Deadlines

Yes, the great evil deadline is looming over my head.    If you don't see a posting here for a while it's because I am glued to my computer trying to finish typing in my manuscript and editing it.  I am to have it ready by Nov. 15th.  My own plan as I don't want to be dealing with a deadline over the holidays.  There is another MacNachton tale I have to have in right after the holidays but it is a short story so won't be quite so needy.

My biggest problem is that I can't seem to break the need to write everything out by hand.  I am not the best typist, either, so that 95 - 100K manuscript takes some time to type in.  I have tried to write on the computer but it doesn't work well.  For one thing I can't type as fast as I think and when the words are there in my head I need to get them down on paper ASAP before they leak out of my brain and vanish.  I also can't seem to connect well with my characters and story when I do the work on the computer and a writer needs to always be in touch with her characters.  When pressed I can write out by hand the first half of the chapter and then finish it on the computer.  By the time I've got that half typed in I've caught the flow, so to speak, and can continue.

So, I am now typing in everything I have handwritten with the occasional break from the computer to scribble down some more.  The story is almost done because Hartley and Alethea finally straightened themselves out and are panting after each other as they should but the typing of it in looms before me like some huge mountain I need to climb.  The hubby has already been warned that I will be glued to the computer until the fifteenth.  Might take a brief break to bake him a cake for his birthday on the fourteenth and had better expect that work will be disturbed by the family trotting up to congratulate him on aging.  Also have my publicist/friend coming down on Thursday, dinner out on Friday, and an all-day conference on Saturday so these next few days will be a little hectic.  If nothing else, I have to pause here and there to do a little housekeeping.  My main plan is to have a lot to type in so that I can do that when she is busy doing something else, like checking her e-mails.

The other thing that is currently looming over me is - the ending.  Sigh.  I hate endings.  It'd be so nice if one could get away with just writing - and they lived happily ever after.  The end.  But, no, nothing's ever that easy.  I always sweat over the ending.  Oh, I know how it ends, just not exactly how to write it out so it's completely satisfying and doesn't just wind down.  That requires a lot of thought, sometimes rewrites, and always a little editing.  Those last few sentences can be like a slow bleeding.

So - back to typing and writing and sweating out the ending.  Before I was published and faced with deadlines, it wasn't such a problem.  One worked when one could and played around with the story as one wished to.  Then, when it was done, it got sent out and the wait began.  Come to think of it, deadlines are better than sitting around wondering if some unknown person at an editor's desk will like or reject what you sent.  So I will stop whining and get back to work.  I'm sure I'll pop up here from time to time in the next 2 weeks as I'm not always ready to write before noon.  Not a morning person.  Sometime inbetween letting the cats out, cleaning the litter boxes, feeding the birds, checking my e-mail, and all those other time consuming chores I will probably stop in to babble from time to time.  Wish me luck.  November 15th isn't all that far away.