Saturday, March 06, 2004
The "first draft" of the story is done (I don't actually write drafts, but the term is convenient here). But, having finished the first draft, I realized that this not the story which I will title "Rappaccini's Dragon." In the end, the parallels between it and Hawthorne's story were not so pronounced as I'd expected. So, I'll need to find a new title today. Something else will be "Rappaccini's Dragon," some other day. If I had my druthers, it would have no title at all. In most cases, giving titles to first-person narratives only compounds the problems of disbelief. Not only am I to believe that Character X sat down and wrote this story for me to read, I'm to believe that she gave it a title. And if she didn't, then who did? The author? No, Character X is the "author"; to believe otherwise defeats the illusion. Anyway, this afternoon, Spooky and I will read through the whole story. I know there's one spot where I need to add a paragraph or two, and there will be the usual line edits. I wrote an amazing (if I do say so myself) 1,499 words (how did I miss 1,500 by one frelling word!) in about five hours.
Afterwards, I was so tired I could hardly walk straight. This is no exaggeration.
It was a wonderful, warm spring evening here last night. Everything's blooming. We went out and rented Big Dumb Movies, because after all the smart films of the past week, and having just finished the story, I needed some dumbassery to soothe my brain. We rented Freddy vs. Jason and Gojira tai Megagirasu: Jii Shômetsu Sakusen. The less said and the Jason and Freddy thing, the better. There was a remarkable amount of obviously silicone breastage, though. "Barbie boobs," as Spooky calls them. Mostly, I couldn't help but think how much funnier and cooler Freddy vs. Beetlejuice would have been. Think about it. The Godzilla movie was more fun, and not half so dull. There's just something enormously charming and comforting about Godzilla movies. Afterwards, we PlayStationed (new verb) until 3 a.m. Finally, I finished Ratchet and Clank: Going Commando and kicked that protopet's big blue eema. Then I started Beyond Good and Evil, which might be a little too Disneyesque and a little too kid-friendly for some gamers, but I think I like it a lot.
And a word of thanks to Tim Tittle, for this link. Spooky and I laughed ourselves woozy. I'm ready for the concubines.
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