What I’m Blogging

…It’s like the Japanese Archery version of writing, hitting the target by not aiming at it…

So here I am on the first day of my vacation, waiting for the NaNoWriMo to kick off. I’m gathering thoughts about what to do, what to write, and at elevenish on a Saturday morning, the most important thing of all, what to eat with my coffee. Can I have kippers for breakfast? Apart from the Supertramp flashbacks, I have been reading what other NaNoWriMonauts^™ are planing and taking heart. Some are just as messed up about it as I am, Some have a plan. In the spirit of panicked authors everywhere a little planning plagiarism is in order.

An Odious Woman (no, not my ex wife) has a rather good plan with an outline and some snappy pointers. This is definitely a plan I will take note of.

My first permanently linked bloggernaut pal Rachel not only introduced me to the Odious Woman (again, no relation to my ex), but also passed on a link about the snowflake method of writing a novel. All good reading, all good advice

For the counter point, however, credit must be given to Pep for his Nike-esque “Just Do It” approach of sitting in front of the keyboard and typing for 30 days. It’s like the Japanese Archery version of writing, hitting the target by not aiming at it.

Today is the anniversary of Black Tuesday, the stock market crash in 1929 that signaled the beginning of the worst economic collapse in the history of the modern industrial world. Three million shares were sold in the first half-hour. Stock prices fell so fast that by the end of the day there were shares in many companies that no one would buy at any price. The stocks had lost their entire value.

…the most disastrous trading day in the stock market’s history…

The front page story in the New York Times on this day read, “Wall Street was a street of vanished hopes, of curiously silent apprehension and of a sort of paralyzed hypnosis… Men and women crowded the brokerage offices, even those who have been long since wiped out, and followed the figures on the tape. Little groups gathered here and there to discuss the fall in prices in hushed and awed tones.”

It was the most disastrous trading day in the stock market’s history. The stock market lost $30 billion, more than a third of its value, in the next two weeks.

From the Writer’s Almanac by Garrison Keillor
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