Part-time prevaricator
Writing about writing.
I shot some photos of the moon through the branches using my longest lens (55–250mm), and was quite pleased how they turned out.
Then I retreated indoors (it’s frickin’ freezing out there) and wrote about 800 words in a new Prairie SF short story. First contact with a farmer. We’ll see where it leads.
Another day, another short story rejected. (It’s actually the same one I wrote about earlier.)
I sighed, and then opened up The (Submission) Grinder to find the next market to send it to.
Wish me luck!
This all originally appeared on Facebook, but not everyone’s on Facebook. (Hi, Mom!) So I’m posting it here, too, for you to enjoy.
Any annotations are in italics, and mostly they provide context or commentary.
Dec. 7th, 5:20 PM
I love paying a $3.50 “convenience” fee and then having to catch a cab to the airport to get on the bus. A fine use of irony there.
At this point I hadn’t left my sister’s house yet. I had no idea. None.
Dec. 7th, 6:51 PM
I’m at the depot ridiculously early. Got my ticket. Found out my bus is delayed by 90 minutes.
If I’d known I wasn’t in a hurry, I’d have told my cabbie to not bother running those three red lights.
Thanks for the notification, Greyhound. You suck.
Any Wpg folks, if you’re bored, swing by and say hi.
One did. Thanks, Michelle!
Dec. 7th, 8:07 PM
I wonder if the dude with the Australian accent running the metal detector over everyone who will be boarding the northbound bus ever looks out the window at the snow, sighs, and thinks about the choices he’s made.
One of my Australian Facebook friends assured me that he does.
Dec. 7th, 8:22 PM
I just now saw a sign telling me that I can save 10% on a Harvey’s burger if I take my bus ticket to the airport terminal.
I was loath to leave the bus terminal, on the chance that my bus would somehow magically show up, and I’d miss it. Also, if you’re trying to lure me away, you’ll have to do better than Harvey’s.
Dec. 7th, 9:05 PM
Douglas Adams pointed out that it’s no coincidence that no language has ever coined the phrase “as pretty as an airport”. Ditto bus terminals.
Self-explanatory, I trust.
Dec. 7th, 9:23 PM
HA HA HA HA HA HA HA
Likewise self-explanatory.
I also posted a comment: “Greyhound, you owe everyone in this terminal a refund on their ‘service’ fee.”
Dec. 7th, 10:00 PM
In line. Greyhound suuuuuuucks.
They herd you through “security” before they load the bus. It’s pretty funny, since people getting on at stops along the way aren’t subjected to a metal detector. Also, in the Winnipeg terminal, you can leave the “security” area and return without a second check. Just so long as you don’t move your carry-on bags out.
Dec. 7th, 10:18 PM
They’re still calling it the 8:30 bus to Brandon. It’s 10:18 PM now. #greyhoundIsTerrible
Dec. 7th, 10:39 PM
The Thompson bus arrived after the Brandon one. Guess which one is boarding first. Go ahead, guess. #ffs
Dec. 7th, 10:43 PM
A dude has decided he’s not getting on the bus now. Cue the clown show of retrieving his checked bag.
He got yelled at for moving his carry-on bags from the “secure” area. He decided that the highway conditions were still too bad to travel. (He was partly right; as is tradition, the highway was terrible from Winnipeg to Portage la Prairie.)
Dec. 7th, 10:54 PM
I’m on a bus.
It’s almost 11 pm. This is the 8:30 bus.
Never again, Greyhound.
The early bus was scheduled to leave Winnipeg at 8:30 PM and arrive in Brandon at 11:10 PM. The late bus was to leave at 11:00 and get in at 1:50.
The early bus left Winnipeg at 11:00 PM (ish) and arrived in Brandon around 1:30 AM. I don’t know the fate of the late bus.
Dec. 7th, 11:00 PM
As we got rolling, I noticed that the front seat held two coolers of human blood, helpfully labelled Please Expedite Without Delay.
Dec. 7th, 11:40 PM
A middle-of-the-night bus ride down a snowy Trans-Canada between Winnipeg and Brandon? Yeah, The Tragically Hip seems like the right soundtrack.
Dec. 8th, 1:52 AM
Home.
Dec. 8th, 9:29 AM
They just got in touch via Twitter and suggested I check their bus tracker next time. I tried that. Apparently “Winnipeg” doesn’t exist.
I snarked a bit on Twitter, too. The helpful people at the Greyhound Help account obviously didn’t realize I was talking about Greyhound Canada.
This also felt a bit like the post-credits scene, the last joke in a rolling farce.
On the up side: at least I didn’t sleep on the floor of the terminal, like the one guy loudly proclaimed he had the previous night. According to him, the temperature dropped overnight in the terminal — almost certainly a cost-saving measure — and no one was willing to turn up the heat.
At least I had a good book to read. (Stories of Your Life and Others, re-titled Arrival to capitalize on the movie, a collection of short stories by Ted Chiang.)
…at the ACI First Friday party.
This morning, before breakfast, I checked my email. One of my short stories, which made it into the second round at a publication (a rarefied space that, according to their statistics, only 10% of submitted stories ever enter), had been rejected.
So I moped for about five minutes—I’d had high hopes for this one, and now they’d been dashed—then had breakfast and prepped it for another market. (Always read the submission guidelines: the second publisher wants all trace of the author’s name scrubbed from the submission, to allow blind judging.)
Moral: If you’re an author, get used to rejection. But don’t let it get you down.
As ever, Kurt Vonnegut’s simple quote applies here: So it goes.
In the shower, I had a moment of insight, an epiphany, about the connection between the situation my main character faces at the end of the story and the situation his sister faces all the way along. It might even inspire the title of the third act, but let’s don’t be hasty.
Along with my collection of six Very Short Stories, these are the works in Word-o-Mat’s Edition #1:
Information about all the authors may be found on the Word-o-Mat website.
It has finally arrived.
I’m not ready yet to slit that seal, though.
Word-o-Mat is an art project that aims to sell packages of short stories from a repurposed Wurlitzer cigarette vending machine in Malmö, Sweden. I have six very short stories included in issue #1.
Some scrawled notes from tonight’s Art of Managing Your Career Master Class.
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So I’m participating in the NYCMidnight Flash Fiction Contest, and I’ve just received the judges’ feedback on my first piece, “The Overnight Shift”.
What the judges liked about your story
Exceptionally clever blend of modern urban elements with fantasy. Robert is such a likable character that by the end I don’t even mind his deceptive treachery. The twist is funny, unexpected, and thoroughly enjoyable.…
Humorous dialogue, especially with the demon and the human. The imagery of the coffee was visceral and imaginative.…
I liked how you incorporated dialogue in your story. Your characters’ personalities shone through with the dialogue.…
What the judges feel needs work
The centaur’s speech is somewhat out of place. He seems like a bit of an archetype, more archaic than the other creatures, especially against the rest of the fantasy races who seem well-integrated. His use of “art thou” is an example of when his speech seems particularly out of place. If this character is meant to be different from the others in terms of his integration, the reader may need more cues to read him this way.…
There’s a lot of introduction of characters that don’t feel like they are necessary to the story. Also because of the anachronistic elements (mentioning Wikipedia and Pokemon Go), I’m having trouble getting a sense of place and how rules work in this fantasy world. Also…why are they letting faun children play in a garbage dump? If that’s okay, why are there 3 of them on duty? If you’re going to have relaxed workers, you must have a contrasting militant one, so we understand the rules. Also, more showing, less telling. We should see the rainbow, not hear about it.…
Make sure that each interaction between your characters is meaningful. With short stories, every word counts. Each scene has to connect to each other somehow, or at least move the story forward.…
I’m glad they enjoyed it. I’ll certainly take their critiques into consideration as I polish it up for submission…