I'll be darned, it looks like a story

I have written a 3600-word story in six days, 1600 of it yesterday. That is very nearly unprecedented for me -- despite the story fighting me every step of the way.

And despite my having referred to it as a "flaccid lump of story" at one point, I ended up with something I'm actually pretty happy with. My alpha reader laughed in the right places, which is always a good sign. The key seemed to be when the main character made a play on words and suddenly developed a rudimentary personality, which he'd been utterly refusing to do until that point. (This never happens to me.) And then the words I'd consciously crafted because they weren't coming any other way suddenly took on a different cast, and it all pretty much worked. So thanks, front-brain; it's not normally your job, but it's nice to know you're there to pick up the slack when the back-brain, I dunno, decides to skip off to Aruba or something. /*glares at back of own head*/

Dinner last night ended up being a hazelnut mocha and some Doritos, whilst hunched over the keyboard. I meant to eat something better, but sort of forgot. I got the story formatted and sent off with all of twenty minutes to spare, then stayed up another hour or two playing solitaire before I processed that I should just go to bed, dammit. Thus is the glamorous life of a writer.

Plotting How To Get Plot Discussion

Patricia Wrede has a post up about character goals, and specifically story-level goals vs. scene-level goals and how each might be helpful (or not) for the writer at various stages.

Although it's a character-oriented post, and I've ranted many times about how I get character stuff when I ask for help with plot, I think this might actually be useful in my ongoing quest for tips on How To Do Plot. Because it seems like people usually want to talk about plot as it pertains to story-level goals, and what I get stuck on is plot as it pertains to scene-level goals. I'm hoping that pointing them toward this might clarify what it is I'm looking for.

So, test drive: If I were to show you that link and then ask you how to Do Plot, what kinds of things would you be inclined to tell me?