What Is This?
Following the lead of my mentor, friend, and exemplar, Tami Moore, this is a weekly article to document progress in meeting my writing goals as described here. I use an Excel spreadsheet to track all my work by category (blog post, copyediting work, creative writing) and item. So all I need to do is add up the “words” column and I’m good to go. This article will be counted, minus the first 150 words. However, it will be counted in the following week’s total. All other blog posts and creative writing count full credit. Copyediting for other writers is counted at ten percent of the starting word count for the document; style sheets for that copyediting will count twenty-five percent. Editing my own work, if and when I get to that point, will count fifty percent of the starting word count.
How Did I Do?
My weekly goal is 2,000 words. This week’s total was a very nice 4,597 words.
- “Weekly Wrap-Up: March 26″ blog post—954
- Novel—2,959
- “The Year So Far” blog post—684
At 16,800 words, March was my most prolific month to date. By comparison, January was 14,980, and February—negatively impacted by my vacation over the first 17 days—was a pedestrian 8,758. Through last Friday, my weekly average is 3,171 words—well ahead of my 2,000 word goal. I’m not displeased.
About the Banner
Earlier this week, I began following Jim C. Hines, a fantasy author whose blog is about more than just writing. Today he announced he is giving away an autographed advance review copy of his forthcoming book, Red Hood’s Revenge. Originally, Jim wanted to ask for donations to the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network (RAINN) or a local rape crisis center for a chance to win the book. However, since he believes that may run afoul of Michigan’s charitable gaming laws, all he’s asking is that you email him. Full details are at the banner link as well as the second link in this paragraph.
In his article, Jim cites some statistics about rape that I found both frightening and appalling. For example:
World Health Organization report on Violence Against Women: “In a random sample of 420 women in Toronto, Canada, 40% reported at least one episode of forced sexual intercourse since the age of 16.”
According to its website, RAINN has been labeled by Worth magazine as “One of “America’s 100 Best Charities.” Blythe Danner, one of my favorite actresses of the ’70s and ’80s, is a RAINN sponsor.
Needless to say, I wholly support this endeavor. I’ve been an anti-rape advocate for as long as I can remember, and certainly as far back as my college days, when a coed was raped and murdered in a parking structure just a few hundred yards from my apartment at UCLA. In addition to making a donation to RAINN, I’ll be displaying Jim’s banner in lieu of my usual Amazon and Thesis banners through April 16 (the drawing date). I strongly encourage you to make a tax-free donation to RAINN or a local rape crisis center in your community. One in four is too many. One in ten, or one in a hundred, are too many.
Idle Thoughts
Item: Tiger Woods to return to competitive golf at The Masters next week. Good, and about time. I just hope CBS will focus on the golf, and not the other crap. The tabloids and E! do enough of that. Yes, Tiger made a colossal mess of his personal life; no, we probably don’t know all there is to know. So what? I really don’t give a damn about whether his manager, caddie, or anyone else knew of his affairs. I don’t care about his personal affairs, period. All I want to do is watch him play golf.
Item: Baseball season gets underway this week. Looking forward to this season, hopeful that my Dodgers can again win the NL West and maybe get all the way to the World Series this year. Of course, they have the very messy divorce case of their owner to deal with, which probably will only be a distraction when they’re asked about it by idiots in the media. As long as they are getting paid, why should the players and coaches care about their boss’s personal life? (Answer to rhetorical question: They shouldn’t.)
Item: Rams figure to take former Oklahoma QB Sam Bradford with first pick in NFL draft. The draft takes place on April 24 (Thursday night in prime time: a really, really dumb call, NFL!); the Rams will have a private workout with Bradford on April 21. However, unless he breaks a leg (or an arm) during that workout, he figures to be a slam dunk (to mix sports metaphors) to go #1. Mark Bulger has done a fine job since replacing Kurt Warner, but he’s gotten pretty beat up the past couple years. However, I’m hopeful he can do a lot to bring Bradford along as an able replacement next year or in 2012 (assuming, of course, there’s a 2011 season).
Item: Raiding in WoW is becoming more of a pain. Odd that I would say that this week: For the first time in months, we were able to do a 25-person raid more than one night this week. In fact, all three nights saw us in 25-man raids! Tuesday and Wednesday we were in ICC, and Wednesday night we scored a guild-first kill of Festergut-25. Last night we were short of healers and a tank (as well as some key DPS) so we headed into ToC-25, to get some of our lesser-geared folks both some 25-person raid experience and possibly some loot. We only got as far as killing Jaraxxus, but we did upgrade a few people.
So why is it a pain? Because it’s becoming more like work: We’re generally short on healers (and no way we could get the seven or eight recommended for Lady Dreamwalker), and we don’t often have more than two tanks, so we’re generally asking one of our top melee DPS to switch to an off-spec as second or third tank. For myself, I’d much rather progress on 25-man content than 10-man, but even when we run 10-mans, if we can’t get a second group going, that means a dozen or more are left out. More and more, I wonder if I’ll make it to Cataclysm.
Item: Spring in South Dakota is a love-hate season. On Monday and Tuesday, our temperatures were in the 70s. Yesterday it rained early in the morning and late in the afternoon (when I was outside at the grill, smoking some baby-back ribs). This morning, I woke to a blizzard. (blizzard [n.] – when it snows sideways) Mother Nature seems to be suffering a 90-day PMS cycle this time of year.
