Thud: The Robot Monuments

March 9, 2016 Progress Notes:

The Robot Monuments

Words today: 100 last night, 850 tonight.
Words total: 15,950.
Reason for stopping: Bedtime.

Darling du Jour: Miles and miles of scaffolds and sparks arc through the air, and at their centres, crouched down and still big as the sky, are the robots.

Research Roundup: Local food of Hokkaido; earthquake-proof construction techniques.

Books in progress: Amanda Sun, Heir to the Sky; Lena Coakley, Worlds of Ink and Shadow.

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It is a good feeling when after a day of not doing much at all (I didn't get a day off this weekend, and I won't next, so I forced myself to schedule one in between) I open a manuscript thinking there's nothing to say to it tonight, and almost a thousand words fall out.

Not the places I thought I'd be working tonight: a lot of fleshing out of a sequence that goes midway in the first third, and sending a few little tendrils from it into the last third of the book. Setting setting setting. Setting, and some relationship establishment.

I might need to name a few more pilots at this point. The placeholder NAME things are getting intrusive.

Thud: The Robot Monuments

March 10, 2016 Progress Notes:

The Robot Monuments

Words today: 1,050.
Words total: 17,000.
Reason for stopping: Should start dinner. I'm thinking of trying to freestyle a sausage soup.

Darling du Jour: Uncle Haru's nod from behind the wheel as I closed his passenger door this morning, how Aunt Misato looked at me when she read the statistics in that flat white envelope: as if, overnight, my face had changed into a vast and shadowed new terrain.

Research Roundup: Architecture of Japanese suburbs; languages, cultures, and religions of Indonesia; depth of the Earth's crust.

Books in progress: Amanda Sun, Heir to the Sky; Lena Coakley, Worlds of Ink and Shadow.

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Another full day dedicated mostly to drafting and sleeping off the remnants of the fever/wobbly thing plus watching documentaries about very serious people being very serious about cooking. If I'm deriving anything from the chef-stuff binge, it's that waking up with that 3am feeling of "Oh god, what have I done?" does not actually preclude skill, talent, or being on the right path to get what you professionally need. It, um, seems to be a feature.

Okay, sausage soup time. I have sausages. I have a cabbage that needs using.