Sunday, July 31, 2005
July's GDR Round-Up
The dicky tummy is gone but the cough is worse. It's a tickly, chesty, hacking cough and it's right deep inside my lungs; I can hear it when I breath. I've got some medicine for it, which helps for a while but I wish ot would just go away.
I was up far too early for a Sunday morning; a trip to the 'wild' west was calling so we jumped into the car and drove off to see my parents. We got stuck on the M8 motorway thanks to a combination of heavy football traffic and the partial closure of the Kingston Bridge, so a 75-minute journey ended up taking 2 and a half hours.
Beautiful sunny weather greeted us and we sat out the back of my parent's house in the garden. I went digging about in the loft and managed to dig out all my old fishing equipment looked out to bring home with me. Talk about memories! I'm hoping to find a place to fish near Edinburgh so I can start to go regularly again. It's in the GDR as a goal for the year; besides, I miss it.
I took Laura to some spots around the garden and relayed some stores from my childhood that came to my mind; things my parents had forgotten about also. She said she likes to hear these stories but I think she was just being polite. It's part of the thing about going home for me - reliving my childhood; seeing the spots in the garden and small reminders of things that happened many years ago and feeling the glow that I can still see those things happening in my mnd's eye.
We stayed for a couple of hours then drove up to see my friends Mikey and Elaine, who have just bought a new house near where my folks live. As it was also their daughter's 1st birthday recently, it was the perfect reason to pop in.
Their house and garden is beautiful; surrounded by masses of trees and greenery with a large pond and long gravel driveway - I knew it was something special before we even stepped inside. The interior has - like ours - got that 'just moved in' feel, although they have the benefit that the house is newly carpeted and has a beautiful kitchen with an Aga cooker.
We were offered drinks - too many as t turned out - and we stayed for our dinner. Mikey saw fit to keep topping up my glass with red wine and I never noticed until the bottle was empty.
We popped in for a nightcap at my parents before we headed home and finally got back at around half past midnight. A long day packed with lots of memories with my folks and some good friends. Great day all round!
There's nothing left for July's blog entries except to round up my GDR for the month. So here we go:
Fiction
* Submit Monday Mornings to WM competition - complete; pending
* Complete Whisky Snatching and submit - Complete - subbed to Critique Circle for crit
* Resubmit Heart of a Child - done Big Ugly Review 12/7 (remit: Hidden Agendas)
* Write novella for KIC e-book project (20k minimum) - on hold
* Write 1 short story - War Generations - WIP
* Read through and re-org of novel WIP - on-going
Poetry
* Write 4 new poems minimum - none written
* Edit and complete 3 poems in WIP (Boxes-done, In the City and Life-done)
* Write more Haiku - none written
Non-Fiction
* Submit article on RLS to intended market - reworked into focussed article; ready to pitch
Marketing and Promotion
* Look at getting business cards made up - on hold
* Press Release for last six months of HJ - not done. KIC contract lost in post!
Reading and Research
* Read more poetry and fiction - critted several stories on crit circle forum. Treasure Island (by RLS)
* Keep up to date with KIC e-zines - complete
Technical
* Complete first draft of Web Development manual - on hold
Other Projects
* 13 Travelling Journals Project
Things that turned up
* KIC lost its 2nd PR person and I had to resend in all my info in again, plus extra.
* Round Table interview/article
* Interview with Devon Ellington for 13 Travelling Journals Project published
* Interview with Hey Asda! Website published
Successes
Nothing worth shouting from the rooftops about.
Failures
None really. Dip in the middle of month with regards to output but other than that, nothing major.
Statistics
Fiction - 4300
Non-Fiction - 5000
Blog - 20200
Summary
A good solid month. A lot of my writing, as far as the word count goes, was non-fiction; a pleasant change. The fiction I did write in July was intense and I am very happy with what was written. I made good progress on both aspects of writing.
Exciting moment when the 13 Journals Project arrived on my doorstep. I've not published anything that has been written yet - I'll cover that in a separate blog entry first after I've sent stuff to Devon.
Plenty of story ideas taken down as well as new character ideas. Would still have liked to write more fiction however; such is the way; but I'm happy with my work, particularly after June. I wish there had been a wider spread of work but I'm not unduly annoyed because the work I did get through was creative and challenging, therefore very satisfying.
I was up far too early for a Sunday morning; a trip to the 'wild' west was calling so we jumped into the car and drove off to see my parents. We got stuck on the M8 motorway thanks to a combination of heavy football traffic and the partial closure of the Kingston Bridge, so a 75-minute journey ended up taking 2 and a half hours.
Beautiful sunny weather greeted us and we sat out the back of my parent's house in the garden. I went digging about in the loft and managed to dig out all my old fishing equipment looked out to bring home with me. Talk about memories! I'm hoping to find a place to fish near Edinburgh so I can start to go regularly again. It's in the GDR as a goal for the year; besides, I miss it.
I took Laura to some spots around the garden and relayed some stores from my childhood that came to my mind; things my parents had forgotten about also. She said she likes to hear these stories but I think she was just being polite. It's part of the thing about going home for me - reliving my childhood; seeing the spots in the garden and small reminders of things that happened many years ago and feeling the glow that I can still see those things happening in my mnd's eye.
We stayed for a couple of hours then drove up to see my friends Mikey and Elaine, who have just bought a new house near where my folks live. As it was also their daughter's 1st birthday recently, it was the perfect reason to pop in.
Their house and garden is beautiful; surrounded by masses of trees and greenery with a large pond and long gravel driveway - I knew it was something special before we even stepped inside. The interior has - like ours - got that 'just moved in' feel, although they have the benefit that the house is newly carpeted and has a beautiful kitchen with an Aga cooker.
We were offered drinks - too many as t turned out - and we stayed for our dinner. Mikey saw fit to keep topping up my glass with red wine and I never noticed until the bottle was empty.
We popped in for a nightcap at my parents before we headed home and finally got back at around half past midnight. A long day packed with lots of memories with my folks and some good friends. Great day all round!
There's nothing left for July's blog entries except to round up my GDR for the month. So here we go:
Fiction
* Submit Monday Mornings to WM competition - complete; pending
* Complete Whisky Snatching and submit - Complete - subbed to Critique Circle for crit
* Resubmit Heart of a Child - done Big Ugly Review 12/7 (remit: Hidden Agendas)
* Write novella for KIC e-book project (20k minimum) - on hold
* Write 1 short story - War Generations - WIP
* Read through and re-org of novel WIP - on-going
Poetry
* Write 4 new poems minimum - none written
* Edit and complete 3 poems in WIP (Boxes-done, In the City and Life-done)
* Write more Haiku - none written
Non-Fiction
* Submit article on RLS to intended market - reworked into focussed article; ready to pitch
Marketing and Promotion
* Look at getting business cards made up - on hold
* Press Release for last six months of HJ - not done. KIC contract lost in post!
Reading and Research
* Read more poetry and fiction - critted several stories on crit circle forum. Treasure Island (by RLS)
* Keep up to date with KIC e-zines - complete
Technical
* Complete first draft of Web Development manual - on hold
Other Projects
* 13 Travelling Journals Project
Things that turned up
* KIC lost its 2nd PR person and I had to resend in all my info in again, plus extra.
* Round Table interview/article
* Interview with Devon Ellington for 13 Travelling Journals Project published
* Interview with Hey Asda! Website published
Successes
Nothing worth shouting from the rooftops about.
Failures
None really. Dip in the middle of month with regards to output but other than that, nothing major.
Statistics
Fiction - 4300
Non-Fiction - 5000
Blog - 20200
Summary
A good solid month. A lot of my writing, as far as the word count goes, was non-fiction; a pleasant change. The fiction I did write in July was intense and I am very happy with what was written. I made good progress on both aspects of writing.
Exciting moment when the 13 Journals Project arrived on my doorstep. I've not published anything that has been written yet - I'll cover that in a separate blog entry first after I've sent stuff to Devon.
Plenty of story ideas taken down as well as new character ideas. Would still have liked to write more fiction however; such is the way; but I'm happy with my work, particularly after June. I wish there had been a wider spread of work but I'm not unduly annoyed because the work I did get through was creative and challenging, therefore very satisfying.
Colin 10:43 pm