51,000

Haven't taken a whole day off to write in some time, but did so on Friday, which was good. Brought me up by almost 11,000 words (in total for week). Interesting when we write, how scenes never go the way we expect, not always at least. But when this happens, it's almost always better than what I'd planned. So, the scenes are moving together towards the final day (the story takes place over the course of a week, and we're about to move into Friday).

Finished a great little science fiction novel, a military space opera called The Myriad, Tour of the Merrimack #1. There's a #2 out (called Wolf Star), and it was the Dearreader.com excerpts from this that got me hooked. Written by R.M. Meluch, the book is fast-paced and very enjoyable. I should say that as I read it, I had to check out imdb.com to see if this guy (I assume RM is male) writes for Battlestar Galactica, because the characters, general feel reminds me a lot of the show - it came out around the same time as the series (and excellent series, by the way) began, so might just be a coincidence.

On another note, it's been about 3 months since I opened up a MySpace page (see sidebar menu for the link), so I should let you know what I think. It's kinf of sucky. Well, OK, the networking with people of similar interests is great, nice to have this connection, as tentative and spam-riddled as it is (I'll explain in a moment). So in that vein I guess it's successful. MySpace itself is a piece of annoying commercial shit, however, and pardon my French. They bombard you with constant ads for half-naked women who supposedly want me, and want me NOW. I'm always getting "friend requests" from non-existent people who are actually porn advertisers (basically, now, if I get a friend request with only a first name, and either a) there's no photo, or b) the photo is of a half-naked woman in a provocative pose, I delete it. My wife Janet calls my infrequent trips to MySpace "going to meet your girlfriends?" I see her point - most of the photos remind one of personal ads, which in some ways it is like that. Not for us writers, though - I tried (unsuccessfully, I think) to explain that writers use it for possible networking opportunities, and to reach fans when we (someday) have a book out. Ah well. The most often used tool I've seen used for communication between members is the "bulletin board" where people post news (sometimes) - if they're your "friend" you can see it. There are occasional people who feel the need to post something every day, in effect bumping the other, less frequent posters' news off the list before I can see them. Like anyone who first gets email and forwards all the same jokes to everyone they know, these folks eventually realize that they're starting to be annoying and taper the bulletins a bit, making room for the next. I can't see the bulleting working very well at all, however, once you're reached a certain number of "friends" - there'll just be too many in the network. Still, if MySpace didn't go SO SLOW because they're constantly filling your screen with semi-nude women, it might have some value. We'll see. I'll check in in another 3 months and see if things have improved.