#ROW80 Check-in and #WIPpet Wednesday – May 6, 2015

So, um. You know how my main goal for this week was to finish that history essay I had due? Well. I kind of maybe withdrew from the course because everything was getting a bit too hard. Here is the thought process:

• I was honestly not sure I was going to finish this essay to a satisfactory standard.
• I would have to be doing an assignment on my way to Sydney next weekend.
• The final assignment (another essay) is due on June 9. My Fair Lady opens June 5 and between May 31 and June 7, I am in the theatre every night (and during the days on the weekend). Yes, I’m taking three days off work during this period, but I’m going to be really tired.
• This course was simply an elective as far as my degree goes, it has nothing to do with my specialisation or anything.
• I’m enrolled in a winter course in the middle of the year, and while it would have been nice for that to mean one less subject at the end of degree, it will at least mean dropping this subject won’t make the degree any longer. I’ll still have done four courses by December.
• It was still at the point where I incur no academic penalty (my “grade” is “withdrawn without fail”). Even though I still have to pay for the course, in the Australian system, the government pays for your tertiary education, and we pay it back through our tax. Sure, it means I’ll get paid less for a bit longer, but you don’t miss money you never actually see in your bank account. It’ll be a nice surprise when I finally have it all paid off and start getting paid a little more. That’s not going to be for some time, though.

So, yes. I’ve now only got one course to concentrate on, and I’ll have handed in the final paper for that one two full weeks before My Fair Lady opens. I do feel like all the hours I spent working on this silly essay have now been in vain, but they’re in the past, and I had to consider my sanity in the near future.

It also means that I’ve had some time to write, and that means that I will only have had to avoid WIPpet Wednesday for one week rather than the seven or eight I was expecting. Camp NaNoWriMo is now over, so I’m making sense of all the brainstorming I did. The story took a couple of unexpected turns throughout the month, so I’m working out where to go with that. I’m also developing the structure for the story a bit more. It’s fun to explore. So now I can actually start sharing from the story, rather than the back story scenes. This one is from… well, I hesitate to say “prologue” but that’s essentially what it is. In this scene, Grace (formerly known as Rosa; I have another MC named Laura and two characters with names ending in A was bugging me) has gone to visit a Seer she trusts before she heads back to her home country. Six paragraphs for the sixth of May. Grace has stated that she doesn’t intend to return to Merrowford, her home town.

Densey held out her hand and Grace took it in one of her own. The old woman closed her eyes and bent her head, stroking Grace’s hand with her thumb. Grace waited.

When Densey opened her eyes again, there was a sparkle in the corner of one. “I think Merrowford might be in your sights. An old lover of yours will return. You’re going to have a run in with him.”

“I think you’re mistaken. I’ve never had a lover in Merrowford. I’ve kept clear of any more emotional attachment to that town.”

“‘Any more’. Where did it start?”

“Do you mean…” Densey raised an eyebrow. Grace shook her head. “That’s impossible, Densey, that man is long dead.”

“And you’re one hundred and twenty-nine years old. Also impossible, wouldn’t you say, my dear?”

I feel like she has a good point. With that, I have only left to say that you should join WIPpet Wednesday over here (just post an excerpt of your WIP that somehow relates to the date), and ROW80 over here. I am going to see out this game of Words With Friends that I’m playing with my partner (he is thrashing me) and then head to bed. It’s been a long day.

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