Friday Stuff

I really got back in the groove yesterday. I was rewriting a scene by putting it into a new document (somehow, that makes me feel less like I'm trashing what I already wrote), and then when I pasted it into the manuscript and replaced the old version of the scene, it turned out that I was about 3,000 words ahead of where I'd been. Meanwhile, I cut a huge chunk that didn't get incorporated into the new scene, so I must have written even more than that. I need to review the new scene in context, and there are a few things I need to look up and a couple of things I forgot to put in, but otherwise, I think it's heading in the right direction. I was up until well past midnight outlining what happens next. If I'm good today and get a lot done, then tomorrow I should get to write a big scene I've been looking forward to for a long time. Tomorrow should be productive, as I've decided against going to a writing group meeting (there are times when writing is more important than talking about writing, and I spent last weekend talking about writing) and have declined a social engagement. I always have my best productivity when I know I've given something up in order to work. I guess I feel obligated.

Meanwhile, I seem to have developed a strange new pattern. Normally, I write best in absolute silence or with instrumental/ambient type music (nothing I can sing to). I don't remember how it started (probably a procrastination tactic), but yesterday I opened iTunes and put it on shuffle, and I ended up getting a lot more done. I would hit skip if it came up on a song that annoyed me, and I may have paused to listen when it hit a song I really liked, but that seemed to make the writing time fly, and the words appeared. There were a couple of weird moments, like when a song from my "soundtrack" came up just as I was writing the scene it went with -- and I was using the whole library on shuffle, not the soundtrack, so it was totally random.

In other news, Amazon's shipping continues to be a source of amusement. I placed an order on Tuesday, and as usual, the default was to the "saver" shipping, where it's not quite get it the next day, but it's a lot faster than the free shipping, and when I clicked on the free shipping, it gave the shipping date as nearly a week later, with shipping time around five days. I didn't have a deadline, so I went with the free shipping. The package arrived yesterday -- two days after I placed the order. I'm not sure how the slightly faster 2-3 day shipping could have improved on that, and the super-special express shipping would have had to involve time travel or teleportation to be that much faster. I think they must stretch their projected shipping date when you choose free shipping (it definitely changes when you click on that) to make you think you need to take the paid option if you want to see your order within a month.

Finally, I'm starting to warm to the idea of spring. I wasn't psychologically or emotionally ready to give up blankets and sweaters, and then last week just as I was starting to like the idea of warmth, we got another snowstorm. But now it's creeping up on me again. The Home Depot ad in the paper yesterday got me started thinking about plants and maybe doing some window boxes with flowers and some other container gardening. We have a tendency to get an Easter cold snap, but the long-term forecast shows Easter being warm, so winter weather really may be gone. As part of my break when the book is done, I may fix up my patio for outdoor living.