The best thing about collaborating with Jukebox is...

Oh, I haven't told you yet who my latest mystery collaborator is? Well, surely I've dropped plenty of hints! ;-P Yes, Jukebox and I are working together on the vampire story I first teased about here. During my visit with Lady Ru'etha and him last November, one of the group (I think it was Lady R, but I'm no longer sure) suggested Jukebox and I should write something together; and when he seemed as interested as I did, I said, "Well, I do have this idea for a vampire story." I described it, and Jukebox liked the idea...as, I think, did Reth Eldirood, who has a thing for vamps himself. ;-) If you like well-written EMC stories but don't want too much horror in the mix, check Reth out. You'll enjoy.

Now, as I was saying, the best thing about collaborating with Jukebox is that I can do it live, by phone. Even when one or both of us is too brain fried to work on the actual story, we still have fun gabbing. For instance, Jukebox and I have decided that the famously "fully functional" Data from Start Trek: TNG was originally designed as a sexbot, but that he doesn't look more studly because his creator was too vain to conceive of a sex machine that didn't look just like him.

As for the actual collaboration process, it's coming along very well. We're approximately halfway through the first of three stories that you'll be able to read as stand-alone's or chapters of a single tale, and we're writing in shared Google documents so we can both work on the same paragraph at the same time. I have to admit, that was a bit nerve-wracking for me at first, since Jukebox at least seemed to write much faster than me; but he's finally convinced me that it only looks that way because his stories are shorter than mine. Working with him live, when both of us are "on," we write at about the same pace.

Now, of course, it's much too early to have any idea when we might be finished; but don't worry. You know Jukebox: he'll probably keep posting a story a week over at the EMCSA from now until forever. And I'm still thinking of turning my morning Virtual Hypnotist session into a dark EMC fantasy. I imagine I could write it pretty quickly, since I'd just be embellishing scripts I've already finished. Who knows when I might find the right combination of time and inspiration to make that happen?

In the meantime, hugs to all my friends - and big, sloppy kisses to my previous collaborators, Tabico and trilby else, whether they want them or not. ;-) I'd work with either of you again in a heartbeat.