Yikes, a few days behind

The week has been okay, but I have been unusually tired during the afternoon, which is usually my solid writing time.

Anyway, I sent off the finalized User Manual to ChartedCourse. Hooray! Apparently launch for the Program is set to happen on the 20th. Good for them.

Today I finished the restructuring of The Mars Betrayal and I am excited to write it up. That will be tomorrow's job. I will get it all done tomorrow. You might ask why. Well, we writers got an e-mail outlining the timeline expected with our books. They're looking to have them in sales packages come mid year. So maybe July. That means that we need to get stuff done quickly. I need to have this draft ready immediately, and it needs to be good. So I have the skeleton redone and am going over it to make sure there are no plot holes and that characters are motivated well. I am still trying to find a way to flesh out the villain some, but that's kind of hard with the length limitations I have.

I'll find a way.

So with the second, good draft done, I will probably need to submit an art brief regarding artwork I think would work, and where I suppose it ought to go. Then I need to work up some proposals as to what the expository subject matter will be. I'm not sure, but I think I might put together a chronicle of the history of space travel over the last four or five decades.

I still fully intend to finish The Cabin this month. I'll squeeze it in. I'll probably start working on it after kids are in bed, in order to get my 5000 words a day.

Now, onto something more personal. I am, blessedly, back in touch with a wonderful lady who is pretty much my oldest friend. I don't mean that she is older than any other friend I have. I mean she is the only friend I have that has been my friend since I was seventeen. Aside, of course, from the folks I grew up with in the Foundation Faith of God. In other words, Jena is the first friend I made outside of the FFoG.

Anyway, she sent me an e-mail and we have been e-mailing lots this week. So Jena, if you're reading this, thanks for sending that e-mail! I'll keep the mushiness to a minimum here on this blog.

So she lives in Austin, which is a place we've actually (I kid you not) been considering as a place to relocate to. Right now I am heavily into a job search. I even interviewed yesterday for a job I don't really want, but that I could do and probably enjoy doing. And I would enjoy the regular $$ that comes from an 8-5 job too. But what I was going to say was that we've seen several possibilities for employment in Austin, and we like the looks of the place and the housing values down there. Our $$ will go farther down there than here in Utah, and we need a bigger house.

But now it's late and I have to run. I really need to get enough sleep tonight. Of course, I've been up late folding laundry. Oh well. Now the pile's gone anyway. If you don't have four growing, insane kids, you don't know what it is to have a pile of laundry. Whew.

Reporting on my Monday

Okay, it didn't go as well as I had hoped, but lofty ambitions are good.

I was able to get the User Manual finished to the best of what I can do. Still waiting on one more image so I can finish it up.

I headed out for a couple hours, as it turned out, to get some resumes dropped off, as I wanted to try to drum up some more clients for my Proofreading biz. I got some contact info for a Nuskin guy, and then headed to Nature's Sunshine, a big but local herb and health company. I take a massive pile of their herbs every day already, so I know they're good. It turns out that they are looking for a part time copywriter. So I applied for the job! I would expect to hear back about it, although it's a little below my current level. The work would be pretty simplistic and the pay ain't gonna make me millions. But, the thing is, that's fine. I need the work and the money and I can do good work for them. Hey, maybe I'd get a discount on all the herbs I take...

Then I tried to switch over my Drivers License to Utah, as my current one is from Alaska and it is expiring in a month and a half. I need to renew before it expires, as I don't want to have to do a driving test. That didn't happen, because the office here in Provo doesn't do state switch-overs. Arg. I'll probably get it done tomorrow, because I plan on taking the older boys out to Orem to do their Spanish School.

So I got back and went right to work on The Mars Betrayal. It's coming together well; I am still reframing. I didn't get it all reframed, but I will finish tomorrow. I am now at a point where the chapters that are left are pretty well in sync, but I will tweak tomorrow so it is all seamless and has no more plot holes. Then I will do at least one chapter in it.

This means that today I could not work on my passion project: The Cabin. Arg again. I pray I will be able to make the time tomorrow to do so. I really want to get this done. I will have it done by the end of March. I will. Because I want to have it ready for submission by the middle of May.

But that's all for now. That sort of outlines my day tomorrow as well, so I will report on how well it goes tomorrow night. By the way, we have been watching Season 4 of the Office online in order to be caught up when it comes back on TV. That show is genius. And, yes I'm a sap, but I really admire how nicely they're doing the Jim/Pam thing. The show has its heart in the right place. Steve Carell is amazing.

I'm going to be a bestselling author. *Keep telling yourself that.* Okay.

That's all! Thanks for tuning in.

My plan for Monday

A new week, a new day, lots of stuff to get done.

A final report on last week: started a massive rewrite of The Mars Betrayal and am confident in its direction. I did get some work done on The Cabin during the week, and I even did just over a thousand words on Saturday. I also did some work for ChartedCourse, applied for a few jobs, got one response on a part-time freelance job and am now waiting for more information, and tried to professionalize my business. Finally, I won some cash from Helium and broke 800 articles last week.

I'm looking at getting into some real estate invesment this week.

Today I will do the final work (yes there's more) on the ChartedCourse member manual. I'll also get some info from Blake on what he needs me to do next. My guess is that I need to get to work on the other manual; the one for directors.

Then I will continue with the re-framing of The Mars Betrayal, with a plan to finish the reframing and then do chapter 2. Then I want to spend at least two or three hours (maybe more...) on The Cabin. I am eager to work on this book, more than I have been for any other project. I want to do a good job! I want to see where my character is going.

So that's my day. I'll report later.