I go back to the trenches tomorrow, so I spent the day playing Zuma’s Revenge revising the chapters I wrote this past weekend and trying to figure out a realistic reason why my hospitalized character might need a EEG so another character could make a fond joke about her abnormal readings . . . But I eventually admitted defeat and killed it.
Poor, funny, throwaway line, we hardly knew thee.
The rest of it was pretty good, after a bit of tinkering and rearrangement, though I was once again reminded that my brain shuts down around midnight and even my stream of subconsciousness dries up. After that, everything seems derivative and clunky*—but I keep reminding myself that every word I put down gives me something to work with, even if I end up sending it to the outtakes file. My tinkering isn’t aimless and I am solving problems.
The world may not be better off, but my story will be.
To borrow something I overheard at Bouchercon,** I don’t have to write the best book ever written—I just have to write the best book I’ve ever written. Over and over and over.
And hope that I’ve filled the plunger with enough glue.
_______
Wondermark! is the brainchild of the brilliant, handsome, and non-litiginous David Malki !
* See Dick write. Dick cannot spell. See Jane write. Jane has a problem with punctuation. See Spot write. Spot has no concept of narrative conventions.
** I honestly don’t know who exactly—an older man with a midwest accent at the table behind me at the Thai place Friday evening (could have been Thursday). I grabbed my notebook instead of turning around and by the time I could casually manage it, they were leaving.
Earful of Cider 
“I don’t have to write the best book ever written—I just have to write the best book I’ve ever written. Over and over and over.”
Love that.
I too was trying to injure a character just to get in a line. I can’t let the little darlin’ go.
I dropped mine three stories without a safety rig, but she still doens’t rate an EEG. Frustrating. 😛
Um, could we just work on the first part and see how the over and over and over plays out? Can someone pass me a paper bag?
Yes, love the first bit, the second not so much. But I guess to get to the first bit we have to do the second bit (which seems a bit backwards, but I never was much good at maths.)
It’s some of that allege-abra again, Downith . . . 😀
Here, Lyra . . .
Don’t sweat the ‘over’ part—I’m told it happens naturally.
You’re like Cinderella. Bet you never realized that, right?
Cinderella put glue in toilet plungers? Serves her stepmother right . . . 😀
This got me to thinking that I could really use a jeweler’s kit.
Jeweler’s loupes are useful things, both as metaphors and for dealing with those tiny little screws at the sides of one’s eyeglasses.
I want to read a series of Dick and Jane books written by you 🙂
Some days, that’s about my speed . . . XD