OT: What are you Writing Right Now?

[MaraudingWalrus]

Similar vein to the what are you listening to, or what are you reading threads, but for writing.

I'm sure there are some here who are writing interesting things. Whatcha got?


I'm currently writing a biography of a First World War service member who is buried in the Meuse-Argonne American Cemetery and Memorial. He was originally a Norwegian immigrant, came to the US in 1906 headed for North Dakota. He eventually was lured to Florida by a stereotypical land company, selling crap land to people who couldn't possibly know any better. Once the settlement failed he enlisted in the war, became a saddler in a field artillery unit, and died of the flu during the pandemic of 1918 without ever making it to the front lines.

Here's (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1BZnQljB3BOk8TVfLBAfCrOAZglYERqHp3Nh3213f6tw/edit?usp=sharing) a link to a copy of my draft of it, for anyone who is more interested than that. Still a very rough draft right now. Working on it quite a bit more this week.

[EDS]

A merger agreement. It's going to be a real page turner . . .

[jimcav]

mainly an exercise to help with the guilt i feel with respect to my mom's passing. I sometimes get the urge to try to write a short story--especially after reading a crappy one in the new yorker, but never seem to make time

[MattTuck]

1. A case study on a financial deal that went South between Goldman Sachs and Libya's sovereign wealth fund.
2. A case study on assessing non-market risk and finding local partners to enter the middle east security market
3. A case study on international post-merger integration.

[OtayBW]

Journal article on reactive aggregate mineralogy in a large-block study of nuclear concrete structures affected by ASR.

You asked....;)

[pdonk]

Nasty letters and emails to government agencies.

[RFC]

Finishing up the 2d ed of my treatise, "Biotechnology and the Law." The 1st ed (ABA 2007) was the ABA's best selling legal treatise of all time, went through 3 printings, in every major law library in the US and many abroad, and is used as a text in more than 25 law schools. It's been long, hard work getting this sucker done.

[colker]

I wrote a check this morning.

[PeregrineA1]

24 Hour Notice to Perform. I love contracting.....

[Bob Ross]

I coach a 12-week training program in cooperative group (road) riding skills for my cycle club, so right now I am writing
1) detailed ride reports about our Participants' progress, that get shared with the other coaches;
2) distillations and elaborations of (a subset of) said ride reports that get shared with the three Participants I've been assigned to mentor; and
3) weekly lesson plans highlighting a particular drill or handling skill that get shared with the other coaches to assist their teaching.

I also just wrote a brief email to an old friend I haven't seen in over 20 years, does that count?

[giverdada]

a gratitude journal every morning around 5:20, etching out 3 simple statements about what i'm grateful for in magenta uniball micro ink on a german moleskine-esque journal with blank, but numbered, pages.

e-mails to old friends who seem to be the only folks who 'get' me these days, thanking them for sticking by me even though we're hundreds of miles apart, and months between visits.

e-mails to my lady wherein i try to tell her what's on my mind and heart without getting too poetic or too task-oriented. not enough hours in the day these days.

[martl]

a money transfer order to the tax office.

[carpediemracing]

This reply.

Seriously though I used to spend a lot of time writing, blog, responses to forum things (here and elsewhere). I do mostly reddit now (r/velo), haven't posted in the blog in forever. The only good grades I got in college were English (all As? I think), all writing oriented classes. Never did literature study type classes.

I did start, in fits and spurts, a book on bike racing tactics. It started as a series of race course recommendations along with basic tactics, 20+ years back, maybe close to 30 years (1989 was when I started doing course tactics with my teammates). I condensed it a bit to put it on an unpublicized website in the early 2000s. Then I worked on it consistently for a few winters maybe 10 years ago. A teammate/friend's wife is an editor and she devoted some significant time to it. I shelved it after it got a bit too big for me, 200-250 pages. Got hard to organize thoughts in my head, with so many different writing styles, basically everything needs to be written as one voice, not as a 20-something at one stage in his live vs a 30- or 40- or even 50 year old in other life stages. It took maybe a month to get just one chapter semi-satisfactory and it's 22-26 chapters, depending on how I organize things. The kicker is that my most significant thoughts don't translate well to words (at least for me) and it's made it very hard for me to proceed because I get stuck in a quagmire of words and thoughts.

[MaraudingWalrus]

This reply.


This is the best answer in the thread!

[Steve in SLO]

Patient progress notes. I wrote 12 of them today.
They were stunningly good.
Too bad I can't share them with you-all, but they're HIPPA-protected.:rolleyes:

[pdmtong]

Acceptance email for nuevo trabajo...!!

[d_douglas]

Nasty letters and emails to government agencies.

Ahhh, so those letter are coming from you?!

[flydhest]

Regularly writing pieces that get sent to clients to explain what is happening with the US economy, the Fed, and so forth. Has been particularly challenging these months.

[5oakterrace]

Musings on the spiritual life - in this case what is it to live in the third day, a daily thought sent out to folks in the church I serve.

[Seramount]

working on two things regarding an underwater cave exploration project I'm involved with...

the first item is the methodology / potential impacts sections for a proposal to perform a dye trace study at the site. results will aid researchers in defining the recharge zone.

the other is a presentation that offers a brief history of diving and an overview of our team's work for a group of high school students that are aspiring scientists/engineers.

[RFC]

working on two things regarding an underwater cave exploration project I'm involved with...

the first item is the methodology / potential impacts sections for a proposal to perform a dye trace study at the site. results will aid researchers in defining the recharge zone.

the other is a presentation that offers a brief history of diving and an overview of our team's work for a group of high school students that are aspiring scientists/engineers.

+1 This is that incredibly deep care dive you and your team are doing, right?

[Seramount]

+1 This is that incredibly deep care dive you and your team are doing, right?

no, that is a different project...the cave you're referring to (Goodenough Springs) is on the Texas / Mexico border and lies at the bottom of Lake Amistad.

this site (Jacob's Well near Wimberley, TX) is relatively shallow (137 ft max depth), but is fairly extensive (main conduit is ~4,500 ft long). round-trip dive to the end of this passage takes about 5 hrs.

JW is locally notorious for the number of recreational divers (8) that have died there...it's not a place that anyone without overhead training should ever consider entering. diving is strictly prohibited now, we had to obtain a research permit to perform operations there.

here's a link to the team's website:

www.jwep.org

[coffeecake]

This reply.

Seriously though I used to spend a lot of time writing, blog, responses to forum things (here and elsewhere). I do mostly reddit now (r/velo), haven't posted in the blog in forever. The only good grades I got in college were English (all As? I think), all writing oriented classes. Never did literature study type classes.

I did start, in fits and spurts, a book on bike racing tactics. It started as a series of race course recommendations along with basic tactics, 20+ years back, maybe close to 30 years (1989 was when I started doing course tactics with my teammates). I condensed it a bit to put it on an unpublicized website in the early 2000s. Then I worked on it consistently for a few winters maybe 10 years ago. A teammate/friend's wife is an editor and she devoted some significant time to it. I shelved it after it got a bit too big for me, 200-250 pages. Got hard to organize thoughts in my head, with so many different writing styles, basically everything needs to be written as one voice, not as a 20-something at one stage in his live vs a 30- or 40- or even 50 year old in other life stages. It took maybe a month to get just one chapter semi-satisfactory and it's 22-26 chapters, depending on how I organize things. The kicker is that my most significant thoughts don't translate well to words (at least for me) and it's made it very hard for me to proceed because I get stuck in a quagmire of words and thoughts.

I just want to say that when I first started racing road bikes, I read your entire blog and watched your race videos several times. The wisdom in the posts was most helpful. Also I bought the It's alright tape because the music was in all of your videos. Thanks for taking the time to put it down on paper.

[ojingoh]

Blockchain and Identity FAQ

[batman1425]

Scientific journal article on host-microbe interactions in the gut and how the gut ecosystem regulates the ability of pathogens to proliferate and cause disease.

[carpediemracing]

I just want to say that when I first started racing road bikes, I read your entire blog and watched your race videos several times. The wisdom in the posts was most helpful. Also I bought the It's alright tape because the music was in all of your videos. Thanks for taking the time to put it down on paper.

The fact that you bought the It's Alright tape (CD?) is awesome. It was my brother's band, if you will, him and Derek were the two leaders/writers. Currently another guy, the drummer Chris, is maintaining some stuff, including YouTube clips (except the two I did), music listings on various sites, etc. They recently got $500 for radio play for the last 15 years (haha) - split it up 5 ways I guess, $100 each. It's like racing Cat 3 and winning prize money.

They're still really good friends, they are the core of Linus (in a number of my later clips), along with one guy that played for a bit in URT and also played with Linus. Derek has moved away so no more Linus, alas.

I'm also glad you got something out of the blog/etc. Maybe one day I'll have a book to offer.

[acorn_user]

I just finished writing a short talk on vocation for my church. I realised afterwards how a few books I had read by Richard Mouw had influenced not just the content, but also the phrases and words I use. Anyway, it made for a change from chemistry lectures. The next thing I will write is a new version of my landscape geology (geomorphology) class :)

[ldamelio]

Pithy responses on cycling forums.

[marciero]

These responses turned out to be more interesting than I thought. Thanks all for sharing.

As an academic there is end-of-year administrative stuff for me-annual faculty evaluations, budget proposals and projections. There is also writing around two new academic programs-proposal, promotional material, requests and rationale for resources,etc. Also R (statistics language) scripts for a data analysis project on treatment for opioid-addicted newborns-while trying to learn R.
That's what I'm supposed to be doing anyway.

[marciero]

Was waiting for someone to post that they are writing music. I know we have musicians here.

[Llewellyn]

I've been writing today's entry in the journal I started back in October 2013.

[carpediemracing]

Was waiting for someone to post that they are writing music. I know we have musicians here.

I wish I knew music a little more. I want to make my own music but don't really know where to start. A friend has a couple software applications that I messed around with, a couple weeks a year (he was my host for my SoCal training trips) but that only got me more interested.

Just another time thing that I never looked into.

Right now I'd rather be in a go kart if I could. I still have 3? unfinished but roughed out helmet cam clips, a 4th one that I'd like to make but would take me forever.

[akelman]

Three books: a graphic history of the Cheyennes between Sand Creek and the Little Bighorn (co-authored with an artist); a very short introduction to the so-called Indian Wars (co-authored with a friend); and a revisionist history of the Civil War (written alone). Writing three books, of course, means that I'm writing no books.

[overmyhead]

My second children's book called "Melba Blue".