Don't use "?????". Give em a name that is descriptive or just a couple of words that pop in your head, like "Fat Guy Mohawk" or "No Parking". They'll evolve into the character's real name and you can go back and Control-H them.

#protip

Control-H? Boat's doing this on a Hemingway-esque typewriter, double spaced, with lots of scribbles and notes in the margins/between lines in my mind.

Probably has some kind of visor involved too. Desk lamp with a green glass shade. In a wood-paneled study with late-afternoon sun filtering through the blinds.

…and a sultry blonde in the corner, taking down a few notes herself. She’s packing two 38’s and a 45. Obviously the 45 is loaded and cocked. The 38’s are just decoration.

hehe, more like one of the proverbial monkeys trying to get shakespeare to come out

Another technology rant.

The pool pump at the house we are trying to sell quit running. Turns out it is controlled by some fancy wifi tech that decided not to control it any more. Can't connect to it because there is no wifi there anymore. Tried a hotspot but that didn't work. Probably end up replacing the stupid fancy thingy with a manual control.

Someone should start a business that deals with contractors for you. I'm trying to find a landscape contractor that will put sod down, but I've found it much more challenging than I thought it would be. Typical in this area.

you absolutely need to watch the most recent southpark

Hire Italians. Problems solved!

I don't think I know any Italians.

Yard finished. The contractor did a pretty good job. She got on it when she said she would, and was only one day off finishing it. She found a couple leaks in the sprinkler system that she is fixing now.

I haven't seen it yet, but she trimmed one of the palm trees. It doesn't show in the picture. Apparently my neighbor (not the *******) yelled at her for trimming it too much. But that's what all the palm trimmers do around here. Looks fine to me.

Remind neighbor that plants grow back. GL with the sale.

Im quickly learning that I'm not the most eloquent writer.

think Hemingway. subject, verb.

https://hemingwayapp.com/

+1

Thanks. I'll take a look.

Hemingway was an awful writer. At least his earlier stuff. I recently reread "The Sun Also Rises" and it might be the worst famous novel I have ever read.

According to Word, I've written almost 70,000 words. I'm getting tot the point where it is so big that I'm getting a little stuck. Plot lines need to be tweaked and most definitely I need to clean up the writing. Just seems monumental right now. I know that I just need to put my head down and whittle away but I'm spending more and more time just staring or procrastinating. - like right now.............

I'm thinking that every human should have mandatory therapy beginning at a young age and continued until they die.

Just keep rereading The Bible; it’s all the therapy you will ever need.

Fortunately, I don't need the therapy. Just everyone else.

The holidays were crazy, but I guess that's the case with a lot of people.

We got an offer on the house the day before Christmas Eve. Woot! Inspection tomorrow. Should be fine.

Biggerwife's daughter and significant other stayed with us for a few days. Then, her family (well, half of it) joined us for a Christmas Eve fest. My sister and niece were supposed to be here, but some unexpected "stuff" happened so they couldn't make it. They tried to reschedule flights for New Year's Eve, but my sister got covid. Fun times.

It is soooooooooo nice to get back to normal.

We managed to get a very short bay fishing trip in. Fishing was slow and the trolling motor broke. Fortunately it's a fairly easy fix once I get a part. The wind here has made offshore fishing impossible for the last couple of months. Ugh.

The book is coming along. It's a grind now. It's so big now that it's hard to manage but I figured it would get harder as I went along.

NYE came and went with the usual onslaught of explosions. I used to love fireworks until I moved to Florida. It's a free-for-all here. They start shooting them off three days before the actual holiday and on NYE it goes from sundown to past 2 am. Some really close. Back in the day it was bottle rockets and black cats. Now it's those huge commercial type fireworks that sound like cannons. I have to say it's wasn't near as bad in the new house as it was in the old house. Mostly older people around here and people that actually respect their neighbors. The whole thing has given me this weird ptsd, though. Just hate it now.

Shoot through a first draft before you clean up anything.

Yeah, that's a good idea.

My sister bought a family subscription of master class. If anyone isn't familiar, it's random "experts" talking about whatever. But I decided to watch a few of James Patterson's talks on writing. I had heard the name but didn't know anything about him or his books. Apparently, some think of him as a bit of a hack. Coming up with ideas but farming out the actual writing to others.

Anyway, he did mention a couple of things to do that would hold the audience's interest which I think I'm going to use. The other thing about his books are very short chapters, something I was worrying about doing. Anyway, I got a couple of little tips that I think might be helpful.

Congratulations on the offer, let's hope it holds up.

I will offer my services as an early reader, but I don't know anything about good writing or bad. Pretty good at spotting typos and that sort of thing though.