If you check out the progress portion of my website, you’ll see that I have a writing plan, sort of. I think through what I want to write, and begin writing those. When I have no definite idea on what to write next, I fall back on the plan, or perhaps adjust the plan so that I can move ahead and keep making progress.

So, I don’t like it when those plans go awry. That happened on Friday, and continued through the weekend. My current work-in-progress is Headshots, the sequel to In Front of Fifty Thousand Screaming People. I’m 20,000 words into that, with most of my words being added on weekends.

But for a long time now a story has been rolling around in my mind. This first passed through my gray cells a year ago, or maybe even longer than that. I don’t know if it was in a dream or a daydream. But a few scenes went through my mind. I pushed them aside because I have lots of other things to do.

This story persisted, however. It consumed valuable mental power. I started thinking about how I could flesh out these scenes to be a full story. How would I begin it? Would it be a Christian story or general market? How long would it be? What would the ending be? Everything started to gel, except perhaps the exact way to end it.

Friday, December 20, when I got home from work, I decided I’d better get to work on it, or it would continue to divert me from my main work. I started around 7:00 p.m. Friday evening. I soon had 300 or so words, and what I felt was a passable beginning. Took a break for supper at that point, then went back to it, off and on during the evening as we watched a DVD movie. My computer was never off my lap. By the time I went to bed I was surprised to see I had 3,300 words, and was done except for the ending, which eluded me.

I put it away until the next day. By this time the ending had come to me, but it covered another 1,000 words. I put it away for a day, then polished it on Sunday and sent it to two beta readers. I’ve heard back from one; she found a few typos, and suggested a couple of structural changes. Otherwise she says it’s good to go. Perhaps I’ll hear back from the other beta reader in time.

So, now the question is: What do I do with this unplanned story? [bugging out for a while; IE at work is very slow on this site; I’ll try from home soon. Or, I’ll try typing in html rather than visual; that seems to be faster.] I have no idea for a cover; it is a stand-alone story not related to anything else I’ve done. So I need to think about this for a while. Maybe I’ll publish it, or maybe I won’t.