wishweaver did not have a good day today, so I wound up taking off at lunchtime from work and coming home. She felt well enough not to go to the doctor, but she was either fighting off a bad virus or she got some bad food yesterday. Much unfun was had by all.

I decided to go ahead and take all day off tomorrow also. We are supposed to have some company coming by tomorrow, so I'll want to use tomorrow morning to get as much done as I can. I did push on today and wound up adding 995 words to Shadows. I also completed the edits on Chapters 17-19. That leaves six chapters to edit between now and Monday. Still going to be close, but we'll keep plugging away. I'm a little less concerned than I was Monday night.

I'm already plotting out things to do once this is done. None of them has anything to do with writing, unless you consider the work I'm going to do on getting my web site back operational as writing. I have a stack of anime that needs to be watched, a stack of older and newer movies I need to watch, an entirely too tall pile of books to be read and some serious video gaming I need to get back on. (If nothing else, I need to finish up Xenosaga II. I've been ready to move onto the last big section in that one since last summer. Just got distracted and never sat down and finished.)

In some ways, Monday can NOT get here soon enough.
______________________________________________________________________________

Words for Today

995 / 1000 words. 100%

Progress on SG-1: Shadows of the Heart

87257 / 80000 words. 109%

Progress on Shadows of the Heart's revisions

19 / 25 chapters. 76%

Words for 2009

78753 / 365000 words. 22%

Well, I had to take a day of leave to stay home with the sick kid. I was thinking, this won't be too bad. Since I didn't work on Steel on Target last night, I can get some extra writing in today.

Then I fell back asleep.

When I woke up, the daughter-unit was feeling a little better, so I took her out for lunch and then we watched a couple of Elemental Gelade disks. We're down to the final one now, but we saved it for later. Then I came upstairs to write and just fiddled around on the computer doing "stuff".

Maybe I was just tired of writing in the guest bedroom. So I bundled everything downstairs to write at the kitchen table. Pulled up my file, reread what I wrote this past weekend and go started.

And stopped.

So, I took a break. Maybe I was trying too hard. Fiddled around with some more stuff, played a little Xenosaga II and came back to the computer.

Still felt like I was wading through mollasses.

But, I did hit 1103 words, so it wasn't a complete failure. Just didn't get the extra words in I had hoped for. Maybe tomorrow night, since I'm still waiting to hear from April on the edits for Chapter Eight on Shattered Mirror.

Or maybe I'll work on one of those short stories I've been threatening to write and start shipping around.

Right now, it's time for relaxing and music.

Night, everyone.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Words for Today

1103 / 1000 words. 110%

Progress on Steel on Target

36911 / 90000 words. 41%

Words for 2008

112982 / 366000 words. 31%

Following klingonguy's lead, I've been slowly uploading my library into Library Thing. I also ordered one of those cute little Cue Cats to help speed up the process. Although, I'm finding it's having trouble with bar codes from books over ten years old. So, I foresee lots of typing in ISBNs in the near future.

Still, it'll be nice to finally have a list of all of wishweaver's and my books somewhere. Nothing aggravates me more than not being able to remember if I have a copy of something already until I've already bought it and see it sitting there on the shelf mocking me.

I've added a little toy on my profile page. Library Thing will be posting random books from my library there, so if you ever wondered just what the heck I read but don't want to wander all the way to Library Thing to check out my library, then I'll just bring my library to you. *grin*

OK, I'm a geek. What can I say?

Besides, it gave me an excuse to get a Read or Die (R.O.D.) avatar.

Work, to be polite, has been a real pain in my fourth point of contact lately and today was no exception. I was pretty whupped by the time I got home so I had to make a decision. I could write or I could finish preparing my "Collecting Anime Cels" panel for NASFiC. But, there wasn't enough energy to do both.

*pondering* Hmm, work on a project with no real deadline or work on a project that's due in three days. */pondering*

So, once again showing that even a computer idiot like myself can work in Adobe, I began editing the fourteen cels I'd scanned into the system yesterday. I think they turned out pretty well and I've added them into the slide show presentation for the convention. I am bringing my actual cels with me simply because if I don't, the convention center will certainly have no A/V support for my panel. (Murphy was an optimist, I'm convinced after these past two weeks at work.) It'll be harder to do the panel with hard copy instead of projected images, but better something than nothing.

Course, no one could show up for the panel . . . but that's another gremlin sitting on my shoulder cackling.

Still, it's done. All I have to do is upload it onto my Sony UX-290P and a thumb drive for back-up and I'm as ready for this panel as I can be.

Keep your fingers crossed that I don't run into a degausser between here and St. Louis. *grin*

Just couldn't get started this evening.

Did knock out about 650 words on Dragon Couchant, but not quite certain how many of them I'm going to keep when I revisit this tomorrow night. For some reason, this chapter isn't going quite where I thought it would, and the confrontation between Asheera and an old nemesis isn't tense enough yet.

Still, I don't want to spend massive amounts of time working on this chapter. I'll try to tighten it up tomorrow night and then push on. I can always fix it in the first rewrite.

Also, been busy today trying to explain to a young writer that contacting an anime company with fifty pages of story ideas on how to "fix" how their anime ended and where they'd like to take the story with their novelizations was not quite the way to get started in the media tie-in racket.

I'm thinking I'm going to try and take what I posted on that other board and post it here (with some judicious editing) and hopefully kradical, terri_osborne, daytonward, tiggeralyn and the others will pitch in with comments and suggestions. There's a ton of knowledge out there regarding Media Tie-in work, if a person is willing to ask.

And remember, Media Tie-in work is not fan-fic. It has a very special set of rules that let you play in someone else's sandbox with their toys, and the license holder is not always very forgiving if you break them.

Wow.

I was skimming through Bill Hollbrook's Kevin and Kell site and found an old link to the Compuserve Comics and Anime forum. That brought back some great memories.

Back in 1994, I was just getting started in comics (not that I ever got very far in comics, but that's a different story), and I was just migrating from Prodigy to Compuserve because that's where anyone who was anyone in comics hung out. Damn, looking back on that now, I can say I used to hobnob with Peter David, Warren Ellis, John Byrne, Bob Ingersoll, Tony Isabella, Rob Davis, Jim Valentino, Joe Monks, Bernie Wrightson, Dave Olbrich and a host of others I'm certain I'll remember as soon as I finish this entry. I got to see a number of people get started in the industry too like Sean McKeever and Paul Storie. Good guys and gals.

Plus, I had the opportunity to meet and visit with a number of retailers like Gib Bickel of the Laughing Ogre in Columbus OH, the late Lee Tenant of Chicago, and Brian Hibbs in San Francisco. There was a lot of wisdom available for a new comic writer/publisher available if you were willing to listen.

The Wednesday Evening Chat was fast, furious and a hell of a lot of fun. I made a lot of good friends and it was fun to have the Compuserve get-togethers at ChicagoCon and Dragon*Con.

I also got introduced into the wonderful world of Anime and Manga there. I remember the people who got the Japanese versions of Pokemon and such and played the games, giving us a walk through while they translated from the Japanese. It was fun to get to see what a game would be like long before it ever reached America. Plus, this was the height of fan-subs and getting copies of anime videos direct from Japan . . . series that still to this day have never been translated into English.

Then, things changed. DC began requiring their people to post on AOL more, then people began setting up their own web sites with their own message boards and the group began to scatter. There are places out on the net where writers hang out now, there was something about the dynamics of the Comics Forum that is almost impossible to replicate these days.

Well, after seeing the link on Bill's site, I decided to see what was going on back in my old stomping grounds. I really wish I hadn't. AOL (who bought out Compuserve) dumped the forums out onto the web, cutting out a lot of the old users who did most of their stuff off-line using readers. There are about six people keeping the forum alive these days.

It's true, you can never go home again. But, still, tonight, I'll raise a glass to Doug Pratt, Chris Swett and the Comics and Anime Forums. Gentlemen, you fought the good fight and gave this old guy a whole lot of entertainment. I can't thank you enough for that.

All right. Ravencon is coming up this weekend.

Unfortunately, a gazillion things are all converging on me at the same time, so if I'm going to the convention there's stuff to do. To quote an old song, "There's a long way to go and a short time to get there".

Tonight, I spent 4.5 hours filling out paperwork for work that had to be done by Thursday.

By Thursday COB, I have to finish the history project (around going to class on Wednesday night).

Before I leave for Richmond, I need to review my Anime slide show for Ravencon and ensure it's on the computer AND on the thumb drive. Also, I need to remember to take the floppy keyboard for the palmtop computer so I can finish the first edits on The Price of Conviction while I'm at the show.

Plus, I need to finish up my lab assignment for class on Monday and prepare for a test on Monday night.

Also, I need to finish some edits on Shattered Mirror by Friday next week.

And, getting started on Demons and Devils would be a good idea.

Not to mention, getting back to submitting Harbinger to agents, and The Demon's Head to the short story market.

Oh, yeah, spending some time with family would be good.

*sigh*

Here is my current schedule for Lunacon 50 (March 16-18, 2007)

Date	Time	Location	Subject	Other Panelists	Comments
Friday	6:00pm - 6:30pm	Port Charles	Reading	N/A	Excerpt from "Echoes of Coventry" and perhaps a few paras from "Redshift"
Friday	8:00pm - 9:00pm	Westchester Assembly	Signing	Michael Ventrella, Esther Friesner	N/A
Friday	9:00pm - 10:00pm	Brundage A&B	Anime 101	Chris Bell, Myra Lopez	Moderator
Friday	11:00pm - 12:00am	Brundage A&B	Strangers Have the Best Candy	Kevin DiVico, Jeff Lyman, Christopher Moore, Meredith Schwartz	Discussion about Villains. Moderator
Saturday	1:00pm - 2:00pm	Bartell	Playing in Someone Else's Sandbox	Keith DeCandido, Bob Greenberger, Susan Shwartz, Dave Mack(M)	N/A
Saturday	4:00pm - 5:00pm	Bartell	A Pirate's Life for Me	Michael D'Ambrosio, Bob Greenberger, Andrea Kail	Moderator
Saturday	5:00pm - 6:00pm	Birch	Collecting Anime Cels	N/A	Slide Show (get to show off my new UX-280P)

I had to drop one panel. It wasn't a subject I was familiar enough with to discuss intelligently (OK, you in the back row, stop laughing), and also, I would have had four events back to back on Friday night if I had kept the 7:00pm panel. That would have been a bit much, even for me.

Good things:
I'm excited that my Collecting Anime Cels show made the cut.
The panels I'm on sound interesting
Definitely looking forward to catching up to the people I see on the guest list

Less than good things:
Panels are crowded together. I'm going to have to shut the pirate panel down early or get a co-moderator to have enough time to set up my slide show at 5:00pm.
I'm spending more time as a moderator than a panelist. *sigh*
No panels on Sunday.

Still, all in all, I can't complain. I'm looking forward to a great show.

Took a little bit to get reorganized, but here we are back home and recovering from Archon. I had a great time and already have my reservations for next year's show since it's going to be the host for NASFIC next year. I had a feeling rooms were going to go fast near the convention center, so went ahead and locked in a room now.

Saturday was a rather painful day. Mainly because as you might note from my last blog entry, I was up way too frelling late Saturday morning and if I hadn't had an 11:00pm panel, I'd have probably just stayed up instead of taking a 2.5 hour nap. But, be that as it may.

My first panel at 10:00am was Star Trek at 40?! We had a good discussion about the TOS, TAS, TNG, DS9, VOY, ENT series as well as discussing some of the novels, both original Ballantine and the modern Pocket versions. Also, one of the panelist had been a designer/troubleshooter for "The Borg Experience" in Las Vegas. This was one of the larger panels I was on crowd-wise with close to 40 people attending. It was an hour and a half panel and we easily could have kept going with all the Trekkies and Trekkers in the audience.

After a rather uneventful signing at 12:00, I managed to go back to the room and do a little more work on my college papers before grabbing a bite to eat at the Ponderosa again. I arrived about a half-hour before my 5:00pm panel, which worked out wonderfully as the panel ahead of mine finished early and I was able to use their A/V equipment. So, with the help of the conventions A/V guy, who's name I didn't get and I wish I had because I owe him a lot of thanks for helping bring this panel off, I had my Collecting Anime Cels panel and it went very well. We had about 20 people there. Some had a few cels they'd purchased, some were interested in learning about how cels were made, how I found them, how to tell if they're a real production cel, what's a seri-cel and some just came to look at the pretty pictures I was showing (and that's all right also). I think they would like me to come back again next year for this panel especially, and I'm hoping that if Archon gets any feedback about the panel that they'll pass it on to me.

After that panel, we had the Urban Legends and Old Wives Tales panel at 7:00pm. Without a doubt, this was the largest panel I was on, audience wise. We had easily 60 people attending. The panel was pretty open, and we had a lot of audience participation. It was a fun panel and we still managed to touch on a few serious topics as well as tossing a few props to our favorite debunkers of Urban Legends, the guys from Mythbusters.

By now, I'm starting to fade fast, but snag a large cup of coffee and wait out the Masquerade. I make my way to the far end of the convention hall and help prepare for the final panel of the day, Breathing New Life into Vampires. Our moderator is a college professor and does a great job using the butcher block paper left in the room. We attempt to get the audience and panelists to define what exactly is the archetype of a vampire, both pre and post 1985. We also list a number of vampire movies and books and then discussed why did we like them (story, effects, actors, etc.). There were about 12 people at the panel not counting my fellow panelists. At times, the panel attempted to get out of hand, but the moderator did a pretty good job reigning things in.

Now, the only bad part of this panel was the fact one of the panelists showed up with a cooler and drunk. He then proceeds to put out four more beer cans on the table in front of him and drinks them during the panel. He was a difficult panelist, interrupting the moderator, getting into one-on-one discussions with audience members and generally not contributing to the panel successfully. Which is too bad, because given his background, he could have had some very entertaining stories, but it wasn't too be.

I got back to my room a little after midnight to find out the hotel had shut off my internet access since it was technically Sunday (my check-out day) and took that as an omen to go to bed.

Last day of the con and aftermath next entry.

Well, I took the night off last night to do some other maintenance stuff I've been putting off trying to get this synopsis off to the agent. sorerutenshi and mollymorrison helped me with scanning in part of my anime cel collection onto the computer. I managed to get 56 of my cels done last night but I have quite a bit more to go.

However, I noted the new scanner doesn't seem to scan small narrow pictures very well. It was cropping them at weird places or only scanning one of two images. I'm going to have to spend some time with the new scanner to see if there's a workaround for this. Highly frustrating.

Once I get them all scanned in, I need to put together a slide show for Archon (and other conventions) to talk about collecting and taking care of anime cels, how they're made, etc. I've done this small panel/coffeehouse about cels for a couple of years, but I hate having to haul my cels with me to conventions. Maybe I'm a bit paranoid, but why take chances? So, hopefully this year, I'll have them all scanned in and put on a disc. That way, either I can bring my laptop and show them in a coffeehouse setting (group around a table) or else the convention will provide A/V equipment and we'll project them in the panel room.

It was nice doing something other than writing for an evening. However, now I have to spend today and tomorrow finishing my college writing and then on Monday, back to the grindstone to touch up a couple of Harbinger spots and then get started on the next project.

(Oh yeah, spend a little time on e-Bay looking for some new cels . . . ;) )

(possibly subject to change . . . more on that later)

Day	Panel	Time	Location	Other Panelists
Friday	Artist Alley	All day	Table #53	Sharing table with Ted Walley
Saturday	Anime 101 (Anime Track)	09:00am	Vinnings (Hyatt)	Tee Morris
Sunday	The Creative Process (Comic Track)	1:00pm	Comic Track Room (TBD)	Steven R. Addlesee, Ben Hunzeker, Chris Staros
Sunday	Reading	4:00pm	Williams (Hyatt)
Sunday	Old School Anime (Anime Track)	8:30pm	Vinnings (Hyatt)	Tee Morris
Sunday	Too Much of a Good Thing (Anime Track)	10:00pm	Vinnings (Hyatt)	None
Monday	Star Trek Author's Cavalcade II (Trek Trak)	1:00pm	Baker (Hyatt)	Ann Crispin, Diana Gallagher, Josepha Sherman

Notes:

1: Yes, I got a table in Artist's Alley this year (huzzah!), so I'll be bringing Chronicles of the Sea Dragon to sell, sign and promote, along with some other stuff. This means on Saturday, Sunday and Monday, I'll be at Table #53 (opposite the doors to go into the Dealer's Room) when I'm not at a panel during the days. (Although I may slip out to visit an occasional panel.) Be sure and stop by!
2: The on-line copy of the Pocket guide doesn't show what room the Comic Track is being held in. I'm assuming it might be in the Hyatt, but who knows? Check the Daily Dragon for updates.
3: I volunteered for a panel in SF Literature about memorable characters, but apparently the Track Coordinator forgot I'd responded to their call for volunteers on LiveJournal. Oh well, maybe next year.
4: Most surprising was the fact I have no panels in the Writer's Track. Considering I was in contact with the Track Coordinator at least five months before the convention after discussing being a panelist at last year's Dragon*Con. Again, maybe next year.

Looking at the schedule, I'll be rather brain dead by the end of Sunday. Three panels and a reading (two panels back to back in the same room) is going to be a trick. Although, knowing Dragon*Con, keep a close eye on the Daily Dragon. Everything posted above is subject to change at a moments notice.

I'm so stoked I got a table in Artist's Alley. (does happy dance. Be glad this isn't a video blog . . . it's not a pretty sight.)

Well, didn't get as much done as I had hoped tonight on Harbinger, but I did get Chapter Thirteen done. Luckily, it was a short chapter, so it went pretty quick once I got going. Took another 304 words out. Considering the finished chapter is now only 2217 words, I'm going to look at parts of Chapter Fourteen and see if any of it would make sense moving it into Chapter Thirteen or if a short chapter is appropriate here.

I've noted a lot of my chapters tend to be rather short. I tend to go between 2800 words to 4000 words for a chapter, (obviously this one is a tad shorter than that). At roughly 250 words a page when it's printed, a 2200 word chapter will only go 9 pages, which is quick, although I have read books where the chapter is only a page. I wonder some times if the chapters are a little choppy because they're short. I know people will say, a chapter ends where it ends and not to worry about an arbitrary number of words. Still, I wonder if readers prefer shorter or longer chapters or does it matter.

Yeah, I know, more stuff to obsess over instead of obsessing about finishing the book. Sigh.

Our roommate, mollymorrison had a friend come up tonight, and I introduced her to Rurouni Kenshin (one of my favorite anime series). We watched the first two DVDs tonight and I think I've corrupted another new anime person (cue diabolical laughter here).

18 days left to complete 15 chapters. Going to be close.

Current Harbinger final draft status:

44,360 / 100,000 (44.4%)

Started the dreaded editing tonight. I printed out every chapter as I finished them during the rewrite and now I've gotten out the dreaded red pen of doom. I edited the first two chapters of Harbinger and then went back and retyped Chapter One. Now, I'm doing the second pass through the chapter. This is the read out loud to yourself pass and I found a few awkward places and cleaned them up.

I think I like this strategy. Red-line two chapters and then spend the rest of my BIC time retyping and then reworking one of the chapters. This way, I'll stay ahead on my red-lining, which is the important first step. The retyping is my next editing stage and then finally, the reading.

I managed to trim Chapter One by 422 words tonight. If I can keep this up, I'll easily get Harbinger down below 100K, which is the goal for this pass through.

Nothing much else going on. Getting ready for FantaSci this Friday. I've invited Tee Morris to be on a couple of the Anime panels I'm moderating at Dragon*Con. This should be a lot of fun.

Current Harbinger final draft status:

3,455 / 100,000 (3.5%)

Remember how I thought I'd have Chapter Seven done this weekend? Heh.

Friday night, we met with our writer's group and reviewed four chapters (one per person). We knew, being Easter Weekend, it was going to be a light crowd. I had a lot of good feedback on Chapter Six. One of the other members noted that I'm writing CSD: Dragon Couchant in a real cinematic style. Which, given the fact it is an homage to the old 30's and 40's pirate movies, it's probably a good thing. There was one section that one of the authors thought could probably go, but Mike pointed out that was a cinematic way of telling the tale vice a more straight-forward novelization. If the book wasn't an homage, then it wouldn't have worked, but it made it feel like watching a movie. But, we agreed, if it looks like I'm going to be well over my self-imposed word count, then it's a scene that could possibly be sacrificed, but I'd need to move some of the information into an earlier section of the chapter since it foreshadows an incident later in the book.

We've spent Saturday and Sunday doing the spring cleaning around here. Not to say, we haven't been needing to do this, but man have we gone through a lot of stuff (and still have a lot of stuff still to go through). Right now, this is the first pass through in what was the den (now the guest bedroom). There are boxes there we've been hauling around since we got married back in 1991. We've had three sets of containers we've been filling up (one for charity, one for the shredder/recycling and one for the trash) and we've got lots of sacks filled for each.

I'm trying to be ruthless, but I know I really need to go back through a bunch of the stuff we've been going through. I've tossed old correspondence when I first started this writing stuff back in 1992, my 3rd, 6th, and 8th Grade report cards that I had forgotten my folks gave me when they sold their house, art work I picked up at comic conventions back in the 90s that I liked, but really don't need to keep any more, etc. I've started going through the library and identifying books that are going to go to the used book store (hey, if they'll give me .10 for them, that's better than them going in the trash). Heck, I've started dumping some of my old military equipment that I've kept around just in case I ever went camping with my daughter's Girl Scout troop.

But, I know, there's still stuff there that if I was honest, I'd still need to get rid off. The stuff like the comics I don't really want anymore or the old CCG stuff, I'm not certain what to do with it. I mean, I could take it to the local comic store and see what I can get, or else I could try to e-Bay some of the better stuff. Or, I could accept the fact that some of this stuff is really just newsprint and cardboard and just toss them out. Eww! I can't believe I said that . . .

To treat myself these past two nights, I've been watching an anime called Divergence Eve. I wasn't sure if I was going to like it, the first episode is tre' weird, but I finally watched the first five episodes and I think it's starting to grow on me. wishweaver sorta-liked the storyline, but the "overly buxomed" young ladies annoyed her. Me? I figure it's just a little fan-servicing and try not to let it get in the way of the story. It's setting up a pretty good mystery and I'm curious to see what they do with it. (I think the first episode was really from the middle of the series and then the second to fifth episodes were filling in the back story.)

I picked up a used copy of All-Purpose Cultural Cat-Girl Nuku Nuku the other day as well as a used copy of Cutey Honey. So, between those and Banner of the Stars and finishing the last bit of Love Hina, I should be just about caught up with the anime I have on hand. Cool! An excuse to put in that order for the third boxed set of You're Under Arrest.

Consider this paying ahead for the short story she's doing for me. We had to do a prose poem for my Creative Writing class tonight. It's a little longer than what the professor was anticipating, but he said I came the closest in the class to hitting the mark with this effort.

Again, I'll hide it behind a cut to spare the casual reader.

( Ozark Woods )

Starting to get ready for Lunacon. Need to sort through my anime cels and get them in some order for my Collecting Anime Cels" coffeehouse. I didn't have a huge crowd at Lunacon last year, but it was at 2pm on Sunday (never a great time when the show closes at 5pm). This one is Friday night, so I'm a little more hopeful. I had a great time doing the panel and showing off my stuff at Archon last fall and I'm hoping the momentum builds for this show.

Of course, one of these days, I'll get all my cels scanned into my computer and can only bring a few select pieces instead of hauling up the portfolios. Then again, that would mean I was prepared and organized.

Right.

<--- foresees dragging the portfolios with him for a long time.

Well, unlike most of the Washington D.C. area, I didn't have the day off, but it was relatively quiet at work. Once I got home, though, things got interesting though. Spent about three hours visiting with wishweaver and my friend, April, about story ideas. We worked on wishweaver's story idea first and I think we fleshed out a really good back story for it, identified the protagonists and antagonists. It's going to be a YA Science Fiction novel, at least for now. We've still got some things to work out but I think it's going to be a fun project once she starts it.

We also went over the YA fantasy that April and I have been kicking around. We reviewed the background material I had been working on and April is off to start working on the first chapter. I'm not certain if we're going to alternate chapters, or exactly how we're going to co-write this, but it's officially underway.

Spent part of this evening watching Noir with my daughter while wishweaver watched it over the edge of her laptop. I'm enjoying this anime series. I'd bought the first disc several months ago, but I was waiting until I got the complete set before buying any more. (Better to buy 7 discs at 80.00 than 7 separate discs at 29.99.) Also, the series has great music, which only makes watching it even more fun.

After dinner, I worked on my tie-in novel proposal. I have the summary page done and am now working on the actual proposal. Right now, my first draft is (as usual) down in the weeds, so I'm going through and taking out unnecessary details so the editor doesn't drown in excess verbiage. I knew this was going to be a painful process, but I always make the initial proposal detailed so I can make certain I haven't forgotten anything and to ensure it "flows". I need to query the editor to see if there is a specific format for sending him proposals before I get too attached to anything I've written so far.

I did some work on Chronicles at lunch today, but nothing to really report on. This was more of a strategy/admin day than a "writing" day. Brainstorming is always a lot of fun, as long as you don't forget to actually write stuff down. ;)

Picked up my daughter's final Christmas present tonight. I had bought a Kero-chan* cel a few weeks ago and she really liked it. So, being properly inspired, we took it to one of the local craft shops and had it double framed. The original artist drawing was matted on a white matte while the cel itself was matted against a light blue and then the whole thing was done in a deeper blue matte. Had it finished off with a plain black frame and I think it looks darn good, if you ask me.

*Kero-chan (otherwise known as Keroberus, the guardian of the Clow Cards) from Cardcaptor Sakura.

Still plugging away on Harbinger. Added another 1937 words tonight. Baring something really going wrong, I'm down to the last couple of pages in the first draft! Tomorrow is D-Day (D for DONE!!!!. Time to get the 18 year old scotch ready to celebrate!



Current Harbinger status

155,358 / 145,000 (107.1%)