Not again...

Every year. EVERY year for some asinine reason I either forget or can't participate in free comic book day again. I forgot to go again today. I slept in because I was so tired, started playing some video games and then I looked over at my comic book and it hit me. Picture me screaming clichéd Hollywood "NOOOOOOOO" as I fall to my knees and crumple into a ball on the ground and roll around like a wounded animal. Yes, wounded animals roll around. On the ground. Screaming NOOOOOOO.

So...my plans were thwarted again, but at least I get to go on vacation tomorrow for a week so I'm not too upset. Probably won't get much writing done, so I'm trying to pump out at least a little bit today. I have a new plan to apply for manuscript writing. Despite my forgetfulness, I don't give up easy. I'm thinking work stories this time around. They seemed to be my most successful ones from my other writing classes. I need an outline and some writing done on it. I'm also thinking of using completely new material. I won't recycle like I did last year.

WMRR has been going through some changes. I know EXACTLY how I want chapter 12, so I just need to do the rewrites and filling in for that. We'll see how silly it sounds when it's finished. Chapter 13 is done, but needs a better ending. The one I have at the moment is pretty awful. Chapter 14 is off to a good start, but I have one hurdle to flail over before the words flow the way I want.

It's going to be intense guys. So, very, intense. I am super excited.

My geek week would have been over today with free comic book day so...yeah. Comic con, Avengers midnight premiere, cosplaying and posting tons of LP videos have shown me that I've fully embraced my nerd identity. I'm so proud of myself.

Avengers was the most amazing movie of my life by the way. Well...maybe second most amazing. Lord of the Rings is hard to beat.

Fiction II

The reading was tonight and it went a lot better than I thought it would. I am so proud of my Fiction II class (and the other classes that read). Everyone performed phenomenal and the excerpts chosen were fantastic. I loved to hear from all the wonderful writers who I'm sure will be big names in the future.

As for those chapbooks....they turned out beautiful. We made only nine to start. Oops. More are coming, but the binder could only coil nine in the short time we gave them. I commend their efforts, but I was a little disappointed. I was hoping for at least 25. I will be going back tomorrow to deal with the rest of the books. A lesson in time management this was...meaning do not leave chapbook printing to the DAY before the reading date. Though, truthfully, the printing is the least time-consuming of the process.

So, manuscript writing. I'm going to go for it. I need to come up with a brand new idea for a novel, that isn't genre-centred and that I could theoretically complete within an 8 month period. I think I can do it. Especially with only 3 courses per term next year. In the meantime, I'm going to Hawaii. Jobs, editing and other aspects of life can wait until I'm back (more or less). I'm too happy about this evening to be down about lost opportunities and further work for the summer. I'm just glad I got to spend the evening in good company. VACATION TIME.

Oh yeah...I still have some critiques and a few edits to finish up...

VACATION SOON.

BALLS

So it turns out that the new release date for Republic of Thieves is JANUARY 10, 2012. BALLS AND A HALF. It's enough to make you cry rivers of madness. Yeah, even I don't know what that means. I was hopeful that it would be this year, maybe even October or November...but no. No that hope was dashed today at that fateful Chapters book search station in Chinook. I thought I'd post an update on that here since that's one of the reasons people are actually finding this blog. So...you're welcome?

Man, this book had better be good. At least it hasn't been 12 years (Duke Nukem Forever anyone? Not that I ever played the originals...and the game looks pretty...not what I'd like.)

Also, speaking of stuff that never gets made, published or written...I finished Dan's interlude. Finally. It's long. I'll probably need to cut a few parts out, but I'm not sure which ones yet. That or I need to make Dedrad's part A LOT longer. I probably should anyway because his interlude isn't as interesting.

I can't remember if I mentioned this, but I think that the place I'm going to insert a lot of explanation on the mechanics of my world in Chapter 1. I need to rewrite it anyways because it's...not fitting with the tone of the rest of the story the way I want it to. So right now I have Chapter 1 and Dedrad's Interlude first on the docket for overhaul when I'm done this. If ever.

Lordy I still have a long way to go. There's an element I'm debating about the end. I am no where close to writing it, but need to decide what's going to happen to two of the characters. I'm hoping that the story will just reveal the answer as I write, but either way, I'm not sure if I'll be completely satisfied with either alternative.

I've made tons of progress in the last year. It's funny because I look back to March of last year and I had JUST finished Dedrad's interlude. Calculating the progress from there until now, this means that I will take another two years to finish this. I'm not liking those stats. I'm going to try and get this done before summer 2012 (NOT BECAUSE THE WORLD IS "ENDING"). I'm planning a 3 month trip to Europe that summer and I want the completion of this to be a reason for celebrating with that trip (aside from...you know graduating university...). I have a lot of work to do, and that's not taking into account school work, work work and any other incidents that may crop up in the meantime.

I am also horrible at setting goals and deadlines for myself. Heh, heh.

Tiki Tiki

Disneyland has melted my mind. I have about three ride themes stuck in my head and they just play one after the other over and over and over. I realize for next week I am completely screwed. I have no time to do anything. This trip has been so horrible for productive work (wonderful otherwise in terms of fun). We get up early, spend all day walking, standing and jumping on rides and other transit, then get home late where I'm so tired I can't do much but sit like a blob on my computer for thirty minutes before collapsing in bed. I get back to Calgary on Tuesday and somehow in 2 days I need to finish the annotated bibliography and do a damned good job with it because I'll let my group down otherwise and I'm depending on this project to save my English 408 mark. I also have four critiques to write for my classmates (which I think I'll hand in on the following Tuesday so I can put more time and effort into them...I'm missing class anyway), I need to come up with a music themed story, which I seriously got nothing on, I have a test to study for on Thursday and I still haven't finished editing my friend's novel, which I said I'd have to him last week (I feel so bad about the delay, but there's nothing I can do unless I want to stop sleeping altogether). I'm leaving Thursday evening for a ski trip, so I won't have much time to spare those nights either. The only saving grace is I can still go to class on Wednesday, even though I have a group meeting to attend that day (usually if my group needs to meet I can't go to class because I have to walk my neighbor's dog). I officially declare February a failure in terms of writing. I only wrote a chapter and a half. FML I'm not going to survive this week.

PS - Did I mention I'm going crazy? The only time I've had to myself this week is when I've been in the shower. Sleeping doesn't really count since it's in the same room as three other people. Hotel rooms ftl. Probably why I haven't written anything while I've been away. I need solitude to work.

Frantic-tic-tic-tic

Almost a week has passed since I posted here. My writing has slowed to nearly a stop. The only progress I can claim to have made is a slight clean up of the endings of a few chapters. Other than that I have written the beginning of Dedrad's introduction in between chapter 5 and 6 in my coil notebook on the train. The trick is to avoid the random stares from the other passengers and to cover the writing with an arm as I write so no creepers read over my shoulder. Less awkward questions that way. I'm leaving today. And by today I mean after I sleep, hand in a paper early, pick up the other people traveling with me, be at the airport by 6pm and catch a plane at 9pm (thank you America for your ridiculous security measures which require me to arrive three hours early to take off my shoes and walk through the machines that look under your clothes). I will try and write as much as I can on my trip while trying to spend as much time with my family and boyfriend as possible, while reading and editing a friend's novel, 3 short stories and sources for an annotated bibliography. Yay holidays? I'll stop complaining now and get back to writing the last 500 words of my paper. YEAH ERASMUS AND THE HUMANISTS!