Not too bad company to keep, I suppose.

I write like
Raymond Chandler

I Write Like by Mémoires, Mac journal software. Analyze your writing!

And then my computer farted and reset itself, and my pretty little entry was gone. I immediately turned the computer off and went to read to a book, lest I do something I’d later regret.

So here I am now, attempting to recreate that lost entry.

Tuesday night, I conducted a small experiment involving a cheap bottle of wine, my computer, and my imagination.

And before anyone asks, no, it wasn’t anything like this:

Instead, I attempted to do something that I had never done before: get drunk by myself and write. I realize that drinking, especially with the intent to get drunk, with only one’s self for company, is not generally the most admirable or lofty of goals. In fact, such people are usually termed “alcoholics.” But I wanted to find out, a) was I even capable of being productive whilst hammered, and b) if I were capable, would any of that prose be good?

So around 22:30 Tuesday, I cracked open the finest bottle of $7 wine that Kroger sells, and stared at the computer screen.

Three hours later . . .

I finished the last of the wine, stumbled drunkenly to the bathroom to pee, came back to the computer, and surveyed the damage. I had completed some serious outlining of an upcoming section of the Project of a Novelish Nature, and written a good thousand words or so of that section. I AM TEH R0X0RS! I gloated to myself. Then I dicked around on the Internet for a while longer, and went to bed.

The next morning I checked out the prose, and it wasn’t bad. It needed a little fixing: I omitted a fair number of words, used the word “transmit” three times in a sentence, and almost exclusively used pronouns instead of character names, which made things a little confusing. Some really good dialogue made up for these negatives, so overall I was pretty happy.

All-in-all, I would call the experiment a resounding success. Apparently alcohol and writing mix very well for me, which is about the only thing that Hemingway and I have in common. Not that I plan on doing this sort of thing very often. Drinking, like sex, is much more fun when someone else is doing it with you. That being said, drinking and writing is a fun way to spend an evening, so I’m sure I will do it again at some point in the future.

I am writing this post at Boston Stoker, trying to work up the motivation to brave the cold and go home. Except for a bearded, corpulent fellow who is barefoot and reading a book, I am the only “customer” here. I put that in quotation marks because I finished my hot tea an hour ago, and am now more or less loitering.

Managed to write a little bit today. Not much, only 600 words. I’ve been fighting a damn cold all week and mostly losing. It’s been confined to my head, thankfully, so I haven’t been completely miserable. But it does seem to have fucked with my muse, a belligerent Brit who shouts at me, and I haven’t felt much inspired to write since Thanksgiving.

No, that’s not entirely accurate. I forgot that on Thursday I came up with a treatment for a short movie I’d like to make in the near future with Ryan. It’s called GENTLEMEN OF LEISURE for now. I’m going to let it percolate for a week or two, then write the script. It falls into the comedy/drama genre, which is much different from the sci-fi/urban fantasy I usually write. I’m going to have to stretch a bit to write it, and that excites me, which is reason enough to actually complete the script, even if it never makes it past the written stage.

There’s one more creative project that I’m entertaining doing: filming a live-reading of an old poem of mine called THE MONKEYS HAVE STOLEN MY CHEESE, but done in a “fireside chat” or Masterpiece Theatre style. I need to revamp the poem first before that goes anywhere. We’ll see if this one happens or not. At the very least, I think it could be fun to make.

It’s odd: the office closing and the intervening month seems like it has completely rejuvenated me, both creatively and in spirit. I want to make weird and fun things again, and hang out with people. I guess I never realized just how unhappy I had become over the last three years. Life has actually become enjoyable again, and being creative has been a large part of making it so.

Oh — the computer has just thrown up the low battery warning. Time to post this and scram.

Oh, great. Coldplay is playing over the satellite radio. Just kill me now.

Moving on. Must finish this quickly and get the hell out of here.

Work on PROPHECY GIRL continues to progress at an agreeable pace. The other night I finally came up with a way to properly tie together the first chapter with the rest of the story. When I started writing PG a few weeks ago, the beginning was giving me a hell of a time. I’ve known the very first sentence for a number of years, and have had a general idea of what needs to happen in the opening chapter. In fact, I’ve written the first chapter several times before, but have never been satisfied with it.

So instead of agonizing over it for another month or year or whatever, I simply skipped the first chapter and moved onto the next chapter that I had a grip on. Once I did that, the words came out pretty easily. And then the other night, with most of Part One now sussed out, an interesting (at least I hope) and workable first chapter sort of sprung into existence in my head. I stopped making dinner, went over to the lappy, and spent the next hour transcribing what amounted to a braindump of ideas and notes. And then as I was writing those down, a number of thoughts and ideas on the middle and end Parts presented themselves, and I wrote those down as well.

I was damn well starving by the time I was finished, but very happy.

Now: time to leave Barnes & Noble before I start using scarves as murder weapons.

Once I get feedback from a few people, I’ll make any appropriate changes, then start sending it out for publication. I’m thinking either Clarkesworld or Strange Horizons.

Update: Looks like it will be Strange Horizons as Clarkesworld is not accepting submissions till the end of September. Makes that choice easier.

JAB

JAB

P.S. – Looks like they’re attempting to and not very well succeeding at posting a new INTERLUDE at least once a week. Bastards.

Perhaps this story — “It’s a Wonderful Death” — will be the one that gets published and then can deliver me out of obscurity.

Fingers are crossed.

JAB

1. very sheer and light; almost completely transparent or translucent.
2. delicately hazy.

See? Who the fuck comes up with diaphanous first when trying to think of something transparent? Me, that’s who. It’s like I have some sort of nerd complex when it comes to my lexicon. Sheesh.

JAB

Thought I’d share with you the new Prologue. Bear in mind that this is only a rough draft, so don’t feel obliged to point out every little niggling error you find. Though I’m sure some of you will.

PROLOGUE

~fin~

Also, since I’m not sure if I’ll be posting after this, let me mentionthat I’ll be in St. Louis from Friday through Tuesday or Wednesday for a much needed vacation. I plan on reading many science fiction novels while soaking up the sun (like in that Sheryl Crow song), doing some writing, and hitting on women. Should be fun.

Bon voyage.

JAB