Now, while I've been playing around with all this, there hasn't been time for introspection. Or to explain why I thought Priest was terrible, while wholeheartedly recommending fluff like 40 Days and 40 Nights. And because I'm a bastard, I'm not going to do that now. There just isn't the time.

Why? Because I've got bigger fish to fry. I've got this story, "In Search of the Perfect Lesbian," which I'm trying to turn into a novel (i.e. In Search of the Perfect Lesbian). But, as you might imagine, I'm more than a little daunted by the task of turning a never-revised 17,000-word short story into a 90,000-word novel. (See, here's what I love about me. I've been so lazy in my undergraduate career that I'm actaully in my fifth year, yet despite this I'm not worrying about my homework, but rather an extracurricular project.) I love my characters: Margaret, Pete, Kari, Jessica, Ben, Erin, Agnes (the oft-renamed BDOC), the other Pete, Skip, P.J., Ryan, Natalie, and the Dykehouses; I just don't know if I can sustain them for 90,000 words.

I think I can, but I'm having a hard time breaking 90,000 down into workable chunks, like chapters or even scenes. Plus, I really want to write a great book, something I'd want to read even if I weren't me, and I keep calling myself a hack. Actually, what I should do is go home right now and make myself work on it. Damn skippy!