Slingblade

I was telling my family recently that I think I have been alone for too long. I find myself talking to myself more than I ever thought I would. This I am okay with - with as many pets as I have, I can always pretend that I am talking with one or all of them. The thing that bothers me is that I have realized that I am becoming Billy Bob in Slingblade, I walk around grunting, groaning and hmm...ing throughout the night. I grunt and groan to emails I read, shows I watch on t.v. and I find myself yelling out loud 'what in the fuck are you thinking' to my reality shows.

I've been alone to long - that is evident. I am trying to make some changes there. Now last night I had to realize the absurdity of the whole thing - there I am checking email watching American Idol, grunting groaning, hmmmmm...ing and I recognize that I am doing these things. So you know what I do, I start talking to myself about how ridiculous it is making all of those noises. I had a full conversation with myself before I realized how utterly challenged I was behaving.

Well back to the writing stuff. I finally heard on that 24 hour contest - I won something from the grab bag (I don't think that was as much a reward on the actual writing as it was just for joining the contest.) There is another contest at the end of this month, I am considering it, but I have to make sure I am going to be in town and around to be able to participate - Hell, it's not like I am made of money and can just throw $5 here, there, and everywhere.

I read one of my shorts recently at my writers group and it was received with fairly positive response. The suggestions they brought up were very good - I think I have mentioned before that I usually put the piece aside for a few weeks before I attempt to rewrite it, and I really am not sure I am going to have to do that with this piece. The amusing thing to me is that this group is made up with a wide variety of writers - from poets, novelist and screenwriters. Most of the novelists have never written shorts and a couple have even told me that they wish they could write stories but they think of a story in the 200-500 page way of thinking. So I read this story and get a few responses who are looking forward to more on the story.

I felt bad last week because I was talking with one of the women - whom I actually adore - and I was sharing a bit about the story that I didn't know how to break it to her. I said to the monitor that this was one of the things that I felt should be taught - that a short is evaluated and read differently than a novel. It kinda broke my heart to put it out there that 'he's dead, the story's over.' It was sweet - I just hope I didn't embarrass her.

Anyhow, I am pretty sure that I am going to be working on the edit/rewrite of that story to be able to submit it to the Writer's Digest short story contest. I also need to have a few hours this week to get the story of the Wishman submitted. I also heard from an agent that I was hopeful regarding this story, but she turned it down. So now I just start submitting it again. I think I changed the name of it too - I was thinking the title might be a little long - I actually have a few stories I have done that with. I believe that I am going to be titling it Wishes and Pockets.