The Word Cloud

I seem to be creating/initiating long jobs for myself.

 

I’m already editing Grey wings, I’m over half way now but it still feels like finishing is a long way off. I’ve given the first eleven chapters to my proof reader but she hasn’t made a start yet. I’m not overly bothered by this at the moment, but I would like to get it sorted by year end so I can send it off to be looked over in January of next year.

 

My dissertation does not officially start until February of next year, but I’m reading books on ‘how to write a masters dissertation’ and I have a bit of a back log at the moment. I’m also doing some preliminary research on the hope that my topic is approved. This is another large job. Also I’ve not heard anything from my uni now since the initial invite and subsequent emails so I’m getting a little concerned. But I already said I would give them until the end of the month to contact me so I’m going to try and be patient. They just started another year of the LPC in Aberystwyth so I’m sure the secretary has a lot to be doing and next Feb’s dissertation students will not be a priority.

 

I’m really hoping to get my own little flat by the end of next year/beginning of 2013. This is also a big-ish undertaking due to my need to be meticulously organised. I figured I needed to work out roughly how much cash I will need to do this so I’m currently trying to work out what furniture I will need, what the average deposit is on a 1 bed flat in my area and collate that information into a project book (awesome invention btw, I use them for all my novels, dissertation and large undertakings).

 

I recently decided to read through, amend or delete all my online posted writing and I knew this would be a long job. However the scale of it seems to have just now hit me. This is really going to take until Xmas and that’s if I can manage 20 or so pieces a week.

My list is daunting to say the least.

 

I have a deadline. I always seem to have one, but this one, although 20 months away has become more real lately. I've mentioned it before, but I have to write a piano concerto for a performance in May 2013. That's 20 months away, but the orchestra will start rehearsing in March of that year, so that's minus three months (17), and it will probably take a couple months to set the parts (15). Sounds luxurious, still. Except that it is a concerto, and the soloist will probably want the music a year in advance of the performance. That means the piece needs to be in a final form by May 2012. (Ding!) Eight months.

I've restarted the piece five times, and in the end, I gave up and arranged another piece with a prominent piano part (that was unfinished) into the hulk of my concerto. I'm not sure that works, but it will have to. My other fall-back plan was to arrange a piano solo piece for piano and orchestra. That probably would have been easier, but less satisfying in the long run. It is still an option if I get in a panic.

Combine that with a potential move back to the US, and that's where unease becomes terror. I've got to finish the piece, pack up 22 years of accumulated junk, move, unpack, set up my office, and possibly teach two theory courses. (Oh, and sell the house and find a new one.)

That, in part, might explain why you haven't see much of me here lately. I just don't have the stomach for another rewrite of Mirror, Mirror right now. Instead, I have been spending my time writing as my alter-ego, finishing the first draft of "her" first completed novel, which is receiving excited responses from my readers.

While I'm awaiting detailed comments, am I writing as myself again? No. I'm still writing as her. She is writing a fake blog on a forum. (Everyone knows it is fake ... but not a fake blog written by a fake person ... although they do know she doesn't write under her real name.) I have assigned myself a minimum of 500 words per day, and it will probably be 79 installments (based on the meme for each installment), unless I get bored with it. (Her followers aren't, so far.) I'll probably end up with 50K words that I won't know what to do with at the end.

I'm not sure what to do. I write more freely under her name. Anything with my name on it becomes self-conscious, lacking her cynicism and frivolity. The wit might still be there, but I feel like I need to be a little more serious because someone is going to judge me by it. (My wife, my friends, my parents ... I'm sure you all know that feeling.)  She can be sappy and romantic or over-emotional, but I have to reign it in.

I suppose I could just wait it out. Finish the concerto, the rewrite of her book (how do I query it? *bangs head*), and write her out of my system until I can get back to Mirror, Mirror or one of my unfinished sci-fi extravaganzas. (Mirror, Mirror might be fatally flawed.)

Or maybe I should just "out" her and resign from all the forums she frequents. *shudders* (She's very popular ... unlike me.) 

I'm busy!! yup I know you are too and to be frank, i can't remember the last time i wasn't busy. or met someone else who wasn't  I can spin you the dit that i'm a single parent, work full time etc etc but you can all replace my activities with ones of your own and be equally buisy and maybe, if you really think about it, more so!!!

but here's the thing, we're all writers or wannabes (in my case anyway) so how the heck do we have the time to something so time consuming as writing a book that, in 98% of cases, no one but our families and friends (and they take up more time!!!) will read.

I ask this simple question as i recently found the Authonomy writing site.  It looked good and then the idea that my book, if good enough, might see a harper collins editor's desk really sold it to me.  But then i see the machanism.  Other readers will vote for my book and if they like it they will 'back it' and if its in the top 5 it goes to the right people.  But people read other people's books who have read theirs!  so to get in the top 5 i need to look at around 200 other peoples books at least (assuming every single one of them loves my awesome book! and why wouldn't they???)  allowing for half of these people not liking my book i can double the time it will take, but i can half it again by only reading snippets of their work and making nice comments.

Either way, with my approximately 4-6 hours a week of 'free writing time' i feel like i have my work cut out.

'stop doing it then!!' i hear you say 'No one makes you do it mate!!'

Nah!!  i love it really!!  I just like a good whine about being busy sometimes!! ;-)