705: SJ at 31,744 words

SJ is not separate from LP, and starts at 31,744 words.  The next novel begins!  The goal is around 90,000 words.

5 copies of LP

Made five copies of LP at Kinko's/Fed Ex.  2 for home and 3 for family members.  Skye made the cover.

SJ: edited to page 50

edited the novel to page 50.

SJ: edited to page 17

I have begun the editing of SJ.  The first task is to copy LP and then delete all the non-SJ parts from it.  That will take a while.  When SJ is by itself then I can start working on the new sections for it.  Next year I'll have to do the same thing with JK, the other strand in LP that will be a separate novel.

Post 701: Novel is done!

happens to be post 701.  OK then.  The novel is done.  At the end of the semester I'll print it out and make copies for family members.  Haven't revised since post 700 -- It's done.  Not intended for publication -- that will be the next two.  So it's time to move on.  I wrote a novel!

Revise pages 1-10

worked on pages 1-10, adding more details.  the rewrite begins!

Edit 184-191

finished the typo editing.  Now it's back to rewriting.  83,000 words presently.  Hooray!

Edited 176-184

Edited pages 176-184 in LP.  Almost done with editing for typos.  Then it's back to rewriting!

Edited 165-175

Edited 165-175  on LP.

Edited 158-164

Edited 158-164 in LP project.

Edited 148-158

Edited 148-158 in LP.

Edited 139-147

Edited pages 139-147.

Edited 131-139

Edited pages 131-139.

Edited 119-130

edited pages 119-130 in LP.

Edited 109-119

Edited pages 109-119 in LP.  Working Fri-Sun on the novel, now that school has started.

Edit 101-109

edited pages 101-109.  School starts tomorrow, so I expect to work on the novel only Fri. - Sun.

Edited 86-101

Edited pages 86-101.  Back on track!

Edited 79-85

just plugging along, editing pages.

Edited 71-78

Edited pages 71-78.  It's more time consuming than I thought it would be!

Edited 63-70

Edited pages 63-70

Edited 55-62

edited pages 55-62.

Editing 42-54

Edited pages 42-54.

Editing 17-41

Did a lot of work taking the scattered texts and merging them into the main narrative. These are all in the first 40 pages, and after that the novel focuses on two main stories, and the overall story that merges them into one.

Editing 1-16, etc.

Now the editing is getting a little complicated.  I finished the highlighting of typos on the printed draft.  Now I'm back to some re-writing.  I moved the Benny section to an earlier part of the story, and changed the name to fit with the other sections.  I'm also adding some small parts to the JB sections in pages 1-16 to better explain what's going on.

Editing Typos 55-79

edited typos on pages 55-79.

Playing Guitar Again

With the wrist brace I can play guitar again.  I wear it while playing, and there's no pain or soreness.  Finally!  Overall the wrist feels much better, with no pain during the day.  I wear the brace at night, and when I play the guitar or use the computer.

Editing Typos 80-125

edited pages 80-125.  Getting there!

Editing Typos 106-129

edited for typos pages 106-129.  Going backwards in the story is an interesting experience!

Editing Typos 130-153

The reason for the typo editing is that the dictation software is not 100%, so I have to go through and make the needed corrections.

Editing Typos 154-178

more work with the yellow highlighter!

Editing Typos 179-191

Edited typos starting from the back, pages 179-191.  Nothing glamorous, but it's necessary!

Editing: pages 1-11

1.  Came up with an overall editing plan for the book, especially for the first 40 pages, which need the most work.
2.  Edited pages 1-11.  Added some material and deleted the poems.  All poems will be deleted.

Editing: Mapping the Chapters

So I went through the novel and made notes of where the three sections appear -- the page numbers.  I then color-coded the list to better see how the narratives flow from beginning to end.  I also noted some important plot points.  Most of the editing needs to be done in the first 40 pages.  The rest just needs some cleaning up.  I might even finish the editing in August.

Editing: 1-40

worked on the first 40 pages of the novel.  Just various things.  Editing is a much different process from writing -- even harder, in some ways.  There's no word count to quantify the work.  I miss that!  The first third or so of the novel is in a bit of a mess, and will take some re-writing to put some of the more obscure pieces in line with the plot as it developed.  The middle and latter sections are in much better shape, as they focus on two main story lines.

Draft of Novel is Finished!

final count is 81,409 words.  The draft of the novel is finished!  Now it's editing time.

LP: 80,680

80,680 words in the novel.  Will finish the draft today or tomorrow!

LP: 79,432

79,432 words in the LP project.  1762 words written today.  Ahead of schedule!  I'll continue the pace tomorrow and Friday and so end up with about 81 or 82,000 words.  Then I'll print out the draft and start editing.  My first novel is almost finished.

LP: 77,670

77,670 words in the LP project.  Wrote 1019 words today.

LP: 76,651

76,651 words in the LP project.  Wrote 1281 words today.  Expect to finish the draft of the novel on Friday.  Oh, I've been on vacation the last few days, so no writing.  Went to Bowling Green, Toronto, and Niagara Falls.

LP: 75,370

75,370  words in the LP project.

LP: 74,224

74,224 words in the LP project.

LP: 72,705

72,705 words in the LP project.

LP: 71,187

71,187 words in the LP project.

LP: 70,019

70,019 words in the LP project.  This was my goal for the end of the month, so I'm a little bit ahead of schedule!

Wearing a Wrist Brace

started wearing a wrist brace today.  It is helping so far.

LP: 69,056

69,056 words in the LP project.

LP: 68,022

68,022 words in the LP project.  Wrote 1,010 words today.

LP: 67,012

67,012 words in LP project.  1660 words today.

LP: 65,352

65,352 words in the LP project.  Only 15,000 more to go!

LP: 63,679

63,679 words in the LP project.

LP: 62,656

62,656  words in LP project.

LP: 61,380

61,380 words in the LP project.  Been busy with vacations for the last few days.

LP: 60,318

60,318 words in the LP project.

LP: 59,336

59,336 words in the LP project!  another 1500 words today.  It can be my new daily goal.

LP: 57,739

57,739 words in the LP project.  I'm doing 1500 words a day for 4 days to make up for the two days I didn't get any writing done.  It was surprisingly easy today to get in 1500 words.  I wrote 500 words for each character: JB, Booth, and Jim.  If possible I'd like to keep this up, and make 1500 my standard daily output.

Dim Sum instead of Writing

didn't get any writing done today.  Instead, we went to Chinatown for dim sum.  It was good.  So now I'm behind 2,000 words!  Gotta catch up in the next week.  Maybe 1,500 words a day for the next four days.

The convention was totally awesome.  chatted with Anthony Montgomery (Mayweather in Enterprise, Rom, and Nog (both from DS9).  Really spent  some solid time talking to all three.  Also Skye and I got our photo taken with William Shatner.  I'll post pics later!

Meeting the Captain

so today I may not get much, or any writing done today.  The family is going to the Star Trek convention at the Westin O'Hare.  We will get a photo of us and Captain Kirk.  William Shatner will speak to the convention and then stick around for photos.  Captain Janeway will also be there, I think on stage with Shatner.  Our first ST convention!

LP: 56,192

56,192 words in the LP project.  I did some surgery this morning, fixing some of the present time sections of the story.  This will help tie together the past section and the future section under one broad storyline.  Initially I didn't have a good way to tie the past and future sections together, But I've come up with the storyline that makes enough sense to do so.

LP: 55,140

55,140 words in the LP project.

LP: 53,662

53,662 words on LP project.  A thousand new words today -- all fresh!  I've moved beyond what I already wrote.  Used the dictation software.  It feels very comfortable to compose that way.

LP: 52,609

52,609 words in LP project.  I've finished the old J of K draft, so now it's all fresh writing.  The plan is to continue and the J of K story until around 80,000 words.  Then I'll go back and write more of the Spirit Jar story, and then I'll take out some introductory  material that no longer fits.  I've got an overall plot line that ties together the Spirit Jar and J of K -- enough of a connection to make sense as a novel.  So by the end of summer I'll have a draft of LP done.  The next step will be taking J of K and separating it out and finishing it as its own novel.  Then I'll do the same with the Spirit Jar.  So that's three novels.  But really, finishing LP will be the accomplishment of the summer.  My first novel.

LP: 50,004

50,004 words in the LP project!

LP: 46,059

46,059 words in the LP project.

40,841 -- Half way there!

40,841 words in LP project.  Half way there!

LP: 37,057

37,057 words in LP project.  4,000 words today!

LP: 33,037

33,037 in the LP project.  At this point I am writing the old J of K story into LP.

LP: 27,387

27, 387 words in LP project.  Plus I'm using Apple's speech-to-text to get my old unfinished novel, J of K, in the computer.  I only have a printout of the novel -- the file is in my old laptop that I can't get anything off of, although I can read the files onscreen.  In fact, a side project is to get all my old writing off that laptop with the speech-to-text function.  Speech to text!  No more wrist problems! A thousand words a day, at least!

LP: 26,183

26,183 words in LP project.

LP: 25,142

LP: 25,142 words.

LP: 24,292

24,292 words in the LP project.

LP: 23,221

23,221 words.  Not much done today, but a little done.

LP: 23,042

23,042 words in LP project.

LP: 19,200

19,200 words for project LP.

LP: 18,277

LP project: 18,277 words.  Onward!

another writing project

OK, it's the Summer 2014 writing project!  Working title: LP.  It will absorb the previous manuscript, the Spirit Jar, so it's already got 15,000 words.  I will also combine other earlier manuscripts and tie them together with a cohesive narration.  Prose and poetry will be combined.  Really, I'm taking my archive of writing and putting it all together.  The goal is 80,000 words.  Only 65,000 more to go, and a lot of that has already been written.  Wish me luck!

Tapping May 12

Proton Beat

Ambient Bells 3

Ambient Bells

VG Strat Plus E-Bow Equals Awesome

latest guitar break

this guitar break is on an optimistic note.  I'm almost there.  Today Poly and I put together an Ikea desk -- and no wrist problem.  I can play badminton at the Y for an hour, without wrist problems.  BUT, If I play the guitar for two or three minutes, it hurts.  Even with the E-Bow I'll get some slight pain.  So it's back to the cases they go -- and the keyboard is back downstairs.

So, if I lay off for a month or two, and then when I play -- only use the E-Bow -- then maybe I'll be OK.  I've gotten a better feel for the EBow -- and with the 339 it sounds fantastic!  So I can see myself focusing on EBow playing.  With any conventional styles so far I'm mediocre at best, so why not try to be good at something more obscure.

so the keyboard is downstairs, and I've got my Beatles fake book out.  Time for some fun!

Space Folk 01

Folk Metal 01

E-Bow Blues 01

Bells

keyboards only

well, the guitar thing was nice for a while.  wrist problems came back, so it's back to the keyboards.  maybe a little with the e-bow, but it doesn't have the same sounds as that bridge pickup on the stratocaster playing blues.  right now the wrist feels good, but it can't take much guitar playing at all.  its weak.  also, it might be permanent, if it is focal dystonia, like i think it is.  look it up.  but i haven't been to the doctor, so i don't really know for sure.

coconut milk shake

E-Bow Blues in A

Saturday Morning E-Bow

back to the blues

well, why the switch to the blues?  basically, it takes fewer right hand gestures than ragtime.  I'm using a slow speed setting on the amp blues track.  I'm hoping that I can play a few minutes and come up with something interesting, and keep the wrist in good shape.  Still doing daily stretching, and it seems to be helping.  Slow is the key.

Also used a mic this time on the amp, and the results are really nice.  better than plugging the guitar straight into the computer.  now i can have the reverb that gives it some depth.  Also liking the bridge pickup on the stratocaster.  it's feeling more crisp than the hum buckers on the other guitars.  don't mind the auto-correct on this blog.  it has a limited vocabulary!

Thursday Morning Blues Riffs

Keep on Truckin Mama Interrupted

some more GCD riffs

carpal tunnel stretches

For almost a week I've been doing some carpal tunnel stretches, and it's really helping.  That's how I could put up the video of 20 seconds of finger style blues.  The pain has gone away, and my hands feel better.  The numbness is gone, too.  I'm going to be very careful and not overdo do it, of course.  Minecraft is banned for life!  I checked, and I haven't played since Feb. 1, 2014.  Never again!  My iPad use is almost zero -- just checking one email account once a day, Facebook once a day, and Twitter once a day or less.  I'm also cutting down on mindless online browsing.  I do the stretches throughout the day.

So my guitar plans for now are to go back to finger style blues and ragtime.  Limited playing and slowly building up the time each day.  Jazz is out, and electric blues is out.  Old school only!

20 seconds of GCD finger style blues

Focus: ambient electronica

https://soundcloud.com/robert-mccord-2/focus

ambient electronica.  guitar is a fender VG start played with an EBow.

ambient electronica 1

https://soundcloud.com/robert-mccord-2/march-22-2014

an ambient electronica piece I put together today.

tapping test

busy semester

no writing lately.  Busy time in the semester.  Good progress with the piano.  That is all.

Spirit Jar Word Count

word count: 15,858 words.  Going into a third major revision that will focus the humor and make it darker.  I've got a better idea of how to position my character, Booth between Wilson and Edison.  Also a new force, the orphan Blake, has made an appearance.  A war for the future will take place in Cleveland, in 1880.

Spirit Jar word count

15,474 words for the whole project.  Continuing to revise and make character changes.  Today I worked on adding more humor.

Spirit Jar part 2 word count.

4777 words for part 2 of the Spirit Jar.  Many ideas are swirling around.  Perhaps make EAP the protagonist -- even to revise the work to focus on him -- a set of short stories dealing with his life from 1849 to the 1880s.  Or that could be the second novel, after this one.  TE is still fun to work with.  Booth will now take a secondary role in this book, I think.  Much rewriting will be needed after the first draft is done.  But getting toward 20,000 words!  15,000 soon!

part 2 word count: the Spirit Jar

so, part 2 of the Spirit Jar has 4144 words --almost half of part 1 already!  The work progresses!  I'm back to writing a scene with the old main character, Booth.  He meets with the Antagonist, EA -- who may be the new main character, depending on how his sections go versus the sections with TE, the current protagonist.  I've never had a writing project do so much seesawing.  I think it's a good sign. 

writing update

The project goes well.  Part 2 of the Spirit Jar has almost 2,000 words already.  It has changed significantly also.  The main character has been demoted to a supporting role, and the adversary has become the protagonist.  And a new adversary has been added.  Also there are mysterious benefactors who work behind the scenes to shape the events of the story.  I am adding more sic-fi elements to the story, and broadening it out into a larger struggle between opposing forces.  The story will be more along the lines of genre fiction, more commercial.  Also there is a humorous streak in it now.  I'm playing with the 19th century.  Fun!

Writing Again!

Back on the novel.  Might change the name to The Spirit Jar.  I'm not gonna do a word count now, for the moment.  I'll keep the blog posted on my progress.  Nothing major so far, but a page or so at a time, even half a page.  Plan to outline the major scenes all the way to the end, then go back and put in the details.

minecraft video 35

switching to keyboards

so at some point I'll make some keyboard videos.  working on some Beatles songs, and I figured out how to record with direct feed from keyboard to laptop.

recorded vs. live

for me, listening to my own videos, I sound worse than if I listen to myself live.  That's one reason to record -- it makes you get better.  Your own ears fool you while playing -- you don't her what it sounds like to others.  It's like proofreading an essay.  The down side is that I don't sound very good with the guitar tapping.  So to continue -- well, I don't know.  It's all for fun anyway.  I sound better on keyboards, but I don't have a good way to record it yet, except with a mike.  Maybe I'll start that soon.  Guitar tapping doesn't replace real playing with a pick, or finger style.

today's tapping video

new post

just a post so that the previous post won't be the latest post.  Enjoy!

Tapping Arpeggio A minor pentatonic

bac to tapping

well that was a short break.  Gonna work on tapping with the epiphone dot.  it doesn't hurt the wrist, so why not?  working on arpeggios with minor pentatonic scale.  videos soon.

Taking a guitar break

need to take a long guitar break.  as in the whole semester.  so far the short breaks have not allowed my wrist  to completely heal.  It's good for a while, then the pain and stiffness sets in.  so I"m off guitars until May.  Back to the keyboard!  I'll post minecraft or keyboard videos instead.  try and do some writing, too.

I might do something with the EBow, as that has no effect on my wrist.  But frankly, I'm not a real fan of the sound it produces.  Kind of annoying.  Also, tapping is fine with my wrist, so who knows, I may try that again.  So I won't rule out tapping videos!  I never stick to my promises, do I?

EBow 12 Jan 2014

minecraft video 34

minecraft video 33

Blues Riffs in A

Tapping Test 10

Tapping Test 9

Chord Tapping Test

Tapping Test 7

Tapping Test 6

Tapping Test 5

Tapping Test 4

Tapping Test 3

Tapping and EBow

so now I find that tapping may be the solution to my wrist problems.  As long as it doesn't make other  pain issues!  I get enough sound by running the guitar through the amp, where I can increase the gain, and then run it directly to the computer.  I don't have to hear the high gain, and so my ears are protected.  The tapping doesn't bother my wrist.  And it's faster than the EBow.  I'm also working on sitting the guitar on my lap for tapping.  this makes the fretboard easier to access.  And with the amp I can use various effects, such as reverb, delay, tremolo, flange, etc.  Let's just hope my hands don't get any more problems!

Tapping Test 2

t

Tapping Test 1

EBow Test 6

EBow Test 5

EBow Test 4