the deep moans round with many voices

And we bring "The Sum of Things" up to the end of my currently completed scenes. Still a rough draft, I'm afraid. :-)

( The Sum of Things, Chapter Two, Part III )

Am going to my parents' on Thursday, and returning to Ithaca next Monday. Am planning, once again, to make shameless use of their washer and dryer, since it saves me $8-$10. (I save up my laundry and usually do three or four loads in one go, which eats most of my afternoon and a ridiculous number of quarters. My next apartment will have laundry facilities in house. Or else.)

Still no job nibbles. My current evil plan is to apply as an after-school counselor at the local YMCA, which is seriously not what I want to be doing long-term but could easily pull me through the next few months. *crosses fingers*

The first chapter of "The Way of the Apartment Manager," my new Naruto story, is finished, and the thing as a whole is thoroughly plotted and outlined. I'm somewhat baffled by its sudden appearance and development, but I guess I shouldn't look gift stories in the mouth.

"Harvest," my half-finished Ekanu story is poking along, as are my HP fics. I think with some luck I may have "Paint the Town" finished in another week -- that is, if I can keep "Apartment Manager" from eating my brain the way "Heritage" did this summer.

And speaking of "Heritage"... there is no Gormenghast section at ff.net, but they do have a Miscellaneous Books option. I will try posting it there and we'll see what happens. I don't expect much by way of readers -- it's an obscure series, and I'm writing a pre-book story (the origins of Steerpike, my favorite character) -- but it will be nice to at least have it publicly available.

---------------------------------------------

So I hear Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is coming out next July. Cool, I guess.

Oddly, while I still do the majority of my fanfiction writing for HP, I seem to be less and less emotionally involved in that fandom. I'm also reading less HP fic than ever. And I find it hard to get wildly enthusiastic about this news. I mean, the new book's coming out. Fine. Great. But it's over SIX MONTHS AWAY. People, get a grip, take a deep breath, and relax.

I'll get excited in the summer.

I wanted to start posting "Heritage," my Gormenghast fic, but the library computer is refusing to read that file off my disk. It likes the others just fine, though, which is nice for printing resume copies, but somewhat baffling in figuring out what's wrong with the one file.

Anyway. Here's some more original stuff instead. Is please to remember is rough draft, yes?

( The Sum of Things, Chapter Two, Parts I and II )

I only have one more completed part of this story, in which we see the meeting Ranna calls at the end of this excerpt. Then it's back to Talin and Bren and the action scene I've been avoiding. What on earth made me think writing a story about war and swordplay was a good idea???

Slow day. Still no job nibbles, but I got my paycheck from my last half week of the old job. Yay money. Am skating the tight edge of being dead broke, though, so I'd better find something by January.

Still a rough draft -- this scene in particular needs tweaking.

( The Sum of Things, Chapter One, Part VI )

Utterly boring day. We have a minimal coating of snow on the ground, but other than that, nothing has happened. This means no job nibbles, as well as no disasters. *sigh* While it's nice to be able to sleep in until ungodly hours, I'd really rather be employed.

Rough draft. You know the drill.

( The Sum of Things, Chapter One, Part V )

Here we are, still in chapter one but having switched from Talin to Ranna, and now getting into politics. Yay politics. This was the scene that killed about three days when I was writing it, since I suddenly realized I had to have 12 people on the Inner Council and I'd never bothered to figure out who on god's green earth they were.

Of course, knowing their personalities and goals opened up lots of new avenues for plot twists... *rubs hands evilly*

As always, please remember that this is a rough draft.

( The Sum of Things, Chapter One, Part IV )

Finally got off my ass and edited the Gormenghast story that ate my brain this summer. Must go see if ff.net has a Gormenghast section... Otherwise, expect it here starting tomorrow. :-)