The Writing Game

It's been awhile since I've blogged about writing, I thought I'd give it a whirl since it's been on my mind lately.

I recently received my first check as a writer for the grand total of $138.74 for my training at my night job. When I held that check in my hand, I was proud as proud can be. Okay, it's not a multi-book contract, but I have to believe that dream is just around the corner.

In the meantime, 5 nights a week, I get the chance to write and watch TV, two things I would be doing anyway.

Of course, being that it's me, there is one problem. Tiredness. The last 3 shifts, I didn't get done until 12:30 a.m. and by the time I got home, it's 1:30. I'm working during the day from 8-5, so 2 days I had to go to work on 4 hours of sleep. I've already overslept twice. Fortunately for me, I know how to get dressed and out the door in a hurry.

Today, I managed to sleep until 8:30, even though I had an exercise class at 9:00 a.m. You've never seen anyone move so fast. I managed to make it just in time. Close call. Tonight, even though my shift started at 7:30, the show I'm supposed to watch and write about doesn't start until 11;30 which gives me 4 hours to kill.

Plenty of time to do my other writing. The other good thing, is that my bosses at my day job know I'm a writer, and they don't mind if I write on company time as long as I get my work done. So far, I've managed to edit 20 pages, and merge 2 characters, streamlining the novel considerably.

I've also had my first experience being heavily edited last night. My show for the night was Three Wishes, the new Amy Grant show. It was on from 9-10, 1/2 for writing the questions, I figured I'd be out of here by 11:00 tops. Didn't work that way.

Another writer was working on writing questions about the product placements, and any question of mine that seemed similar to a question that he wrote, I had to change. Instead of writing 12 questions, I wrote 17. By the end of the night, I was burned out and running out events from the show to write about.

An epiphany of sorts was had on line at the Post Office. I must have the slowest post office on record. 2 clerks and one long line. Anyway, on the way out, one of the women on line handed me an Avon sample with an attached card with her number to order more. Wow, I thought, what a smart idea. What chutzpah to hand out cards to total strangers.

Could I do that, when the time comes to promote my book? Could I go up to complete strangers in bookstores and hand out bookmarks? On-line at the supermarket, at my drycleaner? the nail salon? My hair salon? I guess if I want to sell books, I'm going to have to seriously think about doing something like that.

It can't hurt.

What do other people think?