Bad Monday, Heros, and the Gym

Monday (11/6) -- I woke up kind of sore all over.  I'm not sure why:  I guess it's a combination of colder weather, and age.  But man, having sore toes and fingers and arms and back and shoulders puts a damper on morning productivity.  Eventually, I took a hot half-bath, which helped quite a bit.   I probably need to visit my doctor to see what's up with my right shoulder, as it doesn't seem to be improving (or at least seems good one day and then sore the next).

Monday also started out with some marketing, during which I got another rejection.  There's this one (well, OK, there's more than one) market that I'd really like to break into, but so far I haven't had any luck with them.  The difficulty is that they respond with a form letter that essentially says, "guess why we rejected your story."  I wish they'd just say, "We're sorry, but we will not be buying your story," because the offered reasons why make me want to pull my hair out trying to figure out which reason is the one.  It gets even more annoying when I look at what they do publish, and it seems as if they do publish stories that are close to what I'm sending them....

I'm thankful that the other story I sent out to another market on the same day did not get rejected, because double-rejections feel like a slap in the face.

I started to read "The Hero with a Thousand Faces," partially for writing research, partially because it's one of those books one is supposed to read.  It's feeling pretty White Baby-Boomer Guy to me:  every man is the hero/divinity of his own story working on being the star of his own personal film.   It's also striking me as Fraizieran in its approach to world culture and folklore.   ...And I'm pretty sure one of of stopping points along the Hero's Journey is the hieros gamos or sacred wedding with the Earth Goddess.

Anyway, the Hero's Journey keeps coming up as a story template.  Often writers' guides will feature Star Wars or Harry Potter or The Hobbit worked into the Hero's Journey and urge writers to think of their own manuscripts in a similar fashion.  I figured that I should go to the source material if I wanted to understand the form, but Campbell's style is fairly ramblely ... and because it's comparative folklore from the 40's, it's more a psychoanalytic way to explain the universality of various folktales, myths and legends than a writer's tool.

Went to the gym Monday (11/6).  35minutes on the elliptical for 340 calories.  Spoke with one of the folks there, and decided that I should either knock off any type of upper shoulder machines or only do them at about 10 lbs...

Went to the gym Saturday (11/5): 35 or 40  minutes on the elliptical for at least 330 calories.  3x12 Roman Chair curl ups.  3x12x20lbs triceps curls.  3x12x10?lbs preacher-bench biceps curls. 

Went to the gym Thursday (11/3):  30  minutes on the eliptical for at 300 calories.  3x12 Roman Chair curl ups.  3x12x20lbs tricepcs curls.