Wednesday, June 30, 2010

Goals

Ok, you're in for a long one! I skipped yesterday 'cause I posted twice the day before. Just to let you know, I put in at least 1 1/2 hours yesterday finishing chapter 4 and I spent a 1/2 hour today reading through chapter 5 and making notes. I would have done more, but I was soooo tired, so I took a 2 hour nap :) Anyways, today's post is on more strictly defining my goals, or at least some of them. Here goes:

Ok, so let’s get my goals down on paper and completely defined! I have two major goals with this book. One is to have the book completed in a year from when I started. So it needs to be done by October 4th, 2010. My second goal is to have the book queried out to agents by the end of 2010. Let’s work on the first goal.
I have 3 months to get this book done! I am working on draft 2 and I know there will be a draft 3. Heck, there will probably even be a draft 4. I can only hope that with each draft I spend less time editing. So I’m hoping to have draft 2 done by the end of July, draft 3 done by the end of August, and the final draft, 4, done by the end of September. Now I realize that I’ve got to include beta and editing reading time in the second two months, but not right now. Now’s the time to break down July and finishing draft 2.
Starting today, I’ve got 32 days to finish draft 2. I’ve all ready completed 81 out of 228 pages, so I have 147(approximately) pages to go.
That means I need to edit 4 ½ pages a day to be done on time. Really, to be completely realistic, I need to do more than that, ‘cause I plan on taking weekends off and holidays(Happy Fourth of July!). Break down of July: Starting today(June 29), I’ve got 32 days to finish draft 2. I’ve all ready completed 81 out of 228 pages, so I have 147(approximately) pages to go. I’m going to set slightly higher goals than minimum to make sure I’m done and there’s spare time. That means I need to edit 6 pages a day to be done on time. To simplify it, I need to have 42 pages edited every week. July 10th I need to be on page 123; July 17 I need to be on page 165; July 24 I need to be on page 207; and July 31 I need to be done.
Ok, for now, for you guys, I’m going to stop defining my goal’s any further. I’ll wait until the end of July to continue.  Oh, except to mention that I’ll have 3 months once the book is complete to get it queried out. But that’s for later!

Monday, June 28, 2010

Fallen Hero, Risen Soul


A local hero came home last week
But he didn’t come back alive
I knew his name, that was all
I went to his funeral anyways
My husband knew him and my brother too
I didn’t know him and he didn’t know me
But that doesn’t change the past
He died for me willingly
He is a hero, complex as that.

Long time

I haven't blogged in the past week and that is unfortunately a reflection of how much work I've done on my book. I have a problem, I'm an addict. I'm addicted to reading and once I start a good book, I just can't stop! Really, I'm telling the truth, I have a control problem! I need to get it under control, ha! lol, I'm a goof. Anyways, I have a plan. I need to come up with a goal by when to have the 2nd draft done, taking into consideration editing a 3rd draft, having beta and editing readers and having time to write out queries, etc. Cause I have a big goal of getting this book out to agents by the end of 2010 and if I don't break it down into small goals, it ain't gonna happen. So I need to get back to the math of defining goals.
Also I need to get Rain broke out and sold. I have a problem with that too. I need someone to watch baby and I have a hard time asking people to do that as much as Rain needs work. Doesn't matter now though, she needs to go! Not 'cause I don't like her, but because I didn't buy her to keep. I have one retired horse and two other horses that although they would be quite frisky to hop on right now, they are ride-able. I don't need her, plain and simple. Plus with the lack of rain, water that is, there may be a hay shortage/no second cuttings. It will be cheaper if I only have to feed hay to 3 horses instead of 4. So, I'll let you know how that goes too :)
I worked for 1 1/2 hours and finished editing chapter 3 and I read through chapter 4 making notes of some stuff to change. I've edited 71 out of 227 pages.
On happier notes, it's my 7 year anniversary with hubby :) Too bad he has to be out of town for work :( Well hopefully we'll be taking a day to ourselves Saturday and that will make up for it.

Monday, June 21, 2010

Living Dead in Dallas

Book 2 in the Sookie Stackhouse series! I broke my own rule and I did read this while I was still writing draft 1. I’d like to think I did a little better about managing my time ;) It has been a while since I read this, I'm about to start book 6 now, but I did write this review fresh from reading it. This book was about Sookie being loaned out to another “group” of vampires to find a “lost” vampire. Once again, I devoured this book. Sookie was still her normal and yet not normal, *read telepath*, self. There was actually two mysteries going on in this book, one about Sookie’s home town and then the problem the Dallas vampires were having. I’ve noticed that most of the chapters are longer in these books and thus by the time the Dallas problem was solved, I was thrown for a loop when I realized that the book was now going back to the home town problem. Mostly I was thought “woo hoo” more book to read, rather than “huh?” I definitely recommend this book :) Hope you enjoy!

P.S. I worked about an hour on my WIP today and am on page 61 out of 226 {notice I'm up 2 pages from the last time}

Sunday, June 20, 2010

Difficult

Right now I'm finding it a little difficult to blog. See, I started blogging for a couple of reasons, and one of them was to have sort of a journal of my progress. I used my WIP's journal for private thoughts and ideas for the book, plus tracking my numbers/progress. I used blogging as a public numbers tracker. I find it's getting tedious to track numbers at two places right now :( Right now there's not a whole lot of anguish to the writing process because I have a good idea of what needs fixed right now for almost the whole book. I'm sure the anguish is going to come back when editing the third draft because it won't be so much about fixing major but boring changes, like where Felicia's home is, it will be more about making the book more exciting and refining the book. I need to get back into the routine of doing blogs on something other than book progress. There's a goal for me! What's your goal? Talk to you soon.

Thursday, June 17, 2010

Reporting for Duty

Now keep in mind, as I do, that the word and page count changes with each bit of editing, sometimes going up and sometimes down depending on whether I've added some here or cut some there. Right now I am on page 51 out of 224. Yay! That is a little less than a quarter of the way through the book.
Ok, onwards, onwards and I'm hoping your blasting or struggling, so long as you're doing something, through your very own book :)

Wednesday, June 16, 2010

R.I.P.

It started Monday. I found one of my chickens dead. I knew something had been getting in, but having caught and dealt with a racoon, I thought I had my culprit.
On to Tuesday. Baby broke out in hives while playing outside. I wasn't too worried at first but my father in law was which got me worried. I will say however, my mother in law was not at all worried. Five minutes after administering medicine per dr.'s orders, hives were disappearing. So whatever it was, it was gone before the medicine could have done any good. Next comes my niece who I was giving riding lessons to last summer. She wanted to ride and I'm a sucker, despite the heat. So we went down to the shed and I heard her say, "Karen, one of your chickens is dead." As I approached the outside coop, I counted 3 dead and there were actually 2 dead inside. About five minutes later my f-i-l saw a fox running down the road. Culprit found but not dealt with. I'm not vengeful though and the deed's been done, so I won't be hunting down Mr. Fox, whom I'm pretty sure was coming back for seconds(he didn't eat all of the chickens, just killed them all.) So no more chickens :( RIP Broody and the rest of my girls, they were my pets, not just a farm animal :(
I will say I did put in about 30-60 minutes of editing work, although this was before I found my chickens.
Oh yeah, and this morning my mil is knocking on my door. I open up and she says, "Wayne's in the front yard." Wayne is my husband's uncle who's in from out of state. All I could think was why do I care if he's in the front yard. It was 6 am and baby had a rough night. I asked a couple more times before I figured out she meant "Rain", my paint mare. I left the far gate open last night after using it to haul off my chickens. At least the rest of the day, so far, knock on wood, hasn't went quite so bad.

Tuesday, June 15, 2010

Oh I"ve been bad...

I haven't done anything to my WIP since Thursday :( I have been busy with family so I really don't feel that bad :) I had a great weekend and I hope you did too.
I wrote out two short blurbs for my book this morning and sent it to my "beta" readers. Aka, my mom and my cousin. We'll see what they think. I'm hoping they get mad because the blurb makes them really want to read the book and they can't yet ;) This is the first time I've felt the urge to do a creative thing like a blurb(that's what I'm calling it, what it really is is what you'd read on the back of the book.) You might think I'm strange and you may be grossed out, but once again, the idea came to me while I was...you guessed, in the shower. I think it's cause I'm alone, undisturbed with nothing to do but think about whatever I want cause baby's sleeping. I dunno, and frankly I don't care. I just love the feeling of, oh yeah, I have got to write that down and quick!

Thursday, June 10, 2010

Good day!

Editing is flowing a little better now. I've got a couple scenes more before I hit the end of 1D's chapter 1 making it chapter 1 of 2D. There are certainly a lot of differences, but other than the beginning, I'm doing less major overhauling(read not deleting and rewriting about 8 pages).
I had a great day with baby today. Other than a couple of meltdowns cause he was sooo tired, all was good. We spent almost 2 hours outside with his 2 y/o cousin playing in a kiddie pool. I got burnt on my legs and they look rediculous(deliberate mis-spelling). Only the tops of my thighs burnt and only half of those due to the angle of the sun and where I was sitting. Plus in the middle of the burn there's a white spot where I squirted out some sunblock to dab from while putting it on baby and my niece's face. Oh well ;) I really don't mind, the day completely made up for it.
Also finished the free read, the short second life of bree tanner. Very good and adds good perspective to Eclipse. I'm thinking I'll be buying the book even though I read it for free :) I'm a fanATIC, what else can I say.
Now off to take out my contacts, brush my teeth, clean clothes of the bed, pj's and bed. Good night!

Wednesday, June 9, 2010

Why you shouldn't shower

Ok, so besides gremlins being in the shower with you(Deadline Dames reference), there is something else out there that can be very scarey. In fact, thinking about it, it could almost be a gremlin. It is....Shiney New Idea...Dun, dun, dun! Last night in the midst of a relaxing shower, I came up wtih SNI and had to write it down. So after getting out of the shower I wrote a couple of scenes and plot ideas and even shed a tear one of the scenes was so intense for me. And then...well it fizzled out. Hmmm, not sure if that means I don't have anywhere to go with it or what. Actually this idea touches a very important part of me so I think it has potential even though it would pull a lot out of me. However, I'm going to be grateful(I seem to be using that word a lot in my WIP) that it fizzled out for now. Because my New Years goal for 2010 was to have this WIP completed and sent out to find an agent. I will say though, that the sputtering idea is saved in a document titled "Random Ideas." There are some pieces or chunks in this case, of ideas that do not deserve to be discarded. Of course, as I looked at some of the other Random Ideas, I thought, "Mmmmm, may be not." Oh well, I can't be concerned with that. Now since curiosity and numbers and comparisons and calculating my progress are some things I'm obsessed with, I looked back to see how long it took me to write my first chapter. It took a couple days over a month. I have way more than 6 chapters, so clearly I picked up the pace and so I'm hoping to say the same when I make it to The End of 2D(second draft.)
I spent just about 35-40 minutes editing this morning + I worked out for almost 40 minutes and I took a shower. Woot, woot! Now I'm missing my baby and hoping he wakes up soon :)

Tuesday, June 8, 2010

Sooooooooo..........

Ever feel like that "Soooooooo......." where everything is just dragging out and taking forever? Well, that's how I feel about chapter 1 of 2D right now. Of course there's not a complete c.1 for 2D right now because I haven't finished editing it yet. I've been so much less motivated for editing my WIP than I was to write it in the first place. I admit I've let myself slide some, but geeze, this is ridiculous. I still have about 12 pages to edit and the chapter was about 25 pages to begin with. Yes, I know that seems ridiculously long, but lucky for me, I've seen a possible breaking point. Yay! Well we'll see. So far in this adventure of editing the first chapter I've realized that the first 8 pages were a great idea but written very stupidly. I can almost laugh about how silly I wrote out the scene, but not quite. Now I've also realized something else about the first 3 chapters of the 1D(first draft), that is changing the, hmmm, time frame of the book. Ok, I admit that's vague and doesn't make sense, but at least I understand, kind of :), right? Ok, to end this ramble, I put in 1 and a little + hours this afternoon, completing 2 scenes. Yay me!

Monday, June 7, 2010

Pounding

My head is pounding! Granted, I should probably be greatful that the second medicine I've tried is working slightly better, but I'm not really :( It's my sinuses; every time I lean over I feel like a brick is trying to slam its way out of my head instead of just pulsing in my brain.
Anyways, despite that, I have put in 30 minutes of editing. I'm not too pleased though 'cause I know I need to get on the ball and get this done. I mean, for pete's sake, I haven't even finished editing chapter one and it's been more than a month since I finished the 1D. Grrrrr!!!! Ok, hope y'all are doing better than me!

Friday, June 4, 2010

You can stop patting now :(

So, I didn't work on my WIP on Thursday. I've been a bit crabby and after reading Deadline Dames last night, I've realized I've had some Gremlins in the shower with me! In some ways I can't believe I made it this long with out doubting myself and/or my story. And now...well I guess I'll keep pluggin away.
I worked Rain Wednesday night and it wasn't that great. She got spooked by Grayson(a cat) and took off bucking around the round pen. After that she never quite relaxed. Also while I can spray her off with the hose, if the water is splashing into the mud, it scares the poo out of her. Oh yeah, one more thing...For some reason she doesn't like me to put the fly mask on. Even Nina, who doesn't like to be caught(aka haltered), stands still or will even approach me to have her mask put on. The other day it was kinda funny because I got Nina, Big Boy and Rain(I was just going for Rain) in the round pen so I could put Rain's mask on. Rain was reluctant about letting me put her mask on and I was working on approaching her, not masking her but rubbing it on her neck and head, then walking away. Well the other two ruined it because they basically penned her in so that she had to put the mask on and not move. So much for practice!

Wednesday, June 2, 2010

Pat my back!

Well, blogging must be good for me, 'cause I'm doing better this week with my goals! I worked with Rain Monday night. I booted, saddled, bridled, and lunged her with no problems. Her only upset was to get a little stiff and high headed while I saddled her. I can't blame her though, I haven't done it since last fall. Other than that, I was super proud of her. Now I will say she was a butt this morning and didn't want her fly mask on. I ended up getting her, Big Boy and Nina in the round pen and with the help of the other two, I was able to get her to hold still for the mask. It was actually kind of strange, almost like the other two knew what I wanted to do and that Rain was being rediculous. They basically made her hold still for me :)
As for editing, I worked for about an hour or so yesterday and I worked about 15 minutes today. Onward, onward!