The Cutting Room Floor
Well, I’m back after letting another week pass without a blog post. I need to post shorter entries, but more often. We’ll see what I actually manage.
Yesterday was a grueling day. I finished the long process of editing Chapter 12 of Nereids. I’d already spent two days working on the first half, and I was bound and determined to put paid to the beastie. At ~15,000 words, it’s a blockbuster chapter. Several reality comments pointed out that it dragged in places, though, so I was determined to streamline it.
At the end of a marathon editing session (involving lots of distractions, half a block of cheese, an apple with some peanut butter, and two Sprite Zeros), I had cut another ~2,000 words. I’m pretty happy with the leaner, meaner Chapter 12. I only cut two major scenes, but you get the gist of them with a bit of macro introduction in the remaining follow-up scene. The lesser cuts were all organic. In other words, a little here, a little there.
Yes, Virginia, there is a Nick Scipio
No, I’m not Santa Claus. Yes, I’m alive.
I didn’t realize that I hadn’t posted a blog entry in nine (!!) days. Sorry. I’ve been busy.
Busy with what, you ask. Why, Nereids, of course.
While I am being a little facetious, I’m also serious. I edited Chapter 6 and sent it off to my editor. When he returned it (quickly, I might add), I let it sit for a few days before I made changes and added illustration notes. Then I sent it off to the Ruthie’s Club editor.
After that, I spent a couple of leisurely days editing Chapter 7. I had a lot of real-world things to do in the meantime, though, and I didn’t finish editing Ch7 until a day or two ago. But I sent it off to my editor and began work on Ch8. I finished it today and sent it off as well.
Nip and Tuck
I’ve had a busy week, both at work and in my personal life. Work has been… well… there’s a reason they call it “work.” In my personal life, I’ve been taking a breather from writing. I still have editing to do on Nereids (along with a bit of writing), but I haven’t been in the mood to do it. I’ve had too many other distractions, from the new MacBook to any of a dozen other things. That’s how I work, though. Writing is sometimes a distraction from other things.
Last night, all the kids and grandkids were over. We have family night the first Saturday of every month. It used to be family game night, where we’d play games like Cranium, Apples to Apples, or something similar. But with babies and toddlers, we don’t do much game-playing anymore. Mostly, I get a chance to cook for a large group, and we end up playing with the kids and trying to have a conversation or watch something on TV. You know, veg time.
Last night, I cooked shrimp. My father went down to his local shrimp guy and bought jumbo shrimp, 20-22ct beasties. Then he overnighted a styrofoam cooler with the shrimp packed in ice. So, I have my very own source of fresh seafood, fresh from the Gulf. Nice, huh?
I’ll never, EVER mention a date again…
From this morning’s mail bag:
Well it’s already been 6 weeks now since you said you were gonna start writing Book 4, so have you started yet or are you being lazy again?
It was anonymous, of course, and from AOL, natch.
My imagined response?
Yes, you fucking nitwit, I’ve been flogging my fingers to the bone for your fucking entertainment, and I decided to write something else in the meantime. I’m sorry, you unappreciative piece of shit. I’ll try to write your free fucking erotica on a more timely basis.
Ugh and fucking double ugh!
I’m tempted to change the SC-B4 page to read: “When? When I’m good and goddamned ready, that’s when!”
But on a more realistic note, I think this last Anonymous Fuckwit Feedback will break me of the habit of ever mentioning a date, tentative or otherwise. Too many dipshits in the world, and they drown out the nice people.
Fucking morons.
[venting complete]
- Nick
My Life With the MacBook Kult
Well, I’ve had the shiny white MacBook for almost a week now. UPS delivered it at 2pm last Wednesday, along with another package with RAM and a few other things. I took the computer out of the box and went through the first-time setup routine. It found my wireless network and seamlessly logged on (in true Mac style, it didn’t show any security specifics… it simply detected my encryption and asked for a password).
After I made sure everything worked out of the box, I shut it down and read the manual about how to upgrade the memory. It wasn’t the easiest upgrade I’ve ever done, but it was pretty easy. And from what I’ve heard about older iBooks and PowerBooks, the MacBook is an absolute breeze to upgrade RAM and HD. Anyway, when I restarted, the system told me I had 2Gb of RAM, running at 667MHz, which was what it should’ve told me.
I’m alive!
Sorry I haven’t posted anything in a while. Not surprisingly, I’ve been busy with my shiny new MacBook. I’ve also been busy with lots of other things, but the MacBook is the most fun. (Well, that’s not entirely true… I did host a nice party Saturday. That was fun.)
Anyway, I have two or three posts of stuff to write, so I’ll start with the big news: I finished primary writing on Nereids today, and sent Chapter 12 off to my reality team. Now, I still have lots of work to do to finish it for good, but this was a big milestone.
In the future work category, I need to address my reality team’s comments about Chapter 11. I basically put that off till I finished Ch12. And once the team gets back with comments on 12, I’ll have to make revisions. So I still have some writing ahead of me. And the two final chapters comprise more than 26,000 words, so that’s a lot of editing. Granted, I’ve already done a good top-level editing pass on each chapter, but I’ll end up doing another 1-2 full passes on each.