First, the cry for help. It’s not for me. Saladin Ahmed’s debut novel, THRONE OF THE CRESCENT MOON, was published earlier this year. It takes a lot of courage to write what he wrote yesterday and there’s also a free short story. Go. Read. Support. I COMMAND THEE. (The link opens in a separate window so you can click on it and it will open unobtrusively and still be there after you read my glorious word-angels below. Just so you know.)
So, I went to a quilting evening last night, which was great because I got to work out the scene list for my latest idea while looking at pretty quilts for an hour and a half. And I got to spend time with my mum, which was also lovely. And meet some new people. So lots of good stuff. And this was after I’d run nearly 2.5 miles for week 4 of Couch to 5k.
One word: OUCH.
Or maybe: HYPERVENTILATION.
My vision went a bit blurry a couple of times, but I managed the five minute runs, which gave me a tremendous feeling of achievement. Or would have done if I hadn’t then had to get up three flights of stairs to my flat afterwards, which effectively wiped my brain of any coherent thought.
I would like to say at this point how GOOD GODDAMN PROUD I am of myself and Leona Bushman. Seven weeks in and we’re both going strong, and both seeing results from all our hard work. I wouldn’t have got this far without her.
After I worked up the scene list, I also wrote out the titles of all the various shorts, books and novellas I have in the works. There are a lot of them. The five short stories are all committed to other people. The longest deadline on those isn’t yet set. The second longest is for my Weird Science For Women anthology (Fox Spirit – squee). I need a diary to write this stuff down in.
Then there are the novels. All five of them. Most of them have been written or had a lot of development go into them at some point or other and I don’t want to let the ideas die.
The novellas have also had a lot of development and often actual writing happen. They need to get written, too. Particularly as they’re good candidates for self-publishing, being too short for trad markets. They’re based in the Nexus universe and I really like those stories. Even though one of them is very sad.
I also need to edit stuff for Leona. She’s got deadlines of her own. I can’t just leave her high and dry while I sort out my own stuff.
My time seems to have telescoped recently. Between full-time work and running after work, the hours just vanish. And of course, they can’t. I have stuff to do! Opportunities to seize with both hands and make my bitch. I can’t let any of these things slide, and what’s more, I don’t want to. I want to write these stories. They fascinate me, or I wouldn’t have got as far as developing the ideas in the first place. Various people are telling me their ideas for the shorts they’re going to write for WSFW and it makes me grin in a distinctly Cheshire Cat-like fashion. Their stories. My antho. My word baby. Or rather their word babies going into my word baby to create a… word toddler?
Mmm, methinks this analogy just collapsed.
Anyway, I have a lot of things to do, and I’m not willing to stop doing any of them. So I need a diary. That way I can write all the things, run all the running days, make a handbag or two and… what else? Oh, sleep? Eat? And do the office job.
I think I’ll stop by WHSmith’s this evening on my way home from work. I need a diary…
