As Day Three of my self-imposed exile ends, I note with sadness that the run is over; tomorrow the school bell tolls for thee. Ack.

What follows are a few lessons I want to remember from the experience:
1) Offline writing increases productivity. In fact, the surest way to end creative streaks — launch a web browser slither into the Web’s clutches. A laptop with a decent word processor and no wireless card is the recommended configuration. My greatest realization in the last four years.

2) Divide writing days into two main sessions. A long morning stint, while the brain is freshest, one or two hours of errands, chores, phone calls and eating, then three to four hours on the backstretch. Close with either exercise, alcohol and a shower. In total, it equals roughly eight productive hours, while spanning ten to twelve. During the breaks, engage as many people as possible in conversation. Random compliments can open the floodgates of all sorts of usable dialog or ideas. And there’s no sense turning anti-social, just because the day is spent on anti-social endeavors.

3) The longer the evening session runs, the more spelling devolves, such to the point that by 8 PM the simplest of words, like articles and character names, become Russian Roulette. This breakdown proves the laws of diminishing returns apply beyond physics.

4) Writing outside the home is OK, though choose the spot with care. A buddy’s family room might work. The same dude’s poker table in the middle of a wicked matchup: probably not.

5) Hang up on telemarketers fast, early and often. It’s just the right thing to do. On any day.

Wrote through a Sunday afternoon family visit, TV droning in the corner, without anyone really noticing; they almost expect this sort of behavior from me now.

Part of a conversation with my father-in-law: “Working on your book? Old book, new book?” he asked.

By the time I looked up and said, yes, that one, he was fixing a lawn mower in the garage.

I’m going straight to hell, I swear.

Day one in writing exile, and there are pages for my trouble. And another lesson.

No matter how much I write, the longer the passage, the more glitches surface during revisions. Having wrestled this anomaly for a few years now, it’s clear this is probably a bit more complicated than say, give a dog enough rope and he’ll hang himself with it.

For ages, critics slogged Pink Floyd, charging them with overly minimalistic songs and melodies. But there was a practical reason behind the simplicity. They discovered that while recording, if they made a mistake, and tried to cover it up with production or mixing, it made the error even more noticeable. The whole song lurched. Keep in mind, their reign predated real time digital intervention. Now engineers extricate sour notes with a point and click. Back then, musicians had to get it right. And they were, by their recountings, musicians of average skills. So in order to nail it without going crazy or spending a billion years in the studio, they used stripped down arrangements.

They sold 200 million records. So I’d say maybe people like their entertainment less complicated.

Right now, I also lack a digital mixing board or engineer to automagically fix my mistakes. In lieu of these resources, I keep the chapters under 5 pages and paragraphs under 6 sentences. Wherever possible, sentences are short, independent clauses.

Call me Simple Man.

With three days off in a row, I plan for lots of writing. Here’s wishing that I follow my heart and keep the ass to the seat, and the fingers to the keyboard.

A rock solid week of writing turned cold mid-week. Unforseen extracurricular activities and the job swallowed way more time than I anticipated. Tomorrow the tide reverses.

Seriously though, how often does one need a tux fitting so he can serve as a best man? Or resolve two Internet connectivity issues, one of which idled the entire campus, and killed a business day. Plus convince a CFO that spending 20k is saving money. Then spend 20k.

Got The Stash to a few people for comments and feedback. This will be an interesting exercise, because I’m at a loss as to how I feel about the story myself. Horror and me might work.

Some claim one sign of a solid story is whether or not it interests the author. Translated, is this a story the author has to read? If so, maybe the piece has that special quality that sets it apart. I might be too old and jaded, but I know that my personal tastes are darker and more technical than to serve as any kind of indicator.

Oh, I know what I like. I like 1,200 page biographies and books on network design or application development.Then a Helen Fielding, James Patterson and Robert Parker chaser. Very different genres and kinds of entertainment, that stimulate different areas of the brain, and which draw very different readers. And yet I have no interest writing in any of those genres. All right, I would like to write mysteries like Parker, or thrillers like Patterson.

Bottom line: I distrust my judgment over whether a manuscript delivers the goods. Maybe that makes me try harder at my own writing. It might.

In the past two weeks, I have tried a number of techniques to improve productivity and increase focus while writing. I have learned one important lesson. By far the most effective technique is the simplest.

When I write now, I power up a laptop without inserting the wireless networking card. All writing happens on this one laptop. This combination allows me to work in anywhere, free of wires, and far from the call of the Internet. Ah, so elementary, yet so powerful.

Sure web research starts harmlessly enough. Perhaps a quick peek at websters.com for the online thesaurus or dictionary. Maybe pop over to cnn.com or foxnews.com for the latest headline. Current events matter, after all. And I want my howstuffworks.com, because the writers need intimate knowledge of engineering concepts. But all too often, what is a brief diversion snowballs into a twenty minute distraction.

And Internet borne distractions are more intrusive than life distractions. If the phone rings, I can pick it up and chat for a few minutes and return to a project in about the same place. If Buddhapuss jumps on on my lap, I pat him. But if I’m writing and start surfing, it breaks the spell that keeps the words flowing out of me and onto the screen. Double plus ungood.

Maybe someday I’ll have more discipline to manage my Internet intake. But for now, I’m working it Koontz style.

The Stash passes the morning after test. In other words, the story reads as it did when I finished writing.

Made a few quick tune-ups, but basically a very light edit. After I hear back from a few people who agreed to read it, I’ll consult with someone who knows a lot more about horror markets than myself and find it a home.