Friday, February 12, 2010

a basket of peaches

A good weekend is on the horizon. My aunt and uncle are coming up from Kentucky tonight. Tomorrow I'm hanging out with Dylan and Tyler. Sunday I am (hopefully) going down to the Cincinnati to hang out with Rob, Mandy, Amos, Jessie, Tony, and all the other fellas at house church. (Mandy just texted me telling me she's hanging out with Amanda and Jessie, making me jealous that I'm up in Centerville instead of down in Cincinnati; oh well).

I'm 1/3 of the way done with the revision of the original "36 Hours." It's at around 130 pages. I'm going to be adding a lot of stuff at the end, and then adding a parallel story set ten, fifteen years in the future. I'm also telling the story in 3rd person rather than 1st, hoping that deals with some of the weak characterization. In comparing "36 Hours" to "Dwellers of the Night," I can see that "36 Hours" has its biggest strength that of fast-paced action and a continually evolving storyline. "Dwellers of the Night" is more low-key with action but with more emphasis upon characterization and the development of internal themes. I'm really trying to get out of the "zombie" genre (with current works such as "A Dream For Us," "The Boy Who Hoped," "Metamorphosis," and a possible co-authored book with Sarah), but writing about zombies--well, re:writing about zombies--is fun, too. A guilty pleasure, if you will.

I've applied for several jobs but still no takers. The economy is worse here, some say, than it was down in Cincinnati. My next stop? Retail stores. Target, K-Mart, Wal-Mart. I think it's great to have a college degree and work an hourly job for minimum wage. 80,000 dollars well-spent.

The weight loss has been going well. I'm at 164 pounds, and I am making great strides in developing my chest, arms, abs, and legs. I work out for about thirty minutes a day (strength training). I went for an exhausting bike ride last week, but all this snow is keeping me from doing that again. Black ice coats everything. I almost died from an icicle falling from our roof. I wish I had a camera--all three cameras I had access to stopped working within the same week--so I could take pictures of the snow blanketing the ground and snuggled up in the trees, ice covering everything like lace. It's so beautiful, and I can't take any pictures. Sadness.

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