Those 70s Playgrounds (Personal Update)

Not tired. Nope.
Image description: Writer looking exhausted.

Really Rough Draft  

Raw unfettered shit-  19,084 (Last week 12,785)[Just this week- 6229]  
Slightly polished turd- 10,248 (Last week 1470)  [Just this week- 8778]

So this week I haven't done a lot of raw copy (although I'm still improving–1000 words a day would be about four pages, so I'm still winding UP), but I HAVE gone back and revised much of what I'd already written to incorporate the new vision that inspired the Kickstarter. I'm teasing out a toxic relationship and deepening some dysfunction in echoes of my own childhood, plus if the main character is going to have a meaningful arc of redemption, he can't be so...uninteresting early on. Writing time has gotten pretty After Dark™ around here.

At one point, I said to myself "I'm adding edges to everything," and that phrasing immediately made me think of those macros where it's like "Seventies kids had violently dangerous playgrounds and we LIKED it!"

*[Caveat: Ridiculously safe playgrounds are JUST fine with me now that I have a Bub. Juuuuuust fine. He's going to climb tall trees, bike down impossible hills, break limbs, and flay himself all on his own. I'm okay with the worst thing he has to deal with right now being a fall from four feet onto some wood chips.]

Share this meme if you played on a dangerous playground and survived.
And if you didn't survive....uh......I may have discovered a flaw in this plan.
Image description: Old school playground with a merry-go-round.

I feel like that's me. Adding falls that are just a little TOO high, merry-go-rounds without safety nets that go too fast and throw kids off. See saws that can send kids plummeting fifteen feet to their asses in less than a second if the heavier person leaves. Unforgiving concrete underneath your feet, ready to shred your knees and elbows should you fuck up. Replacing safe, smooth plastic curves on everything with some splintery wood and metal sheeting sharp enough to slice a fingers dragged along it the wrong way.

Oh it's still a playground and I hope people have fun. But let's not make it quite so safe.


Personal Update

This last week was a lot of tag in with The Contrarian, and the Hall of Rectitude is about to have a crime fighting anniversary party this weekend, so there will be more extra tag ins this week. Great for my wallet and for not dipping into Kickstarter funds this week. But it's turning the work weeks into a blur and making it hard to get to those hardcore writing sessions. Even though my productivity is up even from last week when I had a bit more time, I'm hoping it leapfrogs even high after this coming week when scheduling is a little more forgiving.

But this next week is going to involve a lot of stolen moments and fast-as-I-can writing.

There's not a lot going on in my life actually. I'm settling into a pretty boring groove after the move(s), and mostly I'm either writing or working one of the other two jobs. I don't even get to very many video games or fun stuff lately. (Though getting a birthday fuss yesterday at my D&D game certainly did not suck.) At this point I'm trying to keep my edge when my two part time jobs are asking more out of me than normal so that when they ease off, I have the sharp edge to put in the hard hours.

I don't know if I have much of a "lesson" to draw from the last week, but remember when you're working on a long work in progress that life is not going to let every week be nothing but beautiful spiral passes to the wide reciever. Sometimes you have to be happy with working the ball down the field, steady progress and keeping your eyes peeled for an open receiver. But you don't pull hike the ball back and take your time looking for a wide reciever when they're blitzing, and you certainly don't go home because you only gained a couple of yards the last few plays.

If my football metaphor lost you as much as it did me, just remember. 1) I made a hilarious tight end joke. 2) They can't all be 5-8 hour sessions, and some weeks are going to be worse than most. (Most of us don't have the schedule where we have nothing to do but write and then go play canasta with the other members of the Auxiliary Club.) When you can't do the 5 hour sessions, you do the three hour ones. When you can't do the three hour ones, you take the hour where you can get it.

That way you're still in the mindset of your story and your characters when your schedule opens up and your ability to focus hasn't atrophied.