My mid-week report to you that covers the three major commitments I’ve made: to write, to edit, and to read. A bit condensed, since my last update was Friday…
Writing
I’ve spent a good part of the last two weeks working on an outline for a prequel to Sigils. I spent a few days in contemplation then ripped out a plotline that simply didn’t fit, and embraced the idea that what I thought was one of my minor bad guys is actually a truly evil SOB. Now I need to do some research on fae beasties to get some inspiration for what I’ll throw at my MC to up the stakes mid-story.
In the meantime, I put together an entry to submit for the Postcards from P-Con anthology from Raconteur Press.
As you saw earlier this week, I pulled together my notes on social media and wrote that #TeamAndMore post about “Social Media 101 for Authors”. I expected that to take fifteen minutes. A half hour, tops. Three hours and three thousand words later, I published something that only touched on some of the organizational basics. There’s probably another 2-3 similar length articles in there on platform selection, setting up an author website, content schedules, etc. Maybe in the end I’ll turn it into an free ebook or something.
Editing
The big news from last week is that I put out an open call for Stories in the Key of Tull, an anthology of stories inspired by the music of Jethro Tull. Yes, I’ve yielded to the seductive, siren call of editing…
This is in association with my writing group, the Alpha Mercs. And believe me, we went over that open call with a fine-toothed comb to make sure that we did it right. We have a website and everything now! (Keep it bookmarked. The game, as they say, is afoot.)
Shari & I also got back the second draft on the autobiography we’re helping to edit, along with some clarification on the anticipated length, etc. It’s going to be more of a novella, but for the purposes, I think that will work quite well.
Reading
Still in Dragonesque.
Other
The Alpha Mercs attendance at P-Con was well-received. I got together with a fellow Merc that lives nearby, and we declared out little meeting P-Con North. So we had a good time all around.
This past week Shari & I had a ton of things going on. Two gotcha days to celebrate, along with a birthday. #1 Minion (my middle daughter) started her clinicals for nursing school. High school volleyball, several church-related events, and a banquet for a non-profit - not one I have to help organize, thankfully! I even got to help arrange for a presidential candidate meet & greet that will be happening here in Pittsburgh next month.
On top of all that? Late last week I read an Substack article from Monalisa Foster on project management for writers. As a result I installed the time-tracking software (memtime) that she recommended, and started tracking my time. The results have been… interesting.
That’s my categorized time since I started using this on Friday. You can seen I’ve spent about 4 hours on #TeamAndMore stuff. Twice as much time on Alpha Mercs activity. An hour writing, and 30 minutes on stuff for TryLife, one of the non-profits I work with.
There are other reporting options that show me what programs I’ve had open and active on my laptop:
Two hours in Scrivener, two and a half hours in it iTerm2, eight hours on Discord, and nearly eighteen hours in my browser. Ooof!
Now, a lot of that time isn’t being slotted into categories yet. I’ve spent a good chunk of time online in my browser (Facebook, Twitter, etc.) promoting a local non-profit because they’re in a “Best of” contest run by the local newspaper. So that comes up just as “browser time”.
There’s another graphic that breaks down activity by visited websites. Two hours on email, three hours on #TeamAndMore, and six hours on Facebook.
It’s pretty convicting, seeing just how I allocate my time on the computer.
I still need to make some adjustments on my tracking, but overall, I’m happy with memtime. Two thumbs up, would recommend, go read Monalisa’s project management for writers and install it yourself.
I’m afraid to know how much time I spend on social media.
I'm all for ebook with checklists!