This time I worked on Chapters 12, 19, 21, 24, and 26 of TSoA1. Because it seems like the general pattern for the story is short little vignettes, I may well have to expand the story quite a bit or we’re going to be left with a rather thin volume. These are among the things I need to look into. Volume I covers a span of 70 years, so there’s plenty to talk about. We’ll see what I decide to do. Stay tuned.

Because I have trouble keeping track of my place without the source text for reference, I ended up jumping around a bit, starting with Chapter 10  of TSoA1, then going to 11, 15, 18, and 28. You know how I tend to have a few paragraphs of narrative leading into the main event of a chapter? Well, that sort of thing tends to be my main focus when I’m handwriting stuff, often because I’ve often already jotted down dialog in the source text.

I know I said I was going to start serializing TSoA1 once I had at least ten chapters done, but I may be reworking the storyline a bit first. We’ll see. I should come to a decision by the end of the week. Stay tuned.

You wouldn’t think I’d be able to get much done with the old-fashioned approach given how poorly my hands hold up to extensive handwriting, but with enough time and sufficient pain tolerance, you’d be surprised what you can accomplish. I managed to pretty well wrap Chapter 8 of TSoA1 and make good headway into Chapter 9. (I mostly just need to fill out the narrative in the dialog sections I’d written previously.) It is a bit of a pain not being able to cross-reference with the main text or my other resources, but it certainly appears to be a workable solution. It seems I can still make good progress on paper. In fact, without any extraneous distractions, I may well be even more productive. We’ll see how things continue to go. Stay tuned.

I managed to finish Chapters 6 and 7 of TSoA1 and start on Chapter 8 in a fine example of the sort of progress I could make in my downtime at work before it was revealed that I’m not allowed to bring my laptop. Well, shucks. Now we’ll see how the analog approach goes. I suppose it’s good practice for what I’ll have to do if the electrical grid ever gets fried. Stay tuned.

I was able to finish Chapter 22 of CeleKing1, which means I’m just three chapters away from finishing the book. That should be quite manageable next cycle. It would be even more so if I didn’t learn today that my new workplace bans outside devices (and won’t be providing me with an internal machine to use). It’s probably going to wreck my hands, but I see myself resorting to good old-fashioned pen and paper. I’ll have to get the paper, though. ^_^; Well, it’s TSoA1’s turn to get some love. Stay tuned.

I managed to make the day’s quota on Chapter 22 of CeleKing1, but after doing a whole week’s worth of progress in a day, it doesn’t seem like much of an accomplishment. I did spend a fair bit of time doling out fiefs on Erdi to account for the Wo (Japanese) population in the Celestial aristocracy. I’d already done the Man (assorted non-Asian) nobles and I need to spend some time allotting the rest of the Zhao (Korean) spots. Altogether, the non-Chinese population among the nobility accounts for less than a third of the total. Of course, there’s been a lot of intermarriage and the original stock wasn’t necessarily “pure” to begin with, but the Celestials’ racial hierarchy is based more on appearances than anything else.

I should be able to finish Chapter 22 at least before switching over, which means that I should wrap things up next cycle. It’s a good thing the end of the serial run isn’t until a good ways off because I still have a lot of counties to name before I can put up the maps.  (I only have 38 of the 223 counties named as of yet.) Fun for later. Well, let’s see if I can get that last push to finish Chapter 22 and then we can start thinking about making some actual progress in TSoA1. Stay tuned.

I not only made it through Chapter 21 of CeleKing1 but also got a good ways into Chapter 22 as well. At this rate, I may well get to Chapter 23 before the weekend’s out and finishing the book next cycle is entirely probable. Amazing what having absolutely nothing else to do means for progress. (Don’t tell anybody, but so long as my student load is on the light side, I expect to be using a fair bit of my downtime at work to make headway on my stories as well.) I’m going to need to spend some time completing the map of Erdi. I’ve only named a handful of the 223 counties. Things to do, things to do. Stay tuned.