The Marshmallow Ranch Gazette (Patreon)

Volume 2, Issue 18

Wednesday, October 4th, 2017

Howdy, patrons!

September has come and gone here at the Jackalope Serial Company, and what a busy month it was! Yours truly was in Belgium for two weeks on a work trip, and then in Dallas. I'm being trained for a new application at my day job in order to stretch my skill set just that much more. I learned an awful lot beyond technical skills -- if you'd like to read more about that, feel free to go to my blog at jakebe.com and read on!

As soon as I got back home, however, I was scheduled for a wisdom tooth extraction. My bottom two were coming in sideways and messing up the bite of my lower jaw hard-core, so they had to come out. That meant spending at least a week in persistent pain, on medication and a more-or-less liquid diet. The wounds are healing nicely, but eating is still a bit of a dicey proposition -- my husband, the dragon and I have had to postpone our anniversary dinner to make sure I'm up for fine dining. 

This is all to say that I've done next to no writing for a month, and now that things are finally beginning to settle down I'm getting back into the swing of it. Pre-writing on "Boundaries", the next Patreon serial, is coming along slowly but steadily; I don't want to jinx my plans, but I'm happy with how the story and characters are shaping up and I look forward to introducing you all to them very soon. I'm developing a somewhat-consistent writing practice, and rearranging my life to put more of a focus on that. This is why we're all here, after all, and it's disappointing not to have new stuff to show you!

Once I'm feeling more comfortable and "Boundaries" is underway, I'll double-back to the older serials for an editing pass and polish before putting them up on SoFurry. You lucky devils got to read them up to a year ahead, but you'll want to check them out there as well -- hopefully the prose and plotting will be tighter, and the effect of the stories will be significantly stronger!

But that's all pie-in-the-sky dreaming for the future. Right now, it's really fun developing my writing focus and habit, taking the lessons I've learned from my work trip and applying them to my other career. Even though I'm still scrambling, still playing catch-up, I'm feeling a lot more comfortable and confident with what I'm doing. Which means it's only a matter of time before everything goes to heck, right? 

Show of hands, who's doing National Novel Writing Month this year?? I will not be, because there's no way I'm ready for it (though really, who is?). However, I will be increasing my focus on writing in solidarity with all of you stellar writers looking to power through your novel. I'll be aiming to do writing sprints several times a week all through November -- if you're interested in joining me, follow @serialjackalope on Twitter!

I suppose that's all for now. There's still a lot of writing to finish today. Until next time, folks!

Your buckaroo, 

Jakebe