The interior of Fireside is getting warm again but this time, unfortunately, K isn't here to demand, intimidate or, ask the air conditioning be turned on. Fortunately, the outside temperature isn't as warm as it was last week which is to say I'm fanning myself but less often.

Things are quieter here today. I need to remember this is writing time, not social chat time. I'm being good and chose to limit my few questions and conversation to earlier in the afternoon (though I have some for someone else if I can find the right time to ask them later). I've spent the last two and half hours writing up my critique notes for a big ms in preparation for my first Lucky Lab Rats Writers Group (LL) meeting since my audition and acceptance into their group. I have no idea what to expect with the group but I'm sure I'll be fine. Not worried yet.

Now I'm looking for the SciFi Wikipedia link I thought I saw someone post here about four or five months ago. The SciFi channel's SciFiPedia isn't cutting it. Sad but not devastating. J gave me a suggestion for the J&T story and it all revolves around author confidence. If I believe something hard enough to write as though I do, readers will be more apt to forgive something I get wrong. Just don't write something too obviously wrong. That's probably easier said than done but I think I can pull it off given the story isn't about the technology or the science (horrors!). I know, I know. I rely too much on characters. I'll try to live with myself.

Edit note: Also finished another polish of YAWT and am considering asking LL if I might be able to submit this for critique sometime soon. Next up, reread my audition piece in case I'm asked questions about it. Even though it's only been four or five months since I finished that story, it seems like a lot longer.

It's warm in here at Fireside Coffee Lodge this evening. The temperature outside should only be in the mid-seventies but the southern wall of windows looking out onto a busy, rush hour laden Powell Boulevard is reflecting back the heat from the pavement or something. Almost everyone is complaining about how warm it is in here; everyone but Jay who isn't feeling temperatures yet like the rest of us.

700 words tonight on a new short story that I'm going to call J & L for the time being. This WIP is going in two separate directions at the moment and I've half a mind to try to create two separate versions of it - one dark and downtrodden, one with a humor bent like YAWT turned out to have. The dark one is a good release for some angst I've felt pent up with for a while. The humor version is the one I really want to write. I had so much fun writing YAWT, a piece full of voice and character peculiarities. I want all my short stories to be that fun but I know I'd get tired of it eventually, and probably, my readers would too.

I haven't sent YAWT out yet. I'm saving it for a late year submission. What better reason than to create another one along the same lines for earlier submission elsewhere, right? But I did resubmit my previously created short, the one that was almost bought. So close. Not a humor piece at all but well liked. If I'm lucky, very, very lucky, the dark version of J & L will turn out as good as this one and then, I will have fulfilled my personal goal of six new shorts for the year. And with half a year left to go. Sweet!

Yesterday (Tuesday) was a good day. A long one, but good. Husband out did himself with being mobile and helping out around the house. He really does seem to be feeling better but I've ordered him to take it easy for the rest of the week.

I spent the late afternoon and early evening hours at Fireside with Jay (who looks fabulous, btw), David Levine, and Karen Berry (both who look fabulous every day I'm certain). Edited YAWT per my recent INK critique and added about fifty words to Working Title. Again, Fireside and the great writer-vibe of the place came through for me.

Received two pieces of promising news regarding my writing this week. Nothing I can talk about as of yet. Let's wait and see what might happen together.

A question for the all-knowing LJ mind:

Is there a specific term or name of the condition for the spots and/or images someone sees after looking at something intensely bright such as a camera flashbulb or a hunk of burning magnesium for example?

I know the chronic natural effect is called macular degeneration but I'm wondering if there is a term for the short-term result of looking at something bright.

While writing at Fireside Coffee Lodge last night, I finally felt like I was falling back into The Car Novel. You know that feeling: Reconnecting with old family and friends, I mean with your characters, knowing in a heartbeat what some will say in response to anyone and any situation, and immersing yourself back into the world you've lovingly and painstakingly created for them.

In real life and in The Car Novel, the timing is right. The season has just begin. The weather is the same, the worries are the same, the challenges are the same. The frantic, time-line rush to get everything right feels the same for me as I'm editing the first half of my MS for the third time and for my characters as they are walking into a season unlike any they've ever known. Look out big block, side-draft pumping, blower-clad, paddle-shifting, open exhaust, triple chromed, street rod-lovin' world, here I go again!

Come July, I expect I'll be more Floyd, Cecil, Scratchy, and Novato than myself, a mental state that I expect will last deep into autumn. If anyone out there has got a burning question they've wanted to ask me, ask now or risk getting obsessive automotive trivia gibberish later.

Another Tuesday, another evening spent writing and researching at Fireside Coffee Lodge...except tonight was different, better even (missed Grant and Theresa though). Tonight Kami joined us and it was Karindira's birthday. Double fun! Gosh, I love listening to the conversations of all these smart writers. I feel very privileged to know any of them.

I also may have stumbled upon an idea for the end of YAWT thanks again to Wikipedia. I don't think I'll be using as much physics with it as I worried I might need to being as the storyteller doesn't understand anything his accidental inventor friend is involved with; that being physics kinds of things. It's complicated and I only have myself to blame. But hey, I am learning stuff (provided everything written about Tesla coils, ions, corona discharge, and azimuth in Wikipedia is true). Who would have ever thought I'd want to willingly read anything about any of this stuff? All I can say is that my brain isn't leaking out of my ears just yet.

Oh, and please, someone smack me the next time I come up with an idiotic, out-of-the-blue phrase like "Anyway, I seeded the coils" and then make the decision that I absolutely, positively need to write an entire story around it when I have no idea what seeding the coils means.

Fireside Coffee Lodge comes through again. Words poured from my fingers, knowledge seeped into my head.

500 more words on YAWT (Yet Another Working Title), the odd, hail-inspired, 'I have no idea what this means' piece I started last week. Still don't know what it means, what's it's about, or where it's going but I'm trying to use the Scholes' method of sweet wordy humor and dark, and I like what I've got so far.

As an added bonus, I'm trying to absorb as much physics as I can thanks to Wikipedia. Even more strange, I actually kind of understand some of it. Not bad for a middle-aged woman who doesn't get math, proof that if one's head is all filled with that icky stuff early on, there's no room for stuff you might want to learn later.

Or something like that. That's the story I'm currently sticking to. Of course, it is April 1st. I could be spouting anything today.

Earlier, I organized my writing file box, gathered my printed short stories into one place (I've got eight finished now), and mailed out two others to markets. One professional busy bee today, I am.