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about school: i somehow managed to make my 15-page research paper about the Lincoln assassination (i can't decide if it's a gift or a sickness, really). sarah vowell would be proud ~ not of the grade i am sure to get, but hey, it's finished and now i can drag my exhausted self to the next thing.
about work: Eleison is going slow. but going.
about characters: i'm still reading Behrens' The Law of Dreams, also going slow. main character fergus has joined the bog boys. the story is losing appeal for me. fergus so far hasn't proved to be compelling enough to keep my attention. he doesn't seem to do anything particularly inneresting. this is especially striking in the scene in which he and a pal come upon a dying horse. the pal picks up a large stone and drops it on the horse's head to kill it. fergus just watches. the character is so disaffected you neither feel sorry for him, or outraged, or anything ~ leastways i don't. i like a good disaffected character (my own Lewis Fletcher behaves this way most of the time; to the point that other people think he's dead inside ~ but it's important to me that we know he's struggling, always). i'm sort of missing any glint of humanity that might make me care whether fergus gets his next meal and that's a big problem for me story-wise.
~ * ~
in pursuance (five days left!): wrote my first Mr. Hanty scene (finally found the right "in" for him) last night. i have a feeling he will amuse me muchly. he's so...hmmm...teutonic? that's victorian for bullheaded and angsty.
and why this is funny to me is anybody's guess.
i think, of all the characters, i may just feel the sorriest for him on some levels. he seems to have the knack for always being in the wrong place at the wrong time, and yet still manages to land on his feet.
no darlings to report. the draft of the scene is quite drafty. Czar NastyOwlFace makes a very brief appearance just to be nasty and owly (i suppose that's redundant).
and speaking of Mr. Hanty, his letterbooks have arrived (two weeks early!) and were awaiting me at the post office this morning (they were delivered on saturday but i wasn't here to receive them). this is why, by the way, i'm barely writing Hanty's scenes so late in the game. most of his stuff i can shoehorn in to the structure without a problem. his interaction with the other characters is pretty well plotted. it's what he does when he's off on his own that i don't have a handle on yet (but which the letterbooks will determine ~ on a day-to-day basis). i won't put my hope up too high for anything earth-shattering, but then i find all manner of joy in the mundane perhaps most of all. and so far as i'm concerned, the banal day-to-day operation is plenty sufficient to hang story points on.
and yay! this concludes the amassing of source material. there is nothing else out there that i need or desire at this point (yes, please check both ways for winged pigs). i literally giggled obscenely when i took the reel out of the box this morning (snert!).
( microfilm yummy goodness for the geekily-inclined, cut for being a whole bunch of huge )
i have not had a chance but to slap the reel on the reader and look at the contents, but already i can tell it's brimming with fun stuff. in this report (for May 5th), he announces the arrival of Dr. Mudd and 18 year-old Capt. Willie Jett (c.s.a. ~ one of Mosby's guerrillas who helped Booth and Herold cross the Rappahannock). he also talks about Mrs. Surratt (no. 157 who is moved to no. 200) and how she is not eating her food.
a brief (pun unintended) word about underwear: in this same report (the only one i got to read ~ picked at random) Hanty mentions about how they couldn't give prisoner 161 fresh underwear after his bath because the rivets on the chains of his feet prevented them (everyone else seems to have gotten fresh undies, so it's not clear whether they attempted to remove the chains or if it was just a given that they couldn't come off) ~ but it nonetheless answers about 862 other questions i had about bathing the prisoners and changing their clothes. not sure at this point who prisoner 161 is, but when i have a chance to study it, I should be able to find out.
so yeah, expect to hear all manner of lalalala about this nonsense for quite some time.
~ * ~
i am soooo looking forward to the 4th of july. a whole day to do nothing but write. i'm locking myself up in the house with a twelve-pack of diet Coke and not ceasing until this thing is done done done (well, almost done ~ i technically have until saturday night to make my deadline).
: D
about work: Eleison is going slow. but going.
about characters: i'm still reading Behrens' The Law of Dreams, also going slow. main character fergus has joined the bog boys. the story is losing appeal for me. fergus so far hasn't proved to be compelling enough to keep my attention. he doesn't seem to do anything particularly inneresting. this is especially striking in the scene in which he and a pal come upon a dying horse. the pal picks up a large stone and drops it on the horse's head to kill it. fergus just watches. the character is so disaffected you neither feel sorry for him, or outraged, or anything ~ leastways i don't. i like a good disaffected character (my own Lewis Fletcher behaves this way most of the time; to the point that other people think he's dead inside ~ but it's important to me that we know he's struggling, always). i'm sort of missing any glint of humanity that might make me care whether fergus gets his next meal and that's a big problem for me story-wise.
~ * ~
in pursuance (five days left!): wrote my first Mr. Hanty scene (finally found the right "in" for him) last night. i have a feeling he will amuse me muchly. he's so...hmmm...teutonic? that's victorian for bullheaded and angsty.
and why this is funny to me is anybody's guess.
i think, of all the characters, i may just feel the sorriest for him on some levels. he seems to have the knack for always being in the wrong place at the wrong time, and yet still manages to land on his feet.
no darlings to report. the draft of the scene is quite drafty. Czar NastyOwlFace makes a very brief appearance just to be nasty and owly (i suppose that's redundant).
and speaking of Mr. Hanty, his letterbooks have arrived (two weeks early!) and were awaiting me at the post office this morning (they were delivered on saturday but i wasn't here to receive them). this is why, by the way, i'm barely writing Hanty's scenes so late in the game. most of his stuff i can shoehorn in to the structure without a problem. his interaction with the other characters is pretty well plotted. it's what he does when he's off on his own that i don't have a handle on yet (but which the letterbooks will determine ~ on a day-to-day basis). i won't put my hope up too high for anything earth-shattering, but then i find all manner of joy in the mundane perhaps most of all. and so far as i'm concerned, the banal day-to-day operation is plenty sufficient to hang story points on.
and yay! this concludes the amassing of source material. there is nothing else out there that i need or desire at this point (yes, please check both ways for winged pigs). i literally giggled obscenely when i took the reel out of the box this morning (snert!).
( microfilm yummy goodness for the geekily-inclined, cut for being a whole bunch of huge )
i have not had a chance but to slap the reel on the reader and look at the contents, but already i can tell it's brimming with fun stuff. in this report (for May 5th), he announces the arrival of Dr. Mudd and 18 year-old Capt. Willie Jett (c.s.a. ~ one of Mosby's guerrillas who helped Booth and Herold cross the Rappahannock). he also talks about Mrs. Surratt (no. 157 who is moved to no. 200) and how she is not eating her food.
a brief (pun unintended) word about underwear: in this same report (the only one i got to read ~ picked at random) Hanty mentions about how they couldn't give prisoner 161 fresh underwear after his bath because the rivets on the chains of his feet prevented them (everyone else seems to have gotten fresh undies, so it's not clear whether they attempted to remove the chains or if it was just a given that they couldn't come off) ~ but it nonetheless answers about 862 other questions i had about bathing the prisoners and changing their clothes. not sure at this point who prisoner 161 is, but when i have a chance to study it, I should be able to find out.
so yeah, expect to hear all manner of lalalala about this nonsense for quite some time.
~ * ~
i am soooo looking forward to the 4th of july. a whole day to do nothing but write. i'm locking myself up in the house with a twelve-pack of diet Coke and not ceasing until this thing is done done done (well, almost done ~ i technically have until saturday night to make my deadline).
: D
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