You go Anne!

I'm at 911 words. I forgot yesterday, and today has been a little hectic. I want to get to 3000 by the end of the day, though I'm going to have to wait until the babies go to bed tonight, because they're being distracting and seem to think they need mama attention.

Theo, a half hour later, and this just sunk in:

The most important thing is that it doesn't bore you, erika. Making it non-boring to others is work for another month.

Thanks. Amazing how freeing that thought is.

I hit my goal yesterday and made 2547. Today may be tougher because I've got a shorter day (four hour Navajo church services!) and I've got to write a newsletter, and a donor letter today, too. Also there's football on. So we'll see.

Yeah, you guys are right.I've just gotta do it and trust that I can sort it out later.

Getting hung up on "getting it right the first time" has slowed me down so much in the past.

Lizard, stuff you're thankful for, right?

D'you mean my tagline, erika?

(for posterity--

Ice-rinks in summer, well-made pornography, the voice of Amy Ray, the voice of Brian Molko, the voice of Mark Morford; too much hyphenation, too much candy, Catholic grade school, the federal library system, love and luck.

)

It's, yeah, but it's more of a origins-of-me (or -us) thing-- it was written when Reema and I were larkily setting up a fake Amazon.com wedding registry and they asked for a 255-character description of you.

t dork dork dork

Yeah, that's what I thought. And it's a little early, but only a little.

673 words. But I caught a good solid glimpse of the plot.

Didn't write a damn word today. Thought I'd flee to the refuge that is the Buffistas for affirmation, when I realized that this might not be an affirmation motivation time, but a motivation by ass-kicking time.

Nonetheless. Here I am. Didn't write a damn word. Didn't write the newsletter either. Didn't even watch football. Watched Joe Schmoe and the Practice instead.

I did, however, cook, launder, haul firewood and play with the dog. I suspect that my life is a reality show.

I wrote 2500 words of fic today. Go me.

Manuscript and partials mailed yesterday, priority mail, so hopefully they'll have wended their way to the opposite side of the country by the middle of the week.

Meanwhile, I have a truly nasty cold, and I don't get my usual Monday and Tuesday off this week, because I'm coordinating the biggest event of the year at work on Wednesday. So for now I'm taking it easy. But I'm taking Thursday and Friday off instead, which'll give me six straight days away from the House of Soulsuck, and one of the things I'm going to do then is start the next novel. The plot is starting to fall into my place in my head, and I'm looking forward to digging back in.

A question, based on the plot as it stands so far: Supposing you had a woman who was in an unhappy marriage, not because she or her husband was a cruel or horrible person, but just because they weren't well-matched but didn't realize it until it was too late, this being 1811 and divorce for a little thing like incompatibility not really an option. Further suppose this woman developed a completely platonic friendship with another man, and occasionally wistfully thought how nice it would be to get the same level of respect from and have the same camaraderie with her husband. Conveniently for my plot, the husband dies. At some point thereafter (how long thereafter to be determined), the woman and the other man find themselves thrown together under perilous conditions, at which time they become lovers.

What I'm trying to work out is how long a period I need between the husband's death and the woman (Anna) beginning her affair with Man #2 (Jack). In several ways, the plot will go easier if it's quickly--as in, inside a month. If I drag it out too long, I have to find a reason to keep Anna in Portugal/Spain when logic would dictate that, her husband dead, she'd return home to England. Also, since I'm planning that Anna get pregnant with Jack's child, if the interval is short, I get some nice awkwardness with her knowing full well it's not her husband's baby, but others not being quite so sure. My only question is, will readers sympathize with a woman who sleeps with and falls in love with another man so quickly after her husband's death, given that their marriage was in bad shape? Because if readers don't sympathize with the heroine, I'm kinda screwed.