VeryWellAged: Blog

My current and trusted editor --> Grisbuff <-- and others have asked me to pursue some of the story lines from the POV of a woman. I am a old guy and while I flatter myself in that I know a little about women, I also know I feel completely insecure writing from such a POV without a female editor sitting on my shoulder. The problem comes in finding one! There are almost 300 volunteer editors listed, but there is no way to know if there is even one woman among them. And even then, a Filipino woman has a completely different world view than does an American or European woman. It is more than subtle. There are a whole set of different values. So while continuation of Thread #1 can be accomplished with the help of an American woman editor for the accuracy of the POV, and I don't know how to find her, how to get the POV for Joy, or Abbey, or Jun, or Ganda.... well I have no clue. I know how they act in the situations they are found in within my stories... and I know the behaviors are the right ones as would be found in the real world, even though the stories are fiction... but I do not know what goes on in their brains. I only know the results of those processes. Suggestions are welcome.

I submitted version 1.0 with the appendix but the website conversion did not support the code for the appendix, so I have submitted a version without the appendix.

I will review how do get the appendix so that I will display correctly.

I have completed a story I am calling "Gang Aft Agley" from the Robbie Burns poem, "To a Mouse."

I know I will get notes from those who only know the variant of the phrase from "Auld Lang Syne" but such is life... this is a snippet from the Burns' poem.

But Mousie, thou art no thy lane,
In proving foresight may be vain:
The best laid schemes o' mice an' men
Gang aft agley,
An' lea'e us nought but grief an' pain,
For promis'd joy!

Still thou are blest, compared wi' me!
The present only toucheth thee:
But och! I backward cast my e'e,
On prospects drear!
An' forward, tho' I canna see,
I guess an' fear!

And that is the basis for story... with the exception that our protagonist worries but does not fear. I hope you enjoy it when it is posted.

I have submitted this and it will be posted sometime soon. I added a note to the front that will hopefully explain that you need some background either via the Jake stories or in the Philippines before you read the story.

I fixed some long standing typos and reworked a little bit of dialog that just wasn't exactly right.

Once this is up, if there are other type's please, please email me. I have looked at this stuff for so long I am just not catching them all.

When The Whale is posted next week, that will complete the stories I currently have in the pipe. The question arises as to whether I write more about Jake's Girls, Return to Thread #2 for a look at the Triple Jacks, find out how the children Of Thread #1 are doing, or leave Jake and leave the Philippines entirely.

I think the answer needs to come from you. While Jake himself is probably not going to appear in stories any more, there are connections in each Thread that can be picked up.

I don't think I will return to the Philippines outside of the Jake Threads. I posted one story that didn't require the threads as a background "The Food Court" and therefore was read as a stand-alone. The feed back I have gotten is that if I had redone it to be part of the Jake Universe, there would have been fewer downloads but happier readers. It got poorer reviews and that was also a piece of the fallout.