I finished my novel yesterday, and I'm glad I did.

I somehow lost interest in the second half of November, both in writing at all and also in the NaNoWrimo experience. I guess I'm a slow learner and never noticed all the groups before, but I felt very much alone this year and not part of the community at all. I was, and am, very much a privateer, and it felt as if everyone else competing this year is a member of a writing group (Forward Motion, NERD, Piker Press, etc etc etc). They all know each other, all have their own histories and dogma, and I just kept seeing them all verifying their own beliefs and pimping for their causes.

Not what I wanted from NaNo at all.

I also felt very old. I found a few kindered spirits, but I had little to offer against the hordes and pretty much dropped out of posting on the boards. The advice is usually the same, anyway, and I've not much to add that others don't say better.

So, between an aversion to the boards and real life letting me know that I've been neglecting it, writing felt more like a useless diversion than an enjoyment, but I kept at it when I could and managed to get my novel written.

I was invited to go to the San Francisco Home Office TGIO party, but the journey's been cancelled.

If I had November over again to re-do, I don't know what I'd do differently. NaNo may have changed too much, and not to my liking, but I still need and treasure it for what it makes me do. I need to re-do the Big Train Show page for my site, and maybe in a few weeks look over the novel. I've run it through a spell checker, changed the *words* to italics, and discovered in the process characters I'd introduced and forgotten! I just love that kind of thing, the beauty of a NaNo novel!

In spite of my efforts to push everyone away, many of them understood. Thanks.

I'm okay, I guess.

Yesterday my sister and I went to her daughter's home (my niece Rachael's) to spend Thanksgiving with her and her son, Greggory. Adding to the pathos were Greggory's paternal grandparents, Will and Mary. Mary is (partially? wholly?) Indian, so I guess that was traditional enough. Will is her second (?) husband, and they're the parents of Rachael's ex-husband, but like to visit their (only?) grandson on occasion. Greggory is about thirteen.

So we're all related by blood or marriage or something, and that's about the extent of our commonality. It occurred to me that we're what's left over after all the real family and loved ones get together. The high point, for me, was Will and Mary's forgetting to bring a card table so two people got to eat off an ironing board. That, and Will is (was?) a minister (Episcopalian?), so grace no doubt had more effect than were I to have said it.

It wasn't bad. We talked a lot about phones and stealing lumber from construction sites (Greggory's wanting to build a skateboard park in his back yard).

I struggled and got out a couple thousand more words on Big Train Show. I may finish, but maybe not. It feels so much like I'm writing just for the sake of writing instead of creating anything, that I've little heart in it. Unlike Kicker or The Reader's Emporium, this story isn't all that gripping to me. I had some interest going in, but maybe not enough to carry me through to the end. I'm quite jealous of all the other wrimos who are all bubbly and excited, wishing I felt any of that this year. I'm glad for them, and for the efforts of all those who labor to make NaNo work, but I just can't get connected this year.

Not to NaNo, not to anything. I just am.

I hope everyone who looks here has, or had, the nicest of holidays. It's not right to be ungrateful the rest of the year, so I hope in addition to cherishing and remembering those things that make your life so joyous you can take with you the idea that this shouldn't be a one day a year thing.

Please be kind to those around you, remembering always that they're probably doing the best they can.

I treasure you all.

Too busy catching up on all the shit I shoulda been doing the last six months to even think of writing. Haven't been thinking about the novel, that's all been pushed aside by worries over collection agents, plumbing, hiding so I don't get caught as a fuck up.

Nothing to see here. Move along.

I was reading a post from a woman who claimed to eat only those eggs laid by organically fed, free range chickens. This got me to thinking...

First, I should probably admit that in my younger days I read a great deal of science fiction. In many of the stories I enjoyed, the future was bleak, the earth overgrown with skyscrapers, with trees and wood long gone, and hamburgers and bacon a thing of the distant past. These people ate pills or synthetics, but that was rarely the point of the story.

Anyway, like I said, this egg eating woman got me to thinking. I have absolutely no facts on which to back any of this up, and have never farmed. My notion of "free range" chickens is based on nostalgic whimsy, movies, and some recollections from my mom (who grew up on a farm). I'm a city boy.

I'm sure that egg growers use horrifically efficient methods. I'm sure chickens nowdays live their entire life caged in one cubic foot pens stacked fifteen high and are continually fed chemical laden food pellets. These chickens, I'm sure, have never tasted sweet clover, poppy seeds, or an earthworm. They're little more than egg producing machines, and I think they do a pretty damn good job of it.

Free range chickens, on the other hand, I picture as spending their days strolling around, chatting with their friends, taking long baths is pristine water, and generally primping themselves for rooster visits. At the end of the day they waddle back to a comfy straw nest and lay an egg which some rosy-cheeked girl will pick up the next morning and carry gently in her apron.

So I get to thinking about the poster's proclivity (if that's the right word) for these eggs. There's no doubt they're better and healthier, but I wonder how practical they are, now that we're in the 21st century. I wonder why we don't *all* have these delicious eggs, and it occurs to me that we can't.

There are close to three hundred million people in the US alone. If half of them have one egg a week, that's 7,800,000,000 eggs a year. I have a feeling we've outgrown the ability to feed ourselves through romantic means. Not only do I not know anyone willing to give up their cushy office or technical job to wake up at six to feed chickens, I've met several people who've *had* that life and have chosen, instead, to become assistant underwriters or filing clerks.

We're creating an elitist culture, here, based on food. The only way we can produce enough omelettes and pancake batter, french toast and egg drop soup is to manufacture eggs the way we're doing it. It's fucked for the chickens in the cages, I admit, but last I saw they had a brain about the size of my thumbnail and, after dealing with heart and lungs and producing massive amounts of chicken shit each day, I'm guessing there isn't much brain power left for aspirations and sorrow.

I may not like it, but we no longer have the room or people to individually cater to chickens just so we can eat guilt-free eggs. I remember reading someplace that without the farming efficiencies of the last fifty years, this planet couldn't support the people we have. One of the reasons in the explosion of population is because we can eat.

And to return to a quaint way of farming would be to sentence a billion people to starvation.

So if you enjoy organically fed, free range chickens, fine. I had one at a restaurant and it was tasty, just like chicken. But I think it's absurd to take pride in showing off that you're rich enough and elite enought to afford to eat better than the world allows.

I've reached the halfway point, not only in words but also the ides of November. I'm still battling a cold, still scared shitless about my future, and still not doing anything to improve my lot in life.

But the novel may be emerging. I've really been neglecting blogs, both mine and others, of late, as well as forum postings. I've been living in a dream world, too, so between everything, I've been remiss about keeping this and everything else current.

This past weekend our LA group was challenged by the group in Santa Barbara to see who could write the most. The results were painful, with most of the five LA writers having weekend totals of over ten thousand. I did much less than that, as did everyone in SB, but had a personal victory of sorts.

My novel, or writing, had gotten bogged down. I was never sure exactly what scene would next occur, what would happen next, so I was filling pages describing every inconsequential action. I jarred myself out of that momentarily over the weekend, and the plot began inching forward. Yesterday I got stuck again, but this morning I think I have the start of some plot.

I'm concerned, perhaps needlessly, about the number of characters I've introduced. This is why I edit. I don't know as I need two or three people all serving the same role in the story, so I may be doing some compaction later on. Among the curious things to pop up is that Dina, the woman who works at the carnival and whose case Sid finds to start the novel, is dropping to the background, and Luther, her expected evil boyfriend, had yet to make much of an appearance at all.

I'll see how it works out, but I'm the process right now of introducing other characters, ones I hadn't expected. I have a hunch I'm nowhere near the middle of this story.

No, I don't have much progress on anything to report, but I'm tired of neglecting my blog. I know everyone who visits must be crestfallen to see no new entries.

So here's this one.

It rained overnight, but that's not the point. It's done now, so I'm getting ready to pack up and ride buses and meet with some wrimos in a nearby town. I'm still not feeling well, so I won't be kissing anyone.

As if.

The novel continues. I have story ideas, but the writing isn't often feeling inspired. I need to get away from truth and realism long enough to let ideas flow and prosper. I need to sit down and get into a groove, something that's been very elusive this year. I've been writing tons of dialogue, and I don't know why. It's almost as if I'm afraid to say anything in exposition any more, fearing the "telling" criticism.

Today I hope to get Sid and Dina to finish up one adventure and to go on to the next. They have things to chase, and the Big Train Show has been mentioned right in the text!

For the first time, I smiled while writing.

It may have been a mini-breakthrough, one of those things I rely on when I craft my novel. I'd figured on the item Sid found to start the novel being returned to Dina and her boyfriend getting upset with Sid. Maybe some jealousy thing. Instead, as I was getting ready to write that passage a (currently) unknown minor character stepped up and said something, the kind of thing I hadn't planned on, but the exact thing I kept talking about in my tips thread.

Let things happen. At this point I'm trusting my sub-conscious to know what it's doing. The whole thing may be a sub-plot, or it may be the main story's arc, I don't know yet. I'm even less sure about what constitutes a sub-plot than I am about what a chapter is.

But I just love it when a line pops into my head, one that can change everything. At first I resisted it, but then talked myself into accepting it. It may or may not be what that minor character would actually say, but it's the exact type of thing that makes me want to write. I can clean things up or let them play out, depending on how this newly found twist plays out.

(I'd say I can't wait to find out, but I immediately started another thing going on, the introduction of the Big Train Show!)

This is the kinda thing that bugs me. On the news just now they said "A new warning for those who take vitamin E. Taking massive amounts may increase your risk of death."

Um, excuse me. Not sure about everyone else, but I have a *certainty* of death. Reminds me of one of my favorite lines from a doctor interviewed on TV years ago. As he put it, "We don't save lives, we postpone death."

Oh, yeah. The novel. Gotta get back to writing...

I being optimistic about that 3, but I'm no longer wishing to die so I'm back to normal.

Life is so sucky right now I'll just blog about my novel, which is also sucky. This happens every year, and every year when I'm done and go back and read over it I can't tell the good parts from the ones I thought were sucky.

That may not be a good thing.

I hammered out Sid's Amazing Blimp Adventure (Chapt 4 on the Big Train Show website. I was going to save it, but I needed to get it in so I could refer to it later. Actually, so far I think I've done little *except* bring things in that I needed to establish so I can build on or refer to them later. A lot of this novel writing feels like laying groundwork for wonders yet to come, and I don't yet see any brewing wonders.

I *do* know the next thing I need to do: introduce Luther Jack. That should take a couple hundred words. Then, well, I don't know exactly what happens next. To be truthful, I don't know what will happen for the next thirty thousand words. I have a climax I'm writing toward, but the huge hump of the middle of the novel is a bit intimidating. I want to show Sid being challenged, questioning his contented life (which has yet to be shown, so the transition will be ... forced), and should probably come up with two or three things for him and Dina to do, to show her influence on his life.

Then I can get to the train stuff.
Wish me luck!

I have a cold. I've been living off eggs and zinc tablets, napkins and tissue paper.

I think this explains why I was so miserable late last week. I'm hoping by later today to feel decent.

It was a day of bus riding. Not sure how many miles I logged, but I was riding for maybe four or five hours.

I'm feeling very inadequate. I guess I'm really not, but the feeling is there and colors everything I see and do. I see people all around me struggling and succeeding over things many times more difficult than my bullshit. I hate that I can't even enjoy my misery, that I have to see it for the pathetic thing it is. I *can* do better, just choose not to, and then wonder why everything looks so bleak.

I see only the negative, the things I've had and enjoyed and can no longer participate in. I think of those things I shouldn't, and it's no wonder I'm falling behind the rest of the human race. I don't want much, but I'm unwilling to do even the simple steps it would take for me to get and feel better.

Enough self-indulgence. Today I went out to write and got a little done. Left off when Sid will be relating his blimp story. Chris Baty is in town and we all met him at a gathering where everyone was more excited and willing to share than I was, where I learned a lot and got to hear many interesting or funny tales of writing this novel in a month. Everyone is doing well, they're all eager and laughing, and I just keep plodding on, waiting for a miracle.

I may post something later.

I've learned that I feel uplifted when I succeed at a task, and crushed with hopelessness when I fail.

I've tried to write, but couldn't ignore the growing list of things I've been patching and putting off, the things everyone else accomplishes without even thinking.

I still have things to worry about, now more than ever.

In addition to the obvious, silly living type things are bugging me. The heater isn't working, or maybe it's just the thermostat. Things in my life are breaking faster than I can repair them, and it's as if the train of my life is rolling quickly downhill. Without brakes. And without an engineer.

My new fingerless writing gloves are a godsend.

I'm doing okay on my novel, at least as far as wordcount goes. And, it's supposedly all about wordcount. I've "advanced" to the point where I can tell when I'm writing poorly even as I'm doing it. "You're telling," my inner critic yells and I admit he's right. I have this compulsion to dump all the exposition in, and I know I should be doing it more artfully.

I also know that very little has happened yet. It seems to me as if my earlier novels were more quickly paced, but I don't know. I've not yet read anything I've written this year so I can't tell if it's as boring as it feels when I write it. I do know that I've had this same feeling in years past and when I got around to reading it I've not noticed it so much. I think it's one of those things that's more obvious when it's happening.

I've gotten to the point now where Sid and Dina are meeting for the first time. I don't yet have any idea about the types of things she'll be offering or suggesting or talking Sid into. I hope I can come up with some good ones!

I did not get run over on my way to the polling place so I've little exciting news to report. I put that little sticker you get on my bike, so everyone can know how lame I am. I was excited to see my dad was still registered. For over ten years I've been trying to convince them he's dead.
And, out of state.
And, last registered in Minnesota.

Turns out Ohio isn't the only place that permits you to be registered in more than one state. California Rocks!

Each year I plan on checking my sample ballot, marked with my entries, against the results and see if I pass or not.

..Noveling..

Hmmm. Something's not right this year. I think it may be the time change, but I'm too lazy to see when that's happened on years past. I'm groggy and tired and uninspired and it's been a challenge for me to get worked up. I polished off one chapter, a sad one with far more exposition and recounting of boring details than one would expect, and got a start on Chapter 2. It was much more fun writing once Dina showed up, but I continued telling. I don't know why I'm in such a hurry, maybe it's to get all this crap out of the way so I can get into the story.

For the first time ever I'm fairly happy with the dialogue. I may pull down my excerpt and put up one from Chapter 2 that makes me look better. I've not been online much today, not feeling much like it. I guess once I get into a groove I'll be more talkative. I've little to relate at this point.

No, it's not about the novel. Not yet, anyway.

I heard a new term tonight on the news. "Margin of Litigation" Evidently the DNC and RNC have teams of lawyers standing by in many of the states as well as others in reserve, waiting to pounce on any state whose voting outcome falls within this margin of litigation. It no longer matters for whom I vote, it's all dependent on who has the better lawyers.

I'm beginning to think that rights are treated like statistics, and can be swayed however those in or desirous of power wish them to be.

All I know is someone will win, someone who truly wants to do what he thinks is best for the country.

...Now Noveling

I woke up in the middle of the night and got my story started. I went back to bed and sleep, and did some more while enjoying a good, healthy breakfast of black coffee and candy corn. I got to my day's quota and my heart dropped out of things. A lot of e-mail and messaging later, I took a break and pedaled off to buy some dog food. Many of the people on the road and in the stores acted oblivious to NaNoWriMo.

I got Sid, my main character, off the road and into his shop. He runs a trophy shop, and I know nothing about trophies in spite of having won one or two. Oh, sure, I could do research and make this a way for the reader to learn about the exciting world of trophy manufacturing, but I expect I'll downplay the details just as I've done in the past with bookstores, the entire city of Oklahoma City, and vetinarians. In my novels, as in all my writings, I mention these things, but don't fully explore them.

"You can't just drop something like that in," I heard once from someone about a line about a fatal logging accident. "We want to know more!"
"Oh yes I can," I answered.

I toss things around willy-nilly. I'm not sure if that's good writing or not, but I don't have time to explore all these details: I have a book to write!

Just wait until the blimp ride comes in. It may get a cursory nod, or maybe a whole chapter. Depends on how I feel. I kind of like not milking things for all they're worth. Gives the reader more to think about, and prevents me from being seen as 1) talented, or 2) greedy and manipulative.