Monday

[ksmith]

Made the word quota for the day and a bit more, but I'm going to keep plugging to see how much I can kick out. So many people kicking out so many words these past few days. I've been left in the collective dust.

The writing of this book...I think I've mentioned ad nauseum that I'm doing things I've never done before. I wrote events out of sequence. I skipped chapters--I know what occurs in these chapters, but I didn't feel like writing them when it came time for them to be written. Maybe it was because I didn't want to slip into that POV at that time, or didn't want to work through the dynamics of the scenes, but there are several chapters of this book that exist only in my mind. I'm writing their aftereffects now. When rewrite time comes, I'll get back to them.

The thing is, I want to write the last chapters. Much happens of a world-shattering nature (although no actual worlds are shattered in the writing of this book). I want to write the resolutions of relationships, and final scenes, and climaxes, and political turmoil. I'm not sure if it's 8, or 10, or 12 chapters (pleaseLordnot12), but I need to get them written so I know what I need to backfill.

The writing leading up to this has been like pulling teeth. It's not a lot of fun to write just to get stuff down in phosphors when you know that a lot of it was going to go jumpez le fenestre.

And the Winter Games start on Saturday, and I love the Winter Games. All those non-marquee sports like bobsled and luge and skeleton and biathlon. And all that other stuff. Keep the damned figure skating--give me speed skating and skiing and anything else that doesn't involve triple jumps and bad Broadway show tunes.

Of course, I don't know how much I'll be able to watch...

Comments

[kalligraphy.livejournal.com]

I'm with you, I love the winter games. I love downhill and speed skating and bobsled and all that. Figure skating.... bleh! Unfortunately, that is mostly what they show during primetime. :( I was looking at the schedule last night, I suspect my DVR is going to get a work out.

One interesting thing, I saw a video clip of Bode Miller last night. He comes off the second jump on a downhill run doing about 70mph and catches the edge of his left ski. Normally this would take out the skier, but not Bode, he unweights the ski and tries to lift it. The ski catches in the snow twice more and gets ripped from his boot. This is crash material, but somehow Bode is still on his one ski. He managed to ski about half way down the run on one ski before he finally took a spill, that is quite an accomplishment. He never ceases to amaze me.

[kristine-smith.livejournal.com]

They showed a clip during Bode's 60 Minutes interview in which he loses a ski and still completes the run. Apparently he took some flak for doing that. Coaches yammered about how dangerous it was, how he risked injury.

Bode took some heat for that interview, period.

I get the sense that he's a constant source of merriment for his coaches.

[kalligraphy.livejournal.com]

It had to be the same clip and yes, he did risk an injury because skiing on one ski is really difficult. So he risked a crash that could have ended his season, but that man is such an incredible skier. A few years ago I saw his outside ski slip. His hip hit the snow in the middle of a turn (this would end in a crash most times) and Bode managed to get his skis back under him and race like nothing had happened. He ended up doing really well too. I'm not sure how much you know about skiing, but you turn by twisting your knee inward to place pressure on the inside edge of your outside ski. At this point, you unweight the inside ski and let is slide through the turn. To weight the outer edge of the inside ski is actually more difficult to control. So in this case not only was he weighting the outside edge of his inside ski, he was skiing on it. Same thing with skiing on one ski, he had to make right hand turns, which means he was skiing on the outside edge. He is an amazing skier, but he is also a bit of a hotshot. I am sure his coaches just love that!