Production of quota

c. 1,500 words, for a total of 50,009 words.

It was hard to get down to business this morning, my mind is on school starting and on the coming season of training and racing. I don't teach till tomorrow, but I need to sort out final details of syllabus, opening lecture, handouts, etc. for Wednesday's class.

I am coming to the climax of the story now, and it is just as well; I have written the little end bit of this section already, which is the scene I had very vividly in mind from very early on, and I am guessing it is probably about 8,000- to 10,000 words that will take me from where I am to that point. If I keep up quota production until the end of next weekend, in other words, I should have a full draft of sorts.

(It is still unclear to me whether the book just ends there or whether there will be some sort of a final section, perhaps written in the form of a newspaper article or some other kind of archival assemblage, that narrates aftermath and explanation. But I think for now I will stop at that abrupt end, unless things come clearer to me about what the 'real' ending would be. I'll let it sit for a week or so and then revise it over the weekend of Feb. 4-6, just a quick down-and-dirty fixing of obvious inconsistencies and repetitions and so forth, so that I can show it to a few early readers.)