Summary:

A solid amount of paid editing completed this week, plus an attitude shift towards the novel, which seems to have produced some good results.

 

Monday:

At home again today, with the flat to myself, as Dave went into the office.

I started with a new editing project; case studies about water treatment businesses in Pakistan. It was surprisingly interesting, so I was hopeful that the client would be happy with my work and want me to continue on the project.

I reviewed a film we watched the night before.

Then I got started on another new editing project – a self-help book about fears around fatherhood. This was also very interesting and I was looking forward to doing more.

A newsletter came through from a previous editing client over lunch, so I completed that.

Then I tackled the next scene for Machine, which was a real struggle – I’m still generally baffled as to why I resist writing my novels so much! Ah, well…

I finished off my working day with another section of the fatherhood book.

Later, a couple of articles came through from a previous client, so I edited them and sent them back.

The productivity book author also resent the first part of the book, with changes to be reviewed, so I started looking at that, but it turned out to be much more extensive than I’d anticipated, so I went back to him with queries about the amount of time I was spending on it and whether there was additional budget for the extra work. And he added an additional payment to the milestone for the first section! So, that was good!

 

Tuesday:

Today was my birthday, so I took the day off and went out to have fun with friends and family!

 

Wednesday:

Back to work, mostly focusing on the reviews of additional edits for the productivity book.

I also wrote a review of the audiobook I finished the day before.

 

Thursday:

I was planning to go to the cafe today but, after two late nights in a row, and a continuing sense of unease about Covid numbers, I decided against it, despite having a very long list of tasks.

I started with a sample edit for a potential new client and also wrote a review of the musical we went to see the night before.

Then I did the next section of editing for the fatherhood book.

After that, I started reviewing the stories I needed to rank and provide comments on, for the first round of the Sixfold short story competition I’d entered.

After lunch, I started a new editing project on a book about toxic leadership.

Then, I provided editorial feedback on another two submissions to the TL;DR romance anthology.

In my evening meditation class, we talked about motivating yourself through love and compassion rather than being hard on yourself – and I thought about trying to make friends with my novel, so I’d want to spend more time with it. And the subconscious crew invaded the class and presented me with the next two scenes of Machine, so I made some notes after the class was over.

 

Friday:

Starting work got derailed for a while by the painful process of renewing our home contents insurance, but I settled down eventually and completed my ranking and comments for round one of the Sixfold competition.

Then I cracked on with editing the fatherhood book, before spending some time making a sign for my desk and a sticker for my laptop, both of which say, “Make Friends With the Novel!”

After lunch and a long walk, I wrote the next scene of Machine, trying to feel friendly about it.

Then I did another section of editing on the fatherhood book, since it was the only paid editing project I had available to work on.

I did a couple of submissions and also went through this month’s Writing Magazine to add upcoming submission opportunities to my rolling spreadsheet.

 

Saturday:

The subconscious crew came up with some new ideas for Machine overnight, so I wrote some notes.

 

Sunday:

I wrote a couple of reviews.