Hey Folks,
A new, educational quote about writing, especially for any beginning writers and rewriters out there:
“If you write one story [or novel], it may be bad; if you write a hundred, you have the odds in your favor.” — Edgar Rice Burroughs
***
Well, I wrote some today. But I had a thing, a clingy thing, in the back of my mind, bugging me.
I was supposed to receive a UPS package (cigars) yesterday, but coincidentally, yesterday was the day our road (an alley, really) was closed as workers were putting in a new gas line and something else. Water, maybe. My delivery was delayed by a day.
Of course, if UPS came today and the road was still closed… lather, rinse, repeat.
So I talked with one of the workers to find out when the excavation would be finished and the impassible hole filled. He said by 4 p.m. today.
Four p.m.? But UPS comes at noon-ish! This was, as a famous idiot once said, a situation “up with which I would not put.”
Sigh. Me being who I am, the grumbling thought accompanied me to the Hovel. And it stuck with me as I wrote. And around 10:20, after I went to the PO, mostly to work off some nerves, it was still resident in the vicinity of my brain-housing group.
So I did what I do best: I made a decision. Yes, it was a rash decision, and most of the better ones are. And certainly my decisions aren’t always the best, especially with the benefit of 20-20 hindsight, but I’m really good at sticking to them.
So I put myself and a book of Donald Hall’s essays and a cigar in my truck, locked the babies in the house, and drove via an alternate route (apparently unknown to UPS) to sit by the highway (in the sun) and watch for the big brown truck.
I parked at 10:30. Between Hall’s long, ponderous literary paragraphs and looking up to keep an eye on traffic, I still managed to get through 27 pages of essays. Most of them are short, so that was actually about 15 essays.
My plan was to see the big brown truck coming, then jump out and flag him down. Or, failing that, I’d follow him around town until he stopped, then accost him and ask him for my order.
And sure enough, a few minutes after 12, the big brown truck showed up.
I dived out of the passenger seat (it was out of the direct sun so only about 92°) and ran around to the driver’s seat. I plopped my shorts-clad legs on hot black leather, started the truck and —
watched the big brown truck brake sharply and turn down the same alternate, pitted, potholed, booby-trapped driveway I’d used an hour and a half earlier.
They aren’t supposed to do that, but MY UPS guy is a GOOD UPS guy. If he weren’t so masculine I probably would’ve kissed him.
Anyway, he apologized profusely, hand-delivered my cigars, climbed back into the big brown truck and headed out.
I’m not a good enough guy to have driven after him to make sure got through the pitted, pot-holed, etc. driveway, but I did wish him well.
Besides, I couldn’t tear myself away from my packages: two boxes of cigars, with which I immediately began filling my humidors.
So instead of writing for that hour and a half, I chose (foolishly, as it turns out) to wait along the road for a guy who planned to take care of me all along.
Blessed be the insane, for they are watched over. And blessed be the UPS for enabling me.
Of Interest
See “6 Ways to Help Your Make-Believe Evidence Collection More Believable” at https://www.leelofland.com/6-ways-to-help-your-make-believe-evidence-collection-more-believable/.
See “Killing Sacred Cows — Or Maybe Not…” at https://killzoneblog.com/2018/08/killing-sacred-cows-or-maybe-not.html. (If you don’t care for lengthy, syrupy intros, scroll down to “Never Open With the Weather.”)
See “Live Question Sessions with Me and Kris” at https://www.deanwesleysmith.com/live-question-sessions-with-me-and-kris/. If you’re interested in supporting the Kickstarter, read the next post too.
Talk with you again soon.
Fiction Words: 2511
Nonfiction Words: 690 (Journal)
So total words for the day: 3201
Writing of Old Endings (Nick Spalding 1)
Brought forward…… 17778 words
Day 1…… 1449 words. Total words to date…… 19227
Day 2…… 1611 words. Total words to date…… 20838
Day 3…… 3169 words. Total words to date…… 24007
Day 4…… 3077 words. Total words to date…… 27084
Day 5…… 2146 words. Total words to date…… 29230
Day 6…… 3882 words. Total words to date…… 33112
Day 7…… 2511 words. Total words to date…… 35623
Total fiction words for the month……… 53742
Total fiction words for the year………… 302039
Total nonfiction words for the month… 18000
Total nonfiction words for the year…… 116286
Total words for the year (fiction and this blog)…… 418075
Calendar Year 2018 Novels to Date………………………… 6
Calenday Year 2018 Novellas to Date…………………… 2
Calendar Year 2018 Short Stories to Date……… 11
Novels (since Oct 19, 2014)………………………………………… 32
Novellas (since Nov 1, 2015)……………………………………… 6
Short stories (since Apr 15, 2014)………………………… 193