41k

the spock character is saving my arse. he rants and raves, and nothing fills up pages like a john-galt-style lecture about stuff. toss in the fact that spock has a foul mouth (especially when sober) and we've got extra capacity for filler.

i've made it to 41k words. i'm not going to make 50k by -- hey wait, holy crap, it's 12/1. i'm definitely not going to make 50k by the end of november, then. but i am going to make 50k. turns out that's 150-200 pages. a novella at best. but i'll have 50k words to distill into a decent short story, which, i think is the best i can hope for considering how loosely this stuff is all tied together.

it has been a fantastic exercise and a very trying experience. there's nothing more disheartening than laying out what i think is my best effort, 1600 words of difficulty, then reading 2 sentences of Vonnegut and realizing I've got nothing.

But Vonnegut says, in the last book he wrote, that we should write to entertain ourselves, tell us stories out of our imagination.

I agree. I wonder what Spock will say next?

It turns out Spock is a burger flipper by trade. Who knew?