walking on the beach, rearranging the deck chairs

It's true: it is easier to see the problems with something when it's printed out. I printed Story #1 this week, and looked at it in off moments of classes. If I can remember what all my squiggles and lines and arrows mean, I'll be in good shape, I think. If I can fix what all of them mean, too. There may be some darling-killing going on, though possibly not quite yet...

At any rate, it feels productive. I'm not sure how much work I'm actually doing on it, and how much Titanic-deck-chair rearranging I'm doing. It seems like I'm just rewriting a lot of it, which I guess is the point, but I'm not sure if it's any clearer now than before. (I should hope it is, but then you never know, do you.)

This weekend's task: finish putting all the changes into the computer file of Story #1, send it to people whose opinions I trust on writing more than most people's, finish writing Story #2 and print it out. Print out Story 1, too. Go over that, and see tons of flaws I should've fixed before I sent it out. Moan and wail for a while, then give up and go on with life.

21 days or so. Work enough for about two months, probably. The horrible thing is that I know I should be doing this even without the impetus of "Clarion application", or anything else, other than "writing". We'll deal with that later.

For now, it's just the work.