Bloody, sweaty packet 2

My 4th semester advisor, Ellen Howard, said in her letter about my first packet that she wanted me to work harder than I ever had before. She expected me to sweat blood over it, smiling the whole time as I see my novel taking shape after developing an outline. The packet I put in the mail to her on Friday had blood and sweat stains all over it.

The sheer quantity of pages in this packet was not amazing. The novel outline came out to 6 pages, single-spaced, and I submitted 5 revised chapters (about 33 pages). She'd asked me to revise the first 4 and 2 or 3 more, but 5 was all I could hack. By the time I finished the outline, I only had a week left to do revisions. Cutting was quick and easy, but adding new scenes was more time consuming.

Starting Oct. 1, however, I'm reducing my hours at work from 40 to 32. I'll have one whole extra day--Wednesday--every week to keep plugging away on my novel. Why Wednesday instead of Friday or Monday? A couple of reasons:

1. It would be too easy for me to fritter away a day in a long weekend because it wouldn't feel like a work day.
2. My semi-retired husband, who works at home as an outdoor writer (bird hunting articles), goes to shoot skeet (clay targets) on Wednesday mornings, so he will be out of my way, and we won't have to negotiate computer use (we share one).
   

So I plan to make more dramatic progress soon. My speed should pick up now that I have a plan to follow too. I'd like to complete a good draft of this novel by the end of November--sooner if possible.