nothing hurts like your mouth

Today was a bit ridiculous, and I'm actually not sure at all how I feel about it, which is strange, because I'm used to snapping to judgments and upholding them rigidly. But anyway, I went into work, got some terrible scrambled eggs (surprisingly dried out and nasty, considering that the food in my cafe is typically gourmet quality), and had a conference call w/Darragh. Then I had a bunch of meetings, had lunch w/Gyre and Lizzie, had a bunch more meetings, sent some really long emails about some annoying projects that I'm working on, and cut out around 5:15 to go to class.

Class was v. strange; since it's my second class, I came in with all the preconceptions from the first, without the additional perspective of having taken multiple classes. It was a completely different dynamic, which will take some getting used to. The lecturer seems more confident in his own teaching abilities, probably because it sounds like he's been doing this for awhile; the people in the class all seem more self-assured, probably because they signed up for something that wasn't labeled 'beginner'; and the class is more structured, with a more intense syllabus and more guidance on how to write critiques, etc. Also, we're each only turning in one story instead of two, which means that it can be longer (key, since I'm wordy as hell), and that we'll only workshop 2-3 stories per class (also nice, since it encourages more discussion about a story and makes you focus your efforts on one piece in the quarter). I'm turning my in at the end of January, so I should get started soonish. I don't know what I want to write yet, but hopefully something will come to me.

It's interesting, though; my hackles sort of went up at several points in the class, so the verdict is out on how well I'm going to play with the group. The benefit of having more people who know what they're doing is that the discussions could potentially be more interesting; the drawback is that more people may be slightly pretentious about what they've read and how they think fiction should be written. For example, as we introduced ourselves, I mentioned that I'm working on a romance novel; last quarter this drew some interest, but this quarter I felt a certain degree of condescension. You all know how well I respond to condescension. Then again, perhaps I just perceived condescension because I was already worried about whether or not I have the talent and ability to be a 'real' writer, and so just in case I *don't* have the talent, I want to be able to convince myself that being a romance novelist is a worthy profession.

Anyway, enough of all that (for now, at least). I came home, did some work, and then greeted Vidya, who is spending the night with me because she had late evening plans tonight and early morning plans tomorrow that made the drive to and from the evil city unpalatable. So, we chatted, had tea, and gossipped about my class; then, I tucked her in on my couch and retired to my bedroom, where I have finished writing this. Now I should go to bed, so that I can get up in time for a conference call tomorrow morning. I need to seriously slog tomorrow and Friday so that I can have the weekend completely to myself--three days for writing and relaxing would be wonderful. Goodnight!