04 March 2014

ROW80 2014, Round 1, Week 8

I'm gonna make this quick today because I'm stealing time away from my self-imposed writing-intensive week, during which I am focusing on one of my pseudonym's WIPs, to write this blog post.


Writing - Work on WIPs, 3 blog posts/week, submit - MOSTLY MET.
a) Have made some serious progress (or at least what I consider to be serious progress) on one of my pseudonym's WIPs, and a little progress on another.
b) Published four blog posts, including an interview with my author-friend Kristen Strassel, the first post in my series about writer's block, the usual writing prompt, and this one. Next week (not the week we're in the middle of) I plan to bang out a few more in the writer's block series.
c) Nothing submitted. Got one of the loveliest rejection letters EVER, though. Now I have nothing outstanding, so I guess it's time to buckle down and submit again.

Reading - Read something inspiring - MET. More of Charles Simic's The World Doesn't End. Loving it.

Community
  • Participate in #writeclub on Twitter every Friday - NOT MET. Can you believe I wrote for several hours on Friday and it never once occurred to me to get on #writeclub? Sigh. Then again, I tried to stay off the Internet that day for fear of being distracted, so...
  • Continue to attend readings - NOT MET. But I'm going to an event at the library this week where a woman will be talking about her Camino de Santiago adventure, which is sort of like a reading, no?
  • Read and comment on at least 3 other ROW80 participants' check-ins each week - MET. I doubt it'll get done this week, though, because of the writing-intensive thingy.

Health

  • 15 minutes/day of freewriting, recording dreams and/or journaling (good for my mental health) - PARTIALLY MET? I don't have my notebooks with me right now, but I know there have been at least two dreams and one freewrite. Or maybe that's this week. Last week is so long ago.
  • Exercise for at least an hour a day - MET. Walks everyday, and now I've just joined a Tai Chi class. Have never done Tai Chi before, so am excited about this.

This is a blog hop! Click here to read other ROW80 participants' check-ins.

2 comments:

  1. Sounds like you're making great progress on your goals. I'm glad that you received a lovely rejection letter. I've only submitted a manuscript to a few people, but the rejection letters I received where kindly worded and extremely helpful. I'm grateful to the editors who took the time to write them. I hope your experience was the same!

    Enjoy tai chi! I just started attempting it this year. I have to say: Not as easy as it looks. I'm still trying to remember all the motions to "parting the wild horse's mane." :)

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    1. Thanks for the encouraging words, Denise! I'm submitting short stories and poems. Very few editors have/take time to send a personal rejection note, but this one did, and she said several nice things about the piece she rejected and encouraged me to submit again. Woot!

      Speaking of which, my mom was telling me she'd heard or read somewhere (NPR- or New Yorker-related, most likely) that when rejected authors are encouraged to submit again, only 20% of women do so, while a much higher percentage of men submit again within the next couple of days. That right there made me want to submit again immediately, but sadly I don't have any more unpublished stories ready at this time.

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