Author: jkonrath

I’m at the point where I’m thinking more about the novel than other trivial things when I’m in the shower, eating, driving, etc. Today, I brushed my teeth, and then rushed to the spiral notebook for a pageful of ideas. Now I need to do the same with my amount of writing.

I used to tell people I would write for three hours a night: from 9 to midnight, and maybe more. It’s a romantic gesture stolen from Charles Bukowski’s fiction novels, and one I tried to live by. It never worked – I would eat dinner late, get in a phone conversation, go to Denny’s, shopping and Barnes and Noble, whatever, and not get started by 9. And I’d screw around on the computer, get distracted by CDs, and otherwise avoid the writing sometimes. But some nights, I’d burn away and write until dawn. I tried to write 2000 words a night back then, and I’d usually make it. My mistake was that I never wrote 2000 good words. I read so many books that said ‘get your first draft finished, no matter how bad, and then you can edit it). It doesn’t work like that – I can’t edit for shit, especially the jumbled mess I wrote two years ago.

Now, I’m lucky to get an hour of writing done during lunch, and maybe an hour later at night. I’m working on improving that, but it takes work…

I really liked last night’s episode of ER – I’ve always felt that the gutsy surgical bullshit got in the way of the human emotion behind the characters, and not the other way around. I guess I like the medical stuff to an extent – it’s better than exploding rocket launchers and stuff. ER is an addicting show, and aside from the dramatics, the writing really hooks me. It’s also how a show like Seinfeld can drag me in every time. For a show about nothing, it sure is loaded with a bunch of really catchy plots full of self-referential material.

I found out that if you put four whole apples and a whole lemon in a juiceman, it makes a kick-ass lemonade. The apples sweeten it, but the lemon’s taste overpowers it. It’s sort of slushy, like a smoothie. I think I might get some strawberries and try adding them, too.

It’s Friday. Time to finish up the work day, and get out of here for the weekend…

I’m already hitting various mental roadblocks during this new rewrite of my first book, Summer Rain. My new outline is not much more then a mental recollection of how the book is supposed to work. The problem is – sometimes I forget. And when I go back and try to reference the old draft, it corrupts things and I go from creating this new, more functional structure to just rehashing all of the old shit that’s in the book.

I read pieces of a year-old draft, and the amount of work ahead of me is overwhelming. Writing shifts from bad to poor, the story drags with no real ‘hook’ to it, and everything is sloppy. It goes from describing everything too much to having no descriptions at all. I like bits and pieces of it, but some of it is pretty corny. I’ve tried editing it, but I think it would be easier to just start over.

I got my stupid checkbook from Seatac airport. It cost me $2 to park there for 20 seconds and get the thing. But I was able to balance everything and pay another round of bills last night.

Does a cross-section of celery look sort of like an MRI, or is it just me?

I got a kick-ass Camaro catalog in the mail – I must’ve put my name on a list a few months ago. It’s mostly stuff for 67-69, and mostly original with some repro stuff. So it is all expensive, for people who want to pay $175 a tire to get the original Firestone red-wall tires for their totally restored 69 Z-28. Anyway, it’s got me thinking more about buying another Camaro after I unload this piece of shit Escort. I’d need garage space, though. We’ll see…

I had a weird dream about my ex-girlfriend Tanya. I was at some unknown house watching Apocalypse Now with Simms, Andrea, and this guy who lived down the street from my parents. He was on the phone with someone, and then hung up. I asked who it was, and he said it was Tanya and that they were going out. I told him that I dated her a while ago, and he started telling these stories about how they slept together on their first date and how she was really wild in bed, and I was getting insanely jealous about the whole thing. It was like being a Giants fan back when they totally sucked, and you give up on them, and then they get incredibly good. I woke up and thought it all was real, and I was still all jealous about it. I don’t think jealous is the word for it – I didn’t want her back or anything. It was more like a betrayal. I don’t know – maybe it was because I ate right before I went to bed, who knows.

Did I mention that Anton LaVey died? I guess he actually died on the 29th, but his birth certificate says the 31st, which is the major Satanic holiday, aside from your own birthday. His family didn’t report it to the public until this week. Pretty weird.

(For those of you who don’t know – Anton LaVey was the founder of the Church of Satan, and the author of the Satanic Bible, among other books. No, I am not a Satanist – I consider myself more of a Humanist, which in itself is not much more than a label saying I think man is responsible for his own problems. I’ve read The Satanic Bible, and I own a copy, and it has its moments. It isn’t based on killing cats and wearing little red horns, but then it isn’t for everyone, either.)

I’ve been working on an outline for the new and improved Summer Rain. There are many changes in the new version, mostly structural. It has a new ending, and I’m trying to change the pacing of the whole thing a bit more. I don’t know if I will ever write or rewrite anything based on this work – I usually quit after a bit of the outline and continue on some other project. But I’d like to get a decent-enough outline based on all of my old notes – an infallible outline – so that even if I quit, I will have details for later.

I should work on that outline now…

My new 28.8 modem works now, so downloads from home might be a bit more painless. I still need to mess with the dialup script a bit, because it isn’t perfect. I also have a 14.4 internal modem in /dev/modem and the 28.8 external in /dev/mouse. If I had two phone lines, I could run with both. I think I’m just going to wait until I get a house, and then I’m going to get a minidish with internet service on it.

Today I started writing a new outline for my first book, Summer Rain. It’s a frequently recurring project, but maybe something with come of it. I’m designing the book to be a series of short stories that are glued together by chapters that wouldn’t make sense out of place. So it will start with writing a short story, then another, then… In a worst case scenario, I will have a handful of bad short stories. Well, in a worst case scenario, I will have nothing done.

That book has been haunting me, and I’m stalled on Rumored to Exist, so I’ll toy with it a while. Some of it was being in Bloomington, and some of it is the need to write a solid novel of that size. I don’t know what I’ll do with it, but I just need to work out a cohesive piece of work that weaves together all of the feelings and surroundings from that part of my life. I don’t think my first pass did justice to that summer, and I need something with more depth to it. We’ll see.

I had lunch with Bill, Marc, Todd, and Chris Wilson – we went to Chang’s and I actually made Mongolian food with almost no meat in it. Todd and I got in a giant discussion about PC upgrades and what I should get for my ailing Linux box. I’ll eventually install a new monitor, video card, sound card, and CD-ROM. I need a power supply in there, too. All of this will be a slow process, though. I can’t afford to dump a grand into this thing just so I can play cool games or whatever.

It’s pitch black outside, which is my clue to leave…

Today is my one year anniversary with my girlfriend. It doesn’t seem like that long, but I guess that’s my stock response to about any passage of time these days. I got her a present, but I won’t talk about it in case she reads this before I get over there.

The time difference was on my side today. I ‘slept in’ and still got to work eariler than usual. I got a lot of shit done here, but I feel like I’m massively behind. I figure with a week of kicking ass, I will be okay.

Speaking of work, it is 5:14 and I am still here. It’s dark as hell out right now, which should make my drive an adventure. It’s strange to be here this late. Reminds me of my Spry days, sort of.

As for the trip, I guess I haven’t talked as much about it. I have some strong feelings for Summer Rain and rewriting it, but that always happens when I visit Indiana. The whole trip made me feel like I need to do more with my life. Most of the people I know back in Indiana are just clogging their arteries and complaining about the weather. There are exceptions, but it makes me think that I need to do more – write books, save money, get in shape, etc.

For what it’s worth, everyone was shocked at how much weight I lost since last Xmas. They were even more shocked when I told them I lost it all in the last 3 months. Add more shock every time we went to some restaurant serving giant slabs of half-cooked meat where I only ate salad.

I should leave now if I’m ever going to get across the lake and see Karena…

I’m back, and what a day. It started by me getting lost in Indianapolis – I have an uncanny ability for not knowing which was is north in that city. Then I left a tape in the car, and it is probably gone forever. Then my car bill came to like $450. Then all of my pens simultaneously ran out and I had to buy the shittiest bic pen for a dollar at the airport. Then I lost my checkbook in the plane, and didn’t find out until a few hours after I got home. (United found it – I have to go pick it up later this week).

Glad to be back. The trip didn’t go as planned, and I didn’t see as many people as I had wanted. Then again, many people and places are gone. Plus, I can no longer eat at my favorite old restaurants. It gets more depressing every visit, and I’m not sure I will go back in the near future.

Some of it was nice, of course. Seeing everyone – spending time alone, driving on old familiar roads, not working for a week. But I need to get back in gear.

Speaking of which – I have too much stuff to do right now. Maybe tomorrow I can write more about the trip.

I’m just about ready to go home, dry some clothes, and then finish my packing for the trip. It’s always nice when the last details fall into place and everything starts rolling. My favorite time is when I get to the airport early, my bags are checked, my backpack is at my feet, and I can write in my journal and watch the planes fly away as I wait for my boarding time.

I’m not feeling too sick today – I took some sutafed-type medicine and spent most of the morning buzzing all over the place. Without caffeine as a base reference, it really felt potent. Cool.

I spent a lot of last night playing tetris plus and trying to finish the game. There are 4 cities with 20 levels each. I’ve cleared two cities, and I’m on level 20 of the third city. I hope I can finish the damn thing on the plane.

Anyway, time to split. I probably won’t be able to write until I’m in Indiana. Until then…

The rest of today, tomorrow, and then I leave for Indiana. I’m starting to get a cold, and I’m trying every remedy possible – vitamins, vaporizer, medicines, and soup. I’m not doing too bad, so hopefully the flight won’t be a disaster. I got some special earplugs you wear for flying – they have a weird valve in them which protects your inner ear from the pressure change. Maybe they’ll do the trick.

I think I destroyed a Solaris machine here at work, trying to upgrade it. I needed to install a patch from Sun, and the patch completely flattened the computer. I think I’ll have to install the OS all over again. At least that gives me a nice, mellow task to eat up my afternoon.

Because of the cold, I haven’t been doing much more than resting and packing. I’ve been trying to get past level 20 of tetris plus on the gameboy, but it’s a real ball-breaker. Maybe I will make it on that 4 hour plane ride….