Shitty day
By which I mean I've spent most of the day collecting shit samples from unsuspecting lambs, mostly in the Brecon Beacons. Since it's the first paying work I've had in over a month, I can't complain too much. Tomorrow I get to go to St Davids again (to the betterment of my soul), to startle the Pembrokeshire sheep.
There's not much to say about sheepshit sampling. Each farm visit takes little more than fifteen minutes, since the farmers are all forewarned and have brought their likeliest subjects into a small yard, the easier to abuse. Thus most of the day is spent driving between farms, in an elderly Landrover with no radio.
The most positive spin I can put on this is that it gives me a lot of time to think. And some of that thinking is even productive. Today I came up with a new way to do the ending of Benfro book three, currently weighing in at a heart-attack inducing 180k and still growing. The new ending will shave at least ten kay off the total, make everything much neater and less contrived, and possibly even mean I might get the thing finished in under 200k, which would be nice. On the down side, I'll need to seed a few ideas into scenes in the earlier books, which means rewriting without getting sucked into major revisions.
Why did I ever think it would be a good idea to write a multi-part fantasy epic?
There's not much to say about sheepshit sampling. Each farm visit takes little more than fifteen minutes, since the farmers are all forewarned and have brought their likeliest subjects into a small yard, the easier to abuse. Thus most of the day is spent driving between farms, in an elderly Landrover with no radio.
The most positive spin I can put on this is that it gives me a lot of time to think. And some of that thinking is even productive. Today I came up with a new way to do the ending of Benfro book three, currently weighing in at a heart-attack inducing 180k and still growing. The new ending will shave at least ten kay off the total, make everything much neater and less contrived, and possibly even mean I might get the thing finished in under 200k, which would be nice. On the down side, I'll need to seed a few ideas into scenes in the earlier books, which means rewriting without getting sucked into major revisions.
Why did I ever think it would be a good idea to write a multi-part fantasy epic?
Comments
Because you're a closet masochist?
And James isn't a closet masochist - he came out of that particular wardrobe years ago. How else could you explain his fondness for the Proclaimers? Maybe that's the fault of too much beer as well...
Stuart, you're the expert. You should know.