Finals Week

I haven't been doing any editing lately (apologies to my dev editor) because I'm in the middle of finals week. For those of you who have never been college students, this week is a twice-a-year ritual in which professors torture students by making them demonstrate that they actually know the course material. For those of you who have been college students, this week is a twice-a-year ritual in which professors torture students by -- you get the drift.

From a professor's point of view, it's a strange week where office hours are empty and professors prowl around the halls to tell stories of the worst requests they've gotten from students. Best one yet: the student who demanded an A because his "answers were right". (Spoiler: No, they weren't.) It's a hurry up and wait time, where one waits to give exams and then frantically grades them so that semester grades can be turned in by the following Monday.

It's a time when the outside world is calling -- in December, the delights of Christmas; in May the beautiful weather. But to the professor or instructor, they are at best fleeting until the grades go in.

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I am giving my first final today -- actually, they are turning it in because it's an essay final. I will spend the next couple days grading it. I am wearing my ugly Christmas sweater (the reinkitty one -- think of Santa's sleigh with cats) because I need a little Christmas during finals' week.

I anticipate having grades done by Thursday to turn in, and then I'm done for the semester. I'll restart editing Voyageurs then, in the hopes that it will be a worthy submission. I will wait for query responses on Prodigies, hoping for a Christmas present.

May your days be merry and bright.

Don't worry about editing -- yet.

I've been running into some difficulties writing on Whose Hearts Are Mountains, and the reason why is because I've been ignoring one of the big lessons of NaNoWriMo -- don't worry about editing until I'm done with the first draft.

It's hard not to -- I'll be writing and suddenly realize I've contradicted myself. I fix contradictions when I see them, and then I get off-track because it takes a while to hunt them down. And then I start worrying about "Have I gotten enough foreshadowing here?" and "Did I forget this plot thread?" and then I get all muddled up and want to cry.

What I need to do now is write. I need to get those pure ideas on the page and hash out the continuity and the foreshadowing later.

I need to play with the story first.

Then I can do the editing.

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I'll have unexpected time this week to write: I got done grading the big assignment in my classes -- seven hours of straight grading, at the end of which I thought my eyes might be bleeding. Now for the easiest week of my semester, because my finals are multiple-choice and online, which means they grade themselves.