Getting Serious

It's now time to get on with some serious work.

I had a few days off over the weekend - and very nice it was too.  I had a very cultural few days. 

On Friday night we went to the Friends and Family night at the Glasgow School of Art Degree Show.  Ross' girlfriend is exhibiting her work.  It was a really, really good good show.  There were lots of very interesting, challenging and well presented stuff.  And a huge well done to Megan - she deserved her fantastic "First with Distinction" grade.  On Saturday we went to a Pay, Pie and a Pint to see the last play of the season.  It was Peter McDougall's The Brothers' Keeper.  It was good but a bit metaphorical with a lot of similies and alliterations.  In the afternoon went to see the Fine Art Degree Show at the Art School.  It was OK.  I have a pre-concieved idea of what I think fine art should be - and it isn't that.  There was some cracking stuff and some - well - other stuff.  In the evening we went to The Nimmo Brothers gig in Oran Mor.  What can I say?  They were just brilliant.  It was a great gig and a lovely, loud rockin' way to end a great day.  On Sunday I was knackered proving the point that old rockers never die - they just tire very easily.

But all good things must come to an end and the hard work needs to resume.

I'm not sure you can ever really have a day off from writing.  I might not be physically writing but I'm thinking about what I've written and what I'm about to write all the time.  I'm not joking.  I'm even dreaming about it now.  The other night I dreamed Sam gave me 23% for my Major Project.  When she saw I was really upset about the mark she tried to comfort me by saying, "Oh don't worry - I gave you six Well Done stickers."  What the ????. 

So if I want to avoid getting 23% I need to stop faffing around.  It's time to get words onto a page.

But before I can do that I need to work out some technical things.  Stuff like structure and tone and a chapter breakdown.  I've written 7,500 words so I think I've decided on the tone.  (I'm really hoping it's the right one.)  Yesterday I discected a creative non-fiction book to try and establish which narrative position the author took and when.  I did a page by page breakdown using coloured felt tip pens and everything.  It took a while but it was a really interesting exercise.  It showed me I can be chatty and informal and formal and historical on the same page.  And today I think I'm going to concentrate on the chapters.  Once I've done this I think I can start freeing all the stuff which is rattling around my head.

A few days ago I said I was aiming to have written 10,000 words for today.  I have failed.  Maybe I'll hit that mark for next Tuesday.  I'm very aware I'm running out of time.  I wanted to have 20,000 done before I go on holiday at the end of June.  You never know - maybe once I get the techy stuff done the word count will go up quickly.  I do hope so.

OK - time to get on with it.  If I don't I might not even get six Well Done stickers.