Veerry late on Tuesday night

and here I am. I just get this momentum and then my character, Josh Kerr, just takes me along for the ride. It's exciting, but my sleeping patterns are all wack.

I started the day at 51,324 words. I am ending my day at 56,338.

I know I said I saw 6-8000 words to go, like last week. But now I am seeing about that number still. So The Cabin will likely hit 65,000 words in its first draft form. That'll happen this week. Tomorrow I'm going to write like a madman.

I feel good about this story. It's one I am loving to tell and I believe others will love to read it.

And on the adding romance front, it's a go. It's difficult, but I think it's going well.

Remember to check me out on Facebook, find my Writer Page and become a fan, and also to check out my other blog. Oh, and definitely take a look at the family blog that Annemarie's working on.

carpe somnium

I'm going to be a bestselling writer.

Oh! I have to share! I entered a community boards contest on www.helium.com. I hadn't done that before, but thought it would be fun. The contest was to write something that made readers laugh out loud.

I won the contest! Here's a link to my humorous piece: http://www.helium.com/items/1122547-humorous-story-about-meditation

Hope you enjoy!

Look! It's not the middle of the night!

Here I am! Peek a boo! Inai inai ba!

Okay, sorry there. Hehe.

I got it all done! Woohoo!

I was able to tune out distractions for the most part and did exactly what I set out to do today. Here's the play-by-play (for any March Madness addicts, which I am not one of.. and I won't apologize for it).

Helium.com
I set out to write three articles for www.helium.com and I did so. The first one I did was a journalistic piece about a doomsday cult in Russia. They rejected the first version, saying it wouldn't be timeless, so I rewrote it as a commentary and I have high hopes of seeing it published. I am trying to develop journalism skills so that I can become more attractive to clients and employers.

I also rewrote, completely, an article that had been deleted due to length. The third article I wrote was for a contest, and it is sitting happily at the top of its title group. One of the articles I wrote last week for this contest is the last one in its group, and that's really ticking me off. It's like that group isn't being rated or something. Mine was the first article in the title, which isn't always the best thing, so I have some hope that its position will improve over the rating period for this contest. But I intend to write at least one more contest article tomorrow.

Anyhoo, here are the links to the articles I wrote today which are active on Helium:
http://www.helium.com/items/965542-while-expert-speak-sloppy
http://www.helium.com/items/965490-minimum-nothing-shake-stick

The article about the doomsday cult should be active in a day or two. I'll post the link here when it shows up.

Then I rated on Helium for a solid hour. Whew. It can get very dull, but I listened to music while I did it. I have to keep this up, because I must get all the money from the Reward-a-thon.

The Cabin
So then I emerged from the office and found everybody asleep. It was just after 3PM and it was time to get the older boys from Spanish School. Annemarie woke up as I came out and looked blearily around. She was having Braxton Hicks contractions for much of the day and was wiped out by 9PM. Poor lady.

Anyway, I said I would go get the lads and I did so. I got back about 4 PM and got to work on The Cabin soon after. With a break for dinner, clean up and bedtime routines, I finally got back to it just before 9PM. I stopped a few minutes ago having added about 5200 words to it! Wahoo. Boy howdy, this character is going places I wasn't really expecting. But it's a good time. A really good time.

So that's my day. I got some responses from a couple job apps that I sent out. One wants me to come in for an interview, but that's in Austin, so that's kind of hard. Plus, they call the position Marketing Associate, but I get the feeling that this is a euphemism for sales rep. No thanks.

The other is for a job with a local company that I applied to do some freelance work with. They turned me down for that, but I figured I would see about being their staff writer, as it's a company that looks professional and to be going places. They want sample web copy, so I sent an e-mail back to clarify instructions and hope to hear back tomorrow.

What will be will be. I will keep trying to learn this craft. Gonna read Stephen King's On Writing Well again, this time with an eye to learning from a master. I hope to find a workshop in the coming weeks where I can take my work to.

That's all for now. Gonna be a bestselling author.

carpe somnium

Good Friday (not the one before Easter)

Just wanted to write up a quick post. Today was good. Blake finally got me the stuff and the instructions I needed in order to finish up the User Manual. Whew. So I thought I would be able to get it done and still have a couple hours in the afternoon to work on The Cabin, but I was wrong, wrong wrong. Proofreading a 176 page document takes a long time. So I was actually working on it until just about 7PM today, with a break for lunch and for dinner and for a scooter ride in the rain.

So I wasn't able to get anything done on the current novel today, but I still have high hopes for next week. If I can do 5000 words each day, I will hit 45,000 words for the book, and I really think that will probably do it. But I am also open to letting the book go where it needs to. I know the climaxes and the important scenes, but the spaces in between can be as big and detailed as they need to be.

So tomorrow I will pick up my first check for my work for ChartedCourse. That's pretty exciting. It won't be very big, but it's a start. I have done almost 40 hours of work for ChartedCourse by now for the month of February, so that'll be a better check, but it's still not paying the bills.

Gonna keep at it. Gonna write a bestseller. Gonna make this work.