Dig Dug

The hole in the front yard is finished. With the sister-in-law's help we got it all cleaned out, and then started filling it back in with clean (mostly) dirt. We finished up about half of what had been opened up when we ran out of the grindings from the stumps on the one set of trees, leveling out another part of the yard in the process. Now we'll need to dig into the big pile-o'-dirt we have to fill in the rest.

Yes, there are pictures but I'm way to tired to monkey-dance for you all tonight. I hurt, I'm tired, and I need to get the second draft of Chapter 4 done (staid up until past midnight last night and only got about 2/3s the way through). Chapter 4 (formerly Chapter 3) isn't going so well. I'm hoping that by the time I got to this chapter I had the voice and the direction down well and that's why I didn't do much to it last night. It's now over 3000 words, so as long as all the other word count holds out the application for Viable Paradise will just be the first four chapters (somewhere around 8100-8400 words). This week I want to print out the hard copy and go to work on it with the red pen. Normally the first time I do that word count stays about even (the deletions/rewrites tend to equal the new stuff put in). I think I should have it ready to go by Thursday. Even in its current state I feel much better about showing it off (still working through the embarrassment of "I sent it out like this? What was I thinking?") and making the shot at getting in. I'm sure there's still plenty to be embarrassed by in there. That's what the next rewrite is supposed to help me weed out.

And then I'm giving myself until the middle of September to finish it out for at least draft zero of the whole. I suck at self imposed deadlines, though. But I want to get it out so I can get back to the Post-Rapture novel and maybe have part of that ready for next year's Hastings Point Writers Workshop.