Monday, 14 May 2001

Well, that's better.

I finished a second draft of the story I've been working on all this time. There are still a couple of rough spots, a few things I need to fit in one place or another. And, I hope there's some stuff I can take out, because it has run a bit long. It's at 4240 words. I'd be happier with 3500. I doubt if I can find 700-odd words to take out, but I'll go through it and see what I can do. Still, despite all that, it is basically done. I had finished a first draft several days ago, but I was really pretty unhappy with it. That's no longer true. It has come together quite well, finally.

I'll read it through from beginning to end tomorrow and polish a few of the rough spots, then print a copy for Jackie and email a copy to Steve. Then I'll let it sit for a bit before I try to get it into shape for submitting to editors.

After tomorrow it will be time to start a new story. I've been collecting story ideas. Maybe Wednesday I'll find a few minutes at the office to go down to the library and go through a stack of recent issues of Science News. There's always a bunch of ideas in those. I have a goal of getting around twelve good story ideas into my notebook before Clarion. Not that I'll write twelve stories, but I usually only have about a 50% success rate in going from a good idea to a story, so I need some spares.

This morning I started a run, but it started raining just three or four minutes into it. I persisted for a minute, but the rain grew harder, so I turned around and headed back. It ended up being over half a mile, but not by much. Still, it was enough to serve as a warm-up before lifting.