The Sunday Circle is the weekly check-in where I ask the creative-types who follow this blog to weigh in about their goals, inspirations, and challenges for the coming week. The logic behind it can be found here. Want to be involved? It’s easy – just answer three questions in the comments or on your own blog (with a link in the comments here, so that everyone can find them).
After that, throw some thoughts around about other people’s projects, ask questions if you’re so inclined. Be supportive above all.
Then show up again next Sunday when the circle updates next, letting us know how you did on your weekly project and what you’ve got coming down the pipe in the coming week (if you’d like to part of the circle, without subscribing to the rest of the blog, you can sign-up for reminders via email here).
MY CHECK-IN
What am I working on this week?
I mentioned a whole bunch of things in Friday’s post that are still very much on the cards, but my priority for the coming week is running down the checklist of things that need to be done to get Project: Countdown finalised by the end of September.
Splitting my focus continues to work for me. Three of the five writing projects that get my time on a daily basis have deadlines within the next three months and all are ahead of where I expected to be at this point. I had a big epiphany about Project Beeman on Friday that has basically made the entire book fall into place, and set up a bunch of the things that will follow it in the months to come.
What’s inspiring me this week?
I put out a call for books with great racing descriptions this week and a friend suggested S.B. Divya’s novella Runtime which features cyborgs running ultra-marathons. It’s a neat little cyberpunk concept with some great worldbuilding, but reaction to it has been mixed as people either love it or find that it falls into that perennial critique of novellas – “it feels undercooked and I wanted more.”
I feel on the latter side, and given that I’ve written a bunch of novellas and plan on writing more, I spend a lot of time paying attention when I have that reaction in an attempt to figure out where it’s frustrating me. I’m still not sure yet, but reading reviews and comparing my reaction to other people’s is intriguing.
What action do I need to take?
That checklist of things for Project Countdown? I need to revisit it and rebuild it from scratch at this point, since I’m still working on the next-action list I put together a month ago and things have progressed much, much faster since then. I’m now at the point where there’s a bunch of vague things I know I need to do, but no clear guidelines about when or how they’re going to occur.
I also need to keep a close eye on the site’s spam list this week, as it swallowed a bunch of incoming posts from last week’s Sunday Circle.
I’ve ended up taking a short, unscheduled break from writing newsletters over the last fourteen days. Regular GenrePunk Ninja transmissions will resume
Like many of you, I have good weeks and bad weeks on the writing front. This week has been rocky, and if
Welcome to GenrePunk Ninja supplemental, where I occasionally post foundational essays written before I launched the GenrePunk Ninja newsletter, especially if they’re
5 Responses
Peter: it was me that triggered Akismet’s panic mode last week. The comment plugin on your blog silently swallows comments rather than providing any useful feedback if there’s malformed HTML, unfortunately. As per last week’s comment (should have mentioned this last night when we caught up!) I’m happy to look at installing Disqus for you (or researching alternatives) if that’s any use to you.
Great to hear that you’re ahead of expectations at the moment – that’s fantastic news. Is the how of your checklist any use in teasing out the when for what needs to happen for Project Countdown?
I’m currently looking at Disqus alternatives (also, Askimet alternatives). The problems Discqus solves come with a new set of problems which run slightly antithetically to the way I’d like the site running, so I’m looking for something that offers a few more options.
What am I working on this week?
The majority of time this week is going to the survival job, but I’m actually looking forward to that constraint for a stretch as it forces more realistic expectations around what happens with voice work, and forces tighter constraints. It’s been a while since I’ve had to commit time to the survival job, so this’ll help tighten things up a little.
More specifically, I’m working through an application for funding to attend an international gaming industry event next year, and taking some next steps for the narrative & performance panel for PAX this year. Also spending some time on a side project, as I’ve finally cracked the mental block around getting back to creating video content. Making some videos while playing through XCOM 2’s new expansion purely for fun, and exercising some narrative & improv muscles by wrapping a bit of a story around what’s happening.
What’s inspiring me this week?
I’ve fallen down a bit of a rabbit hole thanks to spinning up the video project, and I’ve been reading the Special Forces Guerrilla Warfare Manual with no small amount of interest, while continuing to listen to the audiobook of They Thought They Were Free. Really looking forward to tucking into The Expanse Season 2, and I’m headed to see Tom Waits’ & William S. Burrough’s Black Rider this Friday, which I’m super, SUPER AMPED for, and hoping will scratch a genre itch that Wynonna Earp sadly failed to for me.
Other than that, I’ve found over the last couple of weeks (after a bit of an emotional meltdown) I’ve been working from day to day with a sense of purpose and wonder, which was the mindset I’ve been trying to shift to for a while. I still want to be doing way more than I am (or is practical) but I’ve been able to get my headspace right, which has been a huge saving in energy spent fretting. I suspect working around that mental block on video projects was a definite part of that.
What action do I need to take?
Despite the lack of immediate impact, I need to focus time and effort both on the funding application for international travel, and sorting out preparation for this year’s tax return, as both of those will have the largest immediate impact on the bottom line.
I just googled the Guerrilla Warfare manual and immediately fell down a research rabbit-hole that’s going to occupy me for a few weeks.
If you can flick me a list of the resources on your reading list, that would be fantastic!