echoes1331

[echoes1331]

So, no writing today.

These things happen, especially after a rough night of heavy conversation.

Didn’t even really get any arting done, really… like, I’m too drained to work on the inks for page one of The Bear, but I did get two pages blocked out (paneled) and some loose text down, and one solitary cutesy demure cartoon bear (with the word ‘bear’ written three times on the next page, because I couldn’t be bothered to do any more sketching), but the story is becoming to take shape, that instead of a single Bear, it will be a legion of ‘Bears’, issue to issue… it is a deeply political comic, and I’m trying real hard not to… y’know, do the thing.

Actually, I’m sorry, my words are failing me right now. But I don’t hate what I have so far, as far as The Bear goes…

I should explain the name.

Do you remember the question last summer? Or the debate, maybe, about women choosing the bear over a man? Well, through November, I did a rough 14 pages of a comic, an ashcan if you will, a proof-of-concept, about a woman who, instead of choosing the bear, became the bear. Get it? Got it. Good.

This take, I don’t think will be as fatal, as bloody, but more vigilante-style, a more thought out story instead of my unbridled rage going unchecked. Well, kinda. Maybe. We’ll see what we see, but I like the idea of a noir story where it isn’t the ‘dame’ that’s in distress, but the men who torment her with their bullshit.

That’s one thing that’s important, maybe. About me. I hate men. I have for a long time, I’ve never felt comfortable around them with precious few exceptions. Largely, because they seem to be on the wrong side of history, dig? And if it comes up that I am male-presenting, we just won’t go there. And, I know there are decent men out there, there are. I’m sure there are, I’ve met a couple, but by and large, in this culture of toxic masculinity, more and more of them to seem to be falling in line with the ‘expectations’ of their ‘fathers’. Or it just seems performative. That they’re just playing the role of the decent human, when in their hearts they are just as vile and malevolent as their counterparts.

God I’m tired and I’m rambling, so peace out. I’m going to try and phase outside of reality for like an hour, to see if I can come back to a better headspace.

Or something.

[echoes1331]

Maybe writing, maybe not writing, I don’t know. I’m conflicted on the matter of how to handle Volume 2, Disjointed.

The original opening chapter is good, I like it, but from there on out, on the whole, it is a bit shit. It’s a bit forced. And now I’m having to calculate the [Intermission] and what it changed, how it changed things. I feel like I hit a good stride there, with the exception of the chapter length (as a short story type of beast). It’s good, it moved things along nicely, and Vol 2 feels very stagnant. Sort of. And I’m struggling with the end of the intermission, itself. It ends with Aaron being jettisoned to the It’iokh’s realm, right? Major cliff-hanger shit, and I dunno how to handle that now. STRUGGLES!

Not to mention all the nefarious shit circling around in my head, but that’s neither here nor there.

It’s just that, things have become unwieldy, and while the only way out is through and going through Vol 2 now, and fixing it feels like a valid option, so does starting it over, maybe keeping the first chapter. Maybe, because now I’m beginning to question whether or not I stated a bunch of what had already been stated in the [Intermission], and how the events of the [intermission], in particular between Amelia and Eleanor have changed the shape of things.

LIKE, the Black Giant told Eleanor in her last scene to leave Amelia ASAP, to step away, full-on, that Amelia is going to end up taking her down, right? A warning, right? And a good, accurate warning, which I want to play with before separating them (more or less) at the end of Vol 2, Chapter One… and then there’s the whole Aaron thing. That was such a perfect cliffhanger ending, I’m questioning where it should be placed, at the end of Vol 1, or as a Prologue to Vol 2? And then, to keep that mystery brewing, how long should I wait to reintroduce his plight? My brain hurts, and I don’t like this.

I’ve made a mess of this, by being impatient and too slow-burn for my own good. I have created my own fucking problem, and I’m getting pissy about it. That’s all, I’m just pissy, and here I am, trying to work it out, without a big splash of inspiration, meaning — what? Should I wait and not write today, just sit here and babble about possibilities until I work it out (okay, I had a brief flash of inspiration on how to handle things, but I lost it).

The thing is, see, the thing is… I could just create a new document, and see where it takes me. Let the story dictate where it’s going, instead of my fucking bullshit of trying to over-think things and make them too clever. That will be my biggest downfall, being too clever for my own good.

The catch is, I could end up cutting huge swaths of Vol 1, make Vol 2 a whole lot shorter, then Vol 3 fairly short as well, and do it all as one book, cut all the bullshit out of the way, and do it that way. I had originally wanted to do a series of interconnected short stories, but Vol 1 ballooned as I was trying to figure out wtf the story was going to be, so maybe that is the best course of action. And I introduced the devil, literally, Mr Cadwallader, from the Nowhere stories. Shit.

I have made a big old mess of the whole damn thing, haven’t I? Do I cut Cadwallader? No, he’s too integral to the end-game, right? Like the Epilogue. But cutting him and his team way back may be a good course of action. And sticking with the original plan… Fuck me.

And it is moments like these where I consider just shuffling off to Buffalo, so to speak.

I wanted something clean and interesting, not this bloated fucking 200k word epic mess. Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit.

Fun fact, did you know that while he is often regarded as being short, Napoleon Bonapart was fairly tall for the time, standing at I believe 5’8 to 5’10?

I don’t know what to do, though, my brain is screaming and I’m tired, so settling back and just breathing while I noodle on the idea may be the best course of action. I think cutting everything down, to maybe 100k, 125k goal length may be the best course of action, and that may be the key, here. Maybe.

Then again… then again. Fuck, I dunno.

Going to back off and breathe, and see if I can figure something out while not focusing on it like a goddamn psychopath.

[echoes1331]

I do not feel well.

I just finished the first intermission, at right around 15k words, and I should be elated, but I’m not.

Part of it’s because I now have to go back to Vol 2 and fix that steaming pile of shit, and figure out if I can fix it without just rewriting it (or thusly, wholly cannibalizing chunks of it, to make it make sense…) but also, my depression and loneliness are just crushing me. I haven’t self-harmed in twenty years, but the ideations are becoming more and more tangible. Like, it’s not just that I can see myself doing it, but I can *feel* it too. I won’t, of course. It’s been too long since a lapse, and I ain’t going to break that streak, and I ain’t going to do worse than just take a hunk out of my arm, either. Because I am going to continue breaking my record of consecutive days alive. I have survived so much, so many of my own problems, and I am not going to let this silly shit win. I have horrible people to outlive.

That’s right, I survive out of spite and determination.

I should be so fucking happy right now, though. The last chapter of the intermission changed a lot of things that I had been counting on, like what the fuck is happening to Aaron. Wait… maybe it isn’t the end. Maybe there’s a little more to write, another couple of chapters… or not. Maybe his journey through the It’iokh Realm should be featured in Vol 2 instead of wrapped up nicely in the intermission. A CLIFF-HANGER! Yeah, it’s a shitty tactic, but this series is full of season-ending cliff-hangers. I guess I am writing it a bit like a tv show, maybe, but in novel form.

And then there’s the question of how the fuck it’s going to come out, in a single book, two books, or three.

If it’s going to be a single book, it’s going to be right around 200k words, 666 pages. That’s a motherfucker, and if I try to get traditionally published, 100k is kind of the cut-off as I understand it for first time authors. And at present, it’s already sitting at 70k, which is going to fatten up in the editing process, because the first draft for me, is basically an outline. It will need fleshed out, and let’s say that’s another 15k between the two parts (Vol 1 & Intermission), that’s 85k… and the point I’m getting at is! IS! That three books, individual books, a trilogy, will be the way to do it.

Okay, structure thing:

BOOK ONE

Prologue

Vol 1

BOOK TWO

[Intermission]

Vol 2

BOOK THREE

[Intermission]

Vol 3

Right? And maybe an epilogue, we’ll see. However, maybe Vol 2 should end with another intermission, that way it’s all symmetrical and shit, because again, it is thought to be one book, so a Prologue and an Epilogue capping it just fits. And I already know how the Epilogue is going to go [spoilers].

Why do I have to make everything I write so fucking convoluted? Am I stupid? Bloody hell…

Okay, distraction works to stave off the depression, and fucking with the minutiae of this story in my head is a good distraction, so peace out kiddos…

[echoes1331]

I dunno if today will be a writing day. Outside of this here.

I’m tired. Night before I didn’t sleep for shit [sleep score: 56], and I thought that was the cause of last night’s… dead-ness. Let’s call it that. It was just… unpleasantness, right? But I slept well last night [sleep score: 77], meaning I should be recovered… I should be, but as I sat there this morning trying to pencil the page of my comic, I just didn’t want to. And now, given up on that, I don’t want to write, I don’t think. I just want to curl up and not exist anymore.

I’m in need of a distraction, but the two things that give me that distraction just aren’t doing it today… maybe I should breakout the laptop and do a train layout in SCARM. I don’t know. Maybe. Maybe that will distract me. Right now, though, I’m just hoping this malaise doesn’t continue.

Maybe it’s burnout, maybe it’s just depression… which I suppose is valid, the burnout thing. I’m feeling stretched thin, a bit like Bilbo at the beginnings of Fellowship… so maybe it’s another recovery day.

While I could throw something on the idiot box, to adequately distract me, it would interfere with my music, and I don’t wanna do that. I’m needing the music right now, so maybe I’ll try the train thing, and see if that will make a difference. Or maybe I’ll just lay here on the couch and cuddle Agi Hammerthief, the greatest writing assistant under the sun. The old girl was on one this morning… whining as I sat at the desk, so I moved her into the bedroom with the wife, and she kept whining, so maybe she just needed me on the couch with her, ‘cause she’s being nice and quiet now. I love her with all my heart, but sometimes it’s a bit much. I can’t rationalize with her, and she can’t tell me what she wants. I just want her to be happy, and I ain’t a mind-reader. Never even played one on TV.

Then again, maybe this will be the distraction I need. Not writing, per se, but typing and venting the thoughts that are building up the pressure in my brain.

“If he could express himself, he wouldn’t be thinking about killing himself.”

A paraphrase from George Carlin, but accurate. Not that I’m ACTIVELY thinking about killing myself, of course. Passive at most, but that’s okay, because passive will pass. It always has. I’ve survived this long without snuffing myself, so there’s something to be said. I’m 43 now, and I’m still kicking.

Am I the same shithead that I was at 16? 17? Hell no, and thank fuck for that. I’ve excommunicated my egg-donor, I’ve lost my father. I’ve become asexual and agender, and I am still here. Although, that could be sexual and gender apathy, but that’s neither here nor there. I’ve changed, but my brain chemistry is still lacking, dwindling, and sputtering… store bought is fine, of course, but I can’t afford mental healthcare, or physical healthcare for that matter, so it’s pissing in the wind. I guess. So here I am, and you know what keeps me going? Even at the bottom, what keeps me doing what I do? FOMO. There’s no telling what tomorrow could bring. It’s the whole ‘permanent solution to a temporary problem’ line of thought.

I may be a cynical bastard, but you know what else I am? I am an optimist.

Funny, ain’t it?

No really, I’m okay. I ain’t going to go shuffling myself loose this mortal coil anytime soon. No matter how dire things are looking globally, I will see it through, at least until I get a terminal diagnosis, then that’ll change, a la Hunter S Thompson. I respect the decision. But that’s neither here nor there right now.

The thing is, tomorrow will be a different day, and I will make it through today, even if it kills me.

At the same time, if I don’t do something worthwhile today (writing, for instance), the depression will be compounded. Just gotta white-knuckle it and get it done, don’t I? A mental health day would be nice, to just decompress and breathe, but that will make things worse in the long run. Also, my back hurts.

Honestly, there isn’t a moment of the day where something doesn’t hurt. Largely, my back and my knees/legs (from sitting like a jackass). Is it just being in my 40s? Maybe. And to quote my father — if I had known I’d live this long, I would have taken better care of myself. However, my knees have been a state of bother since I was knee-high, actually. I could blame skating, I could blame being a chunky monkey (in my defense, it was muscle at the time)… or it’s something wrong with my joints that’s never been diagnosed…

And now I’m just rambling, so I’m going to open up Scrivener and see what I can fucking do, yeah? Let’s go.

[echoes1331]

Alright Void, here’s the thing.

I’m having imposter syndrome about writing horror. But, at the same time, I know that it’s the sort of horror that I enjoy, that is more unsettling than terrifying, it’s slow burn horror… I reckon that’s the thing I need to come to terms with. I’m getting impatient, in a way, and thinking more about the Market than what I actually want to do. No, I don’t write standard horror, but more — Lynchian horror. Things that are weird, and out of place, not goobers decimating a corpse for grins and giggles. I guess it could also be construed as Gothic Horror, perhaps, where it’s hidden in the subtext.

Right?

And I was going to write today, and I may still once I rattle this shit loose in my head, because I got 200 words out and it was a bit shit. That happens, I know. Every day can’t be a good day, and it’s my own fault, because I was being stupid yesterday, ‘cause I wasn’t planning on writing, but opened the document, found a shitty sentence, fixed it, and then shit out a thousand words in 30 minutes. I was getting smug. Or some shit. Because for the last two months, I have sat down, opened the document, and done that, without fail. I was getting cocky, so this is the universe knocking me in the balls, putting me back in my place.

So now I’m going to rant and rave here, to have a breather.

I’m also tired.

And you know what? I may be a hack — writer and artist — but you know what? I do create my own shit. I write my words, and I draw my shit by hand. I have never, nor will I ever, use GenAI, because while I’m a hack, I’m not a fucking loser hack.

Well, I am, but that’s neither here nor there. I create my own shit, and all of its foibles are mine.

But I digress. The thing is — I do write horror. And honestly, I’m still within the first 100k words and A, I’ve had a few scary moments, but also B, I am laying the groundwork for Vol 3. Vol 3 is where things are going to go tits up, where the Doors to the eldritch horrors are opening and the really scary shit begins to come out, but before that can happen, the groundwork needs be laid.

Not like that.

The doors need to be open, the pieces put into place. And I’ll be honest — what’s going to happen to Aaron, Mac’s boy, in the very near future is going to be terrifying, if I include the grisly details, because the cube is going to pull him through the door, into the cosmos, where he is going to be flayed alive, essentially. A part of me feels weird writing that, so I might not go into the grisly details, only have him go missing, then be found out in a field, his fleshless corpse.

Then again… I could… no, not that. It’s imperative to the story. Mac and Cheri find out she’s pregnant (that’s what I was writing before I fucked off here) and I ‘like’ the symmetry, of finding out they’re going to have a child a few days before the first child goes ‘missing’. It’s imperative.

And this is … where I bow out and fix some lunch. I didn’t sleep for shit last night, and my brain is all fuzzy because of it, so today is a non-writing day, and I’m allowed to have those here and there.

SONG OF THE DAY:

THE BALLAD OF DWIGHT FRY, Alice Cooper

[echoes1331]

Dearest Void,

Here’s where we are today. I’m approaching the halfway point on the first draft of the intermission. The writing is very rough, very disjointed (hehe that’s the title of Vol 1), but that’s what first drafts are for, though I am beginning to question if again, I am forcing it.

As my father always told me, if you’re forcing it, you’re fucking it.

But I’m writing every day, averaging a thousand words every day (1200 today, 900 yesterday, etc)… but! Am I pushing quantity over quality? Why is my brain all fuzzy? Okay, I was up way past my bedtime last night, and I’m suffering the aftermath of burnout, but that’s neither here nor there. However, it could be argued that that is the point of the first draft, to throw everything to the wall to see what sticks. Some of it will stick, some of it won’t, and the editing will suss that out. But i have to get it all done before I can make them decisions…

Because, I don’t know what scenes will be necessary for the overall story, and what will need to be culled. There are a lot of threads here, and for better or worse, some may need to be trimmed.

God I’m tired, and I think that’s all she wrote for today, so pfft. Peace out, kiddos. Remember to do your homework in the dark and eat your cereal with a fork.

[echoes1331]

Took yesterday off, maybe Saturday too, I can’t remember actually, but I’m back at it today, and got 500 words before the wife woke up, and started making notes in my fancy pants notebook, about what has happened in the [INTERMISSION] and what is shaping up to happen, just so I can reference them and make sense of it all at a quick glance instead of having to … whatever, I got work done and that makes me a happy camper.

However, last night, the wife and I were joking about the Rapture, as one does, and kinda began forming a story… dunno if anything is ever going to come of it, because you know… ADD Brain… but the ideas are there, and I’m trying to get them sussed out, while not abandoning The Seven Doors of Hollow Falls…

But, she’s awake now, and apparently slept well, so I’m off.

[echoes1331]

Yeah, I was right yesterday, in that I was wrong Wednesday. Well, at present that is the thinking, anyway. That the [Intermission] was missing.

The Intermission will be a short story, within the book, sort of like a ‘prologue’ for Vol 2, bridging Vol’s 1 & 2. It will be maybe 10k words, and it will do all the things I wanted to do with that month, including the turning of the second key. Which I don’t wanna deal with, just like I didn’t want to deal with the immediate aftermath of Ellie’s mother’s suicide, that it was going to hit a little too close to home for me.

My head is all fuzzy, due to allergies, and I don’t know that I’ll manage any actual writing today, but here we are. A conclusion drawn (or at least, sketched). That’s something, at the very least.

Now, let’s write, yeah? Because, I can’t not write, if we’re being honest. I feel like dog’s business, but I gotta give it 30 minutes at the very least. I have my writing assistant, Agi Hammerthief (the old lady dog), so let’s give it a shot, yeah? If nothing else, I’ll get things formatted properly.

[echoes1331]

So, 1100 on the day, I think (because after writing, I finished the pencils on the comic book page for another project I’m working on, set in the same Universe). And I am going to ramble (maybe) about Burnout. Not the idea of smoking too much weed, or the Human Torch adjacent character from the 90’s Image comic GEN 13.

It could be argued that I was butting up against burnout last week (and easily argued, at that), but thems the breaks when you’re… like me. It’s not what it was during the winter, when I was running from the Darkness, working on three separate projects at once, a book (or two), a comic, and my model train (which is on hold because I’m moving it to the basement from the attic, but the basement isn’t finished yet). That was bad, and for a couple weeks I was dangerously close to shuffling myself loose this mortal coil.

But! Burnout is a thing, and it sucks. I’m burning the candle at both ends, and last weekend I almost collapsed. Promising myself to take a day or two off from said projects to recoup. Did that happen? Well, sorta. I didn’t write Wednesday, and Wednesday evening while preparing to shower, it dawned on me that the 15k words I had already put into Vol 2 were rubbish. That’s a nice way of saying they were absolute shit, btw. While I showered, I contemplated it long and hard, if it was actually factually shit, or if it was just Imposter Syndrome. Which it could still be, and what I’m doing now is just spinning my wheels, which is why I have yet to delete those 15k words, suspecting that they are the start to the back-half of Vol 2, or the beginning of Vol 3, so they sit until I figure out what the fuck I’m doing now, re-starting Vol 2.

(Side note: the New Volume 2 is coming along nicely, and I like what I’m doing with this first chapter, so far.)

Anyways, I’m still not certain, and the point of that aside was that while I didn’t write on Wednesday, I did work on my book in some capacity, and here I am on Friday afternoon, suffering the drainage of burnout. OR, of course, I’m just tired, and got done today what needed to be done. These things are amorphous, at times.

I am tired, and my back is griping at me to calm the fuck down. To take a day off to recover, and this is a three-day weekend coming up, to celebrate BIG SALES and mourn the dead soldiers? I mean, that’s why it’s Memorial Day, after all. OH! I forgot the Indianapolis 500 across town. That’s kind of a big deal Memorial Day Weekend, ain’t it? I mean, it did sell out apparently, which it hasn’t done since uh, the Centennial back 7-8 years ago. Dunno why, don’t care either. But yeah, we’re coming into a 3 day weekend, and maybe, just maybe, one of those days I will fucking stop and take a breath, yeah? Perchance to dream.

SO, some things… because I tried another blogging site previous to returning to Tumblr to get my long-winded thoughts out…

THE SEVEN DOORS OF HOLLOW FALLS

Is the title of this book, and it is an Appalachian Cosmic Horror story. The main characters, changed from hero and villain to villain and hero (respectively) to two girls in a fucked up situation. I do still want to write a story where two friends diverge, one becoming the hero, and the other going full Dark Willow (while I am not a FAN of Buffy, it’s an easy way to explain it), and it may still happen in Vol 3, but who knows?

I sure don’t, because I am a pantser. I have broad stroke ideas, but that’s about it, and they are constantly shifting. I’m mining this story as it comes. Like, the other day (in the Vol 2? that has been put on hold), I created a brand new … entity, because the Man In Black isn’t so much a character, as he is a harbinger. OOH HARBINGER! I like that word. Anyways, I pulled him from the ether, and have no clue what he’s going to do, but he emerged today. That was the big scene I wrote today. But like, no, I know how the story is going to end (well, this one… kinda), that one of the MC’s is going to go batshit insane, because one cannot see a cosmic horror and remain sane. It’s part of the rules, right? But at least, I’m fairly certain she lives. There was some debate for a while, because she turns the final key (in the Seventh Door) and, more or less, unmakes reality. Whether turning that key killed her, I didn’t know (and a part of me is still waffling on the matter, if we’re being honest).

SO, that’s the story. Cosmic Horror set in the mountains of Virginia. Sounds fun.

The first volume is sitting a little over 50k words. Not a lot, and …

Here’s the thing, 50k used to be a novella. Even Nano told us that 50k was not *actually* a novel, but it was an accomplishment nonetheless. But, as it turns out, in the last 20 years, 40k is the cut off for a Novella, I guess.

BUT, the original intention was to write 3 Volumes, each novellas of right around 50k, and to publish them as one book. Each volume would be episodic, with the main plot continuing throughout, even if the major plot of each volume wasn’t directly linked (like Vol 2? A haunted house story), because I liked the idea. Now, as I am working on volume 2 and editing vol 1, I realize that that probably won’t work, because the second draft is expanding, at least for now. It’s like, I shoot the big shit out the barrel of a shotgun and work on the minutiae on the second pass, right? It’s basically, Draft One is an… outline, with a lot of effing words, right? So I clean it up, and by cleaning it up, the word count grows. SO! Here I am, looking at three books from anywhere between 60k to 75k words. And let’s say, they all end around 70k words. That’s 210k words. That’s a Les Mis fucking doorstop, if I were to publish it as one volume….

HOWEVER, once I get Volume 3 done, and the whole story sussed out, we’ll see what we see. A lot of what I felt at the time was imperative may become trivial, and get cut. Whole scenes may fall to the wayside, right?

AND then, there’s the idea of the [INTERMISSIONS], short(ish) little vignettes that will be sandwiched between the volumes, so 5 stories, right? It’s something I like to do, these [intermissions], to add depth to the world. LIKE, the first Intermission may have nothing to do with the overarching story, but will enrich a character or two (and come to think of it, maybe this New Vol 2 is actually just an intermission… bollocks. SEE! This is why I should not be left to my own devices, and I think it may track. That it will just be a short story, covering the month gap between Vol 1 and the OG Vol 2… fucking hell. I hate my brain sometimes. Now I need to go and noodle on this awhile, to see what I decide… bloody hell, my brain is a bastard…)

And there we are, at present.

This blog is just going to be a document of my thought processes, and how things come to life.

Really, it’s just a way for shit like that to get out and make me think on them.

Be safe and don’t bite anyone. Unless they really-really deserve it.

[echoes1331]

So, this is where I will ramble about my writing shenanigans, present problems and work through them with the faithful void.

Screaming into the void is what I am best at, talking to the audience of zero, so let's go.

I finished the first draft of Vol 1 on May 1, go me, and have spent the last month writing, every day, but the catch is, apparently I wasn't writing Vol 2 (maybe the back half of it, or perhaps the opening of Vol 3 [we shall see what we see]).

Last night, I planned on completely scrapping what I'd written this month, let it collect cybernetic dust the way things do, and start fresh on Vol 2, because the tonal shift between the two was just too damn abrupt, right? Like, I have every intention of them being two different styles of story (the first being the intro, more or less, the forging of a friendship while weird things are taking place in the town of Hollow Falls, Virginia, laying the groundwork, and the second being more of a haunted house story).

Great plans, but the characters changed too much, too quickly (not really though, because there was a month between the final events of Vol 1 and the start of Vol 2... and shit happened, in that time that i didn't go into.)

Now! There is the chance that what I started today will get folded into what had been previously written, by way of flashback or just non-linear story telling... well now, that's an idea, ain't it. And not a horrible one... well, shit.

And this is why I will come here, because ideas will present themselves in a way that I can work through... by like throwing things against the wall to see if they stick, so that's it, you're the wall. But how can a void be a wall?

Magic.

And, from here, I may more or less cobble together the lurking, looming nightmare that is the Synopsis of said book(s)...

I feel I should clarify something. While it is three stories, how it will manifest itself as a product, three books or one, is up for debate. But I won't know that until I finish Vol 3, dig?

So, there we are. And today, I wrote 1500 words on this beast... now, I'm off to needle the idea of folding these two takes on vol 2 together, non-linearly. Ooh I'm excited.