The Last 200

I've come out to a coffee shop with the specific intention of finishing  up a short story that I'm working on, since I tend to work a bit better if I've got myself out of the house where there's too much temptation to stay in bed and re-watch box sets of '24' (currently re-working my way through season 4). This is important, because I've got a deadline to meet before Wednesday. The short story that I'm working on - In The Middle Of The Night - I would have been working on anyway, since I'm hoping to put together a collection of short stories on the kindle. My hope was to have them all finished by January 2013, and while that's certainly still possible,  I don't just want to rush and hack them out. After all, no-one knows who the hell I am - it's not like anyone is eagerly awaiting this book. 

The reason, therefore, that this particular story finds itself with a deadline in to days time is because I hope to enter it for a short story competition. The reasoning behind this is three fold. The first is fairly prosaic: if the story actually gets anywhere, then I can assume that it's got a chance of finding a larger audience outside those who feel contractually and emotionally obliged to tell me that they like it. Secondly, of course, if it does really well, it will have some financial reward. And if I can't get flattery, then I'm happy to take the money. Thirdly, of course, if it does really really well - ie, if it is a runner-up or even a winner, then that's obviously something that I can plaster on the promo material for the book.

So, this is why I'm here in the coffee shop. It's a 3,000 word story (not actually that long), and I've completed about 2,800 words. It isn't, as you might have thought, simply a matter of just if providing the missing 200 words. There's still a bit of shifting around in tone and texture, and, at the moment, the resolution to the story just jumps out a bit suddenly, without a great deal of lead-in, so I need to fix that. I think it's probably a relatively easy fix, however, and I'm not overly concerned about it. 

And that's why I'm in this coffee shop. With some ideas and a laptop. But not, as I've only just discovered, without the external hard drive on which I've saved the latest draft of the story. That, I've left back at home (probably on the bed, next to the 24 box set). Which means that I'm not likely to be able to finish the story today. Again, though, I'm not overly concerned, since the deadline isn't til Wednesday, and luckily I've managed to remember to bring out a hard copy of the short story collection. This, luckily enough, chimes in with the way I very often write: printing out a hard copy (or seven) as I go along, and reading it as I would if it was finished, all the while scrawling notes and annotations over the text. There's still something very alluring and persuasive about seeing the words on a page of foolscap. It makes the whole thing a great deal more accessible and - 'real' than just seeing the words on a screen. All of which, I guess, means that even though I don't have the hard drive with me, I don't really have any excuse to stop writing the story today. Which in addition means  I'm really using some delaying tactics in writing this blog. 

Despite the fact that I was paranoid that nobody was going to turn up to my first improv class, there was actually a nice little turn out. Of course, I'll need a few more on a regular basis in order for me to break even after hire costs and everything, but it's a promising start. We played a few short-form improv games, and it was a very decent evening. I'll go on about this a lot, but the main bulk of what I'll be saying is that the improv classes will be held every Sunday at the DukeBox Theatre, at the back of the Iron Duke pub on Waterloo Street, 7.00 - 9.00pm. It's £5 per workshop, and there's loyalty cards available. 

By the way, I'm going to be doing a couple of Ghostwalks this week. Because it's Halloween this week, there's a special late night one (well, at 9.00pm) on the night itself, which is on Wednesday. There's no need to book, and you can just rock up to outside the Druids Head pub (not the Druids pub, which is something else) at 9.00 on Halloween. For those of you who have been saying for the past year that you're definitely going to come one time, this would seem to be a perfect opportunity. Just saying.