That's about 1.5 miles. Today I did two laps around the lake.

It may be another week or two before my "regular" run is two miles, but, basically, I'm where I want to be. Not in terms of fitness, but in terms of being able to do a workout that I know from experience works well for me: three times a week I run 20-25 minutes and then lift. That's about three hours a week devoted to fitness. I'll squeeze that in, even if I have to give up eating. More would be better, but that's enough.