Another 5K week for Petra Released.
I remain on schedule, and I’m happy about that, given the productivity land mines I had to dodge this week. Consider:
Monday
I usually spend Mondays catching up on correspondence, writing my weekly progress report, and sometimes getting mss back into circulation. Every Monday, I intend to get all this out of the way and then get in at least 500 words. Never works out that way, and last Monday was no exception. I don’t fret too much about this. If I do a thousand words a day for 5 days, I hit my weekly word goal. This allows me some flexibility. And some weeks, you really need it. Some weeks, you must truly bend like the proverbial willow to get the words down. So. Monday’s over. I have six days left to get in 5K words (I count from Monday to Sunday, in case you hadn’t noticed).
Tuesday
I got off to a late start–nothing new there–so I feared I might not make my thousand words. I make a deal with myself: just get 500 words done, at least. And by the time I got there, I just decided to push on and get the other 500. I kinda suspected this might happen. Oh, the little games we play to trick ourselves into being productive. So I make my goal, and I’m feeling good about that.
Wednesday
Another late start. Oh, well. Things are going along OK, but it turns out my wife needs the computer for a bit, and it can’t wait. She’s got to do something for my nephew’s graduation, coming Sunday, and he’s stopping by to pick it up in a few minutes. I get 500 words done, but now I have to start planning how I’m going to make up that other 500. See, my nephew’s graduating on Sunday, so that day is probably going to be pretty much full. But maybe I can squeeze in 500 words on Sunday morning.
Thursday
We buy a car. We’ve been in the market for a while, and we finally settle on one. My wonderful wife has been doing all the leg work on this, visiting lots, arranging financing, and suchlike. So we go to the dealer Thursday evening, settle on a price, and sign the papers. (It’s a 2006 Kia Optima, in case you care.) By the time we’re back home, it’s late, but the future schedule is unforgiving. I have to get some verbiage in. I do 500 words. Now I’m up to 2K for the week, with three days remaining. But I know I’m kidding myself. No way I’m going to get anything done on Sunday. But Saturday, we have nothing planned, so I start thinking about a big catch-up session that day.
Friday
We get invited to my niece and nephew-in-law’s place for dinner. I manage to get in my thousand words before we leave, so I’m able to enjoy the evening without fretting.
Saturday
The wife knows I’m going to be busy all afternoon, so she runs errands. The weather cooperates, being cold and rainy. No yard work for me today, thanks. I haltingly bang out 1K words, and work in lunch while I’m at it. I finish a chapter and, as usual, have to take some time to figure out what’s going to happen in the next. I have to reread a previous chapter to pick up the thread of this particular subplot, then get it done. I finish the second 1K by six o’clock, and breathe a sigh of relief. I’ve gotten in my 5K words, and I have Sunday free and clear.
Sunday
So I decide to write my progress report while I have a few minutes. But now the wife’s asking me to do some stuff preparatory to departing for the graduation, so I gotta bail.
And that was my week in writing. How was yours?
