Remember that writing contest I entered two months ago? I had eight days to write a 2,500-word short story using an assigned genre (action/adventure), a subject (a boat race), and a character (a biographer)? How excited I was? 

Well, here is an updated confessional on that whole experiment. I spent a week writing drafts, getting feedback, and then ripping everything apart. Not since 1975 when I penned an ambitious junior high version of "Looking for Mr. Goodbar" have I dabbled in fiction. It was hard!