Writing Excuses: An 8-Week Self-Assigned Course

I've been feeling a bit fat today. Okay, not really, but I've been annoyingly conscious of the fact that I sit at a desk for eight hours every day, I sit in a car for a little over an hour, and I spend most days lounging around my house. I need to get started on an exercise program or something, and yoga doesn't count. I'm writing this while sitting at my desk and eating homemade raspberry crisp, by the way. I think that detail supports my argument.

Something else I need to get started on, and for me, this one's a little more plausible, is my self-education. School's over (for now. Master's is a dream-goal and a PhD. would be even better), but I want to continue to improve. I definitely do not want to lose everything I just spent four years building.

I have finished the crisp, and I will now tell you my game plan. Feel free to mentally insert either a game play strategy chart or a syllabus here. Game play strategy chart? What do they call those things? For sports. Personally, I've never really played one. Maybe if I had, I wouldn't have been writing that first paragraph.

I'm going to begin my self-education with (this is all I have planned out so far) an 8-week writing course I made up. Its course material follows the Writing Excuses podcast. Writing Excuses is a well-known podcast hosted by Mary Robinette Kowal (novelist), Brandon Sanderson (fantasy novelist and, right now, the only person in this list I'm familiar with. I plan to fix that at some point) Howard Tayler (cartoonist), and Dan Wells (horror novelist). There are, as of now, eight seasons, and they cover all sorts of topics. When I first heard of this podcast, it was from a friend, and I misunderstood what she was saying. I thought she was saying that my research for a story was a writing excuse. Happily, I didn't respond in a manner that showed her I was miffed. I've become a bit more familiar with the podcast since then, but I am still not a regular listener. I'll probably go back to being an irregular listener after this course, but you never know! There are things they have to say that I may learn from. That's what I'm banking on.

My course schedule is as follows. I include it in detail just in case you find yourself also wanting to take this writing course.

Overall scope of class: Listen to a total of 35 Writing Excuses podcasts, two episodes per day for five day stretches (may as well have a school-ish schedule, right?) Each week is assigned its own season, in chronological order (Week 1 will be Season 1, etc.). Please note that episodes are about 15 minutes in length.

Each week, episodes will be chosen using the following rationale:
Day 1: Choose two episodes that seem interesting
Day 2: Choose two episodes you would rather not listen to, episodes that sound boring
Day 3: Choose two episodes about writing or editing
Day 4: Choose two episodes about story elements
Day 5: Choose two episodes about the business of writing

In addition to listening to these podcasts, limited notes will be expected, and I am holding myself responsible for writing one blog entry per week, detailing the more interesting things I learned, along with my reflections on that week's episodes.

At some point during each week, I must "turn in" a piece of writing of at least one page in length (i.e. post it on this blog). One page = 12 point font, single-spaced, Times New Roman (the font will change on the blog, but please know it's at least that long on Microsoft Word or Google Docs. I promise not to cheat). The topics for these must come from one of the writing prompts provided in the episodes from that week (each episode ends with a writing prompt).

I started this morning. That means my weeks aren't going to be calendar weeks, but that's fine. I mean, who cares? It's self-education.