quest

By good fortune, I had to search out the word "turned" in my current revision. I was using it as a stand-in for someone who had "turned" to the enemy. I replaced it with another term/verb that fits the world better. Besides, it kept making me think, "Turn away from the Dark Side, Luke."

But good-fucking-golly do I use the word turned A LOT--mostly people turning toward someone or away or to go--sometimes three on a page! So now, joy, I get to go through and find alternate verbs. Those are one of those habit words, I think, that I fall back on for choreography. You can get away with that in dialogue, because to me, that sounds more real. The more people talk, the more they talk like themselves. But I have to fix me some choreography.
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I'm itching to draft. But I have to grit my teeth and keep revising. It's maybe easier for writers who have only one story at a time, but I always have several running through my head. Right now the folks from Exiled keep calling to me in tinny little voices from my harddrive:

"Hey! Down here! Just open the file. You know you want to. It won't hurt. The first time's free..."
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Anyone going to WorldCon here in Denver? I'll be there with bells on. If any readers come up to me and mention Sex Scenes I'll personally buy you a beer. (Or give you a can of Coors Light from the cooler in my room.)
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I'm on a mission (quest, if you will) to find a fountain for my back yard. My mom said, "Now honey, don't go out and get a Tony Soprano fountain."

Yeah, you know what she means. The Tickler wants one with lions. I told him it's not the fucking Kansas City Plaza. Or Europe. Thing is, our tastes lean that way. Except our back yard is all Colorado. Think boulders and pine trees around the patio, you know? (I do have a wonderful covered patio that I designed myself, thanks very much.) So I'd like something rustic and simple and European, preferably cistern style. I have one in mind that I saw in a magazine, but I can't find it, of course. It's some old thing that Romans used for drinking water. So I found something with the same feeling, sans cute little birdies, etc, but The Tickler declared it "Too Zen."

Grr. So the quest for the holy fountain continues.