Taking a quick look at the title you might think that I had gone back to school and was knocking back a pack to get some homework done in time. Wrong.
I committed the three day Memorial Day weekend to working on my novel. During the trip to Europe I had done extensive work reviewing the book and coming up with a long list of pre-rewrite projects in order to clean up logical inconsistencies, answer backdrop questions that the story brings up put doesn't provide any frame of reference, and research certain things that are part of the fantasy world to ensure accuracy. I've been thinking about these issues for some time and in my own mind I had answered them but I'd not gotten it all written down.
I'm happy to say that I was able to get all the major back stories written and figured out. I'm pretty happy with the logic of how things work and the sequence of historical events that lead to the situation I'm writing about and the workings of the fantasy world. I still have one tricky relationship and scenes related to it that I have to work out. Initially it was done in sort of an adolescent humor style (think Ferris Buehler's Day Off) but I've made the relationship much deeper and I've got to change the scenes accordingly. But there is also I humor component I need to maintain. Oh the trauma of it all!
The smoking refers to my ongoing attempts to master my Yoder Smoker and create real BBQ. Wife loves pulled pork. Last time I tried I ended up with tasty roast pork but nothing close to pulled pork. This latest attempt was fraught with challenges. I took my meat out Friday night with the intention of doing it on Saturday. However Saturday morning arrived and it was still solid! Pushed the attempt to Sunday. Got up early. Started the machine. An hour later I figured out it had not ignited properly. Trouble shot the problem. Got it started but this cut out a couple of hours from the time I had to get things cooked. Still cooked it for 10 hours. This time I was closer. It was like good sliced pork BBQ but not done enough to get pulled pork. But at least we're making progress. I think I need to put the heat up a bit and aim for 12 hours for a 5 pound piece of meat.
4 comments:
I thought that you meant that your progress on writing the book was smoking hot.
I thought that you meant that your progress on writing the book was smoking hot.
I am looking forward to reading some sneak previews of the book!
Smoking is sort of an art form. I don't think many are able to master it, but I have no doubt that you will.
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