No, that's not a typo in the title. BYU lost, the Dallas Cowboys lost, and my fantasy football team lost. I can't even say, "Well, one out of three ain't bad," even though one out of three is bad.

After I arrived home from watching the BYU game at grandfather's, I got my mail. I saw that my SASE had returned from Analog, and I prepared myself for rejection, because I'd heard that when Analog accepts something, they send out a contract that won't fit in a normal envelope. To my great delight, though, the editor said that he... read more »

Well, I watched BYU lose a game they were capable of winning, and my patience with Gary Crowton is now exhausted. I've bent over backwards to support him, making excuses for him, but tonight I felt I could have done a better job of calling plays and managing the game. If he leads BYU to the conference championship this season,... read more »

Last weekend was my best football weekend of the season so far. BYU pulled of a win on the road at Colorado State in their conference opener. And my fantasy football team, the Klingon Warriors, beat my brother Jonathan's #1-ranked Filthy Beasts. (The Dallas Cowboys had a bye week.)

Back at the beginning of the year, I made three writing resolutions. One of those resolutions was to write at least thirteen lines every day, and I got to April before that one completely fell apart. Another was to double the number of words in my novel, and I just realized I passed that milestone a week ago. The other... read more »

Finished chapter 35 today. It's a short one (1340 words) and not too difficult. I think it turned out OK, even though it has nothing to do with what my outline said this chapter should be about. The outline version was boring and basically irrelevant.

Well, in the warm dark of night, I decided only to tweak chapter 34, rather than revamp it. I may have to tone parts of it down later, but I have decided to move on.

Another long and difficult chapter. At this point, I'm fairly certain there's no way I will finish the novel within my goal for either time or word count, but I'm going to continue to press ahead anyway. UPDATE: In the cold light of morning, I've decided the chapter moves too quickly and will need to be changed.

Yesterday I composed the following limerick of writing advice: You can start off a tale with a hook, And make quite an int'resting book. But a good end's a must, For without one it just Falls flat.

This chapter has two main scenes. One was difficult to write because it was a character-development scene and I'm not sure how well it succeeded, and the other was easy to write because it was just a bit of plot advancement.