Infinite regress of idiocy

Sunday night: I edit the start of chapter 3, which I haven’t worked on since early December.  I place the entire novel folder onto my brand-new USB key (thanks, Rhys) which has nothing else on it and thus there is no danger of overwriting anything.

Monday afternoon: in the library, I open chapter 3 and find that in fact I did not save my edit of chapter 3.  I have only the early December version.  I try in vain to blame the computer for my own stupidity, and edit the start of chapter 3 again.

Monday night: I get home and find that I did, in fact, save my edited chapter 3, but transferred the folder before saving the edits.  So the computer has the original edited version (and the original non-edited version), and the USB key has a different edited version.

Well, at least I didn’t lose any work after all.

Punchline: the second (Monday afternoon) version was the superior one.  Nevertheless, I don’t intend to make this sort of thing a habit.

Submissions: a how-to guide

Identify the submission to make. (If you’re looking for competitions, I highly recommend Sally Quilford’s competition calendar.)

Look through list of ‘finished’ pieces, i.e. those which can be read without massive shudders or cries of ‘God, that’s awful’. Double-check to see whether an earlier contest you entered has any explicit ban on simultaneous submissions. Ponder whether to do it anyway, as nothing ever wins. Reject such defeatism by a narrow margin.

Print out the competition’s entry form. At intervals, yell ‘NO!’ to Thundercat, who is perched on the computer monitor in preparation for launching onto the printer’s paper tray, because clearly all that squeaking and scurrying can only mean one thing: a colony of mice inside the printer must be vanquished!!!!!1!1!1!1

Print out the submission(s). Peer at every page to see whether the crummy ink-jet printer has smeared any of the words. Reprint any pages so afflicted. Complain to Rhys about the printer. Wonder if multiple submissions should be printed in different fonts to fool judging panel into thinking they are not from the same person. Smack self for being a doofus.

Play air drums during one of the verse-to-chorus bridges of the Scorpions’ ‘Winds of Change’.

Fill out the entry form. Try not to a) worry about data protection issues or b) misspell own name.

Write the check. Double-check who it’s being made out to. Firmly resist the urge to calculate how much money has been spent on contest entries and postage, in comparison to how much money has been earned through writing.

Find a previously-used envelope that doesn’t need too many stickers to make it reusable, and doesn’t have the flap completely ripped away. Find blank white stickers and place them over the old address/stamps/bar codes. Find address on entry form. Remove Thundercat, who in the last 0.14 seconds gave up on the printer, ran through into the other room, jumped up onto the table and sat on the envelope. Write address on envelope. Try not to smear the ink. Wonder if placing clear tape over the address (to prevent smudging in the rain) will mark one as eccentric. Do it anyway. Tape up the envelope, hoping that the office won’t need to use multiple implements to open it.

Take envelope to post office. Wonder if post office people conduct rituals of mockery in relation to the quantity of envelopes going out with ‘contest’ in the title line.

Buy postage.

Wave farewell to entry as it is plonked into the mail sack. (Back in the days of self-addressed stamped envelopes, you would be certain of seeing it again soon! These days, it is all recycled.)

Update submission database.

Bookmark competition web page; check incessantly.

Scary research

I haven’t been writing much lately, mainly because of computer woes ™. The fact that the crash occurred as a direct result of being about to back up makes it all worse. However, it looks as though I salvaged everything, in spite of Thundercat nearly sending the extracted hard drive crashing off the desk, and buying a new laptop has been on the cards for a while now. Obviously that will make me more productive. (Joke.)

DNP (a/k/a The Novel) is set during WWII, and can I just say that researching this era can be frightening. I don’t just mean reliving the events of whatever aspect of the war you’re dealing with – though that’s pretty rough; Rachel Seiffert was depressed for a year because she kept immersing herself in the Holocaust. (Brief foray off-topic to say that Helen Pidd was a great editor when I worked for her, and I’m glad she’s doing well in the big bad world of journalism.) I mean that if you want details of the field tunics or sewing kits or any other type of army kit, you end up looking at re-enactors catalogues. I’m not going to list the creepy Nazi stuff because while I would like a larger readership, I’m not eager to attract the sort of people who are punching search terms into Google because they are genuinely seeking a Waffen-SS coffee mug, but if you want to know what a British Shell Dressing Bag looks like, it’s on page 47.

And another quotation. I think the quotations are likely to be things that stop me when I’m reading and make me say, wow, that is absolutely spot on. This one is from Dorothy Baker’s Trio (1943):

I know what it’s like to be drunk for two weeks and to sleep for three days in a big red fog, and to walk down the street and see a tree come at me fast and try to fall on me.

Not having ever been on a two-week bender, I can’t comment on whether the ‘big red fog’ is accurate, but that description of the tree encapsulated a sense of a person losing control of their own perception.