I realized today that I have written twenty-five short stories in the past twelve months. Twenty-five. What’s more, I think all but a handful at least have a decent chance at publication. Looking back, I’ve only sent out ten of them and, of those, I now believe only four truly have a market. They’re my earliest work and written before I had a clear idea of what the markets looked like and what kinds of stories are wanted. I also have two more stories that are at least half done (entitled “The Kaibatsu Report” and “Ten Year Reunion”) and a bunch percolating in the brain waiting to get out which means I should easily have thirty short stories written by the end of the year.

Of course, the real key is getting them published which means I need to get to work revising which is such pain. Why can’t it all come out right the first time? :) Still, I think it’s feasible to get about a dozen out the door in the near future and see what happens. There are probably six that require a good deal of work on the sentence level to really make them sing–I think they deserve it. The others aren’t necessarily fluff, I’m just not reaching as deep.

In non-writing news, saw “Super Size Me” last night. Loved it. It’s Fast Food Nation on the big screen.

And, ho hum, the US Women won the gold medal in Athens. Look, I’m a soccer nut and I like a number of womens’ sports (I happen to prefer watching women’s volleyball and women’s tennis to men’s) but women’s soccer still has a way to go before it quickens the pulse. The problem? For one, all the keepers I’ve seen (except from the US) are total flappers. I watched part of US-Japan and laughed out loud when the US scored their second. The Japanese keeper shied away from a cross into the box in a way remniscient of a grade schooler afraid to catch a fly ball. And this is their national team keeper–no one in the country is better than her.

That and the fact that so few players can really whack the ball. I was mightily impressed by Tarpley’s rocket goal today from way outside, but way too few players can crank the ball with decent accuracy. The Brazil players could strike the ball hard, and they could place the ball, but they couldn’t strike the ball hard and place it in the corners. If they could, the game would have been 5-0 Brazil. The announcers (who always suck) went on and on about how Brazil’s shots really were coming in fast but they failed to mention how they consistently blazed over the bar or hit the side netting, even when they had plenty of time and space.

The women’s game needs another Michelle Akers. She’d crash through the midfield, bowl people over, smack in amazing goals. She played the game the way it was meant to be played. In all fairness, Wambach’s game winner today didn’t have that much heat. It should have been easily headed away. Even so, it’s hard to get excited when a simple cutback move works repeatedly for every player on the pitch, especially in a final. So yea! to the US and I’m happy to see them win the gold…even if I listened far more than I watched, and looked up only for the good parts.