Even Though I Made The Game, I Wasn't Thinking About It
I thought it was going to take the weekend and me collecting my thoughts to get me back on the writing track. At work this afternoon (I ended up going in after all though if this were an NBA injury report, I'm day-to-day for tomorrow and Friday and if it was an NFL injury report, I'm Probable for tomorrow) I was actually fretting that I was done for. It's a bit early in the month for that to be sure but people have dropped out over less than writer's block.
But tonight I got back in track by jumping ahead a little bit to a couple of ideas that I had earlier in the month. The one that provided the most word count was having the narrator talk about Little Green Envelope sex. At the kickoff party, I thought it was a good idea (or at least a funny one) to have them engage in human activities - including that. But as the month has actually begun, I decided that the story was better told by keeping boundaries between the Little Green Envelope world and the human one.
So instead I think I wrote an amusing section of the novel:
I know that some of you humans are probably getting all sorts of ideas and asking all sorts of questions about us Little Green Envelopes by this point in the narrative. You’re probably saying to yourself “do they do what you humans do in the room with the bed?” or “do they ever want to switch their genders?” or “do they ever want to send themselves to the incinerator?”
The answers to those questions are “no,” “sometimes it happens by mistake but we don’t attempt to,” and “no.”
But the first question is the one that’s most important here as I’ve raised the subject. It would be virtually impossible for us to do that messy thing that you humans do in the room with the bed. After all, we can’t move ourselves. And we all have the exact same parts (and we’re lacking the parts that you humans have that lets you do that messy thing in the room with the bed). But if you want to picture how that would work if it could, then go ahead with your own narrative in your “brains.”
I wouldn’t be surprised if you humans sometimes take two of us envelopes, lip the flaps and start to put the corner of one of us into the open slot of the other trying to imitate the messy thing that you humans do in the room with the bed. And of course you wouldn’t even know that you’ve got a good chance of smashing together two males or two females. Which there is, of course, nothing wrong with. We Little Green Envelopes appreciate our brothers and sisters from that genre a lot. But I know that I’ve just disgusted quite a few of you humans with that thought so I’ll quit fast forwarding.
But first, can I just say for the record that we would get no enjoyment out of that act the way you humans seem to. In fact, it’s actually quite painful when you smash us together in any way or pile us on top of each other (though it does make it easier to converse close together since we can’t control our volume) or bury us or put out fires with us or kill insects with us by smacking us against “the wall” and crushing them. I don’t know why you humans think that because of our physical appearance we’re so good for doing all of those things when really all we’re supposed to be used for is carrying movies through the mail.
So if you get nothing else out of this narrative, just remember that fact.
I felt a public service announcement preview right there. I’m sorry.
And I finally had the Little Green Envelope come in contact with the Little Green romance Envelope that Kate had rented and which she watched the night before she broke up with Andy and left. I know I had planned that in advance but I don't know when I was going to put that in. I figured it was going to be just before the story moved out of the apartment by the envelopes being sent back. And I think it still is.
I think I'm getting close to the end of part one of the novel. I even made "part" markers. Since the novel is "Pets, Drugs, and Fireworks" part one is called "Pets." Part two is going to be called "Drugs." And, I know everyone is going to have figured this out by this point, part three is going to be called "Fireworks."
Part one has a lot of the mention of the cat that Andy owns so I think it makes logical sense. Part two is going to have Hoodie dragging Andy to a party where a Bruce Lee movie is going to be shown as background entertainment and where there will be some crazy activities so that goes along with the "drugs." I've yet to have any reason to call part three "fireworks" yet but I'm thinking the story is going to end around the fourth of July. And there will be quite a few emotional fireworks since it's the third act.
Part one has really been sort of mundane like "pets" would indicate. It hasn't left the first apartment so it's very fitting. I just hope if anyone reads this, they can survive "Pets" and get to the, hopefully, more exciting "Drugs" and "Fireworks."
I've also had a lot of exposition by the Little Green Envelope in part one so it's almost like he's treating the humans as "pets" (ironic since he has no control over them and is the possession and not them). But since the three acts of a traditional novel are introduction, conflict, and resolution, I think I'm fine with the "pets" chapters being that way.
At least I'm justifying the novel thusfar in that way.
I think at 14,000 words (13,981) like I am now I'm needing to get a little more conflict into the story and I will very soon. Pets really needs to transition into drugs post-haste.
---
13,981 means I'm now on pace to reach 60,000 words this month. But the Word War has made me feel pretty inferior in that regards. As usual Toronto's got this one person who's decided to set their sights on 150,000 words. This one isn't 12 though so that's good.
They have stated that they are going to reach 50,000 tonight.
I look at my novel and I guess there's nothing that I haven't written thusfar that I couldn't have written in the first night or two if I had really pinned myself to my chair. Well except that very meta first fight scene since my roommate was vacuuming obsessively on the 2nd. But had I found something else for them to fight about it could have worked just as well.
I keep thinking part of my problem is I'm breaking at weird points. I'm leaving myself wanting to write the next chapter and all but I'm sometimes breaking mid-thought from exhaustion or whatever. I look back to my 2004 novel, still the most successful and thinking that I wrote that only a chapter at a time. If I couldn't finish the chapter, I wouldn't start it. Of course, those chapter were only about 1,000 words so I could do that. These are five or six pages a piece.
Next year I am going to write chapter to chapter again. I just have to get a story that's more easy to serialize.
---
Speaking of the Word War, Chicago won round one! I'm shocked to be honest, but the final standings for October 1-6, 2007 were as follows:
1. Chicago: 580286
2. New York City: 572825
3. Toronto: 533111
Of course the only standings that matter are November 1, 2007. Still this is the first time we've ever been ahead of Toronto in any count so I'm psyched.
I've actually put together a Rhapsody playlist of all-Canadian artists to egg myself on. It contains The Tragically Hip, Our Lady Peace, Barenaked Ladies, Bruce Cockburn, Leonard Cohen, and Neil Young.
There's no real soundtrack for my novel yet which is why I probably don't have the feel of it yet but maybe that's for this weekend. I'm too busy writing right now for that.
---
I have some thoughts on dialog but I think I'm going to go back to writing and try to hit 15,000 tonight (some people are going for 20,000 today but I'm nowhere close even if I wrote for a solid two or three hours).
But tonight I got back in track by jumping ahead a little bit to a couple of ideas that I had earlier in the month. The one that provided the most word count was having the narrator talk about Little Green Envelope sex. At the kickoff party, I thought it was a good idea (or at least a funny one) to have them engage in human activities - including that. But as the month has actually begun, I decided that the story was better told by keeping boundaries between the Little Green Envelope world and the human one.
So instead I think I wrote an amusing section of the novel:
I know that some of you humans are probably getting all sorts of ideas and asking all sorts of questions about us Little Green Envelopes by this point in the narrative. You’re probably saying to yourself “do they do what you humans do in the room with the bed?” or “do they ever want to switch their genders?” or “do they ever want to send themselves to the incinerator?”
The answers to those questions are “no,” “sometimes it happens by mistake but we don’t attempt to,” and “no.”
But the first question is the one that’s most important here as I’ve raised the subject. It would be virtually impossible for us to do that messy thing that you humans do in the room with the bed. After all, we can’t move ourselves. And we all have the exact same parts (and we’re lacking the parts that you humans have that lets you do that messy thing in the room with the bed). But if you want to picture how that would work if it could, then go ahead with your own narrative in your “brains.”
I wouldn’t be surprised if you humans sometimes take two of us envelopes, lip the flaps and start to put the corner of one of us into the open slot of the other trying to imitate the messy thing that you humans do in the room with the bed. And of course you wouldn’t even know that you’ve got a good chance of smashing together two males or two females. Which there is, of course, nothing wrong with. We Little Green Envelopes appreciate our brothers and sisters from that genre a lot. But I know that I’ve just disgusted quite a few of you humans with that thought so I’ll quit fast forwarding.
But first, can I just say for the record that we would get no enjoyment out of that act the way you humans seem to. In fact, it’s actually quite painful when you smash us together in any way or pile us on top of each other (though it does make it easier to converse close together since we can’t control our volume) or bury us or put out fires with us or kill insects with us by smacking us against “the wall” and crushing them. I don’t know why you humans think that because of our physical appearance we’re so good for doing all of those things when really all we’re supposed to be used for is carrying movies through the mail.
So if you get nothing else out of this narrative, just remember that fact.
I felt a public service announcement preview right there. I’m sorry.
And I finally had the Little Green Envelope come in contact with the Little Green romance Envelope that Kate had rented and which she watched the night before she broke up with Andy and left. I know I had planned that in advance but I don't know when I was going to put that in. I figured it was going to be just before the story moved out of the apartment by the envelopes being sent back. And I think it still is.
I think I'm getting close to the end of part one of the novel. I even made "part" markers. Since the novel is "Pets, Drugs, and Fireworks" part one is called "Pets." Part two is going to be called "Drugs." And, I know everyone is going to have figured this out by this point, part three is going to be called "Fireworks."
Part one has a lot of the mention of the cat that Andy owns so I think it makes logical sense. Part two is going to have Hoodie dragging Andy to a party where a Bruce Lee movie is going to be shown as background entertainment and where there will be some crazy activities so that goes along with the "drugs." I've yet to have any reason to call part three "fireworks" yet but I'm thinking the story is going to end around the fourth of July. And there will be quite a few emotional fireworks since it's the third act.
Part one has really been sort of mundane like "pets" would indicate. It hasn't left the first apartment so it's very fitting. I just hope if anyone reads this, they can survive "Pets" and get to the, hopefully, more exciting "Drugs" and "Fireworks."
I've also had a lot of exposition by the Little Green Envelope in part one so it's almost like he's treating the humans as "pets" (ironic since he has no control over them and is the possession and not them). But since the three acts of a traditional novel are introduction, conflict, and resolution, I think I'm fine with the "pets" chapters being that way.
At least I'm justifying the novel thusfar in that way.
I think at 14,000 words (13,981) like I am now I'm needing to get a little more conflict into the story and I will very soon. Pets really needs to transition into drugs post-haste.
---
13,981 means I'm now on pace to reach 60,000 words this month. But the Word War has made me feel pretty inferior in that regards. As usual Toronto's got this one person who's decided to set their sights on 150,000 words. This one isn't 12 though so that's good.
They have stated that they are going to reach 50,000 tonight.
I look at my novel and I guess there's nothing that I haven't written thusfar that I couldn't have written in the first night or two if I had really pinned myself to my chair. Well except that very meta first fight scene since my roommate was vacuuming obsessively on the 2nd. But had I found something else for them to fight about it could have worked just as well.
I keep thinking part of my problem is I'm breaking at weird points. I'm leaving myself wanting to write the next chapter and all but I'm sometimes breaking mid-thought from exhaustion or whatever. I look back to my 2004 novel, still the most successful and thinking that I wrote that only a chapter at a time. If I couldn't finish the chapter, I wouldn't start it. Of course, those chapter were only about 1,000 words so I could do that. These are five or six pages a piece.
Next year I am going to write chapter to chapter again. I just have to get a story that's more easy to serialize.
---
Speaking of the Word War, Chicago won round one! I'm shocked to be honest, but the final standings for October 1-6, 2007 were as follows:
1. Chicago: 580286
2. New York City: 572825
3. Toronto: 533111
Of course the only standings that matter are November 1, 2007. Still this is the first time we've ever been ahead of Toronto in any count so I'm psyched.
I've actually put together a Rhapsody playlist of all-Canadian artists to egg myself on. It contains The Tragically Hip, Our Lady Peace, Barenaked Ladies, Bruce Cockburn, Leonard Cohen, and Neil Young.
There's no real soundtrack for my novel yet which is why I probably don't have the feel of it yet but maybe that's for this weekend. I'm too busy writing right now for that.
---
I have some thoughts on dialog but I think I'm going to go back to writing and try to hit 15,000 tonight (some people are going for 20,000 today but I'm nowhere close even if I wrote for a solid two or three hours).
posted by incendiarymind at 7:59 PM
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