Shipwreck
New words: 4340
Total wordcount: 38,260

Prayer: Father, please be with J and his family, S and her family, and H and her family.

Ferret Adventures:


--

I might have the seed of a title. I'm going to poke at it some and see what happens.

I didn't get as much done today as I was hoping. (You look at the number and laugh, but please remember I wrote from 7am until now, with a few breaks for food, yarn, and ferrets. And actually, I eat over the computer. *slob*) But at the rate it was going to begin with, I'm fairly pleased with the progress. I got a lot of backstory in, revealed a couple scary things to the characters, and there is a Tentative Plan, but most of them are gonna die anyway. Poor fools!

Tomorrow I get to write yet another talky scene. (I feel like they're all talky scenes, even though I know they aren't.) I try to break them up with action scenes, or trick people into thinking my talky scenes are action scenes (look, Ma, no scene breaks from the talky into the action...ish stuff). But after that, we get to go to the space ship! I wonder what can go wrong there. Something cool, but plotty, too. Maybe magic will attack them. Somehow. Magically.

Then there's more Investigating of the Murders, and a couple more murders while they're doing that. (This'll be how I trick you into thinking my talky scene has action. Something might blow up in the middle of investigating, and they'll be all, "Oooh, what's that? Ow ow hot!" and then go back to talking, and at the end of the scene, hah, more dead people. It's an action scene! (So you're supposed to think. :D) And I seem to have lost track of my parinthesis.)

*deep breath*

After that, I think we get more talky scene to go to the old city, where hopefully more plot will happen. Plot that is not, "And then scary monsters attacked! Boom!"

I picked out DRAGON WARS and SUNSHINE (which I originally looked at because it made me think of robinmckinley's book of the same name). There's another one with SUNSHINE called SUPERNOVA, which we haven't watched yet. Suffice to say, the ones we have watched already are *bad*. Well, DW is bad. S is just mostly bad.

Does anyone really need spoiler cuts for these movies? ( Oh, fine. )

And that's why I'm not allowed to pick out movies anymore. I can't say I really *blame* Jeff for deciding this.

Without context:

I got a video of the girls fighting in pants.

(*cackling*)

The ferret girls. The without-context way cracks me up so much. I didn't realize how it sounded until someone went, "Buh?"

Anyway, here are Miss Suzi and Leanne fighting in the pants. They actually are fighting. Suzi does not like Leanne. Usually they just ignore each other, but sometimes Suzi can't help herself. (No one is getting hurt, despite how it may sound on the video. If there'd been actual screaming, I'd have stopped them. Here, mostly they're yelling at each other to seem more fierce. No one is getting hurt. And probably not even touched.)



--

For Christmas, we went to Jeff's grandparents' house for dinner. Trying to be helpful, I grabbed a dish rag and took a sheet of rolls out of the oven, and put it on the stove...and then discovered the fringe of my towel was on fire.

Oh noes!

Okay, it was just a couple of sparks, but the towel was definitely singed. Apparently I'd got it too close to the hot element when I had my hand in there. Sigh! Next time I get the urge to be helpful, I'll stick to setting the table or fussing with dishes. :P (Everyone was surprisingly unconcerened about the flaming towel. I do love my in-law family.)

--

Burning things seems to be a thing with me. Mostly I just burn myself. My first job was at Wendy's when I turned 16. The first job you learn there is fries. During that time, I managed to burn my hand by dropping a chicken nugget into the grease and splashing it all over the back of my hand. I had a bunch of icky burns on my knuckles all summer. Putting my hand under the heat lamp to scoop fries hurt. I did it again the next summer. *sigh!*

(I was afraid it was going to be an every summer thing, but fortunately, it was not. I burned myself in other less painful ways during my years there (sigh!) but not as bad.)

When I was 19 I got a job as a waitress at Don Pablo's (nummy Mexican food). There, I forgot to put the sock on the end of the fajita skillet, and tried grabbing the hot iron with my bare hand. (The jerks at the table I was at didn't even ask if I was okay! My palm was just turning bright red and I was trying very hard not to cry.)

You'd think after three serious burns on my right hand, I'd have stopped working with food. But no, when Don Pablo's closed one day (and I mean, one day -- when I got to work one day, they were taking the sign off the side of the building), I went and got a job at Chili's. Don't think I hurt myself too badly there, though.

--

In SHADOW OF VENGEANCE, I'm working on the masquerade part. (I've been 8k from the end for days.) And seriously, why don't more of my stories have masquerades? I love dressing up characters, and I really want to write something with a masquerade where my characters can stay for a while (rather than having to run off and take care of plot) and there can be trying to figure out who people are, lots of fancy costumes, mystery...

*sigh* This is how I end up with new books. (Do not need right now!) I start daydreaming about something -- all it takes is one thing -- and suddenly I have a bunch of other things, and when I meet the characters, well they're so darn cute and I love them and want to torture them so they can appreciate being happy...

--

Back to the word mines! Maybe someone will come online and keep me company. *eyeing friends*

Harpy Book
Pages edited: 33 - 40
Total pagecount: 260

Thank God for word processors: This book has all the semicolons.
The darling that lived: All of me was cold, actually, and I thought about reaching down for my coat, but I wasn't sure if I'd be able to lean that far, or if they'd stop me. They probably didn't want me covered anyway, in case I could pick the lock on my cuffs with my magic harpy fingernails.

Prayer: Father, please be with J and his family, S, R, and H.

Ferret Adventures: I was finally able to get their favorite kind of food again (which, happily, is also better for them and cheaper than the other food I'm okay buying for them), and the ferrets were soooo happy. They took it from my hand like treats....and then played in the empty bag after I poured it in the food container. *sigh*

Kippy Adventures: Promptly at 3am, Kippy becomes a crazy person, running around the house like there are monstsers after her.

--

Boom!

The creepy things always happen on third shift. (Third shift = husband gone to work all night.)

There I was, slacking off to talk with pfriends revising Harpy when I heard this click and pop, and the glass casing over my office light fell. Made a huge thump, too, but the floor is carpeted and the glass is solid, so it didn't break. One of the lightbulbs went out. (Didn't I just get Jeff to change those? I thought so.)

How did this happen? I have no idea. Was kind of creepy, though. I'm mostly glad I wasn't standing under it. :P

Before I moved into the office, I used my laptop on the dining room table, next to the window unit AC. The window is shaded all around the unit, so it isn't actally useful as, you know, a window, but because of the AC there, I could hear what was going on outside pretty well. One night (always happens at night!), I was working when I heard footfalls on the concrete porch right outside the window.

Obviously nothing happened, or there would have been a big freakout post long ago. It's just...you know. :D

Writing

I know this paragraph made sense at one point. It wouldn't have survived so many drafts if it didn't. (Well, maybe it would have. Lots of other things seem to have survived...) But I cannot figure out what the hey I was trying to say there. Or, if it's what I think I must have been trying to say, why I had to say it in the most confusing way posisble.

There was also an unhealthy amount of time devoted to naming a city. One stupid city. And trying to figure out what kind of mass transportation they might have, if a subway made people think of NYC too much. Then I got stuck thinking about how big the city must be, and putting it in a state... I'd gone with Anycity, USA before, because the city isn't important. We never see it again after scene three. But...the things we do to make people unconfused. :P

I managed to revise two whole scenes tonight! But they were short scenes, so that isn't as cool as it sounds. I was, however, going to quit and go to bed after the first one. My pushy work ethic tricked me into staying up because the next one was short, too. Still took just as long, and now I'm sleepier than I was! But quite pleased with my progress. I could have this revision done....in a year! (Maybe twenty.)

So, either I'm stuck in a time warp and today is not actually Tuesday, but is in fact Wednesday and the Fourth of July -- or everyone else is on something. Because a) people are going to see Transformers today, which isn't supposed to come out until tomorrow, and b) I saw two firework shows on my way home from the store today. And apparently people knew about it because they were parked up and down the highway to watch.

So. Time warp? Or mass insanity?

You decide!

(Also, it is raining on people's fireworks. That will teach them to shoot them a day early.)

Touch of the Silence
New words: 3649
Total: 81,400

Typo: na
Darling: "It didn't work."
Deaths: Yes! Bunch! I set a man on fire! Boom!
Mean things: Fighting. Fire. Bad man. More pain. No hope!

Prayer: Father, please be with J and her family, S and her family, L's family, J, R, K, and J.

Ferret Adventures: So, there is this little bar that sticks out on the weight machine, just enough to put a small thing of WD-40 on it. (for the weight machine. It just seems to live there.) Anyway, the other day, it fell down somehow, and Oscar was mighty interested in it. But of course I took it away and put it back where it belongs. (Er, lives. :S) So a few minutes later, I looked up and there were Suzi and Oscar on the weight bench, about a foot away from the bar. Oscar kind of looks at Suzi, and she *jumps* across, grabs the bar, and nudges the WD-40 off with her nose. Oscar hops down to get it.

It's moved to a safer location now. But geeze. It's bad enough when they do things on their own. Teamwork is the worst! *doomed*

Kippy Adventures: Kippy seems to think I can see the milk ring for milk ring fetch when she's standing over it. But meowing at me won't give me x-ray vision. (As far as I know.)

--

Goals for today:

Words a day needed to finish by May 31: 0

Yesterday's* W-a-D goal: 562: Yes! (hee.)
Get through the climax: Yes!
Reach 80k: Yes!
Finish the book: Yes. o.o

And just for my pfriends, I am rejoicyquack.

Because someone will ask: Number ten. Or eleven, depending on whether you count the whitepaper draft of CHAFF BEFORE THE WIND. That also makes it my first--or second!--book for the year.

Tomorrow (and after, until I'm done) I will return reviews. Then I will read a bunch of stuff I'm supposed to finish because everyonesakitty told me to. I will probably be back at TOUCH OF THE SILENCE after a little while to fix the stuff I know about before I send it to whoever wants to read it. (Unless you're not allowed to read anything until you've finished your book and sent it to me. You know who you are. *eyes*)

I already miss those crazy spy kids. And I'm kind of excited about going back and making the MHG even more mysterious and hot, giving Imogene way cooler motivations in the beginning, and figuring out a way to show her personal stakes right away. (I think that will probably tie in with getting her motivations straightened out there.) Of course, I'm also excited about going to make the words not suck.

--

In other (but maybe not unrelated?) news, Jeff and I have purchased our first chainsaw.

Went to watch Pirates of the Caribbean : At World's End yesterday. (See below.) When we came home, we found part of the World Tree lying in our driveway. Apparently there was a storm. So we moved the stuff in the driveway, and we'll have to get a chainsaw or something to be able to move the rest. (Jeff likes chainsaws, so this should be okay.)

Here's a picture of what we came home to. That's Jeff and his mom in the back there. Jeff is six feet tall, just to give you an idea of how huge this branch is.



( One more )

So, um, the bad: the World Tree seems to be falling apart. Get your helmets.

Now for pirates. Yarr!

No spoiler babble: I enjoyed it. We stayed to watch the little thing after the credits--which wasn't anything unexpected, once you've seen to the end of the movie.

It seems like they took the reactions to Dead Man's Chest seriously and didn't repeat so many jokes. They played off a few of them, which was still fun. More like a bunch of people sharing an inside joke than just, "Well, you laughed *last* time..."

They set up for yet another movie, which is exciting if you like the series so far. I'm really glad they concluded this storyline, though.

Only real general complaint: Hans Zimmer must have been working on a score for another movie while this one was in production and said, "Eh, just use the one from the second movie. No one will notice." But *I* noticed. I could have hummed along if there wasn't a stranger sitting next to me. And I bet kmkibble75 noticed. *sniff*

ETA: Upon listening to bits of the soundtrack on Amazon, it looks like they put the more unique pieces on the CD, so it may be worth getting after all. But I swear, there were a ton of times I could have hummed along while watching the movie.

Touch of the Silence
New words: 2203
Total: 55,733

55,733 / 90,000 (61.9%)

Typo: I seldom drink anything other than whine.
Mean things: Made her see what a good person her father isn't. She also feels like the Bad Daughter. Her sister is still crazy.

Prayer: Father, please be with J and her family, S and her family, K, R, and J.

Ferret Adventures: Oscar practically gave me a shower today. I was sitting by one of the cages, and he'd gone up for a drink. For some reason it's cool to shove your face in the water dish, then shake the water off when you need to breathe.

Kippy Adventures: When we play milk ring fetch, she gets irritated when she doesn't bring it all the way back (or back at all), and I don't get up to fetch it *for* her...and then throw it again. She just meows for a while and finally brings it back to where I will be able to reach it. *wins*

--

My mother-in-law brought over the Michaels sales paper yesterday. This is always great joy for me, because yarn sales! Yay! So I opened it up immediately and looked and looked...and found no yarn on sale.

:(

At least the writing went a little better tonight. Tomorrow, I bring back the MHG so he can give an update on what's been going on with him. And then the downward spiral to everything going horribly, horribly wrong... boom.

Touch of the Silence
New words: 2550
Total: 37,691

Typo: na
Darling: The scents of maple, lilacs, and loam flow over the brick like a waterfall, if waterfalls could be air and aroma.
Deaths: no
Mean things: Made her burn tattoos off her ex-boy. He's keeping sekrits.

Reviews: Er, no, but I have been entrusted with another novel. I really need to get started on this pile of reviews I owe...

Prayer: Father, please be with J and her family, S and her family, K, J, R, and S.

Ferret Adventures: Oscar and Stewie have been playing together a lot lately. They're hoppy buddies. Usually playing involves one chasing after the other...and tackling him. Which is terribly cute.

Kippy Adventures: Dude. She was meowing at me. A ton. And trying to get me to go with her, which I did. But Timmy was not trapped in the well or anything. I honestly have no idea what she wanted.

--

Note to self: Hurting the MHG makes words. It's a sad thing, I know, that MHGs must suffer for wordcount, but it's entirely possible they would not be so mysterious and hot if they did not have to work for it.

Something to keep in mind: The MHGs people like best are the ones who suffer most. See Whisper and Malcolm. Informal polls in pfriend chat indicate that these are the favorites, and these are the ones who suffer most. (There was brief talk of Kelt from BRANDED, who has also suffered muchly, but for some reason I never thought of him as the MHG since he's also the main character.) (Grem from PARANOID PSYCHIC also got a mention, mostly because of his name and his "electric personality." Har har, irysangel. You're very punny. :P)

What to do about this: Hurt more boys.

Touch of the Silence
New words: 2170
Total: 33,224

Typo: I can't even loo at Aiden
Darling: "I took the needles from your sack. I hope you don't mind." Ida looks up from her knitting. She already has several rows; it must be early afternoon by now.
"Of course not." I warm my palms on the blue ceramic teapot before choosing a cup and filling it with strong, brown liquid. The last time I had tea here was more than three years ago, the evening before I got my orders to head to Springcastle. "But I did kill someone with those."
The knitting stops. "Oh."
Deaths: alas
Mean things: almost got caught. sister mad at her. misunderstandings. exhaustion.

Prayer: Father, please be with J and her family, S and her family, M and her family, J, S, and R.

Ferret Adventures: They got a box from Ferret Depot for my birthday. (Okay, so we ordered the treats a week ago. But...good timing!)

Also, I guess I left one of the small side doors on their cage open yesterday, while I was cleaning. No one bothered with it until this morning, when Diego found his way into our room. He was just ambling along and didn't fuss when I picked him up. (Leanne always knows what I'm going to do, but this might be the first time Diego has really escaped.) When I put him back in the cage, however, he ran right back to the door I'd left open. But I'd already closed it.

Kippy Adventures: Her whiskers were twitching while she was sleeping on the bookshelf. I wonder what she was dreaming about.

--

I got so excited about what I was writing today that I lost track of time. I think it's the first time it's happened with this book, but it's always a good sign. This poor book got a slow start, but now I have plot, direction, an antag, and luuuuurve.

Tomorrow we'll visit the dying man, maybe get a few threats in there, and at some point I need to bring back the other plot. The one with scope and stuff.

Maybe something can explode tomorrow, too.

*boggling how flies got in the house*

Jeff: Maybe when I opened the door earlier...
Me: I had the window open in my office, but it has a screen...
Jeff: That's it, you let them in!
Me: But there was a fly yesterday!
Jeff: Doesn't matter. You let them in!
Me: Time traveling flies?
Jeff: Alternate reality vortex!
Me: Alternate...reality...vortex?
Jeff: They came back to save their kind.

Shortly after this conversation, they were all dead, thanks to Kippy's keen eyes and Jeff's swiftness with a flyswatter.

They failed their mission. Flykind is doomed.

Chaff Before the Wind
New words: 2932
Total: 19,168

19,168 / 110,000 (17.4%)

Typo: na
Darling: The moan was hers. She knew because the sensation of crushed glass cutting her throat grew particularly strong, and only made her groan more.
Deaths: Messy redshirt death, at last.
Mean things: Killed a man and blamed it on Selah. Made her see the dead person, too. Insanity. Self-injury.

Reviews: Not yet...

Prayer: Father, please be with J and her family, S and her family, D and his family, J and his family, S and C, J, and K.

Ferret Adventures: Everyone was really good today. I managed to save the soup from Leanne twice, which always feels like an accomplishment.

Kippy Adventures: I have the most tolorant cat in the entire world. Click the cut for proof. ( Kippy, Queen of Yarn )

--

Happiness is telling your mom how you killed a redshirt with a brain hook, and she tells you how they used to cure madness by stirring up and getting rid of the part of the brain that was crazy.

The wordcount isn't as cool as it looks, mostly because I was able to rip some things out of the old draft and--with a bit of hacking and sawing--make them fit here. It was kind of fun.

I know I had something else to say here, possibly relating to redshirt death, but I can't remember now. Too bad. I know it would have been fascinating. ;)

Toil for the Wind
Pages edited: 293 - 305
Total pagecount: 348

305 / 348 (87.6%)

Thank God for word processors: Their sales were read and black.
The darling that lived: "It was dancing, you know. With the rocks and waves, and we were on the bottom of its shoe, but isn't that always the way with boats? Every one I've been on--except the rowboat, of course--has been bad-tempered. Boats are not like horses at all."

Prayer: Father, please be with J and her family, M and her family, S and her family, and K and her family.

Ferret Adventures: Stewie was very worried about the bandaid on my finger. He kept sniffing it and looking up at me.

Kippy Adventures: Kippy was pawing at Sammy the Hammy's hamsterball (while Sammy was not in there--I kick Kippy out of the room to let Sammy run). Sammy saw her hamsterball being violated, and she got the most upset look ever! Kippy, of course, did not care, and continued to paw at the ball.

--

I am almost finished with the blanket I am crocheting for Nephew. I know probably only two of you care about this, but I'm really excited! I love finishing things! And, hehe, once I'm done with this, I can go back to making "potholders" and working on the Blanket That Will Not Die.

Also, crocheting with a cut forefinger? Ow. :P

--

Okay, I have cut most of the slowtastic stuff out, and left just enough to give them time to make decisions and start an important conversation. I have destroyed #s where there should have been transitions, and put transitions!

Now there's a car boat chase. It's possible there's enough tension with the other guys chasing them, and then finding a body of someone they know in the water. We'll see. There should probably be flamethrowers magic fires! and spooky stuff during this chase scene, because people have mentioned the other guys just kind of...disappear. :S

And then? WAY COOLER STUFF where there is, right now, internal tension and not enough violence.

If these kids had extra boats waiting around, I'd probably blow this one up. But they need it until the endish part, and then I suspect a sea monster ate it. But maybe it can explode, first, and the sea monster can eat the debris.

You can never have enough explosions.