Litany of Excuses – 01/06/09

Blog Words: 109
Novel Words: 1769

So that was a massive failure.  Well maybe not as things progressed ok on the book although sub the weekly target and blog…

I’m blaming ongoing stomach issues, which I am not going to bore people with but lets just say I was not feeling good and a very busy weekend ensured no chance to catch op from the week behind.  In fact I’m even a little behind on OU work but not in a major way so there’s no need to his the giant red button of panic yet.  Yet…

No, a good week is coming, I feel it in my waters so to speak.

Litany of Excuses – 25/05/09

Blog Words: 153
Novel Words: 684

The assignment is done and I am determined not to let myself fall so far behind again in the future.  The fallout from the work early in the week is that I have spent most of the rest of it either at work or resting up as I was exhausted so very little work done on either sets of words.  In fact all I’ve really managed to do is catch up with The Wire and sleep.

Hopefully I shall now kick on with everything so here’s to a more productive week *raises virtual beer* and let the work begin.

Litany of Excuses – 18/05/09

Blog Words: 147
Novel Words: 2695

A week dominated by OU work and the fact that I am rapidly approaching an assignment deadline meant that again I failed to update this blog with anything.

However, for the first time I hit my word target for the book and even have a vague idea of how I am going to proceed although it would appear the final section could be much longer than the others and an aborted trilogy that has got amalgamated into one book in three sections might go into four but we will see.

So sadly I must return to my OU work and other chores but by the end of this week I hope to have got things a little more organised and finally be back to where I should.  You never know, I might even get a chance to write about something on here properly.

Litany of Excuses – 11/05/09

Blog Words: 162
Novel Words: 2284

A very good week for the book even though the numbers don’t look that difference but I am very busy with OU maths and so the fact I was able to keep some words going was very pleasing.  The down side of this was a week without blog updates.

I am hoping that in about a week and half I shall have everything balanced up again and not only can I keep both words up but also keep the housework in order so the other half doesn’t come at me with a heavy blunt instrument.

So back to the grind I go, dreaming all the while of explaining new approach to maths, commenting on Sarah’s post about finding music, the brilliance of Great Apes, Thin Lizzy and the under appreciation of Brian Downey as a drummer etc.

Litany of Excuses – 04/05/09

Blog Words: 370
Novel Words: 2132

A good week for the book, after a slow start for the first couple of days I began to hit the word target and develop what I was actually going to do with it so hopefully I can keep the momentum going and really start nailing the last third.

Blog numbers down but apart from an increase of writing activity I am absolutely buried in OU maths.  I am adopting a new approach that is definitely helping and I am slowly chipping away at it but another bank holiday weekend in which I very selfishly spent some time with my other half ate into my OU maths time.  Oh what a selfish man I am, wanting to spend time with the woman I love!

This week could go either way but we will see and hopefully I might even get round to writing up what I am trying with my OU work.

A Midweek Update!

So shock of shocks I’m actually getting to this on a week night.  What is the reason for this momentous occasion?  Well firstly I am trying some new approaches to getting my OU work done so I’m taking a break to do fiddle with this.  I have updated the music & reading page to reflect the changes on my mp3 player and reading.

On the subject of reading, I am hitting a fine vein of books at the moment.  I was very happy to discover the joys of Old Men in Love, which led me to go back to the stunning Lanark.  I can’t say enough about Lanark as it one of my favourite books.  For me books are a bit like music in that my favourites change according to my mood but with it’s wonderfully constructed story that plays with novel conventions  and the fact that Alasdair Gray is so good at creating a print object you want to hold and explore means that Lanark is one of those books I don’t think I will ever tire of rereading.

So onto my current book, Great Apes.  I don’t know why it has taken me so long to get read a novel of Will Self’s as I grew up aware of him through his various media appearances and knew he was a writer so quite how it has taken me so long I do not know but I am certainly enjoying myself so far.  More to come on this when I get to the end of the book but for now back to the maths.

Litany of Excuses – 27/04/09

Blog Words: 534
Novel Words: 0

A terrible week in that I had lots of blog ideas that shall forever remain locked in my head (this may or may not be a bad thing in actuality but it is bad in the context of words written) due to bad focus and a large quantity of OU maths.

There was a similar failure of word for the book but I did have some progress with the scene in my head and I even managed a couple of hundred words this morning so maybe there is hope for me yet.

Draft Weekend Excitement

As a long standing NFL fan and in particular Cincinnati Bengals supporter, not only is draft weekend an exciting time but also one that has mixed fortunes (first round pick forced to retire through broken neck, bad choices on character etc) so it was particularly frustrating that the live web coverage I’m usually glued to on Saturday evening and during Sunday afternoon was too busy to connect to.  It might be hard to explain to those Brits who have failed to fall for the NFL bug and who the idea most strongly relates to side picking at school but if you follow a team this is almost the best time of year.  All those positive reports coming out of the beginning of pre-season, seven rounds of player picks (the Bengals actually have 11 picks this year) to improve your team and because of the relative parity of talent in the NFL, even though my beloved Bengals went 4-11-1 last season I can dream of playoffs next season.

So on to the picks so far, round one and with the 6^th pick we select Andre Smith, an offensive tackle who despite some dubious choices (leaving scouting combine early and running topless at his pro-day [what 330 Ibs man looks good running topless?]).  I’ve seen some people saying we should have picked Eugene Monroe as the most polished LT but Smith has a mean streak on the field which should be a really good fit in the physical AFC North.

Second round pick was Rey Maualuga, an inside linebacker who I thought was going to be long gone by our second round pick (some people had him as a mid first round pick).  A hard hitting guy that’s going to bring intensity and chemistry to our improving defence and was a team mate of last years first round pick of Keith Rivers in college for two years.

Now if you’re reading all this in a state of bewilderment then don’t worry, the best thing about the draft is the endless speculation, no one really knows for 3-4 years how well a team has drafted.  All you can do is wish your team well in the future and debate with anyone who is interested the various benefits of the teams picks.

I say we’ve picked two players that can come in and make a difference this season and I’m excited about it.  I’m looking forward to an afternoon of OU maths accompanied by more NFL draft and then a good preseason and then playoffs, well a boy can dream can’t he.

Litany of Excuses – 20/04/09

Blog Words: 576
Novel Words: 0

A combination of another bank holiday, band practise, manic work day followed by yet more holiday meant that I barely got anytime for OU work (behind again!) yet alone writing so I managed a little fiddling with this blog and no novel words.

Having said that, I will tentatively suggest that if I can get at my keyboard for any length of time this week I should get somewhere as I have finally had some ideas how to write the next scenes.  The plot it seems will have to wait for a bit.

Another Week Nearly Gone

And squeaking in on the last day of the week I rescue the blog from a week without a proper post and just in time too!  So the full explanations will go into the litany as that is what it is there for but I shall try to address a couple of thing that I have been thinking about.

 

I think that Temporal Confusion will be a bit of a pain to write whenever I wish to refer to the blog so I shall shorten it to TC, which handily references back to Top Cat.

 

I have also had another string of things to blog about appear in my brain over the last few days but time and the world were set against me but something struck me yesterday was a writer on BBC Breakfast (on for the weather forecast) saying her best advice to writers was for them to write.  This is not exactly news to me as I have a couple of books on the subject of writing (I particularly enjoyed Stephen King’s On Writing and I don’t really like his novels but it is good on the subject of being an author) that mention writing everyday as good practise but the act of separating myself from the world is difficult in a house with only two rooms.  Still I found myself on Friday in a garage getting a slow puncture repaired and over the course of an hour or so I managed to finish off another chapter of OU maths.  The lesson I learned from this is maybe I am better at focussing with distraction than I thought so there should be no excuse for not keeping up with this blog as notepad of ideas and experiences.

 

Finally, TC now has an added page.  The cunningly titled Music & Reading, which will contain the lists of what is currently on my trusty mp3 player and what I am reading, planning to read and what I have read since I started this blog.  This is mainly for my own interest and organisation when it comes to books but take a look if you want and suggestions for books are always welcome.

 

For now however, the day is calling with a sumptuous feast of shopping, washing up, ironing, OU maths and hopefully some more writing given the chance before finishing with band practise.  No wonder I never have time for anything.