The month began well, but as can be expected when vacation comes in that month, it did not end all that well.

1. Market “Mom’s Letter” to at least five markets. Some of the markets I’ve selected close to submissions in May, so I have to get that done this month. I accomplished this goal, sending “Mom’s Letter” to exactly five markets. Haven’t heard anything yet, of course.

2. Begin work on “It’s Over Over Here”, my article on Dad’s work with The Stars and Stripes during World War 2. Even if I don’t get the assignment from the magazine, I’d like to write the article. Did not do this. Too many other writing activities took precedence.

3. Complete the beta reading project I’ve committed to. I was doing good on this before my illness, and before tax diversion. I’m 2/3 of the way through this short, young adult novel. I can do this this month. Yes, I completed this. The project was interesting, reading and critiquing a novel whose target audience is teen age girls. Hopefully I did some good.

4. Write at least one chapter of In Front of Fifty Thousand Screaming People. I outlined seven chapters last month; surely I can get one of those written. Nope, did not do this; it didn’t even come up on the radar.

5. Blog 12 to 14 times. This seems to be the thing that is easiest for me, so I’ll bump up my goal a little this month. Yes, I blogged 14 times.

6. Monitor five writing blogs/web sites. This is also easy, and I’m learning much from these sites. I also did this monitoring, something that’s easy to do a day at a time. I have some catching up to do from vacation.

7. Complete the political essay I started on the Baby Boomer generation, and post it to The Senescent Man blog. I’m almost halfway done with this. I completed this, and posted it in four segments at “The Senescent Man” blog. BTW, we three main contributors to “The Senescent Man” got together in real live last Tuesday in Cranston, RI, along with another man, all friends from college, some from high school, some from junior high, and some even from grade school.

8. Get back to writing, at least a little, on the notes and appendixes of the Harmony of the Gospels. I’d like to spend about an hour a week on this, which will give me continued progress by inches. I looked at this a little bit, but did not come even close to spending an hour a week on it. Last month I gave a copy of the work as it stands to my pastor, who told me he is enjoying it, and is anxious to see those appendixes.

It’s difficult to set writing goals for this month, when I’m stuck in the morass of preparing my income taxes. They aren’t difficult; just time consuming, and difficult to stick to. Last night for example, after a late supper after church, I went to the Dungeon to work on them, but took one look at the papers and computer screen and decided I couldn’t that night. So I played mindless computer games, and did some other things before going back upstairs to read and to bed.

Still, I must set goals, and I can always come back later and edit them, after I finish the taxes and clarity of mind and intentions return. So here they are.

1. Market “Mom’s Letter” to at least five markets. Some of the markets I’ve selected close to submissions in May, so I have to get that done this month.

2. Begin work on “It’s Over Over Here”, my article on Dad’s work with The Stars and Stripes during World War 2. Even if I don’t get the assignment from the magazine, I’d like to write the article.

3. Complete the beta reading project I’ve committed to. I was doing good on this before my illness, and before tax diversion. I’m 2/3 of the way through this short, young adult novel. I can do this this month.

4. Write at least one chapter of In Front of Fifty Thousand Screaming People. I outlined seven chapters last month; surely I can get one of those written.

5. Blog 12 to 14 times. This seems to be the thing that is easiest for me, so I’ll bump up my goal a little this month.

6. Monitor five writing blogs/web sites. This is also easy, and I’m learning much from these sites.

7. Complete the political essay I started on the Baby Boomer generation, and post it to The Senescent Man blog. I’m almost halfway done with this.

8. Get back to writing, at least a little, on the notes and appendixes of the Harmony of the Gospels. I’d like to spend about an hour a week on this, which will give me continued progress by inches.

I’m not planning on attending writers critique group this month, for a number of reasons. I don’t know about my long term participation with this group.

Ah, time for my monthly report. Naturally this would happen on a morning when I forgot to set my alarm the night before, got up more than an hour late, therefore got caught in the height of rush hour and my 25 minute commute took almost 40. So, I’m posting this on my employer’s time. I’ll make it up after hours. Here are the goals posted on March 1, and how I did on each.

1. Blog 10 to 12 times. This seems very achievable, based on the past three months. >>> Blogged 15 times, so achieved this.

2. Complete the few remaining tasks for A Harmony of the Gospels; print; put in the hands of two beta readers. >>> I sort of finished this. I completed the basic writing and typing of the Harmony itself, completed one appendix, started another, and worked on several of the passage notes. I gave it to one beta reader, my pastor, but not to a second.

3. Attend at least one writers critique group; present one of my Documenting America columns. >>> I attended critique group twice, each time sharing a Documenting America column. One they hated; the other they sort of liked. Of course, I am the only one in the group on my side of the political spectrum.

4. Monitor 5 writing blogs. As I mentioned in my last post, I may have to find a couple of new ones. >>> I monitored the blogs. Dropped one, as it hasn’t been updated since January. Found another, a writing coaching blog. So far so good.

5. Complete beta reading of a YA novel for someone at an on-line writers site. I received this late last week, and hope to begin tonight and finish before the end of the month. >>> I did not complete this. I got 2/3 of the way through, with, I think, good comments for that writer. Completing it in April, taxes allowing, should be no problem.

6. Write at least one chapter of In Front Of Fifty Thousand Screaming People. >>> Alas, I did not do this. Instead, I outlined the next seven chapters. I really wanted to get back to the writing of this, but my food poisoning episode happened just about at the time when my schedule would have allowed for it. Always an excuse.

7. Market Mom’s Letter to at least five markets. Did not get this done. I did manage to complete the marketing research, and narrowed the list down to about ten magazines, but didn’t get to the next step.

One other thing, a big thing, that I accomplished writing-wise that was not on my list was to submit a query about a World War 2 article. No response yet, but it’s only been a couple of business days since they got it, due to an e-mail glitch at home.

Ah, time for my monthly ritual of setting short-term goals. Once again, trying to be realistic considering life circumstances. I have to get the taxes done this month; yard work begins; and some un-done work is piling up, indicating the need for some extra hours, at least this week.

1. Blog 10 to 12 times. This seems very achievable, based on the past three months.

2. Complete the few remaining tasks for A Harmony of the Gospels; print; put in the hands of two beta readers.

3. Attend at least one writers critique group; present one of my Documenting America columns.

4. Monitor 5 writing blogs. As I mentioned in my last post, I may have to find a couple of new ones.

5. Complete beta reading of a YA novel for someone at an on-line writers site. I received this late last week, and hope to begin tonight and finish before the end of the month.

6. Write at least one chapter of In Front Of Fifty Thousand Screaming People.

7. Market Mom’s Letter to at least five markets.

These were written kind of quickly. I may come back and edit in a day or so.

It’s time for my monthly report, when I consider how I did in my writing relative to my goals set at the beginning of the month. I was somewhat slowed down this month by my home computer deciding to have a boot error, being unusable for two weeks. I had another computer to monitor with, but not to type on.

1. Blog 10 to 12 times. Achieved this; I think I had 12 exactly.

2. Monitor the five blogs I’ve been monitoring on a regular basis. Achieved this. One of those five blogs has gone dormant, and one no longer seems relevant. I’m going to have to find two others or will cut back.

3. Complete as much of the Harmony of the gospels as I can. This will include:- All NIV footnotes entered- Formatting for reading completed- Introduction written and typed- Passage notes cleaned up and typed for a few key passages- Appendixes identified, and one written Did better on this than I expected. I added all the footnotes, the Introduction is 90 percent written and typed (maybe 95 percent), I did the passage notes for a couple of key passages (enough for my beta reader version), and I identified all the appendixes and wrote one. I did not get the text formatted for reading yet, but this is a one day task I will complete tomorrow. This evening I completed typing a round of edits.

4. Market “Mom’s Letter” to someone; includes marketing research. Came real close on this. Got the marketing research mostly done, narrowing the submittal places down to ten, of which I intend to submit to five.

5. Attend one critique group session; present a Documenting America column. Did not attend either session, due to the pressures of work, home, family, and avocation. Hopefully this month.

6. More fully capture, for future development, a couple of Bible study ideas that have recently flittered through my mind and managed to make their way on to a capture list. I partly completed this. I wrote a couple of pages on one of these Bible studies, and I managed to come up with a priority list of studies I will work on.

7. As time allows, work on my essay on the Resurrection. Did not do this. In fact, a month after I wrote this, I wonder if I will do this at all. The circumstances that made this seem so important a month ago are now a faded memory.

Given that December is full of holiday activities, I’m going to pare down my writing goals even more this month.

1. Blog 10 to 12 times.

2. Finish some more filing/organization of writing material. I thought I had finished this, except for buying file folders and filling them. Last night I bought those and filled them. However, I remembered I had a stack of writing stuff at work that I need to bring home and file. So I guess I’m not done yet. Writing seems to be a kind of paper chase.

3. More work on Life on a Yo Yo Life Group lesson series, which I begin teaching January 4.

4. See if I can flesh out the brainstorming work on the short Life Group lesson series from the Apocrypha. I looked at it a little last night, and unless I get something down on paper, I’m not sure I’ll have a legitimate series.

5. Buy one writing magazine, as a Christmas present to myself, and read it.

6. Continue to work down my reading list. Since the book I’m currently reading is 736 pages, and I’m only on page 165, this may take all month.

Edited to add:
7. Complete the review I’ve started of Macaulay’s essay on Ranke’s History of the Popes.