mike[space] dot net

It's been a couple of weeks since I've mentioned the writing, so thought it might be worth an update. The piece I mentioned in my last posting progressed to a 3rd draft just over a week ago, and has been titled "Just Good Friends". I've been getting feedback from a couple of people, and will hopefully be tackling another draft (possibly final) in the next week or so. However, last week was not a good week overall, as I struggled a little with the assignment from City Lit, and didn't seem to get past it. At the same time, flat hunting has begun in earnest, which is a fairly distracting process. I'm trying not to be too hard on myself, if for no other reason than being miserable about it isn't going to help all that much, and if anything risks making matter worse. I knew getting into this that were bound to be more and less productive phases, and I need to develop strategies for dealing with it rather than wallowing too much.

And today has been better, I've managed to complete a second draft of the exercise for the class; an exercise in using memory as source material. It's a little dark, but I did enjoy writing it - it'll be interesting to see whether I can take it much further. I also have a more fun piece to write up from the class itself as well, but I need to try and develop the style of it a bit more. And finally I have been thinking about a short scifi piece to meet the challenge that Mark set me a week or two ago to try and get published on 365tomorrows.com, but that might take a little time to get anywhere ;-)

I also think I do need to start getting a little more disciplined about getting up in the morning and getting on with work. I'm finding it a little too easy at the moment to slowly get up and not really be in a position to do any work until 10/1030 ... clearly not a particularly aggressive schedule - not helped a great deal by the fact that I have been out drinking a lot in the last few days (Tuesday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday!). I've been a little loath to admit that to myself, cos then I have to do something about it, but self discipline is going to be one of those continual tests I am going to face ...