Blah

I'm not sure if I'm stuck again, or just worn out and in need of a break. As can be plainly seen, I couldn't even think of a more interesting title for this post.

I know I mentioned earlier that I was basically winging it with this one, even though in the past I have written complete outlines for several stories. The problem with winging it is that if you get stuck, you really get stuck. And right now I've ground to a halt at the most lame of points: trying to fill space between what I just wrote, and the Halloween scene I've already basically completed.

While being stuck, I've been going back to re-read some of my older things, including the paired novels I have complete outlines for. I hadn't read those outlines in several years, and much to my surprise I found nothing I'd really need or want to change. Even more to my surprise, I suddenly found myself wanting to start writing them.

I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised; I always want to write something else when the thing I am working on begins to annoy me. But the fact that I have two entire complete outlines there, staring at me, is awfully tempting all of a sudden.

I also want to try out that idea of mine where all the adults vanish from the world, but there will be no winging it on that one. An outline is definitely required there.

Now that I'm thinking about it, I can't recall the process that resulted in those outlines. What I mean by that is, I can't recall if I thought about them for x days or weeks first, or if I just sort of, well -- winged it. (Wung it?). They've been gathering dust for so long, I can't even remember how I came up with the ideas at all, which is a little weird -- I remember exactly how the MO formed in my head, and even where I was, more or less. I also remember the exact gestation of the Wee Vampire Story, and of another, long-lost book idea from back in high school that will never see the light of day. (For very good reasons; trust me.)

I was also reading another old thing, the story where the girl from the magical land comes here, instead of the usual way it happens. I wasn't feeling any particular temptation to start writing it again, but I did come across an interesting passage that more or less dates when I was writing it. There's a scene where the heroine, finding herself in Boston, see the natives talking on pay phones, and I mentioned in the text that they're all NYNEX phones. NYNEX was the successor to AT&T after the 1984 breakup, but it only lasted until 1997 when it became Bell Atlantic. I figured, if it's been that long since the last time I wrote a word, there's really no hurry to start up again.

I think I'll muddle through the current story for at least a little while longer, and hopefully I can knock some creativity out of myself and finish this silly little cut scene I'm working on. Or decide the scene isn't needed at all. One or the other. And we're back to the old question if I'm even writing in the correct direction. Unfortunately, there's never an answer to that one until after you've figured it out for yourself.