The Quick and the Deadly

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For the last few days I’ve been focussed on short stories. I’m not sure if that’s the right thing to do, except they’re a hell of a lot easier to get published and a bit of name recognition can only help my novel-flogging efforts.

Maybe three days ago I was struck with a mental image that I could really get my brain around. It’s been done before, but everything has. Ideas are worthless; it’s what you do with them that matters. I sat down to craft that moment into a story. With the image came a voice, and I’m not sure why, but that voice is really stinking hard to write. The story is told in broken fragments by a broken man, but there is a transformation taking place, revealed (in retrospect) through sensory impressions, and every word is critical. Roughly seven hours in I have six paragraphs, which still need to be fine-tuned. Perhaps a tenth of the story. Hopefully the pace of writing will pick up as the story moves into the confrontation.

At roughly paragraph four I had another idea. I took a break from that story and cranked out a rather fun 1700 words about why demons are so cranky when summoned. A lighthearted tale in three brief acts, it teaches us the importance of being polite — especially to powerful demons. That story spilled out through my fingers, and after some revision today has that flash-of-light-off-the-corner-accompanied-by-the-high-pitched-bell-ring of “marketable”. (Note to newcomers: We of the Muddled Empire are not afraid of hyphens. In fact, we are doing our level best to alleviate the worldwide hyphen surfeit. As with all gluts, China is to blame.)

Now it’s back to the slow one. I’m at what may be the most challenging paragraph. Man, I wish I could get confirmation that the style is working, but it’s going to be a long haul before there’s enough there for someone to evaluate. However, I am very happy with the dark and desperate atmosphere of the piece so far. Gotta have faith, brother, and the result might even be good. Nobody said this job was easy. Well, almost nobody, anyway.

Thanks!

A troubling sign

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This may not be news to locals, but I don’t think they understand the true import of the event. TGIFriday’s has arrived in Prague. Sure, McDonald’s has been here for a while now, as has KFC, and I assume there’s a Hard Rock Café around here somewhere. (Note to self: If there isn’t, make a deal with a bootlegger at a flea market to buy up a bunch of fake Hard Rock Prague t-shirts and flog them in Old Town Square.)

If McD’s and The Colonel are the cavalry, the vanguard of capitalism sent to root out the native businesses and push them into the locations no one wants, TGIFriday’s and the others sure to follow represent the next wave. They are the settlers. Moving into areas firmly established by those that came before, they will gradually push the boundaries, creating expanding zones of Urban Interchangeable, where local businesses will have the choice to play the game or move out.

TGIFriday’s will succeed here, no doubt about it. A few other restaurants in town have good burgers, but they don’t have a continent-leaping marketing machine. Now there is a place in town that every American will associate with a higher grade of burger than the fast-food places. They will go. The locals will follow. Why? Because burgers are good. Better burgers are better. I have no idea what the replaced business was selling. That in itself is telling, because I walked past the place regularly. Oh, the power of a name.

I may not know what the previous establishment sold, but it wasn’t burgers. It was different. Maybe not better, but different.

Thanks!

I Have Fixed It!

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It dawned on me the other day that my house guest had the tools required for me to be able to dismantle my laptop. Yes, a torx T-8 is to Cassius what a towel was to Douglas Adams. It also occurred to me that since I could make the screen work when I stood on one foot and whistled “The Star-Spangled Banner” through a carrot that the problem might be something as mundane as a loose connector. (This realization was accelerated by Cassius pointing out the obvious.)

I opened up my old Road Warrior and tried not to think too much about the little pieces of plastic that fell out. I’m sure they were simply for cosmetic purposes. Right there at the corner of the case where I found I improve reliability by wedging a matchbox under the power plug (later I found that a stack of two beer coasters under that corner was similarly effective), there was the tiny little connector for the backlight power. Bingo! I thought.

With my computer running, up on its side with its insides right there for everyone to see, I fiddled and futzed with the connector for over an hour. Things got steadily worse. Then they got better. Then they got worse again. Finally I realized that in fact my futzing had become completely superstitious and the connector was not the problem.

One clue was the faint sizzling sound I could hear when the screen was flickering, rather than going out. With ear to electronics I moved to a different corner of the box and took up poking and prodding there. That’s when, back behind a little circuit board, I saw the sparks.

I expect that car mechanics and heart surgeons get used to removing parts labled “not user serviceable” and “warranty will be voided”, but I imagine it was with some trepidation that Joe Cardiologist, M.D. sliced open his first sternum. So it was with me. I liberated the piece in question so that I could play with it in isolation while the computer ran. (More like a neurosurgeon, then, who needs the patient conscious to ask “what did that feel like?” when he prods the brain in question with a pointy thing.)

The little circuit board was wrapped in a plastic film, presumably to prevent it from touching other parts, which could lead to sparks and other bad things. At the edge, where the plastic wrapped around, there was a enough to bulge outwards and press against neighboring components. After yet more gentle torture I found the exact direction of force on the plastic to cause instant screen death. (Luckily I had a second monitor so I could bring the screen back to life by switching screen modes.)

So there it was. And I fixed it using some ancient medical advice: “Doc, it hurts when I do this.” “Then don’t do that.” I pushed the plastic around so that the pressure would not exert the wrong way and I wedged the piece back in so the plastic could not shift back. Ultimately, that is a mechanical solution to an electrical problem (there’s still a potential short circuit on that board), but it’s good enough for me. Better, in fact, because it’s both cheaper than replacing the broken part and has that old-school getting-the-most-out-of-everything feel to it.

I’m back in business, reliably so, and itching to go mobile.

Thanks!

Be’er, now.

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As I write this I am sitting under a large umbrella, listening to the rain patter against the fabric. We are in a park; from where I sit I see only trees and slightly dilapidated picnic tables. It’s not raining hard — at least not yet — and it’s nice out here. If the deluge comes, we will move into the big tent. There is a pretty girl whose job it is to bring me beers.

This is summer in Prague. It is the way life should be, they way it is in longing stories of exotic places. The palapa on the deserted beach in Baja California, the tree house bar in the jungle. Beer is always just a little more civilized when consumed outdoors. This is why I want a transequatorial lifestyle, so that wherever the beers are served with a side order of fresh air, borne to me by pretty girls in miniskirts, that’s where I’ll be.

True to a theme we’ve explored here recently, I am already shuddering as I think of the coming Prague winter. I just want to stay right here, just like this. But even if I stayed still, the world would continue to move, leaving me behind, floating in space on the Sirius side of the sun. Overall, not a good solution.

Thanks!

Tiptoe Through the Google

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Quite a lot of the traffic to this site is thanks to Google and the other search engines. I imagine that most of those drawn here with the promise of a match on their phrase take one look, say “Well that wasn’t what I was looking for,” and leave again post-haste. Nevertheless, I like to browse through the search phrases that brought people here from time to time, just to get a feel for the odd things people want to find. Some of the things I list below are there for entertainment, while others are there because the link back to episodes I like. Think of this as an index to my site compiled by a dyslexic teenager with raging hormones.

  • where is the rubble from Japan? – Where indeed has all that rubble got to?
  • how to write a nursing reflection essay – visitor 40404 landed, improbably, on an episode about writing without fear that I happen to like.
  • threat level indicator – It seems most of the other threat level indicators out there are for silly things like pandemics and stuff. Fortunately the SSDC threat meter ranks right up there with the top matches on Google.
  • sexy nymphs stickers – attracted to the verbal pot-luck that is the observations category
  • sex pitchers – more economical than sex by the glass
  • band rush bobblehead dolls – that just seems wrong on so many levels.
  • how much for a single rose? – Oh, you are only beginning to pay the price when you fish out your wallet.
  • “rat trap” bucket bacon – another poetry candidate. Anyone want to make a bit of verse that uses this? Connected to a chapter one that starts and ends well. Natasha is cool.
  • “bad song” daniel powter – could the searcher actually have been looking for my version?
  • respectable breast – rated high in google, where, nestled among the more predictable results, was a brief discussion of the American Road Myth, an essay that has since been improved here.
  • “you’re “selling past the close” again – linked to a tour through my unfinished business, an even more muddled ramble than usual, but there are some interesting bits.
  • ned’s albuquerque – sitting in a bar after a long drive.
  • some people ruin their drinks with ice” – a lyric I quote in an episode about a particularly good day.
  • Tallest Structure before 1889 – This recent episode is already attracting attention. (The answer is in the comments.)
  • english story writing-it was raining heavily i dashed in a deserted building – the Stories category page seems to have hit on many of those words.
  • born guy but had sex change now woman with pics – surprisingly, the Stories category page came up on top in Yahoo, despite just a smattering of matching words. No, no pics, and no sex changes, either.
  • origin of the sestina – Google has decided that I have the explanation the world will most want to see. Google is dead wrong.
  • bud light taste nasty – oh, yes it does
  • we met a the sports bar on sat in mesquite – but was Bobbi there?
  • fotbol slang – I don’t know any, but I’m still the top match for an episode in which the Czechs qualified for the world cup (barely)
  • smoll bar – a new addition to the list of bar names people search for
  • speed bowling – the precursor to team bowling
  • pregnant and constant headrush – believe me, there’s nothing on this site that could possibly be of interest on that subject, but there is always the Homeless Tour category page.
  • sunshine company ocean beach – a bar mentioned in this episode
  • strasnice – Google’s first match was for “Find a Grave”. My episodes that mentioned the Haunted City came quite a bit farther down.
  • beyond yotta – the rest of the scientific community is beginning to show interest in my pioneering work
  • haircuts by drunk man – That might yield some interesting results. No haircuts in this episode, but there is drunk.
  • “I LIKE THIS BAR” – not a bad search string — you could combine it with a city name before you go anywhere and find a good place to hang. Like, for instance, here.
  • sabotaging brakes – someone should have put the brakes on this episode, I suspect
  • to inspect mimeographed miles – an odd phrase, that, but there’s been more than one search for it landing here lately. Perhaps it is a line in a poem or pop song or something. Miles strike me as being rather difficult to mimeograph, although that might explain Kansas. Cowboy God was the number two hit.
  • How Many People Owned Televisions in 1950 – I have no idea, and I suspect the searcher came away from the Homeless Tour category page none the wiser.
  • as i drove she began to rub my crotch – linked not to stories from my road trip (there is not crotch-rubing there, I promise you), but to my Stories category page.
  • “Bar and Books” Prague – another bar I mention
  • trouble with trendy fern bars – I don’t have trouble with them, per se
  • “slush pile” “magazine of fantasy & science fiction” – the searcher came to the writing category page, but was probably looking for the Slush God.
  • lil j’s sports bar, san angelo, tx – another in my legacy of bar stories that rate higher than the sites for the bars themselves (if the bar even has a site). Maybe there’s a business opportunity there…
  • sad music – buried way deep in Google’s results was a link to a brief episode where I wonder what might have been.
  • menorca call girls – this is not the place to find out about those, but don’t tell Google.
  • kundera essays – if not call girls, then perhaps the writings of a celebrated Czech author. Linked to the Stories category.
  • moonlight sonata story – Well, I have a story called Moonlight Sonata with which I’m fairly pleased, but not THE story of Moonlight Sonata. I have improved the sotry since, but this version is still pretty good.)
  • “en vogue girl” – Ah, the key line in the lyrics to Cutey Honey Flash!
  • first time auditions daisy – linked to an episode about my experiences
    casting Pirates.
  • “embarrassment to our country”bush – linked to the episode long ago where I declared my candidacy for president last election.
  • why do sneezes come in threes? – linked to a not-very-good chapter one.
  • nature of bowling – not so surprising that Team Bowling would show up, buried deep in a list of results. In fact, it was right before an article called “Aggression in Invertebrates”.
  • hiking stacking.rocks – the dot did not interfere from MSN recognizing a kindred spirit.
  • cadíz – I’m surprised my episode about Cadíz ranked so high (5th out of 37,000), but it was the Czech Google, so maybe the presence of a few czech words here and there worked in my favor. Or maybe not — maybe it was my use of the accented í without the accented a. Czech Google may be more accent-sensitive, as are the czechs.
  • 9 bastards of the World – top match on Yahoo linked to a brief episode about Skype bringing cheap bastards of the world together.
  • can pomegranates cause flatulence in some people – came from a search engine I’d never seen before. Linked to the main page where I still have an episode that mentions Persephone and farting.
  • road food weed california – included here as an excuse to link back to an old episode about my trip to Weed, a rambling episode from early in my ramblings.
  • Jerry Seeger – quite a few people recently have been looking for me by name. I must confess I always have to check where they’re from. I know, I know, but I just can’t help it. New York is suddenly an exciting place for someone interested in me to be from. They have agents there.

Of course, there are the perennial favorites – Egg friers and those looking for lyrics to theme songs for very silly anime. Several people have come looking for suggestions about what to write in yearbooks, while others are attracted to descriptions of particular bars. In the last two days, there has been a surge in people searching for Suicide Squirrels, which makes me think it’s time to review the threat level meter.

I get a few hits from image searches as well. The picture titled Rain in San Angelo gets a surprising number of hits. Go figure.

What does this all mean? Are the search engines providing a cross-section of modern thought? I hope not.

Thanks!

Be careful what you wish for…

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In a comment to a story I posted a week or two ago, I mentioned another story I had sent to a smaller publication because I didn’t think it was A-list material. In the intervening time I went back to make it better for the next submission, and I decided that it was better than I had originally thought. In fact, I was starting to feel that it was pretty darn good. So I expressed hope that the small mag would reject it, so I could throw it into the shark tank in more visible markets.

Well, I got my wish.

The only thing is that the rejection was by far the most perfunctory dismissal I’ve ever received. Now I think the story sucks again.

Thanks!

Yesterday

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Ah, yesterday. A fleeting thing, lost, gone by definition. Some yesterdays leave something behind, a tendril of connection that we can grasp to assert that yesterday was more than just a mathematical concept — more than just a number on the calendar. Some yesterdays linger for lifetimes, becoming The Day That… Most yesterdays fade, however, as further yesterdays intervene, until they are lost into a statistical mish-mash of a “typical day” for that phase of one’s life.

Yesterday was not a typical day, but (unless this writing makes it a Day That…), it is not a day that has managed to linger in memory even until it’s own end. Forgotten before it was even finished.

I was tired yesterday. Two nights previous I had gone out with Cassius and Frodo, and we had welcomed the dawn together. The following night I was surprised to not be drowsy (I think I had given myself jet-lag) so I started playing a computer game. I did this well into the following morning without a break, at which point I had to get up and do things. Four hours sleep, then none at all. So, yeah, like I said, I was tired.

And that, really, is all there is to say about yesterday. No words written, no chores done, no accomplishments. So today my only handle on yesterday is a hole: a day when the lists of things to do all got longer. Most if it I just spent breathing, I think, although I do vaguely recall a nice dinner at home, and this morning there were dishes to prove it. Nice to have a houseguest who cooks.

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Germany 3, Portugal 1, Stretchers 0

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To the best of my (limited) knowledge, there were no stretchers brought out onto the field for last night’s world cup game. This is what happens when a media empire starts naming names, calling supposedly grown men to task for being babies. Let us all hope the Zero Baby Tolerance policy continues. Italy’s playing in the final, though, so that’s asking a lot. They are, by my reckoning, the third most shameless team of the world cup. And that’s saying a lot.

Thanks!

The Wiener Dogs of Terrible Town

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People joke about the name of my neighborhood: strašný means “horrible” or “terrible”, so Strašnice could be interpreted to mean “Terrible Place”. Marketing was slow to catch on here.

It’s a quiet neighborhood, even at the busiest of times. The sounds that come in through my open windows are the songs of birds and the occasional distant rumble of a tram. Today was a holiday, so I was not at all surprised to find the streets deserted when I left my flat. I moseyed up the street, and saw no one. I heard no sound of automobiles. After a couple of blocks it was starting to feel a little spooky, but when I walked through the little park on my way down to the tram stop it was eerily quiet. There were no drunks on the benches, no kids in the play lot, and, most frightening of all, there were no old men with wiener dogs.

Those who have been hanging around this blog for a while know that wiener dogs and the old men who walk them are a fixture in this neighborhood.

I was alone, Strašnice was abandoned, leaving only me and the ghosts. Perhaps the last thing my landlord had said, (which I pretended to understand but didn’t) was that all living souls were to evacuate the neighborhood today. I paused in the park and contemplated the true source of my neighborhood’s name. Strašit means “to haunt”. In recognition of the sprawling graveyards that define this part of town, my neighborhood is called “Haunted Place”. I live in Ghost Town and today, it seems, is the ghosts’ day to play. All others are gone — the wiener dogs have been packed up with their old men and shipped off to the countryside, the drunks have braved the trams to find a part of town where the beer stores are open on holidays.

Perhaps on other days, when the wiener dogs rule, you could think of Strašnice as Terrible Town. But when even the wiener dogs know better the city’s true nature is revealed. If I knew how, perhaps I could see out the corner of my eye the shades of those who had gone before, the ghosts of old men long forgotten and their forgotten long dogs.

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A couple of fragments I like

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Her lips were full and red, sensuous and stark against her pale white skin. Her blue-black hair was pulled up and back, revealing her long, slender neck. Her eyes were dark, mysterious pools with the glint of treasure far beneath the surface. She looked good enough to eat, but I was too pissed off by then.

“What’s with you guys?” I asked. “It’s like your fashion sense is stranded in the 1920’s.”

She slid an annoyed glance my direction. “At least we have a fashion sense. Look in a mirror lately?”

“Hey, I dress for comfort.”

“Huh. You can take the boy out of the forest, but you can’t take the forest out of the boy.”

“At least I don’t wear clothes I can hardly walk in.”

She turned to look me in the eye. “You don’t like this?” Her tone was haughty, but I could hear the hurt buried deep within it. She turned back and I watched the way the black silk moved with her body, light flowing over her contours.

Damn. I’d marched right into that one. Time to tuck the tail. “Yeah, I like it,” I said, letting a little of a growl into my voice. “You look good.” Luckily there was no need to lie, she would have known.

She smiled her little smile, the one that didn’t show teeth, which meant I was forgiven. She pointed at my sweatshirt and jeans. “But I’m not going anywhere with you looking like that.” I allowed myself to hope for a moment that perhaps I was off the hook, but before I could even open my mouth she said “Go change.”

“Do you really need me there?”

She sighed theatrically. “We’ve been over this. When we get a new member it’s important that everyone is at the reception. It’s a ritual that goes back centuries.”

“Yeah, but I’m not one of you.”

“If you’re with me, you are.”

“I just can’t believe what a big deal you all make of this.”

“Listen, we have to look out for each other, and it’s traumatic for the newbies. We’re not like you. We don’t just sniff each other’s butts and then go out and get drunk.”

I let that pass. I had tried the “more hygenic than shaking hands” argument before, but it never worked. I went to find some clothes she would approve of. It didn’t take long; options were limited. Black jeans, black turtleneck, and a camel-hair coat from the thrift store. I ran my fingers through my hair (no pony tail for formal occasions), and presented myself for inspection.

“Eventually, you’re going to need another outfit. You’d look good in black leather.”

“Give me a break.”

She regarded me harshly, but she liked the way I looked; I could smell it. Maybe, just maybe, I thought…

“Don’t even try it. We’re already late.” She looked over her shoulder as she passed through the door. “Try not to hump anyone’s leg.”

When her back was turned I made a face and silently mouthed the words back at her. Try not to hump anyone’s leg.

“I heard that,” she said.

Sometimes I hate the vampires’ sense of hearing.

* * *

“I can’t believe you said that to Vlad.”

“What do you mean? The dude was being an ass-wipe.”

“Just because someone’s an ass-wipe doesn’t mean you have to call him that right in front of everyone.”

“So what’s the harm? Everyone knows he’s an ass-wipe anyway.”

“Tom, you humped his leg!”

I smiled. “That was for you. Jesus, that guy bugs me. All those Old-Europe airs, that world-weary cosmopolitan bullshit. Give me a break. He’s from Cleveland, for fuck’s sake.”

“You have no right… Really? Cleveland?”

“Guess he forgot to mention that at his big reception.”

“How do you know?”

“You’d know if you’d sniffed his butt. He’s the punchline to a lot of our jokes about vampires. He tried to join us and we shined him on. That’s when he went over to you guys.”

“He’s a werewolf reject?”

“That’s right.”

She smiled her glittery smile, the one with all her teeth framed between her red, red lips. “Oh, that is interesting.”

* * *

“Tell me a vampire joke.”

I thought for a moment. There was no way I was going to tell her any of the jokes we traded around the pub, but if I didn’t come up with something, things would get awkward. “All right, how many vampires does it take to unscrew a lightbulb?”

She scowled for a moment, then said, “I don’t know. How many?”

“That, uh, was the joke. UNscrew. Vampires like it dark.”

“I don’t get it.”

“Usually it’s screw in the lightbulb.”

“Hm. That’s not very funny.” Silence stretched for an awkward moment, and she asked, “how many werewolves does it take to screw in a lightbulb?”

“I don’t know.”

She turned to the ceiling and shouted, “FUCKING LIGHTBULB!” She sold it, too, letting herself go the way vampires never do, making the answer a howl of rage, even putting a bit of a wolf growl into it, and I fell in love with her all over again, even as she blushed and regained her decorum. As I laughed I wondered once more what she saw in me.

“You know,” she said, “don’t let this go to your head, but if I’d gone to that party without you a lot of people would have been upset with me. The ones worth a damn.”

“That’s surprising. Mostly what I get is ‘oh, crap, what’s he going to do this time?'”

“Half of them say that. The other half say, ‘I can’t wait to see what he does this time.’ You’re like the yurodivy, the Russian Holy Fool who is allowed to speak the truth in a sort of code, and be exempt from reprisal.”

“My code isn’t very subtle.”

She smiled. “No, but it’s fun to watch.”

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Back to the Past

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Yesterday it happened. We reached the point in my lessons where I have been entrusted with the tools to travel through time. I now have the knowledge (ability will require a lot of practice) to reach back to events as distant as yesterday, and bring them to life. How will I use this awesome power?

Incorrectly, if my past performance with the language is any guide. But there have been many times when I have thought of things I’d like to say, and even had someone willing to wait while I worked things out, but I would be stumped by the past. I’m going to spend some extra study time this week on forming sentences that speak of a time that is no more. The folks at my regular watering holes have also begun to tutor me now and then, correcting pronunciation they used to let slide and adding to my vocabulary things that aren’t found in the textbooks. I believe I crossed a threshold recently, where I have enough words that I can get the gist of what people are saying (some people anyway — for others speech is still just a long string of sound without any apparent structure at all), and this has increased the enthusiasm of people around me to try and communicate with me.

That has a down side, of course. It means more interruptions to my work and I am more easily distracted by conversations going on around me. A word from the next table will drift into my ear and I’ll pause to think, “hey! I knew that word!”

I am composing an episode about Czech cursing. Stay tuned.

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Summertime Fun!

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An offhand comment elsewhere about another topic altogether made me realize today that (provided I’m not lying on the cutting-room floor) now I, too, can claim connectedness with Kevin Bacon. But how many degrees separate us?

In my case the cutting-room floor outcome is pretty likely (I can imagine the dispute. “The scene’s timing is off; this part has to go.” “You can’t do that. We have to keep the guy looking at the thing.” “Scene’s too long. It’s an action movie. Gotta make it snappier.” “But the guy — the thing…” “Besides, look at him. The way he looks at the thing. Nobody’s even going to notice the action, they’ll all be watching him.” “Yeah, you’re right. Maybe I’ll do a documentary next, about people looking at things.”), so I thought it best not to wait for the movie before playing this little game.

Although, actually, I probably won’t be very good at it. I don’t watch that many movies, and even when I do I forget who was in the cast, so I’m pretty much out of luck here. I’m not even sure who’s in the cast of Casino Royale (for all I know Kevin bacon is in it).

I suppose, since I won’t be in the movie credits (those would be long credits before “1st guy looking at thing when the dude came down the stairs” was included), this is not in the spirit of the “real” game, but screw that. From Jerry Seeger in Casino Royale to Kevin Bacon in the fewest steps. Anyone want to take a shot?

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Adapting to immobility

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When it comes to writing, I’m a creature of habit. Writing, for me, now means getting the hell away from the Internet and drinking way too much caffeine as I scratch out rough prose, all twitchy and birdlike and generally neurotic. Hey, it’s my idiom. But lately the laptop hasn’t been up to the trip, so I’ve taken up the ol’ pen and paper. In the last couple of days I’ve drafted two pretty cool short stories (one has a lot of work ahead of it). I think in the last three days I’ve scribbled about eight thousand words in my notebook. Words that must be revisited from scratch as I enter them into the land of ones and zeroes. As these stories play out into final versions it will be a very interesting test of writing styles: discrete revisions versus continuous editing.

Tonight I wrote a story I really quite like. It’s there, sprawled over a few pages in my notebook (I fit a lot of words onto each page) and it hangs together pretty well, even if it is a series of three fragments. Laura K. Hamilton meets the nitty gritty of everyday life. It’s a love story, not a lust story. I want to share it with you. Hell, I want to sell it. It’s on paper. Paper! Who thought of this crap?

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Another baby step

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I got an email from an agent yesterday, which said (more or less): “We probably won’t take you on, but we’d like to see more of your work to be sure first.”

[Edited post because I decided it’s best not to talk about business negotiations while they are going on. I don’t think there’s any big deal in this case, but it just seems like a good policy for down the road. Sorry for the tease.]

Still, it beats the hell out of a “no”.

*”partial” refers to sending a part of the novel to an agent. For many agents, the process goes something like this: Writer sends a query. A query is a one-page letter describing the work, possibly the first five pages of the story, and sometimes a brief synopsis. If the agent is intrigued by the query, she will request a partial. A partial means a bigger chunk of the story (often the first three chapters or so), and perhaps a more detailed synopsis. The agent may also begin to take an interest in personal information about the writer. Should the partial pass muster, then the agent will request a “full”, and will at long last commit to reading the whole damn story. That’s a big deal for an agent, because reading generally happens in her “free” time. Once the agent reads the story, she will ask herself “can I sell this?” which is itself a complicated question, and “can I work with this writer?” Should both those questions came back with a “yes”, the agent will contact the writer and the two will discuss the possibility of working together. Even then, it’s not a sure thing.

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Sorting out the computer issues

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My laptop is unhappy; the screen light keeps turning off. (This can’t possibly have anything to do with it falling out of my backpack last week. I had been distracted by my company at the time and didn’t take proper care as I zipped up.) I can make out the vague shapes of windows, but there’s no way to work on it.

I decided to finally bite the bullet and get the Intel-based Mac mini so I could use that while the old PowerBook is in the shop, and finally get an Intel version of Jer’s Novel Writer built and tested. Only problem is, there aren’t any Mac minis with the DVD burner to be had, nor will there be for a while. It seems there are none in the Czech Republic at this time, and one guy told me that Eurpoe is fresh out.

I did get a monitor, however, knowing I would need one for the mini when I finally got it anyway. I got it home a little while ago and set it up, and discovered that it even came with the DVI cable that matched my Mac’s Digital Video connector. Oddly, that cable could not be attached to the monitor. Yes, the monitor shipped with a cable that was completely useless without a DVI adapter. I have such an adapter, so no problem, but with the adapter, the regular cable that came with monitor works just fine also. Oh, well, another cable in the “things that might come in handy for some reason someday” bin.

So, I am back! Able to post blog entries and everything. Life is not perfect, however; unless I want to lug around the monitor, I am stuck at home until the laptop is fixed, and my seating position is a little torqued, as the new screen is next to the keyboard, rather than behind it. But if I send in the laptop for service, I won’t have anything. So do I bite the bullet and go computerless for a few days and then return to my carefree nomadic ways, or do I sit chained to my table until I can get the new machine, then sit chained to the table but at least productive while the laptop is repaired? Quite a conundrum.

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Thanks!