11,000 and Counting...

To recap, my former computer died a slow, violent death. In its demise, it took with it most of my written work to date. It took me quite a while to get over that. I'd see a publisher's guidelines and I'd think "Great! I've got just the short story to submit to them!" Then the ugly truth would knock me in the head. Nope. Not gonna happen. Your stories are no more.

Thankfully, with the help of wonderful, caring publishers, I was able to recoup some of my work. Two novels were e-mailed back to me so I could have them for my records. And a few short stories have also trickled back. To all of you who took the time to do that for me, I'm very grateful.

But the one that really got to me, stuck in my craw, shall we say, was my current work in progress. I was 11,000 words into the novel when my computer came down with an incurable virus. I'd kept written notes for my work, but most of that was just in idea form, jotted down in a hurry. If I was lucky, sometimes I could even read my own chicken-scratch.

But, as of last evening, I am once again over 11,000 words! The story has many of the same elements, but has changed somewhat. Some parts I remembered word for word, while others were just a cloudy concept stuck somewhere in my brain. I'm very happy to say, I like the story that's emerging even better than the previous one. A blessing in disguise? Yes, I believe it is.

Have You Seen My Dunce-Cap?

Ah, here it is. I'm placing it on my pointed head where it belongs. You see, I am a dunce. Why, you ask? Because I seem to have lost all of my written work from my last, may-it-rest-in-peace computer. All my own fault. Not the computer dying, just the losing of my stuff. Of course, if I'd been a non-dunce, like the rest of the PC-literate world, I would have saved my stories on a memory stick. Oh, I had saved one of them. I'd started out with good intentions and all, but got lazy. And well, duncey. I hadn't bothered to save the rest. So when my PC took a dive, I was not prepared. I learned an expensive, irritating lesson: If you don't save your stories, you may end up one day rewriting them. And on top of that, you have to wear the ugly dunce cap! And believe me, it's not very fashionable.