Yes, I know they always happen and we should always build in some sort of contingency. But I’d only just got into a good rhythm of work when this week happened.
And not only this week. Wednesday happened as well. Wednesday was not a good day.
I had so many chores to do that by midday I still hadn’t started my own work. And then, to top it all, a line of washing I’d taken the time to peg out fell to the floor when the line snapped. And the washing was still wet.
Had the washing been dry, the floor was clear enough for me to just give everything a good shake and I might have got away with it. But the washing was still wet, and so every blade of grass, every speck of dust, every dead or living insect clung to the washing. And it all had to be washed again.
Not only that, but I also had to (a) unpeg it from the line again, and (b) bend over to pick every item up off the floor. And with my back, bending over to unpeg numerous items and pick them up off the floor is not great.
I had a good old whinge to the poet, who just happened to call as I was picking the washing up off the floor, and when he got home he was bearing cake! THREE cakes!
He made us a nice cup of tea and we had 1½ cakes each. (The diet went right out the window, but for one day I didn’t care.) Then he went outside and repaired the washing line and did the chores I hadn’t managed so far just so I could chalk up some work for the day. Then he got on with his own work.
I didn’t do any writing, but I did do some more editing for the client. I also did some thinking about my 10-project planning spreadsheet.
The cake, we think, went right through me and I had a bit of rough night. A fab finish to a fab day. Not. But the cake was nice at the time. Very nice.
Anyway, today was a new day and I thought more about my own workload. And then I tackled my scheduled projects.
I’m easing myself in gently. There’s no way I can jump right into writing and/or revising 10 different projects at the same time. But I have spent July so far just writing one project.
The Life of Richard Cadbury came back during this time, and I need to proofread that before we move on to the indexing stage. We also need to add in the foreword from Richard Cadbury’s great-granddaughter.
And then I received an unexpected royalty from Smashwords. I didn’t think I had any live projects over on Smashwords anymore, but it turns out that I do. Diary of a Scaredy Cat is on there, but it’s not published yet. The one that is live is Twee Tales Too.
Now, I didn’t think that Twee Tales Too was available anywhere, and the plan was to remove some stories and replace them with new and then re-release it as a new issue with a new cover, etc.
I can’t do that now, as someone has bought it. So instead, I’ll do a rebrand, like I did with Night Crawler, and re-issue it as-is, but with a new cover – and I already have the new cover, front and back. I’d prepared it for the complete re-release.
So that means I have 2 revision projects I can add to the 10-project planner. I’m going to try and proofread Twee Tales Too during the last week of July (i.e. next week), and then do the Richard Cadbury proofread during the first 2 weeks in August.
I still have the second half of Catch the Rainbow to finish writing throughout August, plus I have the first half to finish before the end of July.
Next week, then, I’ll be running 2 projects side-by-side. I’ll have the remainder of Catch the Rainbow to write, at less than 2,000 words per day (depending on how I do today and tomorrow), and I’ll have 72 pages of Twee Tales Too to proofread, working out at just over 14 pages per day.
Then, starting on 3 August, I’ll have 37,220 words of Catch the Rainbow to write, working out at 1,861 words per day over 20 days (we have a bank holiday coming up in August), and for the first 2 weeks, I’ll also be proofreading The Life of Richard Cadbury, which is 192 pages over 10 days, or just over 19 pages per day.
Until Richard Cadbury is done, I won’t add another project. I’ll see how it goes, and then re-assess from there. But if all goes well, I might add a second writing project and a revision project …
Thursday morning was, therefore, spent rejigging the spreadsheet to incorporate these 2 extra projects. It took a bit of jiggery-pokery as I don’t yet have all of the formulae in place. But I’m a bit further along with that now. I just need to keep at it to remind myself what to do.
The washing went back out on the repaired line and so far it hasn’t snapped. And then it was work … Even if it was quite late in the day.
