More Progress

Put in another 1200 words today at piano lessons. Would have continued at home, but had to help one of the girls study for a math test. That 1200 words puts me at about the mid-point of the story I'm working on, "The Great Basilisk Race." This is the first pure fantasy story I've ever done. I've done some fantasy slipstrem, but never pure fantasy. I considered putting this on a different planet and making it SF, but I've wanted to try a fantasy story for a while, and this story fits that kind of setting.

I set a goal for 100,000 new short fiction words on 2006, and with this big surge over the past few days, I'm sitting around 92,000 with over a month to go. That leaves one or two more stories by the end of the year and I'll have hit the target.

"The Great Basilisk Race" will be story number 36 in circulation. If you add back the four I sold this year, the number is 40. I wrote almost all of them since Bootcamp in June of 2005. They range from a low of 185 words to a high of 14484 words. The main population falls between 4000 and 6000.

Back early from the holiday

Looks like the spammers came back from the holiday early. The pill-pushers and, ehem, phalus expansion crowd are up to their usual tricks. It's the penny stock pump and dumpers that have the rest. Never ever buy a stock off these emails. You will lose. Today's bait is APWL. Stay away.

New personal best

Today, I overcame yet another bout of lethargy. Yesterday, I managed to put down a very painful 850 words on my current work in progress, a short story called "Chemical Soup." We've been doing so much work around the house that I didn't have many ergs left for writing, yet managed to force myself.

Again, today, lethargy almost shackled me, but I forced myself to write. Now, two hours and change later, I completed both the story and my best single-session word count ever, 2199 words. (No, I'm not going to hunt for a word to insert for the nice number.) It feel's good to pound out the words that way, especially when I run out of story before I run out of vigor. The first 500 words felt as painful as yesterday's slog-a-thon. Once I got past there, the story just few out of my fingers. Ba-boom, the story's done. I'll give it the once-over tomorrow to clean it up, then I'll send it into the world on Monday.

Interestingly enough, the plot I started with never made it into the story, so I still have that one to write eventually. This one changed from a horror story about the dangers of experimenting where we arguably have no business, into an emotional character story about betrayal. Sometimes writing is funny that way.

Tarot anyone?

Mary Robinette Kowal found this fun web site that will tell you which tarot card represents you. This is what came up for me. I'm not sure how well it represents me, but here it is.

You are The Hierophant

Divine Wisdom. Manifestation. Explanation. Teaching.

All things relating to education, patience, help from superiors.The Hierophant is often considered to be a Guardian Angel.

The Hierophant's purpose is to bring the spiritual down to Earth. Where the High Priestess between her two pillars deals with realms beyond this Earth, the Hierophant (or High Priest) deals with worldly problems. He is well suited to do this because he strives to create harmony and peace in the midst of a crisis. The Hierophant's only problem is that he can be stubborn and hidebound. At his best, he is wise and soothing, at his worst, he is an unbending traditionalist.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

Home Page Overhaul

I just did a serious revamping of my home page, as in a complete overhaul. I think it looks pretty good now. check it out at www.ricknovy.com and let me know what you think.

BRK/B

This week I finally broke down and purchased a share of Berkshire-Hathaway. Now, before you jump to any conclusions, I have to confess that I did not purchase the $108,000 A shares. I purchased a single $3500 B share. It's enough to get me Warren Buffett's shareholder newsletter and has a pretty good track record to boot. Hey, it's Warren Buffett.

Now if you'll excuse me *sniff* I have to make plans to attend the Berkshire-Hathaway shareholder meeting next May to exercise my 1/200th vote.

The Results Are In

Today, my daughter Audrey competed in the Arizona Flute Society young artists competition. This is her final year in the Debut (4th-6th grade) division. In 4th grade, she took the only honorable mention. In 5th grade, she took 3rd place. This year, in 6th grade, she tied for first place!

She played Haydn's Serenade, and played it well, despite the fact that her piano accompanist had to recover from having a page of music upside-down as a result of dropping the music. Audrey played on without missing a beat, allowing the pianist to jump back into the piece quickly.

A Big Hurrah

...for my friend and IGMS editor Ed Schubert. One of his stories was just nominated for an Edgar award, the mystery genre's equivalent to SF's Nebula award. You can see all the comments on his blog:

http://www.sideshowfreaks.blogspot.com/

Another Blog

The Scottsdale Republic is the local section of the Arizona Republic. I will be one of several community bloggers that will comment on local activity of all kinds, starting sometime in December. I am supposed to go for an orientation meeting on December 4 to see the software and hear the ground rules. I'll post a link when it goes live.

Sale - State Secrets

I just received an interesting rejection from Between Kisses. They like my story, but it's too long. They offered to buy it for their children's magazine, Beyond Centauri. Considering I planned to send it there next, it saves me the trouble.