squeequeg | Second time around!

Breakfast on Wednesday is mildly marred by the cold I seem to have caught. Oh well. I scarf food and go to my one-on-one with Debra Doyle. She seems to like the story, though catches a number of points where things just don't work, especially remnants of earlier drafts that hung around waaay too long. That's kind of embarrassing.

I talk a little too much at the next 5-way critique, but it doesn't seem to do any damage, and the writer's still talking to me at the end of it. LM gives a lecture on the Care and Feeding of Your Beast, or, How not to piss off the Muse. We do a number of creative exercises, and I create a character that I may use later for something: a government scientist who believes he's the Richard Feynman of biology and may be planning to clone himself.

Today's our "free time" day, which mostly means we have a chance to catch up a little. I work outside, listening to music. It's probably a bad sign that my writing music includes "Don't Cry for Me, Argentina," covered by Tom Jones and anything by Richard Cheese. But a draft gets done, and I go for a walk. I write a letter home and realize that writers' cramp is not just a myth. Ow.

Into Oak Bluffs for dinner and the famed $10 hamburger (it's actually pretty good) with April, Yoon, Lisa, Anna, and Scott, who makes a joke about matriarchies -- apparently someone's story involves one. Dammit, I want to read it too! But I have no time; barely enough to do my own work.

I stop in to schedule a one-on-one with TNH and end up trading raunchy jokes for a while. Instead of going down to play Thing, I use Kate the staffer's computer to type up my story, since I have trouble reading my own writing sometimes. Afterwards I head downstairs, intending to go to bed, and end up playing Thing and Mafia for an hour.

Thursday morning I lurch out of bed and head over to April's room for a tasty breakfast. Mmm mushrooms. The crit goes well, even though I was writing mine after midnight (testimony to my time-management issues rather than to the writing itself), and afterward we read some of our writing exercises out loud. Andy's giant robot story, Jax's twins-with-a-grudge story, and Geoff's Open Letter to His Former Minions (can't remember the title) are all hilarious; Val's story makes me want to hear more, and I'm intrigued by Yoon's. Only after I read it later on do I get some of the mathematical intricacies of the plot. I get some appreciative ahhs when I read my Tam Lin In Space (or should that be In Spaaaaaace!).

DD's lecture on research is next. I learned a crude method like this when I was going nuts with the Grail research (the story's stalled, but can be salvaged). Most important is how to tell the wacko theories from the rest. I curl up with hot ramen noodles for lunch; right now broth is what I need. Our next writing assignment is a tough one: I find myself going back to the really tough part over and over. Thing is, I only have so much that I can work with on that subject. Over and over . . . and I've got a story.

I will later realize this story was inspired by Sealab 2021, minus the "Dodgeball time, bitch!" and magical talking piñatas. This does not diminish my desire to one day see it in print.

Steve Gould gives his lecture on The Writer's Life. It's mildly depressing: for one thing, it's clear I'll have to have a day job for the rest of my life, since I'm not sure I can write on demand to support myself. Still, there are worse fates. Colloquium is fun but peters out a bit, probably because we're all so damn tired.

During my one-on-one with TNH, I discover a vital test for plot: if I can't describe it out loud without waffling in the middle, something's probably wrong. She makes a lot of really good points, and while I get the sense that she likes some of it, I also think I'm going to need that major rewrite.

I come outside to hear April playing the fiddle across the green.

During dinner, someone (Joe?) puts on Read or Die!, an anime about writing and editing and super powers. I probably have that summary wrong, but I'll try to rent some soon. Eventually I borrow Kate's computer again, this time for the Faustus story, and then go back down for more Thing. Yeah, I should know better by now. There's a brief fire scare before bed -- the chimneys tend to share smoke rather than conduct it away, so one person with a fire in the fireplace alerts several different suites.

Friday I wake up and feel slightly better. I reread the stories I've written this week and am mostly satisfied. Lisa and I read our stories, which are very different despite the same roots - hers is beautiful and sad, while mine has more than a little slapstick to it.

PNH gives his lecture on the state of the industry. I had expected this to be somewhat bleak; you hear a lot about how publishing isn't what it used to be, etc. It's not, though. The incentive these days is to create something unique, something that stands out, rather than following old tropes or trying to be the next Author X.

Potluck lunch (Val manages to ditch the big block o'cheese) and then to the beach again. It's warmer this time, warm enough that I later wish I'd gone swimming. Instead I watch April and Lisa swim and continue to beachcomb, this time getting my ankles wet and finding a lot of sea glass. I suggest holding colloquium outside, since it's so nice out. More stories -- pen names, Anne Rice, and others. Jim hands me a marked-up copy of my submission piece for VP. Hmmm....

thomascantor shows up after the group photo, and he whisks me away to Oak Bluffs. I have a terrible time concentrating on any one thing at dinner, and the Sox game, though great, doesn't help.

After a minor shirt-related incident (this is what happens when I pack my bags while on cold medicine), the signing party begins, and the VP promo spots are shown. Hee. Before I go, Jim tells me that if I don't write this book, he will come to my house and mock me. And I'll deserve it, too.

thomascantor and I walk home in the dark, holding hands.

The results of this week? Aside from the happiness of the whole week and the friends I've made, I now have six, count 'em, SIX short stories in various states of completion, a lot of fantastic feedback, and an idea of how I want my novel to go. Oh yeah, it was worth it.