Working on Underground Guy now...

I've gone through UG once again and am beginning to format it for ebook. I think I'm going to make one more pass on it to be double sure, but overall it looks good to me. And there are parts of it I love the fact that I wrote them. Granted, this is another in-your-face book with lots of gay sex in it, but it's also a character study of a man in crisis who is forced to find a new way of dealing with his issues.

I know that sounds bit silly and self-aggrandizing, but I am fucking proud of how I get Devlin to change from being a wild animal into a human being. Not just because it happens logically, but because it's done in a simple way...over chewing gum. Seeing a video of one of the serial killer's victims pop some gum in his mouth just before going off to what Devlin knows will be his death slams into him with the viciousness of a sledgehammer to the gut.

Devlin thinks of all the times he's done that, himself, when rushing off to meet a new client. "Can't have coffee breath." It shatters the walls he's put up to protect himself and he nearly loses his grip on his sanity. And it just...happened...

I have a couple moments approaching that already written in APoS. Like when Brendan does lose his mind at the end of book 1 and slowly claws his way back to reality at the beginning of book 2. What solidifies it is him seeing his uncle's car needs won't start on a damp morning, and since he's good with fixing things he goes out to effect a repair...and that's the point where you know he's going to be okay.

If I had a better grip on my grammar, I might actually start to think I'm a damn good writer.

Returning home...

Everything is back-assedwards so I haven't been posting. I've been working on finalizing Underground Guy, instead; I want it up and available this weekend, if possible.

I'm also having to deal with Tumbler suddenly deciding to go puritan and trash any websites with overt gay material on them. I've had posts flagged even though the new rules aren't supposed to go into effect till the 17th. Looks like the glory days of the internet are in the past. Now you have to please the masters or not be allowed to play in the fields of the overlords.

I guess I could work on Wordpress or start up another blog with the "18 and over only" disclaimer at the beginning. Blogger can still get freaky about nude men, be it photography or art, so not sure. I'll deal with it when I have my head back in order.

This trip to Hong Kong was okay, and it was good to see everyone was happy. The dealer I'm crushing on keeps getting better and better looking so that was nice, too...even though his wife was with him. I didn't do much sight-seeing; I wanted to get UG going and, to be honest, I've seen what I want to see here. This new area turned out to be more convenient in many ways, though the hotel isn't as nice as the one in Sheung Wan.

I do seem to be getting used to how things work here, and have ideas on where to go to find things I need. I located packing tape on a Sunday over near Western Market, for example. I've also found Stanley Market is going upscale. When I dropped in this time I found a Bed & Beyond and couple of chain retail outlets with mall-style shops while lots of smaller quirky businesses have been moved out. These are things you can find anywhere else in the city so why bother going to Stanley?

I did watch a movie being made on Stanley's promenade. A tracking shot of a blind man and his guide dog walking along, over and over, followed by a young man. No idea what the story is; no one would talk to me and they got huffy when the saw me trying to take a photo.

So...I snuck a couple. But if I got too close to the camera or actors, I got the waving hands and no-no-no talk. Then I had my requisite fish&chips at a place that wasn't the best but not inedible. Then came back to the book fair, checked on a couple of things, shot my nighttime images of the city and came back to the hotel to start writing.

Monday I had lunch at a Chinese restaurant with some people from the company we're using for the shipments here..and some of that was just plain nasty. But some was very tasty. I have no idea which is called what...just that they made an order of Dim Sum with BBQ pork and I could live on that.

Of course, in a pinch, there's always 5 Guys...if you don't mind the line...

China in Print Fair

Move-in is done and the fair underway. I went about 6pm on Friday and they had a good turnout.

What you can't see from this vantage point...and since it's night, outside...is how spectacular the venue is. It's right on Victoria Harbor and has a view of the east  that is breathtaking. The books are high-end stuff with an Asian bent and the dealers seem happy to be there.

I'm okay about it. This is my 8th trip to Hong Kong and I think I've seen and done all the touristy things one can. What's nice about this year's fair is it's later so the Christmas decorations are up in the city. There are a lot of Catholics here as well as Buddhists, Baptists and Bahai.

My hotel in North Point isn't on a scale as the one I stayed at in Shueng Wan, but I'm finding it's a lot more convenient and there is access to a better selection of restaurants.

So here's a taste of Christmas in Hong Kong...and a link to a video showing the lights at their best...both taken from in front of the Hong Kong Maritime Museum, where the book fair is underway. 

I did it for Dair's Window...

Don't believe it, but a 15 hour plane ride two seats away from a brat that would not settle helped me slam through DW. 50,098 words, the last of which were written while listening to bad Pet Shop Boys albums on the plane's entertainment service. It was that, K-pop or Opera.

The story's a mess...it needs a full restructuring and I'm sure I have some repetition in it...but I'm aiming for something deliberate there -- a moment seen from two viewpoints showing how differently each person sees the same event -- but it's also a start...for another time. Now I need to finish up Underground Guy and get at least a first draft of APoS completed.

A madman's work is never done...

In Toronto waitin' on a plane

And it's been delayed nearly 2 hours. We're not leaving till 3am. Ugh. BUT...it's giving me time to work on DW and keep it moving. I sent out a plea to the characters for help on adding to it...and they provided me with a nice little bit between Adam and Marion, Dair's mother, where she effectively gives her blessing to him being with her son and showing how she feels about her daughter-in-law. Got rather colorful.

Of course, the issue is I'm listening to Christmas hymns and carols...grr...but I'm feeling a lot better about the story. I may still miss it by a few hundred but the fact that it's still building in me shows there's something there. And I'll have a 15 hour flight where I can't do anything else. I didn't bring a book or anything to do so maybe I'll get it done while en route. The story ends with Dair flying to Tokyo...

Dammit, having the plane be this late's made me hungry. I'm gonna find a Starbuck's or Timmy Ho's and get some tea and crumpets.

Gotta feed the beast within.

7200 to go...

I'm closing in on 50K with Dair's Window but it's going to be close. I'm at the point where the wedding is about to take place and haven't got much story left to build upon -- about 5000 words left to add the 7200 to. The 42,800 includes the full script I shifted to narrative format so the story is basically written to the end, but it's not really written yet, if that makes sense. I'm going through and filling in the bits that need more description to make sense. So we'll see how it goes.

I still need to add more about Dair's trial for beating up the guy who firebombed his house. And there is that incessant antagonism between him and a local punk. But overall it's a more interior book than I thought it would be. Might be why it's not a very good script; I haven't really dug into it as much as I should have.

So this is kind of a light story, action-wise. It's more about emotions and feelings and contemplations and explanations and it's not very interesting, right now. Once I come back to it, I'll do what I can to make it better...starting with coherence and consistency. My two big bugaboos...

I'm also changing some names. I don't like Caroline as the name of the villain so will shift it to Sarah. And I gave Bobby and Nelda a last name -- Szebeniec...which is Poilish-ish for madman.

I couldn't do a lot on it today due to having to get ready for my trip to Hong Kong. I've already found I have an issue with my check-in with the Airline. I didn't use my full name when I made the reservation and now they require the name on the ticket match exactly what's on your passport. I'll have to do a manual check in when I get to Toronto's airport, so will need to leave earlier than I expected. Good thing is, the flight's not till 1:20am Tuesday.

I'm feeling a bit paranoid, right now, after the debacle with that shipment from DC. Turns out the damage was done in the delivery truck, so at least no paperwork was lost. But now I'm freaky about everything so am taking extra information with me to Hong Kong to make sure I'm covered.

Also feeding into my paranoia is learning a friend from Heritage Book Shop is in Hong Kong. I sent him a message saying I'd be there and maybe we could get together and got a "Sorry, I'm leaving that day." It reminded me he's never been very chatty on Facebook, just polite. Guess he's not really a friend, just an acquaintance, now.

Sometimes it takes me a while to get the hint...

Still at it...

Dair's Window is threatening to actually make it to 50K in wordage, to my shock. I won't make it before I head to Hong Kong on Monday night, but I'll have a 15 hour flight to work on it...hopefully with power. Sometimes the seat plugs work and sometimes they don't. We'll just have to see.

But today was a good day for the story. I guess my whining made the characters realize I needed their help here...and so they stepped up. I worked on a long tender discussion between Dair and Adam that Adam's telling. He starts out intending to seduce Dair and make him a client; he's made money as a rent boy. But as they talk and he gets to know Dair, his feelings shift. He may be a few years younger but he's lived on the street and has a realistic view of the world and the people in it...and he sees Dair is still caught in the idea that you should trust people.

During the talk, Adam learns Dair has anger issues and had them pretty much under control, thanks to being away from certain situations for a couple years. But his sister-in-law knows exactly the right buttons to push to send him over the edge then feign innocence when he explodes...and she's still at her old tricks.

Dair hosts a birthday party for himself and invites friends from Seattle and Tacoma, and some bring their kids. The sister-in-law calls child protective services on them and they show up during the party. Adam is there, sees Dair is about to explode so steps in and pretends he invited the women, then he and Marion, Dair's mother, show them around the house. By the time they leave they're kissing Dair's cheek for good luck. All nicely handled.

Now Dair's torn. He knows what happened and is fighting himself over it. Anything he does will cause a massive rift with his brother and disrupt his relationship with his nieces. It might even affect his mother's relationship with them. But he has always stood up for himself and can't let it go. That's when Adam comes in and talks with him...and they share secrets...and Dair finally makes a move on Adam...and things progress from there.

As mentioned, Adam has a very questionable background. There are a lot of things he had to do to survive after being kicked out of his parents' home...and Dair winds up being his salvation as much as he is Dair's. I'm not sure how to handle this, yet, but something I want to keep in mind is...not only was Adam ripped away from Dair but Dair was also ripped away from him. He's a dead man telling his part of the story...so can he feel sorrow about this? Pain? Anger? Like Dair feels?

The question I asked myself for this story was, How do you move on when your soul mate dies? Guess I'm wondering if that's also a question in the afterlife.

I'm not gonna make it...

I've run out of story on Dair's Window and I'm at 38,300 words. I'm digging and going through what I've written and a lot of it's whiny and tedious...so this may be a story that's not ready to be told or just plain isn't novel material. More like novella. No padding allowed in those.

I really do get the sense the story's only partially prepped in my head. The characters can't decide who they are, yet; they keep shifting back and forth as to what the story's about. One character has decided to take on a more powerful role as villain and is proving to be interesting but is worthy of a lot more care than I can give at the moment.

I suppose I could cheat and say I made 50K...but I'm the only one I'd be cheating, nobody else. Kind of silly to do that, I think. Just self-defeating. I'll keep at it, but I don't expect to achieve my goal on this.

I got some artwork I'd commissioned to use as the cover of Underground Guy...and it didn't turn out like I wanted. It's good and polished, but it's not right. It's...nice...a bit on the cartoonish side...no, really more like Yaoi or Manga than anything. Not the least bit raw, and that story is not nice. It would be completely wrong to use. So I'm back to square one -- using my own photo worked over in Photoshop.

This is the second time I've asked for artwork and gotten what I asked for and it's turned out wrong. I must be bad at explaining what I really want. That or I'm choosing the wrong artists for the project...which is probably more likely. I have a habit of grabbing the wrong thing at the wrong time.

That's my way -- going right when I should go left...

Hitting over 37,300 words on DW

I had a decent early dinner and worked on DW and managed to reach 37,300 words, so far. I'm still not sure what the story's about because I know some of the stuff I'm working on is tedious and unreadable, but it's a beginning.

The turkey make me sleepy so I took a nap, too. I still managed slam through 2300 words. Late Monday night I'm headed for Hong Kong hoping I don't fuck up, again, but you never know till you do it what's going to happen.

I'm forcing myself to keep writing despite the last couple days. What little confidence I had in myself got shattered thanks to that job in DC. I got down there, got the collection and archives packed in about the amount of time I said I would, got it picked up even though our trucker didn't show up and got it packed into containers to protect the shipment during transit, all on schedule. I was proud...and tired.

But...because I didn't do one last step -- have plastic banding put around these nice solid containers to hold the lids in place -- somehow along the way a 700 pound 48x40x45 inch container got dumped on its side and the top popped off...and the collection got messed up, inside. Some of it wound up caught between the clear shrink wrap on the container and the container, itself. Items may be missing; they won't know till they've gone through everything.

I got sick. Seriously. A blinding headache and depression like I've never felt. It was a lovely collection of books and photos and papers from Eastern Europe under Communism...and it may be ruined. It brought out memories of every stupid thing I've ever done in my life, and there are a lot of them, and jolted me down to the point where I actually was suggesting to Brendan he find someone else to write his story because I would just fuck it up. He ignored me.

I'm better now...but still upset. And shaky. And nothing pleases me. Nothing. I should never write when I feel like this...but if I don't I don't meet the challenge for NaNoWriMo. So I put down bland and boring and figure I'll come back to it later.

Maybe.

Some of today's work on DW...

I've had two hideous days at work so worked on a moment of tenderness between Dair and Adam to cleanse myself...and I have no idea where this goes in the story, yet...
-------
Sometimes I would watch Dair as he worked. Always quietly. Always in a way that would cause him no disturbance.

The first time I did this was by accident. I returned from repairing the door to a shed to find him seated on an old lounging chair he kept in his studio, hunched over and his legs crossed. It was late and dark so I thought he was resting, but as I approached and before I called to him I noticed he was focused on two pieces of glass -- his left hand held one that was a red as deep as blood and gleaming like a ruby; his right hand held one that was pale and shifted between a soft blue and a clearness as clean as a freshly cut diamond. His face was caught in a frown as his eyes shifted from one to the other, holding each at slightly different angles so their colors changed with the light.

I stopped. Almost held my breath for fear I would startle him.

He held them side by side, then one atop the other, then switching them around, using the light from a lamp beside him to shine through them, then the harsh overhead light. I saw he wore the gloves I had found for him. I had thought he did this only to silence my concerns...but this time I began to believe he did not want his blood to mar the beauty of the pieces he so lovingly gazed upon.

He reminded me of the youngest children in my skiing classes. So focused on doing everything just right. Turning their feet just so. Holding their poles at the proper angle while drifting down the beginner slopes. Even on snowboards, they held this sort of focus. A focus only someone innocent can manage. Blocking out the world and all its distractions.

He was so beautiful there. Just sitting there. Shadows behind him. His dark eyes searching for something. Inspiration? Agreement? Acknowledgement? I wanted to know but dared not break the spell.

Finally, he shifted and slowly rose to his feet to climb off the recliner to head back to his workbench. I silently moved closer to keep him in view and found him crouched before a small mound of shattered glass that gleamed in shades of amber. He would pick one up to look through then place it back on the pile, never toss, never drop. Over and over he did this...until he found the one he wanted. Then he stood up and turned on a strong lamp above his bench and, from what I could tell, looked at all three resting side by side in the palms of his hands.

I had been hungry when I arrived home, and somewhere in the back of my mind I still was, but to see him like this cast aside all other concerns. I felt as if I were seeing him fresh and new.

I silently maneuvered to the lounger and sat to watch as he laid the pieces together and turned to another small pile of red glass to go through the same process. Then he did this with the blue, each time placing another sliver of glass with the others.

I was so focused on watching him it took me several moments to realize there were a dozen sketches of me tacked to the walls, each from a different angle catching a different expression of my face. Exactly right and well-detailed. I could not remember him ever doing them. Had he taken photographs of me without my knowing?

I saw him weave a little and take in a deep breath. His whole being still focused on the glass spread atop his bench, he backed up to the lounger. I could see he was planning to sit so I straddled it to let him glide down at its foot. He shifted back and felt my leg and looked around at me...and his face became a smile. His dark eyes grew lighter and open. All without the least bit of shock or surprise.

His voice was a whisper of reverence as he said, “I’m trying something new. Dunno if it’ll work, but why not?”

I replied in the same tone, “Do you wish to tell me of it?”

“Let’s how it goes, first. ‘Kay?”

I smiled and nodded and drew him into my embrace, running my hands softly over his arms and chest.

“Your muscles are tight,” I said. “And I think I hear your tummy saying it wishes to be fed. Have you eaten anything, today?”

He took in a deep breath and gave me a gentle shrug.

I nodded. “Then it is good I took a steak from the freezer and brought with me some of that potato salad you like. And we can begin with a nice mushroom soup. Would that be satisfactory, monsieur?”

“I would love it,” purred from him.

“Then as you take a nice hot shower...” He looked at me, feigning insult, so I added, “To remove the dustings of glass I see on you. Very hot. Very careful. By the time you are done, dinner will be served. No need to dress; we are very informal.”

He chuckled and caressed the line of my chin with the backs of his left fingers as his right hand wound itself in with mine. He was almost back into my world.