Where My Writing Has Been · 7:12am Mar 5th, 2021
If you follow me, you may have noticed the lack of new story chapters from me showing up in your feed. And you'd be right. On this account, I only published a total of three chapters in the entire month of February. What's going on?
Well, to bring you good news, I actually have been rather active in terms of writing. It's just in a different place on the site. Notice the phrase "On this account" in what I previously stated. Most of my story activity this past month has taken place in a collab story that's on the other author's account. The story, titled Something Sparkling, is a collab between me and Captain_Cosmos where my OC Autumn Apple, who appeared in Perfect Game, crosses paths with Captain's OC Sparkling Medley, whom you can gather important info about by reading these two stories.
As of when I'm writing this blog, on March 5, 2021, that story, which is ongoing, has six chapters, and it was only published on February 14. And one of them got published just yesterday. So yes, I have been writing quite a lot. Don't worry.
Now, what about the stories on this account, particularly Secret of the Pies, which hasn't gotten a new chapter since Feb. 14? Well, I rammed all the way through the first draft of Chapter 6 in about an hour or two a while ago, and sadly haven't made much progress on it since, however, I feel like I did a thorough enough job on the first draft that it won't need quite as much editing.
Another reason for the lack of new chapters from this account is the fact that my next upcoming story, which will be currently referred to as "Story #9", is a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure story, and after consulting with some helpful users about it, I was convinced it wouldn't be a good idea to publish a CYOA that doesn't yet have all its options available. As such, because I typically publish chapters one-by-one, that story will have an unusually long wait time to be released.
If Story #9 wasn't a CYOA, it almost certainly would have been out by now, so that's definitely a contributing factor to the emptiness in story activity from this account.
I initially was going to chalk this situation up to laziness on my end, but tonight, I just realized that I've been currently exceeding the upper bound for how many stories I work on for a while now without realizing it. With Secret of the Pies, Something Sparkling, and Story #9 all being in progress, that's three I've been working on, and I try to limit myself to two. So yeah, with that, plus Story #9 being a CYOA and more of my attention going to Something Sparkling then Secret of the Pies, no wonder this has been happening.
And I also realized it shouldn't be a surprise that I haven't done much writing on days where Captain_Cosmos and I work on Something Sparkling, because we after we finish a session with it, I don't have much energy left to write my solo stories.
I think the reason this happens despite me usually being able to work on two stories in the same night just fine is because Something Sparkling is a tougher task to write. Captain and I are going about it with no outline, and we're both contributing a major amount of ideas for the story, so we have to discuss a lot of things as we write it. Then we're both actively writing the story; using a Google Doc where we meet up on it.
This is in high contrast to how Switch Swap and I worked on Secret of the Pies, where we fully completed an outline mostly based off of Switch's ideas before writing a single word of the story, and then had me do all the writing, with Switch just approving it.
I love writing, don't get me wrong, but even activities you love can be tiresome and leave you exhausted from them for the rest of the day. Writing sure can be; it isn't easy to do by any stretch, and as above, I'm finding Something Sparkling to be of even more difficulty. So it does make sense that after a session on that story, I wouldn't have much energy to write my solo stories.
Still though, I think there is at least some laziness on my part. Captain and I don't work on Something Sparkling every night, and I definitely have caught myself not writing during times where I definitely could have. There were times where I could tell I was currently feeling up to writing, but didn't do it in favor of time-wasting activities that, in contrast to writing, don't provide me any fulfillment. And I... really don't know why I do things like that. 
But hey, do let me tell you that yes, I have been working on my solo stories. Well, mostly Story #9; Secret of the Pies has been on pause for a while likely due to the two-story limit I have and more attention going to the other two, but it's a continuing pattern. That story has been on the slower end for pretty much its whole life.
And Story #9, again, would almost definitely be out if it didn't need to have all of its chapters published before coming out. This account would look more busy if that wasn't the case.
Don't fret about Secret of the Pies, though; it's not being put on hiatus, much less canceled. I love that story and can't bear the idea of canceling it. It will probably remain slow to be updated, but it will be completed, I can tell you that. Switch Swap may be gone now, but I feel a strong enough attachment to that story to keep it going by myself.
Consistently, at that. Even though it means working on three stories at once, I'm not going to wait on Chapter 6 of Secret of the Pies until either Story #9 or Something Sparkling get completed. I don't want to wait that long.
And while I'm here, I would like to ask you to check out Something Sparkling. I've been having a great time with it, and it's the only story I know of where two authors have their OCs cross paths.
Mistake from me: I should have informed you guys earlier about that story and how it would be on Captain's account, because, like, that's really important info. Sorry about that. 
I also hope to see reads, votes, and comments on Story #9 when it comes out. Keep an eye out for it! 
- Player 4
