I just got that rush editing project. One month to do an insane amount of work. Soliciting anthology submissions, editing them, organizing them, and the final steps before publication.
Goodbye, Orchestrated.
*headdesk*
ETA: Four hours and a crazy-intensive burst of work later, and I’ve done all I can for the moment. I’m going to take a quick pass through the manuscript, but apart from that, I’m waiting. So… I might as well keep plugging away on Orchestrated.
I’ve been struggling to get back into the flow of Orchestrated. I’m so close to the end, and it’s frustrating because things are moving at a snail’s pace. Not the actual story, but my execution of it. I worked on it January 5, then it lay untouched (other work with deadlines, small child at home) until last Thursday when I got just over six hundred words down in it. Today, I ground out a more respectable amount of work, but it still feels like pulling teeth. I hate having to leave things aside for more than a day; I lose the flow and the mindset and the sense of what’s happening. The longer it’s aside, the longer it takes me to get back into it.
Orchestrated:
New words today: 1,588
Total word count, Orchestrated: 60,840
I didn’t even register that I broke 60K. As that had been my arbitrary target word count for the completed project, I’m going to have to revise that to something between 65K and 70K. I’d like to wrap it up in 5K, although it will feel rushed. What I need is a completed first draft, though, so I can go back and start doing the subtle stuff instead of trying to put the subtle stuff in as I go. A first draft is too clunky for that, especially in the wrap-up part. Get the skeleton down, then flesh it out; that’s what I should be thinking at this point.
To that end, I will write brief one-line descriptions of what scenes need to happen between here and the end, then expand them one by one. We’ll see how that goes.
So that one-page brief overview of a topic that I was asked to write for inclusion in a private collection of educational material turned into a two-page intro plus a page of sources.
Yeah, I know. But it was all important.
And I found a newly published book on the subject that I need to read, too! When I have money to buy books online again, that is.
Last night I felt off. This morning I thought I was okay but have grown steadily worse. Hello, flu.
Despite the wooziness I’ve been working all morning, and the day so far can be summed up as follows from my Facebook status updates, because I don’t have the energy to sum it up in new words:
Autumn is officially sick with the flu. Good grief, world, what are you trying to DO to me? Haven’t you seen my workload? 9:27am
Autumn just cancelled her cello lesson. She can has chicken noodle soup in bed now? 11:02am
Autumn is Oh, copyeditors, why have you left both “staffs” and “staves” as-is in the same paragraph? 11:47am
Autumn is wondering why her little mackeral tabby cat smells like fabric softener. 1:02pm
Autumn is 230/256, has one chapter left to proof, and is going to bed. Urg. 1:34pm
And this is me, off to bed. Or at least the chesterfield with the afghan and a cat. Be good, Internets.
Look what I found in my in-box this morning!
I had no idea they were redesigning it, but it’s absolutely lovely and I love it with much love.
I need to take a moment to say that, this book? Is good. Of course, I’ve only proofed the acknowledgements and the introduction, but so far, excellent. (I’ve found two errors! But it’s the same error twice and involves a missing accent, so.)
I love what almost a year away from something can bring. (Handling those six copyedits don’t count, because I didn’t actually read the book at that point; I was paging through it to get to the queries.) Reading it in its final page layout helps a lot, too. It’s pretty, and it looks just like a Real Book.
That is all. Thank you. Now, back to proofing these galleys.
I have further caught up on the holiday backlog of e-mail and cleaned out most of my in-box, I have yogaed, and I have celloed. I am very pleased to see that my cello skills haven’t completely crumbled in my two-week hiatus. In fact, wow. Positive proof that my two months of lessons have made a definite impact and improvement. The Lee piece sounds excellent, especially considering that this is only the third time I’ve played it. But in the interest of full disclosure and humbling myself, the piece from the Mooney book sounds awful: I can’t get the damn rhythm of “Erik’s Minuet.” I subdivide, I count, nothing works. Argh. It figures I’d stumble on the easy piece and whip through the more challenging one.
Now for a snack (because I had an early lunch before celloing), and then work. I think I’ll do the first half of the proofs today, or however far I get so long as it’s at least five chapters. Drat; I need to download and install Foxit on this computer so I can mark them up if necessary.
And later, when I need a break (and I will, because I remember what page proofs are like) I will sew up the ends of HRH’s scarf and put the tassels on, because I went over to Ceri and Scott’s house last night and Ceri gave me a J crochet hook of my very own. The test tassel I did was too long, so I’ll need to find an intermediate-sized book to wrap the yarn around. And in other knitting news, I did indeed frog those two inches of hat last night; I cast the Softwist yarn on my size 8 Addis instead, and wow. I prefer bamboo needles to metal, and I thought the slippery yarn on the super-slick metal Addis would be a match made in hell, but it’s spookily easier, somehow.
Right; Foxit has downloaded. Time to install and get to work.