Go go go!

Alright. I've watched two movies with Fernando (I -heart- Huckabees, and an episode of Sherlock), I've had my afternoon nap, I've read some blogs, checked my email, added my latest book purchases to myreads, fed the people in my café, procured a cat, and lit a candle. Time to settle in and write!

17 104

Alright I gotta stop. Back in the days before my sleepytime pill I could have kept going, esp since it's still dark out! But I took my pill and it's hitting me. Brain... slowing... down.

16 804 - We're past the 1/3 mark

That last scene went well. It's nice when you hit a scene that's just right, and then the writing flies. Wee! With a little help from Alicia and Wyclef:



Must be time for a Kitty Picture Break.

This used to be a feather toy. Before winter sets in and I get really lazy, I'll have to make a trip to the pet supply store for more Minion toys.

Here she is TRYING to be a good writing cat. Sitting on her cushion, but you can see in her face she's thinking: How is this more helpful than sucking on your finger??

Here she tries out the Tried and True Classic Cat position--which is when the cat is allowed on your lap, and even allowed on your typing arms, but is not disrupting finger usage.

This evening there's a candle distracting her, which is helping. She's got her cake face on.

Then she lay on the blanket on the floor for awhile (only cat I've owned who liked to sleep on the floor other than in hot weather), and now she's back on the lap staring longingly at the fingers. Maybe if I recite the story and she types... hmm...

14 966

Oh my gosh I'm slow as molasses. It's because I keep stopping and researching. Like... how would someone make coffee in 1918? (Most likely in a Universal brand percolator.)

To be fair, I keep getting slowed down by Normal Writerly Things too, like trying to work out some plot points, and what scenes to do etc.

At least I don't have to make a bunch of playlists, because I still have the ones I made for this story two Nanos ago. The story is quite different in this incarnation, but the characters are mostly the same, as well as the bare bones.

This time it's being done in first person diary form, which I was unsure about in the beginning. The goal is just to be funny, and I wasn't sure I could. But I must say once I got into it I started having a good ole time.

My heroine's basic personality is the same--head strong, pushy--but I made her a little bit stupid. She's very smart, but she didn't pay much attention in school, and hasn't until now paid much attention to how the world works. [She doesn't have this bob yet, but she will.]

The other fun thing about writing a diary is that it doesn't have to be grammatically correct etc. If I could insert scribbled drawings in Scrivener, I would. Here's a scene quite near the beginning, when we find out why our heroine is angry at her father, and he's sending her to stay with her grandmother after she tried to run away. It's also where she first sees Our Hero. Keep in mind this is a completely super rough draft. And while you read that, I'll go back to my story. [hangs head]


7 PM
Sitting on a bench at the Southern Pacific depot with Faun. She’s been nattering non-stop about what a spoiled brat I am. I’m ignoring her and watching the guy sitting across from us.

2 Minutes Later
“What’s in that fellow’s box?” I asked Faun.
“An instrument.”
“He’s a musician?”
“We are going to New Orleans.”
She went back to reading some pamphlet. Until I elbowed her again.
“What instrument?”
“I should know? Ask him.”
“You’re always sassy. Why are you so sassy?”
“Because you are a spoiled rich white girl and I am not and have to work for you.”
“Why are you coming with me to New Orleans?”
“Because you can’t do anything for yourself.”
I would turn her off except she’s right. Which raises the question of why I thought I could successfully run away from home. I still have to leave home, but I’ve got to come up with a good plan this time.
Have I even told you why I’m running?

I just flipped back to the other days, and all I see are a lot of !!!!!s.
- SIGH IMPATIENTLY -
How can I make this story short?
- Me: only child
- Father: rich newspaper tycoon
- No obvious heirs except me
- Me knowing Everything about The Business
- Me so obviously should inherit business
- Me excited that my 18th birthday had come because the Creeping Welching Supposed Father would announce me as his official successor
- Women: able to own property since 1849, able to vote since 1911 and therefore NO REASON why I shouldn’t run Capet
- 18th birthday party
- Me: foxtrotting in new Paul Poiret gown
- Midnight: CWSF makes a double-news announcement…
1. His successor at Capet will be his right hand man, Bobo McGee
2. To keep the business in the family, he has accepted Bobo’s request to ask for his daughter’s hand in marriage
…
…
…
I’ll let your imagination fill in what happened next.

2 Minutes Later
I really want to know what instrument that is.

1 Minute Later
I think he’s looking at me too.

2 Minutes Later
Damn your imagination, it’s probably not good enough.
Bobo is a very BORING and UNIMAGINATIVE man who’s been chasing me ever since he came to work for the Welcher. He’s obviously extremely dense, so how the Welcher thinks he can run MY company I do not know.
I was frozen on the stage. To the spot. With fury. I know the fury showed in my face. The one or two not-drunk-halfway-intelligent people in the room were eyeing me uneasily. But Bobo just kneels down and brings out a diamond ring and smiles at me expectantly!
I took the ring - OOHS AAAHS - I put it on - APPLAUSE - and then I punched him.
Maybe it wasn’t right to hit him, when I really wanted to hit my father. I cut his cheek right open.
But it serves him right! I have never ever ever never ever never welcomed his advances. Quite the opposite. Here—
“Faun have I ever encouraged Bobo McGee to think he had a chance with me?”
Faun is reading some pamphlet in Chinese. “No.”
“Exactly, no. What did I tell him?”
“That he could go boil his head.”
“What else?”
“That his brain was mushier than an overripe avocado.”
“No, I did not say avocado, I said alligator pear. Let’s be truthful to history. What else did I say?”
“When?”
“The third time he asked me to marry him.”
“I wasn’t there.”
“Oh ya, he managed to get me alone that time.” - INSERT SHUDDER -
So there you see. There was no misunderstanding. He deserved to be whacked in the face. But in truth, my father deserved it more. I did give him the ring back. Well I sort of flung it back. Well I sort of flung it at my father, but I’m sure he gave it back. I didn’t see because I  immediately left and drove away in the new automobile I got for my birthday.
I can still understand why Bobo thought I would marry him anyway—because he’s extREMEly stupid. But the Welcher is intelligent. Bobo is what women consider “good looking” - INSERT VOMIT - so I guess that’s why he thought I’d marry him?
…
That musician is good looking. I mean. Some women might think so.