Discussion: Q1 Volume 39

@derbestin 

Great news! Good luck and Happy New Year!!!!! Sorry about the extra stress on this. It was a programing error on the submission time for the auto cut off that was fixed.

Jason

@jason Thanks for taking time New Year Eve to fix for my friends here online.

Posted by: @jason

@derbestin 

Great news! Good luck and Happy New Year!!!!! Sorry about the extra stress on this. It was a programing error on the submission time for the auto cut off that was fixed.

Jason

You the man, Jason! Thanks for fixing the end of year bug! Let’s hope it’s the last, and the new year remains trouble free! Cheers!

So this quarter was quite the lesson for me.  I took a previous rejection thinking I would just rewrite it for two reasons.

1. The core of the story was good, and it deserved another chance now that I'm a little less clueless.
2. It would take me less time.

Well, suffice it to say it was so unbelievably flawed I spent more time on this story than on any previous entry, particularly during this last week following some useful crits.  In retrospect executing my Q2 idea now would have led to a better story with less effort.

Anyway, I'm in.  Good luck to everyone still cranking out their final revisions.

I'm in! Huzzah! I have high hopes for this piece but I think that about all my entries...not the worst outlook to have, I suppose, haha. Best of luck all and I hope everyone has a happy and healthy new year!! (and gets their stories in by the deadline, of course!)

Congratulations to all getting their submissions in this quarter! It’s been a tough year, but you held fast, and persistence yields rewards! Now go enjoy some well-earned rest from your labors, and we’ll see you next year!

May the Force be with you! Cheers!

Wulf Moon

Forum Moderator 

@jason Thank you so much for getting it fixed! Huzzah! I got my submission in now and I'm excited  

@physa Congrats on taking the plunge and submitting to Illustrators for Q1. That's exciting! I hope the editing is going well!

Thank you Jason, for fixing the link!

My story is up up and away. Now to Q2!

I'm in for the first time in a year.  This one took a good 7 months to write.  Good luck to all who have entered!!

I'm in! A few hours to spare but no chance to have this one critiqued. 3 quarters in a row--now on to Q2 and make it a whole year's worth of submissions. The timing is right to make that my new year's resolution for 2022   

In for Q1! Good luck to all who hit submit this time.

Okay I'm in for Q1. Good luck to us all.

I've never submitted after midnight my time (I'm in EST, so still a few hours before the deadline), but I just did! I'm in for Q1!

I guess I'll find out in several months if those last minute revisions were worth it  

I handed my wife my completely rewritten draft at 11:57pm and asked her to proof. That's Eastern time. An hour later, she handed it back. I made corrections and submitted. Had I not learned last year about which time zone the contest was in, I'd have had (more) issues.

I'm in!

Time to forget all about it and get started on Q2.

Forgot to add that my loving wife stopped reading at one point and asked if I had gotten "a bag of buts from Kmart?"

That lady speaks my language.  

Posted by: @clfors

@physa Congrats on taking the plunge and submitting to Illustrators for Q1. That's exciting! I hope the editing is going well!

Got my Q1 in with 8 hours to spare,

Good luck to all and now on to Q2 after a time of rest and celebration to ring in the new year,

Congratulations to all who submitted a story! That’s an act of courage! Best of luck to all!

I just opened up the file I submitted for Q1 and almost cried. The formatting is wonky - several paragraphs are not indented. What's the consensus on this making my story a guaranteed R?

I feel so dumb right now.

?

I got in last night too! This quarter wasn't what I wanted it to be, but luckily I had written an extra story last quarter that I was able to add a bit of polish to and send along. The upside to not being able to finish a new story is that I've already got 3,000 words written for Q2, so... cool!

Great job to everyone who submitted.  

Posted by: @patezell

I just opened up the file I submitted for Q1 and almost cried. The formatting is wonky - several paragraphs are not indented. What's the consensus on this making my story a guaranteed R?

I feel so dumb right now.

?

I'm not certain, but I think I remember hearing that a few formatting errors are okay until a story starts getting considered for the higher certs. Missing a few indents definitely doesn't sound like an instant reject to me.

I'm cringing inside reading about the last-minute submissions. I couldn't take the stress. I submitted mid-December and felt the pressure.

Took me one year to draft, revise, revise, revise, get feedback, revise, get feedback, revise (you get the picture) but I've submitted my first entry. I will be thrilled beyond words to get an honourable mention (the list of credentials I see for some of y'all are truly amazing).

Posted by: @patezell

I just opened up the file I submitted for Q1 and almost cried. The formatting is wonky - several paragraphs are not indented. What's the consensus on this making my story a guaranteed R?

I feel so dumb right now.

?

It's super easy to second guess yourself and catastrophize right after submitting. I always give myself the cold sweats thinking, 'what if I sent the wrong pdf file? What if they're looking at my grandmother's sugar-cookie recipe instead of my story?!'

I wouldn't think that a couple of formatting errors are going to put yours into the R pile. Dave isn't some vengeful schoolmarm with a red pen, lying in wait to mark you down for the slightest mistake. At the end of the day, if you have a quality story, that's what's going to be considered at highest importance. In any case, the die is cast; gear up for next quarter come what may!  

I'm in as of a couple days ago, pretty close to the cutoff but happy to have made it. Now I'm staying out of that file for awhile, because I don't need the stress! "I never look back darling, it distracts from the now!"

Posted by: @patezell

I just opened up the file I submitted for Q1 and almost cried. The formatting is wonky - several paragraphs are not indented. What's the consensus on this making my story a guaranteed R?

I feel so dumb right now.

?

I'd argue that, regardless of how things turn out with this particular quarter, your efforts weren't wasted. You still wrote a story. I don't know what kind of formatting errors occured, so I can't say for sure how that will affect your chances--but I can certainly say that, if you do get an R, you can always fix the formatting and resubmit. This isn't like some markets, where any given story can only be sent in once. The only stories that can't be resubbed are semi-finalists and finalists.  

Regardless of how things turn out, though, it would probably be good to figure out how/why the formatting errors occured (if such a thing is possible) and fix them so that you don't have to worry about this again in future.

@penmark

@derbestin

@disgruntledpeony

Thank you for the kind responses regarding my submission snafu! While I still feel like a dope for sending in a story with formatting problems, it's a done deal now, and I need to focus on my Q2. Bet you a brownie it will be shipshape before I hit that submit button.

I think I know what happened. Switched my file from Google docs to Word before I sent it, but I know I checked and corrected some indent problems then. I'm guessing I failed to save the changes. Grrrr. I claim temporary insanity, as I had two children (both grown) isolating upstairs with Omicron, and a puppy recovering from surgery. 

Does the word Omicron make anyone else think of the Transformers? Maybe it's just me. Happy New Year!

Posted by: @patezell

I think I know what happened. Switched my file from Google docs to Word before I sent it, but I know I checked and corrected some indent problems then. I'm guessing I failed to save the changes.

I did a similar thing because I had been working on a computer that didn't have word and then was able to switch to one that did. A lot of formatting stuff was off, though in particular the em dashes looked messed up so I had to manually go in and fix it. Then I started freaking out that when I clicked on "get info" it showed my name for recent editing changes and I had to figure out how to get rid of it. A lot of last minute stress that I did not need.

I don't know if you do this but I recommend it, I learned it myself from Becky on here, is to make it automatically indent. You can do this on word and on google docs. Go to format, align indent, indentation options, special indent, first line, 0.5

@scribblesatdusk 

I did not know that! Thank you so much for telling me. I will do that henceforth.

Congrats to all who are in for Q1! Mine was down to the wire - with only minutes to spare. (Is there an award for procrastination?)

On to Q2...

Posted by: @babooher

@ldwriter2 Awesome! Now forget about it and start on your next one.

 

Write on, write on, write on.

This is a bit late but yes I am working on more short stories.