Tag: Writing

How could they possibly understand?

~ Scott W. Baker ~ 6 Comments

A few things came together recently to inspire this post.  I’ll weave them together in the best tapestry I can.  I don’t recall every source.  If one I don’t cite seems familiar, let me know.

The first item is the vaguest, but I think it came from Kate Wilhelm’s Storyteller.  Whatever it was, the writer was talking about how people don’t understand the plight of being a writer.  Even your closest friends and loved ones — especially your closest friends and loved ones — see you struggling hour after hour, day in and day out, alone with your computer and barely typing.  They want to offer you relief, to help you somehow overcome the frustrating struggle.  How could they possibly know that it’s this struggle that we writers live for?  It’s not about victory, it’s about the fight, gaining ground on a vision that can never be perfectly translated to paper.  We’re marathon runners of words, triathletes of typing.  It’s the struggle against ourselves that is beautiful, rewarding.  If it came easy, we wouldn’t do it.

This came up the other day with my wife.  She spends a lot of time in the basement working on her photography (portrait, stock, and event), especially doing editing on her computer.  I can understand what she does to a point.  I can see the changes she makes.  Some are too subtle for me to notice, others are obvious across the room.  She is a professional in that she advertises and accepts clients, but she is not full time.  She is quite talented and I am proud of all she has accomplished so far.

But.

I proposed that we each set aside some time during the week to focus on our secondary careers while the other takes care of our daughter.  She nodded and said something about she makes money doing what she does.

Ouch.  She has a point, I’m not raking in the dough with stories.  That’s not what it’s about, at least not everything it’s about.  Right now her photography money is supporting her photography habit and nothing more.  She’ll move past that eventually as long as she keeps working hard at it.  So will I.

She apologized for the comment and said she understood why I needed private time to write.  I told her she didn’t understand, but that was okay.  Now I was a little harsh there and still owe her an apology of my own, but it was true.  In fact my need for time is so obscure, I couldn’t find a way to explain to her why she wouldn’t get it.

Today I was sitting on my reading chair (read: toilet) and stumbled across as good an explanation as I’ve found as to why my seclusion time is necessary in large chunks.  I found it in the out-of-print book Those Who Can (Robin Wilson, ed.) in Samuel Delany’s essay, “Thickening the Plot”.  I won’t infringe on Delany’s copyright, but I want to share his explanation of how writers really work.  I’ll try to recreate the idea using an excerpt from my own story, “Chasers” (originally printed in the anthology Triangulation 2004).  The italics are what I’m typing; the rest is in my head.  This is a dramatization.  The real experience is much less pleasant.

  • I want to start with my character, Sebastian, flying his ship away from the base.  Sebastian accelerated away from the base. No, too bland.  I need some sensory words.  What does he feel?  Sebastian felt the acceleration… How does he feel it?  Where?  Sebastian felt the acceleration in his stomach… too specific…in his gut…not quite.  I need something more visceral, more descriptive.  How did it feel?  A push?  A pull?  I know, a squeeze.  Sebastian felt his gut squeeze… No, that doesn’t work.  Sebastian’s gut squeezed against his back… Not quite right.  Lower, more internal.  Sebastian’s stomach squeezed into his pelvis as he accelerated. Close.  There’s stomach again.  Why did I discard it before?  Too specific.  Sebastian’s organs squeezed into his pelvis as he accelerated. Good but feels unfinished.  How fast was he going?  Good place to put in some world-specific terminology.  I wanted speeds expressed in decimals of the speed of light.  How fast was he going? Check your research, dummy.  The ship he’s chasing will be going like .2 times the speed of light, so maybe he’s going .1  …as he accelerated to .1. Looks weird.  …as he accelerated to point-one. Better, but he’s not stopping at point-one.  …as he accelerated past point-one. That will work.  Let’s get in his head now.  He’s chasing a ship to refuel it.  He hasn’t caught one before, so is he optimistic or pessimistic?  Optimistic plays better.  He knew he would succeed this time. No, too optimistic.  He had a good feeling this time. Not bad, the good feeling plays against the squeezing organs.  Damn I’m good.  Need to say something about his goal.  He was going to catch this ship. A little blunt and sounds like he’s in a police chase.  Can I put more world-specific lingo in?  Maybe he wouldn’t mention the ship, but just say he’ll catch “it”.  Or better, maybe “catch” could be the noun.  He was going to make this catch. That works conceptually, but the sentences are getting monotonous.  Can “catch” be the subject?  This catch was going to be his. Ick, passive voice.  Was it better the other way?  Not really.  There’s something neat about describing a catch passively, isn’t there?  Eh, maybe I’ll come back.

That’s how writing works, forward and backward and rewriting as you go.  Not always, sometimes it rolls off the fingers like butter, but timewise, this seems to be how I work.  My original opening paragraph was surely not as smooth as this, but the process was the same.  If my wife were to come check on me after this process, my screen would say:

Sebastian’s organs squeezed into his pelvis as he accelerated past point-one.  He had a good feeling this time.  This catch was going to be his.

What have I been doing all this time?  She can’t get it.  She can have an idea.  She can equate it to the moving around of lights she did for a half hour on prom night while she made me stand there as her test dummy, but only writers seem to get it.

I love my wife and I know she wants me to succeed as a writer.  I need to keep this in mind when she calls me from my keyboard to change a diaper or take the dogs out or even do something that does not involve urine.  It’s hard to explain that breaking away from a train of thought derails the process and makes me start over, possibly rewriting several lines, even paragraphs, in order to align the story to where I am now.

What’s my point?  (Do I ever have one?)  I guess I’m trying to reassure my visitors that I get it — we all get it — even though a lot of people don’t, won’t, and can’t.  Writing is hard, it’s lonely, it’s frustrating.  Maybe I’m crazy, but I love it anyway.

Subraction by Addition

~ Scott W. Baker ~ Leave a comment

My Algebra classes just took an important (but not difficult) state test, so we are taking a couple days for a culturally significant experience.  We’re watching Star Wars (A New Hope).  I was shocked by how few of my students had seen it: less than a third, perhaps a dozen overall.  It’s a movie all educated people should see.  I tried this once with Casablanca with less than stellar results.  This title seems more successful.

Alas, the only version I had access to was my Special Edition.  Greedo shoots first, there are lots of CGI dinosaurs on Tatooine, and Han steps on Jabba’s tail.  And all the stereotypes about bad storytelling due to insufficient cutting are brought to the big screen.

I went through the first 80 minutes three times today, so that much is fresh in my head.  Most of us already know the parts that suck in the special edition, so I’ll use them to illustrate my points about writing, particularly short stories.  They are all sins I commit regularly.  It’s just peculiar to see Lucas get it right the first time and mess it up later.

  • Greedo shooting first. It’s hard to prove this point to some people because the original cut has become so hard to find, but Greedo originally never shot at Han Solo.  So why the change?  Han is billed throughout the franchise as a good guy so cold blooded murder doesn’t fit the stereotype.  But shooting the guy whose gun is in your face is hardly murder.  And Han is not a good guy at the beginning of the story.  Paul (Saul) is not a good guy when he first appears in the Bible.  Bad boys (usually selfish boys) that find a cause worth believing in make endearing characters.  Attempts to soften them, make them more “likeable” really rob an interesting character of his identity.  Don’t be temptted to soften a character’s actions because they aren’t likeable enough or someone says a hero shouldn’t do this or that.  Everyone has a preference, even editors.  Bending to one preference can alienate your character or even your story.  Soften with extreme caution.  Interesting is more important than nice.
  • The Jabba Scene: There are a lot of flaws in that scene, likely the reason it hit the cuttingroom floor originally.  The biggest flaw for me is the redindancy.  Han repeats half his conversation with Greedo and Jabba says a lot of Greedo’s lines.  “Even I get boarded sometimes.”  “…drops a shipment at the first sign of an imperial…”  If the information is already there, don’t give it to me again just to get a new character introduced.  Do something different with it or don’t do it at all.
  • Extra scenery: Lucas just had to add things to the movie.  Irrelevant things.  Who cares if a storm trooper is riding a dinosaur to look for droids?  If things are there just to be looked at without extending plot or character or anything (people could argue some additions as part of the setting, but setting can often be overdone by trying too hard), cut it.  If your story requires a description of the bar’s clientelle, include it.  But you don’t have to describe every client.  A cross section will do.  And little beats thrown in for comic effect may be cute, but they are usually distracting.  A taste is usually enough.

The next time you’re resisting cuts to a story, or worse, feeling the temptation to embellish a story, watch any of the Star Wars Special Editions.  Those odd moments of “why” might just inspire you to do the right thing.  Sometimes more is less.

“Secondhand” reception

~ Scott W. Baker ~ 2 Comments

“Secondhand Rush” made its appearance at Baen’s Bar a few days ago.  Edith Maor was, as always, right on top of things and provided comments within hours of posting it.  She had some good points that really strenghtened my story.  She seems to have a habit of disliking my characters.  Either I really need to work on likeability or Edith and I just disagree.  It happens.  But when I disagree with an editor of a professional magazine, especially a gatekeeper like Edith, I tend to give them the benefit of the doubt.

I also seemed to have been too subtle in a few places.  The ending made reference to something only mentioned at the story’s begining in passing.  I built up the emphasis and made the end reference more direct.  I also clarified a minor character’s involvement (Axel) and made him a touch more important.

The biggest change was to the protagonist.  He was subtly afraid of death in the original (despite being a bit of a daredevil) but without cause.  In the rewrite, [SPOILER ALERT!!] he has multiple sclerosis.  The illness doesn’t change the plot much but changes the reader’s perception of it.  This came primarily from a reviewer questioning how desperate Chang was. It also came a little from Edith’s plea to make Chang more sympathetic.  I know she didn’t mean “pitiable”, but it came from the same place.  Chang isn’t pitiful at all (how many pitiful people climb the exterior of the Statue of Liberty?), just defiant of his illness.

Anyway, I really think this rewrite is a winner, probably 90% of the way to publishability.  If Baen doesn’t want it, WotF is probably the next stop.  I think it will fit their tastes well, based on some past winners I’ve read.  But if I really knew these kinds of things, I’d be writing those stories anyway.

I highly encourage aspiring writers to join Baen’s Bar even if they aren’t ready to post there.  Izanobu can vouch for the benefits of lurking.  Looking at the short, blunt editorial comments left to other authors by the slush editors is enlightening, as is viewing the progression from one iteration of a story to the next.  Pages load a little slow; that’s my only complaint as it impedes my lurk-and-browse technique.

-Oso

Rewriting and revision

~ Scott W. Baker ~ 7 Comments

As I mentioned in a few posts, I’ve been rewriting an old gem I found on my hard drive from at least five years ago, probably more. I think I just finished that rewrite, at almost exactly midnight on May 2nd.  I’ll probably want to edit more in a few days, but I’m pretty pleased with the results.

I didn’t cut the massive opening sequence I had considered axing.  It seemed to start kind of slow, but it was more the fault of excessive wordiness than anything else. Maybe I’ll stick it in Baen’s Bar to get some feedback.

In ways, “Secondhand Rush” is simpler than “Leech Run” which got slapped around.  It’s simpler in that the protagonist’s motivations are perfectly clear from the beginning.  His needs are simple, his life is simple, his goal is simple.

The story’s structure, however, is oddly complex.  It violates Jordan Lapp’s rule that a first person POV story should have no scene breaks.  I, in fact, jump periodically to other characters to eavesdrop of their conversations.  The story wouldn’t work without miranda7 and LucAs [sic] popping in and out.  It’s the nature of the narration that it happen that way.  Trust me, it works.  Some people may not like it, but it works.

miranda7 and LucAs also converse a lot like my students do with text messages.  It’s a byproduct of their living situation (they are downloaded into computers for immortality).  It may make their dialogue tough to read, but it’s always short blurbs and it fits the story.

I’m proud of this little creation.  Sad that I shelved it so long ago.  It wasn’t ready for the public and I wasn’t ready to fix it.  I’m curious to see its reception.  If I don’t declare otherwise here, I’ll have “Secondhand Rush” up in Baen’s Universe Slush by the end of the weekend.

In related news, I have put my Critters membership on hiatus.  I still love Critters, I just don’t have time to keep up my crit count.  That, and I’m considering joining the “sff online writing workshop”, maybe next month when school is getting out for the summer.  (Tarcie, I haven’t forgotten.)  Hopefully I’ll have another story ready by then.

Bad excuses

~ Scott W. Baker ~ 2 Comments

I have accomplished a paltry couple-hundred words or so this week.  Pitiful.  There is no excuse for my poor progress.  School has been hectic, but not unlivably so.  I have started this pesky diet, which leaves me feeling a bit weak and light headed at times (like right now) and makes it hard to concentrate.  The feeling will pass in a few days when my metabolism gets used to my lack of binges and severely reduced intake of both sugar and caffeine.  The diet is making it tough to focus today.  I’m going to try to get at least a thousand words in this weekend.

I need to brush up my all-dialog story and send it to coolstuff4writers.com (big thanks to Tracie and Jamie for their comments).  I also need to build some momentum on my brilliant brainstorm story.  And that old story I rediscovered that needs a rewrite.  Lots to do but it ain’t getting done.

Maybe displaying my goals for the weekend will help me attain them.  Here they are:

  • 1000 words minimum of new writing [1300 baby!]
  • polish and send the story to coolstuff4writers.com [done]
  • fill my wife’s garden with a load of dirt [done]
  • get the kitchen and living room clean [1 down]
  • grade my stack of long-ignored factoring tests
  • send back my mildly defective headphones [done]
  • take a hike [done, but shorter than planned]
  • set more goals for next week

So it’s not all about writing.  Knowing what’s there helps me schedule.  I’ll update Monday to let you know which goals I achieved…and which fell short.

-Oso

Ever feel brilliant?

~ Scott W. Baker ~ 2 Comments

Some days I feel like I am a genius.  This usually happens on days where I don’t get a lot of actual writing done.  Today is one of those days.

I was once an outliner, using the whole Roman numeral system and everything, just like they taught me in middle school.  I eventually regressed to a bullet system, but even that is often too rigid for my short fiction.  Now I do almost all of my story planning in freewriting exercises (also something i learned in middle school).  It usually just helps me find character motivations, flesh out plots.  Today it worked a miracle.

Okay, it’s probably not the freewriting.  Only so much of it is even me.  I got my inspiration from, of all places, a reality television show.  The rest came from about a dozen of those writing books that line my bookshelf (many described here).  I kept asking myslf the right questions.  Like what?  The biggest: What human truth am I revealing with this story?  According to Kate Wilhelm’s Storyteller, triviality is a regular problem with stories, even at Clarion.  I suffer that problem a lot.  I am pleased to say that this story isn’t planned to be trivial.  How about that, huh?  (Sorry, watching Leno as I type.)

Other questions: Why do I care?  Who’s viewpoint is the most dramatic?  Why would she do that?  How would I accomplish this or that goal?  It’s all basic stuff, but I finally feel like I’m asking the right questions at the right time.

I realize, this late in the post, that most of you probably don’t care.  I sound kind of like I’m bragging.  Maybe I am.  It has seemed recently that everything I’ve been writing has either slipped out too smoothly or bogged down in attempts  be relevant only to end up monotonous.  People keep telling me that making the Clarion West waitlist this year means I’ll surely make it next year (unless lightning hits Jordan Lapp before June).  But I hadn’t felt like the ideas hitting me had the potential to be any better than “Leech Run” or “Glow Baby”.  This one could be.  I’m excited about my good idea and I’m taking it out on you.

Reality check: I haven’t written the first word yet.  I have my main characters (mother and daughter named Evelyn and Kelby Abrams), an opening scene idea (think the opening of The Great Gatsby set in a CEO’s waiting lounge), a POV (Kelby’s), the antagonist’s motvation, the SF plot points, comuppance, a major foreshadowing element, a few minor characters, and that great human truth that so many of us endure…but they are all ideas in paraphrased forms that may or may not play out in words the way I envision them.  Basiclly, I’ve done the easy part.  Next comes the gruesome act of spewing this into narrative form, followd by the painful art of revision and editing.  It’s like I’m looing at Everest from basecamp praising myself for making it this far.

Still, I am thrilled that my brain has returned to me.  I go through phases like this, where I don’t feel like I’m getting anywhere just to come out of it a long way ahead of where I fell off.  My monkey paw touched the monolith.  Now let’s see what I can do with this bone.

Submission streak

~ Scott W. Baker ~ 2 Comments

I have just surpassed my submission total from 2008.  And that doesn’t even include my applications to Clarion or Clarion West.  It is April, right?

I have always been a slow submitter.  I didn’t keep very good records when I started.  I seldom had more than one or two stories in the wind at a time.  Right now I have four.  Okay, three since “Leech Run” is obviously not getting scooped out of the slush at Baen’s Universe.  Still, “Brother Goo”, “Glow Baby”, and “Excuse Me” are all out being considered.  I also intend to send one tentatively titled “How Quickly We Forget” to Every Day Fiction (depending on how it looks when I read it over; it’s a one-draft story right now).  My Kree story is really close to finishing its first draft and its process should speed up soon.

This may not sound like much, but it’s a gushing output for me.  In my own submission defense, I spent a lot of time the past couple years hopping from unfinished novel to unfinished novel, a lot less focus on shorts.  Still, my work ethis was poor and my submission confidence was low.  The community I discovered while applying to the Clarions has helped me greatly.  My good showing on the CW list and my WotF HM (I’d like to buy a vowel) have helped my confidence, too.

My new goal is to surpass my total of documented submissions before December.  That’s just twenty-six including stories I sent to the Critters workshop.  I’ve sent more — I only started keeping track in 2004 — but twenty-six is a lofty goal for me, full time job and all.  Of course acceptances are likely to slow the pace down, them taking longer to process and forcing to write new stuff to submit.  If that forces me short of my goal, I’ll find a way to cope.

-Oso

Fiction on a blog on fiction

~ Scott W. Baker ~ 3 Comments

A question for all you writers with blogs: is it worth the effort to post a story to your personal blog?  Not a story you plan to sell, obviously, but one you already sold or one you can’t quite find the market for.

I can see the both sides of things.  On the pro side, it gives your blog reade a taste of your writing, turns lurkers into potential fans.  You have control of how long it’s available and can track how many people read it.  As for cons, who really goes to blogs looking for fiction?  It says something about a story’s quality to have the author pimping it him/herself for free.  And of coure, it uses up some rights for the story (even second electronic rights could be worth something).

As I mentioned in my last post, I have a few stories that have vanished from the net that I’d like to get back out there, notably my first sale.  Not to mention my military vampire story, my story for young readers.  I even have a short comedy that can’t quite find a market.  I’m thinking about putting one up here,adding more if it goes over well.

I haven’t decided yet. We’ll see.

-Oso

How I would sell out the Milford Model

~ Scott W. Baker ~ 1 Comment

This post is Jordan Lapp’s fault, him and Locus agazine.  The idea has been swimming through my head for years.  Locus ran an “article” about the fictitious Clarion reality show, Jordan mentioned it on his blog, now I’m posting my old article with a little poll.  Enjoy.

  • ************************************

I am a Clarion Dreamer. Are you?

How many are out there like me? Hundreds? Thousands? Tens of thousands? How many people out there want to write? How many out there believe themselves to be writers? How many are waiting for that one break that will make him (or her) the next great genre writer? For me, that elusive break takes the form of a writer’s workshop – Clarion.

Or Odyssey. Or Clarion West or South. Pick your poison, they’re all the same…the same in the fact that I did not attend. Same in the fact that I’m certain that if I attended, my career would take off the very next day.

I understand that I’m wrong. I realize that these workshops can provide their attendees with tools and techniques that guide the creative process. I fully appreciate that the best an attendee can expect is to replace years worth of rejection slips with a few weeks of tough criticism and sleepless nights. None of this blocks me from my delusion, this mirage of miraculous success that is the Milford-model writing workshop.

Again I pose the question: how many out there are like me? How many writers know they’re better than the bums that go to these workshops? How many are convinced they can spot the flaws in another author’s story despite a depressing inability to correct their own? How many wish they could be at least a fly on the wall at such a workshop?

Writing is an art form, no different from singing or dancing or backstabbing in a jungle or racing around the world. Have I lost you? I’m talking about television. Reality television. Ironically I’m talking about the shows that require no writers (or only concept writers) because a million-dollar prize is a lot cheaper than paying a dozen actors and writers and shooting take after take. People tune in to listen to the recording artists of tomorrow. Or to see if Reuben wins immunity. Or if that obnoxious team can make it to China before the sweet old couple. Or if the guy from Saved by the Bell can dance.

Would people tune in for a chance to see what a Milford-style workshop is really like? Would they log on to read excerpts from that funny guy’s story? Or that hippie chick’s story? Or that arrogant fat guy’s story? Would they vote for the story they liked best?

I confess that what I propose violates one of the cardinal rules of the Milford-model: no spectators. All due respect to the late Damon Knight (Milford’s founder), but maybe the time for privacy has gone. A writer who wants to sell needs name-recognition, promotion. What better way than to throw that writer on the television for seven to fifteen weeks?

Like any show it would need a title. “Who Wants To Be The Next Asimov?” or more succinctly “Sci-Fi Writer”. The latter would work especially well if the show found its most obvious home on the Sci-Fi Channel.

The conference model need not be disturbed. One professional writer would guest-lecture each week, taking part in the critique process as well as providing insight into the profession in general. One would obviously hope to attract big names to this highly public event – names that would bring an audience to the show – but any author with a career substantial enough to warrant a two-minute bio could find a niche. (After all, how many American Idol fans really remembered Peter Noone?)

Could a show this narrowly focused really bring in an audience? Could it really be entertaining enough to tune in more than once or twice? Why not? Are speculative writers any more rare than clothing designers? Chefs? Singers and dancers? Washed up celebrities? If they all get their own reality shows, we deserve one too. In fact I contend that we, the speculative writers, outnumber most of these pigeon-holed reality contestants. How many science fiction readers are there? How many fantasy readers? Horror? How many of them write (or try to write or want to write)? That’s right, most of them. Try it: meet a stranger in the sci-fi section of a bookstore and ask her if she has ever tried to write this kind of thing. Don’t be creepy about it, just strike up a polite conversation. You may want to map out the exits first just in case she insists on telling you all about Druzida, the elf-vampire and her fifteen-thousand-page battle against the evil dragon, Thhrp. Or about the Glxx-ian invasion of Kalamazoo. Bottom line, the people watching reruns of Buffy, Star Trek, Firefly, Xena, or The Twilight Zone are more than likely writers,.

But how entertaining is a Milford workshop? I guess it depends on who goes. I understand that watergun fights and superballs were staples of the Clarion experience for years. So were sleepless nights, stories eviscerated by peers and pros, rivalries, coups against instructors, and priceless tidbits of knowledge. Sounds like good television to me.

So why am I writing this article instead of pitching this show to the big-wigs and becoming the next Mark Burnett? Well, that’s not what I do. I dream big ideas share them with people who might think they’re entertaining. I write, not pitch or produce. Besides, before I could pitch a show I’d have to support the claims I’ve made: 1) people would watch this show, 2) sci-fi fans are almost all writers, and 3) a bunch of geeky writers can be entertaining. That’s where you come in. Yes, you. If you’re reading this then you are likely part of my target audience, so I want to know what you think. Would you watch this show (at least a few times) if someone made it? Would your friends? Would my friends? If you think I’ve missed the mark, I want to know. Got an idea that might make this work better? I’m all ears.

Oh, and if you work for a network that wants to start filming this tomorrow, we really need to chat.

writing overtime

~ Scott W. Baker ~ 1 Comment

I’ve been working on a quaint little story the past few days (the Kree story is in time-out for bad behavior).  I won’t go into details on the plot, but I was trying to put the first draft to paper and kept getting stuck trying to finish it.  I knew I was close to an ending, but I just couldn’t find the angle of approach. I couldn’t even bear to look at it during my pergatory of a day at school.  I opened up my laptop tonight and realized…it was already done.

Don’t get me wrong (I say that a lot, don’t I), this is about as rough a rough draft as I’ve ever created.  The idea was still sketchy and my characters need better motivation and the setting is beige, but the essence of the story was complete.  It’s one of those stories without a satisfying ending; I knew that before I started writing it.  I just kept trying to trudge along into unnecessary summary.  Either the reader gets it (gets something out of it) or she doesn’t.

Fred (as Damon Knight called the subconscious) must have known when the story ended.  I just kept writing and deleting back to the exact same spot, the spot where one character walks out and the story ends.

Now the hard part: editing.  Writing can be tough, grueling, but it’s the creative side.  I made something out of nothing.  Now I need to make something good out of something raw.  This is the sculpting part, an art all its own.  It seems more satisfying when I edit.  I get the sense of doing something right, making something better.  It’s still tough.  Most things worth doing are.

This story, titled “Roshambo”,  comes in about 1800 words.  It may grow a little as I flesh out the setting, maybe put more character into the beats, but it’s still the shortest thing I’ve written (over drabble length) in quite a while.  I hope that’s a good thing.  We’ll see.