Thanks for the help! I think she's going to be Margaret. It suits her, and my protagonist, who's taken up residence in a corner of my brain and made himself at home since I started this manuscript, is nodding sagely and agreeing that's her name.

(Heather is lovely, but I don't think it was in use in the 18th century.)

I like Margaret - plus there are like a million nicknames people could call her if they were close.

that's my seester's name. Margaret Anne.

(Heather is lovely, but I don't think it was in use in the 18th century.)

Missed it by a century.

Coming in late, Margaret's good, but Janet is a good classic Scottish name (unless I'm wrong about the time it was in use ... which is always a possibility).

One last shot at drabble challenges - a main challenge and an alternative.

"If not for bad luck, I'd have no luck at all".

alternative challenge: "blue" :

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My first attempt came out kind of coded and personal. Maybe I should have tried "bad luck instead"

I first saw the blue girl at a party. Literally across a smoke filled room she was. She was ruffled and mascaraed. I was ripped-jeaned and safety-pinned. I don’t recall if I worked up the courage to talk to her that night. Some day I did. Or went out of my way to shop at the record store where she worked. Then one day like clouds parting she told me she had seen me across that room too. But all things pass. Absence doesn’t always work the way you’d expect. She’s that blue woman now. Drifting away into the blue.

Laga, I like it. Coded and personal or not it seems pretty clear what is going on and what it means to you. Sure part of the story is in the shadows, but that is the nature of three dimensional writing. Only flat writing, writing without perspective gives you ever detail, every motive, every meaning.

Deena asked me for a couple of more stories for Drollerie in as quick as time as I can manage. This is utterly unknown territory for me--original work quickly that I'm not ashamed to put my name to.

At the beginning of the year I made a sort of promise to myself that 2007 would be the year I'd find out if I had the chops to work as a writer to any kind of professional level. Then Drollerie appeared. I'm very proud of myself for getting myself out of my rut and daring to put original work out there. Now the bar's been nudged higher, and both my pride and my promises will hurt me if I don't deliver. The writing demons keep telling me that previous work was a fluke, that I had access to the Scroll of Universal Understanding and won't be able to produce something good without serendipitous inspiration.

I now understand even better why thrilling is not always a happy-joy-joy thing, and anticipation leads to bitten down nails.