George: status update

So last week, I posted about my laptop, George, eating my novel's file. I was at first so mad at the computer that I couldn't even look in its direction for fear I'd lunge at it and break it into tiny pieces. Over the course of the weekend, Mr. W worked with it, testing out various things, and figured out that the crash might have been a combo of Microsoft Word and the antivirus software.

My antivirus software does "real-time scanning". I always assumed this meant "I will check any file you download as you download it" but it turns out it means "I will check any file you change every time you change it".

Combine that with a slow hard drive and a paranoid writer who saves at least once a minute (seriously) and you're bound to hit trouble sooner or later.

Mr. W's automated testing (if you were shortsighted enough not to marry/date a software developer, I suggest you remedy that at once: they're HANDY to have around) was able to recreate my crash within an hour or so with the antivirus on, and with it off it wouldn't happen again all weekend long.

Therefore, I am back to using George. I really like him, and trying to use my old laptop feels weird and uncomfortable now that I'm used to George's smaller size.

But if he eats another file, he and I are going on a trip to the tallest skyscraper I can find, and only I will be taking the elevator back to the ground floor. :)

George, how COULD you?

George is my recently acquired Acer Aspire One laptop. (Hell, yes, I'm naming names. :)

George and I, I THOUGHT, were friends. We've been hanging out together nearly every day, working on Raoul and Aardvark and some days both, and we check the occasional email and do the occasional "we should be working but we don't wanna" random Internet search.

Today was Raoul re-reading day. I finished the editing on Tuesday, let it rest yesterday, and today I started reviewing it top to bottom to make sure I hadn't done anything weird. (like the "smile of pure belief" I wrote instead of the intended "disbelief" which does make for a rather different sentence)

I worked for two hours this morning and I did GOOD stuff. I found a bunch of little things here and there that needed to be changed, and I changed them. George and I were on fire.

Perhaps George was literally on fire, because at 2:00pm I pressed "Save" (I never quite trust Microsoft Word so I save CONSTANTLY to make sure nothing goes missing) and George said, "I'm disinclined to acquiesce to your suggestion." (Actually, he said something about the drive being missing, but a good Pirates of the Caribbean quote is never a mistake.)

I said, "!!!" and Word shut down.

Okay, fine, I'll just re-open the file and...

OH. The file is not there. The file has in fact been erased from the drive.

Then I said a few other things that cannot be posted here.

Then I stomped around.

Then I phoned Mr. W (who, lucky for him, was in a meeting) and told him I planned to do myself and the computer some serious damage and he might want to call back before it happened.

(He still hasn't called. :)

To make a long and infuriating story short, I eventually got Word to admit that a) it had a temp file and b) the stuff was there, and I lost maybe two or three minutes of work.

Unfortunately, my fury at the computer for just dying for no apparent reason did not exactly leave me in a calm and rational state of mind that would be conducive for editing. I even ate two squares of chocolate (if it's good enough to help Harry Potter recover from disaster, it's good enough for me - and I DID track its calories) but no good.

So I thought, how to calm myself? Where can I pour out all this annoyance and blinding rage?

:)

Now, feeling a little calmer, I shall return to work. Not on George, though. When a man jerks you around that bad, he don't deserve no second chances.

Read an E-Book Week!

This week (Mar 8-14) has been designated Read an E-Book Week. The official website has lots of books available for free or cheap download (including, of course, mine) and also information on new and upcoming devices for electronic reading.

Interesting idea and I hope they have much success in encouraging people to read electronically!

My newest article: Wii Fit

I write monthly articles for Computing Unplugged, and my newest one is now online. It's a review of the Wii Fit, so if you've been considering getting one, check it out!

Heather

May 21, 2008: Three DAYS??

I reached the end of Seven today. I SO didn't expect to be done in three days. I'm thrilled, but stunned too.

Since I had intended this to take me until Friday, I will spend tomorrow and Friday re-reading it again. I will read it, as best I can, as though it's brand new to me, and see how it works. I really am happy with it, though. :)

Writing Project: 7's edits
Time Planned: 5 hours
Time Spent: 4.25 hours, 'cause I FINISHED!
Favourite Part: Finishing. :)

Exercise: 30 minute elliptical
One Fun Thing I Did Today: I synchronized my Palm at Starbucks using my new Bluetooth adaptor. Nerd heaven. :)

May 8, 2008: Write now, clean later!

I'd planned to work on Raoul this morning and then spend the afternoon in various decluttering projects and finishing off my article. I did the morning, and was about halfway through creating Raoul's scene list. In the afternoon, I did the article and then felt like working on Raoul.

"No," I said to myself, "you're supposed to be cleaning." And then I realized the foolishness of that. The clutter is nearly all of the hidden variety these days - kitchen cabinets and whatnot - and even if it were teetering piles of junk, why would I put off an urge to write to clean instead?

So I didn't. I spent two more hours on Raoul, I have the scene list finished, and I am ridiculously happy. So a good day!

I was going to put said scene list into Excel, as per the instructions on the Snowflake Method I use to write my books. But in the past, I've had trouble keeping track of little tidbits of dialogue or action, little "ooh, this should happen in this scene" things... so this time, I'm using an outlining program on my Palm called ListPro.

The picture shows the first few scenes. See the little plus sign? It expands to show the tidbits (which I'm not showing YOU... you'll have to read the book when it's done! :) and now I don't have to do my usual method (which involves putting all the bits into an enormous Word file and then scrabbling through it whenever I need something). The code in the note field is to tell me which subplot(s) the scene is covering. I feel so organized. 'All' that's left is to write the book. :)

The Mississauga half marathon is on Sunday. Sure hope I'm ready!

Writing Project: Raoul's planning
Time Planned: 2 hours
Time Spent: 4 hours
Favourite Part: CRAVING doing more

Exercise: scheduled rest day
One Fun Thing I Did Today: played with my new Bluetooth adaptor which I'm using to wirelessly synchronize my Palm. I am a nerd and I love it!