Well, first stumble at the new assignment today. Not a big deal, but it was still aggravating. I coordinated with my partner at the old assignment to make sure I could cut out at 0930 instead of 1200 to meet with the person who is currently in charge of the program web sites. Took off in plenty of time, caught the shuttle bus, grabbed my car, got to the new site . . . and she was gone. Apparently the person who was supposed to coordinate the meeting got sick, so the current web master was at another set of meetings across town.

*sigh*

We're trying to reschedule for Monday. Hopefully she'll be in tomorrow and will check her e-mail. Right now it's hard for me to coordinate with her directly since she's a 0500-1330 person. *insert jaw drop here. Hell some nights I'm not getting to bed much before she's waking up to come to work.* Since I don't get to the new assignment until 1300, she's in the process of wrapping up for the day, so coordinating a morning meeting is important since they really want me to start in on the web pages as soon as possible.

Hmm, tech writer = web master. Yep, I've seen this scenario before.

However, the good news is I started cooking on Steel on Target tonight. I added another 1176 words and could easily stay up another couple of hours with this story. I'm finding something interesting with this story. As I get to the more exciting or tension-filled parts, I can feel my typing starting to pick up speed as the characters start talking in shorter sentences. It's like I'm actually in the tent or the turret watching the upcoming battle unfolding.

Now, I was a cavalry trooper, but I admit, I was in the MI company, not driving an M1A1 or an APC or a self-propelled howitzer. But, I still remember those night maneuvers, hunkering down next to the over-sized tires of my M35A2 6x6 2.5 ton truck, cargo w/winch with my M16 in hand as some OPFOR tried to overrun the camp, and the joys of being in an observation post with an F-5 screaming down the valley at NTC, strafing the camp just below me.

Steel on Target, while a Military SF story using futuristic tanks and such, is still a very real experience for me. Hopefully, it'll feel real to someone else when they read it.

Course, that presupposes that I'm going to finish the damn thing.

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Words for Today

1176 / 1000 words. 118%

Progress on Steel on Target

18671 / 90000 words. 21%

Words for 2008

29709 / 366000 words. 8%