Writing in Real Time

This might sound familiar.  This is how a typical wordcount happens in my own ‘Real Time’ i.e. including all the interruptions, distractions and meandering trains of thought.  These words are fresh and in no way represent anything I’ve ever written (nor perhaps ever will).

The banks of the river lay heavy with morning dew, the fronds wait a minute, ‘fronds’, is that the right word or do I mean fernds? No, surely there’s no such word as ‘fernds’, I’m thinking of ‘ferns’ but I don’t think ferns grow by water do they? Aren’t they more… tropical?  Okay, I’ll have to Google it. Oh… look… Fern Britten’s lost a lot of weight lately hasn’t she?  And that Jennifer Aniston (“did you mean ‘Friends’?”) should start using a better hair colour, you can tell it’s not real….  

*PING* Oooh look… Pizza Express are doing one of those lovely offers; two main meals for a tenner… what should I do? Are we going out between those dates? Should I just delete it in case it entices me, or should I keep it in case the Girl wants to use it with her friends?  I’ll quickly text her to see if she needs the voucher saving. 

Okay definitely fronds.  That’s fine.  I’ll go with fronds.  But where was I going next?  Do I really want my banks heavy with morning dew? Now that I’ve seen before and after pictures of Fern Britten I’m less inclined to go with heavy.  Oh god now I can feel a biscuit coming on.

*PHONE* “No, we’re fine.  No, we had it done a few years ago.  Yes, very happy thank you.  No.  Yes.  No.  Not really.  Okay then not AT ALL. Yes our Soffits and Fuschias are just dandy thank you!”

Maybe I shouldn’t have had that biscuit, now my head hurts.  Or perhaps it was the sales call. Where was I?  Oh the Girl’s texted back.  She doesn’t need the voucher but can I take her to her friend’s house tomorrow night.  I don’t know.  I could say yes but we might be doing something else.  I’ll have to text the hubster just to make sure.  

So fronds it is then. 

Camberley Abbey stood regal and proud in the grounds beyond.  Its splendour shone from the majestic leaded windows on the upper floors to the heavy dark oaked doors beneath.  Wait; is it oaked or oak?  If something been ‘oaked’ does that mean it’s been, like, treated with Oak – as in laminated?  I don’t think a majestic splendid Abbey would have laminated doors, would it?  And heavy?  Again with heavy?  Okay how about In the distance, Camberley Abbey’s splendour shone with majestic leaded windows on the upper floors to the great wooden doors below.  Now that’s just stupid. Nothing shines with lead and wood, does it, FFS. God I HATE descriptive stuff.  Why can’t I just cut out the middle man (like, agents, publishers etc) and go straight to film? That way I wouldn’t have to bloody worry about my heavy flippin’ fronds and my majestic laminate doors. They'd just BE THERE.

*PING* Oh, one of my Strictly teammates has a technical problem.  Should I help or should I let someone else handle it?  If I try to help I’m going to get distracted.  But I don’t want to seem rude by not responding.  And aren’t I already distracted by worrying that I might get distracted?  I’ll see if there’s anything I can do. 

*BRRRR* (that’s the mobile – just to differentiate between that and the *PHONE* landline) Yep, that’s fine.  Two o’clock.  Yes.   What, aren’t you coming with them?  But we gave you a key and everything.  But I might be… yes, we are serious about selling but… yes I know, I’m just concerned that… no, it’s fine.  Yep, sure.  Yes, lovely. I’ll see them then.

Right I definitely need a biscuit now.  This is ridiculous.  What are we paying an Estate Agent for if WE have to do the showing around ourselves?  I could probably have run up some details and stuck an advert on the RightMove website myself for less that we’ll end up paying them to do just this.  I’m cross.  I need to calm down.  I need a cup of tea and then I’ll see how quickly I can cobble together some house details and photos.  Ha – maybe I’ll have a change of career.  Then I could do one of those pieces in Good Housekeeping* about how I changed my life at 49 and ‘found myself’.  I’ve always wanted to find myself.  I’ve looked everywhere…

*TEXT ALERT* Ah.  We’re not doing anything tomorrow night.  Hang on, though, why do I need to know this again?  What was I doing with this information? He’s either being deliberately obtuse or I’ve forgotten… ah wait, yes, it’s coming back to me now… I have to text the Girl .

*PING* Ah the Strictly techie problem is sorted.

*PING*  the Strictly techie problem is sorted.

*PING* the Strictly techie problem is sorted. Yes I know that.

*PING* Aaaargghhhh the Strictly techie problem is sorted.

We’re  such a helpful lot, arent’ we?  Maybe I should just turn off e-mail alerts.  But what if something REALLY important comes through, like encouraging news from an Agent.  I’m sure there’s at least ONE agent out there who hasn’t vilified the last three chapters I sent off.  In fact to save them the time and trouble perhaps I’ll send them a ‘multiple choice tick-off’ postcard with the next lot of submissions I send out.  IF I send any out that is, if I haven’t left the country or stuffed stones in my pockets and wandered off into the nearest….. ah… my fronds… my majestic abbey….

*MIIIAAAAOWWWWW*

I don't really need the wordcount icon on my computer.  I can count to ten by eye!

 *Other glossies are available.

*Subbing* seems to be the hardest word

Forget cardiovascular workouts, forget frenzied, passionate all-night lovemaking sessions… al...though…no… no… c’mon, focus now…and forget the sheer icy panic you get when you think you mightn’t have locked the front door before your 2-hour trip… or turned the gas off (seriously? WHO forgets to turn the Gas off?) Nope - if there’s anything guaranteed to quicken my pulse, send my heart-rate into overdrive and my blood pressure soaring, it’s sending out a submission.
And I’m not alone *gulp* am I?

 Over the years, I've probably lost about fourteen pounds (that’s a stone, right?) just sitting at the keyboard with my finger poised over the left-clicker – THAT’s how trembly my right hand gets. I've never needed one of those mad machines that shakes my cellulite into surrender, like a crazy blender with no lid… oh no, all I have to do is prepare my nice polite enquiry email, make sure I’ve got a new document with three chapters in it, polish my synopsis until I can see my (sweaty) face in it, swallow back whatever meal that threatens to re-appear and hover over ‘send’.

I’ve even been known to do it with my eyes shut; it gets that bad. As if shutting my eyes somehow makes the whole process that much easier, less stressful, more dream-like. Like it maybe didn’t happen because I wasn’t looking? Isn’t that a bit like calories not counting if you eat something when nobody’s watching? Love that idea. Eating alone is my diet of choice. But I digress.
Subbing.
I used to take Subbing to the max. “Extreme Subbing” if you like. Back in the days when paper, ink, envelopes (including self-addressed) and stamps were de rigueur. And Post Offices. My God, Post Offices. I’m still very surprised that the lady behind the counter who worked the 2 o’clock shift didn’t ever ask me if I’d thought about therapy, the number of times I got her to weigh the envelope with contents, then take out the self-addressed envelope and letter and weigh it all again so I’d know how much the return postage would be. Because sometimes I might have used ‘heavier’ ink than the last time. I mean, wouldn’t it stand to reason that the lower an ink cartridge gets, the fainter the print, and the lighter the whole caboodle? And I didn’t want those nice people at the Marsh Literary Agency* thinking I was a total prole for not understanding something as straightforward as the Royal Mail standard postage weights and measures guidelines. Well, did I? Such ineptitude would surely send my manuscript back to the bottom of the slush pile - for only submissions by writers with a basic grasp of Post Office Protocol would be worthy of reading.
At least that was my worry. Well, one of them.

Along with all the others. Did I put the right letter in the right envelope? did I put the right SAE in the right envelope? did I stick stamps on every-bloody-thing? And of course, did the nice Post Office lady really understand what it is I was asking her to do in the first place anyway?
I’m surprised I slept at all.

But at least in those ‘paper-days’ I’d have been able (if I’d been so inclined and that convinced that something in an envelope was awry) to stake out the box into which the envelope had been posted, lie in wait for the post van to collect the contents and then wrestle my envelope from his sack so that I could rip everything open only to discover that nothing WAS actually wrong in the first place and actually I DO need to seek psychiatric assistance of some kind.
After my second book did the (boomerang) rounds and I worked out I was probably spending more in posting my submissions than I was getting paid for in the part-time job which fuelled my habit, I decided to just sub to Agents whose email details appeared in the Writers and Artists Yearbook.  And there're a fair few of them.  But it doesn't make the 'sending' any less traumatic.  In fact there's not even the consolation of being able to lie in wait for the Royal Mail van after you've hit 'send' - and the blind panic I felt once when I realised I'd sent an enquiry to two different Agencies but addressed to the same person, was something I do not wish repeating in a hurry.

And, so having committed this idiotically heart-stopping misdemeanour, would YOU:
a) send another e-mail saying 'oops, sorry about that - I'm a fool who doesn't deserve representation.  I insist you send this message and any attachments directly to your recycle bin', or
b) pretend you didn't notice and hope they don't either, or
c) convince yourself that they'll think you're just a typical creative-type who, although obviously a skilled story-teller, has a head too full of creative ideas to master the banalities of basic emailing.
Yup, me too.  I'm a c) person every time.

*Just one of a number of very lovely Literary Agencies Out There.