Drat. I’ve been sucked in.

I blame it all on the thread at henneth-annun. Of course, they would have to create a challenge to write drabbles and then write some of the most beautiful, poetic 100 word fics that I have ever read.

Of course, I’m still scared to touch any Tolkien subject with my keyboard. My two fics are still only two painful paragraphs long and will probably stay that way for years to come.

So I tackled GG, the project of the day. There were definitely scenes that I wanted to explore, but I knew that I didn’t have enough to make an actual story out of them–Jess’s leaving, for one. And I think there’s still more that I might add later.

There’s incredible power in this form–each word has to be just right. I think some of mine are still weak, but some seemed to get what I wanted. I had to find the tendency to make it sound like a prose-ish free verse poem.

And so I issue a challenge: I want more and I want yours. Any GG character, any pairing, any situation, any time. Directly from the show or an AU. I’d love to see some that managed to capture the humor and wittiness of GG–I only got the angst. Email them to me, post them here or on my review, wherever. Heck, you could even write me and say that while you wrote one, it’s been put where all the bad fics go; I don’t care. I’d just like to see people write.

On a more personal note, but still related to my fic, my shoulder has been giving me a lot of problems again–recovery has not been as smooth as I could wish and I’ve been in some pain. Thankfully, I have therapy tomorrow–my salvation, I swear, but I think I’m causing the pain by being hunched over my computer and I know my doctor’s going to want me to back off. Thus my ambitious plans to have the next chapter finished and posted in a week probably won’t pan out. And I was so excited!

I don’t know, listening to the Buffy musical seems to make everything better. I honestly don’t know what I’m going to do without a Buffy fix!

Airports, airplanes are wonderful things. Seriously, think about it–you get to your destination in a small fraction of the time it would take you to drive, you don’t have to worry about packing our car, or where you put the map, or the crazy drivers on their cell phones, and you share a seat with someone who inevitably is defined by the word “interesting”–and for some reason (the cheesy side of me is saying it’s because in a plane you’re high enough to brush the angels’ wings…ugh, I’m making myself ill), inspiration flows, your muse becomes yours again.

A few weeks ago, I flew to Washington, DC, probably my favorite city in the world. Some day I’ll live there, just off of Rock Creek Park on Connecticut Avenue. But I digress. I had layovers on the way there in St. Louis and on the way back in Houston, nice long layovers. I brought my notebook, my “Pilot P-700” blue ink pen, and a three mixed CDs that I had made the night before–so with Eva Cassidy, Matchbox 20, Loreena McKinnett and, yes, Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Musical playing in my ears, I wrote. Mostly on my story, Like Never Before. I wrote most of chapter 7, the first scene of 8, the last scene of 12 and polished up 9. Not bad for a few hours on a plane, eh? I’m so excited about it! The chapters are coming together just as I had hoped and I’ve received a little more encouragement (thanks guys!), which just makes the juices flow better and sweeter. Boy, i really am waxing crony tonight, aren’t I? 🙂 🙂

I posted Chapter 7 last night. My sister read it, declared it perfect, then proceeded to lecture me of how random the scene with Jamie was. I was afraid of that. I rewrote it a little and I hope it flows a little better, but it’s extremely important that it happen this way. I hope most people can forgive me for Jamie. Jamie is such a foreign character to me–we’ve seen him, twice, and yet Paris and he have this “relationship”???

Jamie doesn’t have a last name, does he?

In any case, I should have chapter 8 done shortly (fingers crossed), as long as I don’t get distracted by my other project: I’m designing a webpage! Now, I know basic, basic, basic HTML–I know what < i > and < b > mean, for example, but I’ve never designed a site from scratch. It’s for my Lord of the Rings literary discussion group–we just finished reading LOTR together, and I’m trying to compile all of our ponderous thoughts and discussions and put them on an easily navigational site. I made our logo today, which I’m really impressed with–it’s exactly what I was hoping for. I’d proudly display it, but I have no idea how to attach an image if it’s not on the web. Now to figure out how add drop-down graphics and lay out a table. Ah, right now, I am really loving life.

10 days until I start school again. I think I’ve completely forgotten all of my “doctoring skills.” Oh dear.