Monday 5 June 2023: The power board this week

Friday was a fair day, work-wise. The poet had a LOT of meetings in the morning, and a few in the afternoon too. When I realised that I wouldn’t get anything creative done unless I put my earphones in, I decided to something mechanical instead.

I wrote up a meal plan for this week and a shopping list. Well, it has to be done, and Friday afternoons are now pigeonholed for shopping and errands. I moved a few jobs from Friday to this week and I rejigged the ClickUp schedule. I also did my weekly tech scan and backup. Jobs moved to this week:

• Substack (posting weekly premium content behind paywall)
• Killer Queen – revising
• Catch the Rainbow – typing
• Diary of a Pussycat – revising
• admin: new month spreadsheets

Yup, that’s right. I still hadn’t done my new month spreadsheets. But as I’d not written any new words, nor revised any new pages, that is a job that could wait until this week.

By mid-morning I had my earphones in and was rewatching another of my Motivational Monday videos. Yes, I know it wasn’t Monday. But I did watch them the first time around on a Monday and once I’ve caught up I’ll be doing that again. I only watched one week’s worth before cracking on with some other work.

I hauled out Paper Roses, read it through, and decided it could go out to the next market on the list. I formatted it to suit the specific market and emailed it off. AND I MOVED IT ALONG MY POWER BOARD!

Yay!

Then it was back to non-creative stuff, and I was editing those last two chapters of the Taliban book that I asked the author for. Finishing this part of the job was a biggie and I was able to relax a bit once it was done.

We went out and did the shopping, and we bought a takeaway on the way home for tea. He had spam fritter, chips and curry sauce (🤢), I had a small sausage, chips and a pickled egg.

Saturday

We didn’t have a big window of time on Saturday because the poet had an almost tea-time gig that evening. We put some washing through and I hung that out while the poet worked in the front garden. There will be more on the garden in Thursday’s post over on the garden blog.

Hotdogs for tea, because we knew we’d be back in time to have something else if we needed it. But when we got there, just as the band were doing their sound check, the sound engineer from another venue in town came down to see them and ask them for a favour: Would they be willing and able to do another gig right afterwards, because the band they had booked had let them down at the last minute.

Well, we were all looking forward to an early finish for a change, but they talked about it amongst themselves and then asked the WaGs. The gig they were doing wouldn’t be paid that night as that venue prefers to pay by BACs about six weeks after the event. If they did this extra gig, at least they’d have some cash on Saturday and not have to wait for the BACs payment. So they agreed to do it.

As soon as they started to pack down, I jumped in the car and headed home to see to the dog and the cat. I brought some washing in as well while I was there, and I spent a bit of time with them. Then I headed back to town in time for the second gig of the night.

By the end of it we were all shattered, but they’d done both the sound engineer and the venue a massive favour by stepping in at such short notice.

Sunday

We didn’t see very much of Sunday as a result. We didn’t feel like doing anything in the garden so instead we went window shopping to Meadowhall. While we were there we had a bit to eat, but I wasn’t feeling very well.

The poet had a nasty cold last week and we rarely keep anything like that to ourselves and, sure enough, I started to come down with a ‘bit of a throat’. We caught up on the semi-finals for Britain’s Got Talent and had chicken and bread and butter for tea as neither of us fancied a proper dinner. Then we watched the final of Britain’s Got Talent (and completely agreed with who the winner was).

Monday so far

I had a shocking night on Sunday. I was awake every few minutes with a raging thirst and a raw throat. After about the third or fourth time of getting up, I succumbed and took some tablets, hoping they didn’t upset my stomach any more than it already was. The only reason I got up this morning, the ONLY reason, was because I had my first yoga class booked and I’d paid for it when I booked it.

I did a COVID test, that’s how ill I was feeling, but it was negative (phew!), forced a cup of tea down, and off I went.

More on that tomorrow.

The power board this week

Now that I have a working writing schedule on my whiteboard, I’ll be keeping an eye on it every week to see how everything’s moving along – IF it’s moving along. If it doesn’t seem to work, I’ll devise another use for the power board (formerly known as my murder board).

Here’s how it looks this week:

1. percolating

In the short fiction row for the percolating column, I have:

1. Thin – this is the next prompt for 12 Stories in 12 Months
2. They Did It Wrong – this is for one of my Dean Wesley Smith/WMG Publishing workshops
3. The Two of Wands – this is a short Horvale story.

In medium fiction:

1. The Magician – a Horvale novella (or they might be full-length novels yet)

In long fiction:

1. Snowblind – a Marcie Craig mystery
2. Hattie’s Hotshots – this is book 2 of my historical ‘cider chronicles’ (working series title)
3. The Honey Trap – this one is a collaboration between me and the poet; we’re writing it as D.I. Wordsworth (Diane & Ian Wordsworth, using the DI as a police-sounding name too…)

2. brainstorming

In the short fiction row for the brainstorming column I have:

1. The Ace of Swords – a short Horvale story
2. The Ace of Pentacles – a short Horvale story

3. planning

In the medium fiction row I have:

1. The Fool – a Horvale novella

In long fiction I have:

1. The Beast Within – a Marcie Craig story

4. writing

In short fiction:

1. A Death in the Night – this was a call for fiction, but I’m adapting it now to suit a weekly market
2. Fireworks at Killiecrankie – a Wordsworth short

In non-fiction:

1. Project Management for Writers: Gate 3 – writers’ guide
2. Project Management for Writers: Gate 4 – writers’ guide
3. Project Management for Writers: Gate 5 – writers’ guide

5. typing

In long fiction:

1. Catch the Rainbow – book 1 of the cider chronicles

6. revising

In short fiction:

1. Killer Queen – a Marcie Craig short story

In non-fiction:

1. Diary of a Pussycat – writers’ guide
2. Diary of a Cool Cat – writers’ guide
3. Diary of a Tiger – writers’ guide

7. cooling

I currently have nothing in cooling.

8. proofreading

In short fiction:

1. Autumn Fayre – a Wordsworth short

9. publishing:

In short fiction:

1. The Kite Festival – a Wordsworth short
2. Paper Roses – a Wordsworth short

I almost have something in every column. I think the idea is to have something in every box at any one time. There’s still a lot of other stuff to go up there, but one of the things we failed to buy on our shopping trip, and at the supermarket, was new assorted sticky notes. There were lots at half the size I want, but the board’s been lined up to fit a certain size.

Today

I have a lot on today. Here’s today’s to-do list:

• yoga class ✔️
• secret sugarholic blog post for tomorrow (maybe – if I can think of something to write)
• new month spreadsheets
• Diary of a Pussycat revisions
• Catch the Rainbow typing
• Diane’s Gig List admin ✔️
• Monkey Dust admin
• tomorrow’s blog post
• hospital appointment

I also have to find room this week for everything I moved over from last week.

Ideally, I could do with spending some time on everything… As I still feel quite shocking, though, I think first I’ll have a quick nap.

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