Wednesday, January 2, 2008

Uptick

See, that's how I work.  I complain (in my last post) about my limits and then I go and break them.
 
Today has been a good day.  I sat down this morning and pounded a chapter's worth of words out of the scene I'd been avoiding - Glencoe.  There's still work to be done; the chunk itself looks a bit like swiss cheese, as do most of my "in process" bits.  Large solid pieces with holes scattered throughout (where I left off to hop down - or up - and work on whatever popped into my head at that point).  So those will need to be filled in, but the majority of it is there.  Pretty good stuff, if I do say so myself.  *g,w* 
 
When I'd exhausted my creativity stores for the morning, I switched gears (and hemispheres) into "organize" mode, and guess what?  Those miles of blank pages I was fretting about yesterday were mostly full after all.  I've rearranged chunks into chapters and I now have up through chapter Twenty-Two in place!  (The aforementioned Glencoe chunk became chapter 21.)  259 MS pages.  By wordcount that's more than 2/3 of the story in a contiguous piece. 
 
Mind, all the newly-inaugurated "chapters" (18-22) still have varying amounts of writing left to be done within them, to fill gaps/smooth transitions, but no more than about 2-3 pages each.  I'll be working on that tonight. 
 
The exception is Chapter 22, newly named but incomplete. It begins with Alec bound and dragged through the snow from Glencoe back to Kilchurn.  I have a planned bit where Elspeth takes the news of his capture back to Glenstrae and recieves a cold welcome (it is somewhat her fault) and from there departs for Kilchurn to rescue him, by whatever means necessary.
 
That, I really think, is the last "big" chunk I need to write that isn't at least in process.  The rest will be sorting into chapters and filling gaps, as I have been.  Still time-consuming, but there's definitely been a HUGE uptick in my momentum.  Woohoo!
 
Now it's time to do the job I get paid for, hehe, and then maybe take a little nap in my office to refresh before I set-to again.  DH is being very understanding and agreed to let me stay late to write.  I'll work here until dinnertime, then go home to eat and put Little Boy down.  Then, more writing!  I've become a machine.  Not sure how long I'll hold out tonight, since I'm running on about 5 hours sleep and have been hitting it pretty hard already.  I may turn in "early" so I'll be fresh in the morning.  Now that I have an alarm clock that actually wakes me up, it's my most productive time.
 
Non-related: tomorrow is my impressions and x-rays appointment, and two weeks after that (gulp!) I get my braces.  Guess I'll take the book I'm supposed to review/chat about tomorrow night - but still haven't read - to the appointment, and skim it in the waiting room.  *w*

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