Drama! Stress!

So I've had my manuscript out in the hands of an agent the last two and a half months. Or so I thought. I finally decided it was time to see if she'd taken a look at it yet--just a gentle reminder/inquiry, etc. I agonized over the five sentence email, trying to combine just the right tone of respect, enthusiasm, and interest in knowing more. I also wanted to be careful not to sound aggressive or hostile. This is the kind of thing I get super neurotic about. I want this to work so much--probably too much.

Anyway, I sent the email and got back a response about an hour later saying that she didn't recognize the title of my manuscript and asked if I mailed it or emailed it. This was my second worst scenario. The first being rejection, of course. So we exchanged emails for a little while and I provided her with the name of the person who signed for it in her office, and a copy of the original email asking me for the manuscript so that she wouldn't think I was trying to scam my way in the backdoor.

She responded and asked me to attach the manuscript to an email, so I did and now it's actually in her hands. I can't decide if she's going to be positively motivated toward the manuscript out of some sense that her office lost it and was at fault, or if she's going to be annoyed at me for being such a pushy (albeit, polite and respectful) asshat.

The bottom line is that after almost three months of a strange mixture of excitement, desperation and terror, I didn't even have anything to worry about. NOW I do though, so I'm ramping up those emotions again at a frightening rate.

Yeesh.

Cry more, noob.

I apologize to anyone who reads this who is not a video game fan. I promise this doesn't signify a vast change in my content here.

Why is it that every single MMORPG since EQ is fundamentally the same? It's around 10 years after EQ and we're still dealing with the same basic issues. Sure, the sugar coating has gotten better: neato question mark graphics above the quest giving npc's head, a mail system, 'mounted' travel.

I'm playing Aion lately in a casual way and this game has all the new eye candy and convenient additions, plus some new ones that are cool. But when you peel all that stuff away it's really no different than anything that came before it. Here's a quick list.

a. static and insufficient quests. this results in boring leveling after the first toon. And grinding. crap loads of grinding.

b. endgame content designed to feed the obsessive and well connect players, and completely ignores the casual player.

c. a crafting system that is designed to be a time and money sink and results in items that are mediocre in most cases

d. combat systems that are basically unchanged from the first mmorpgs: chains, cooldown timers, etc

e. level based advancement. I know that at least one recent game has tried to get back to the skill advancement system that UO sported in the old days, but other than that we're still madly rushing to max-level and uber-gear so we can be even remotely competitive. This is especially painful for those of us that are gradually losing synaptic speed.

I can go on and on. Admittedly, graphics have gotten better, UIs have gotten more user friendly and configurable, and otherwise the games have improved in many ways, but fundamentally the underlying structure of the games are the same.

Freaking out!

Today I have decided, is the day that I write an email to the agent who is reading my manuscript and see where they are at. I have no real idea how long this part of the process should take, but it's been around 8 weeks or so, and I've begun to wonder if I just dreamed the whole thing.

My first draft was obsequious. Here's an approximation:

Dear So and so,

Please forgive me for intruding upon your day. I hope you are having a wonderful week. I wanted to make sure that my manuscript arrived in good shape. FedEx claimed it did but we all know what liarheads they can be. If you did get it, that's great and I hope you're enjoying it. I look forward to hearing from you at your convenience. If you want. I don't mean to sound pushy.

thanks,

jeremy

Emily told me that obsequious wasn't a good thing. So my next attempt was a bit more assertive:

Dear So and so,

WHERE THE #!&^ IS MY RESPONSE. I SENT THAT THING TO YOU MONTHS AGO.

looking forward to hearing back from you. Have a nice day!

jeremy

This is about where Emily smacked me on the back of the head. I finally settled on businesslike and calmly assertive without being rude or pushy. Along the lines of:

Dear So and so,

I'm writing to inquire as to the status of my manuscript, which you requested I send to you a while ago. I'm new to this entire process so I don't know what to expect in terms of a response or if I need to do anything further.

Please let me know,

thanks,

jeremy

I sent it and now I'm shaking and checking email every ten minutes or so. Do you think I might want this too much?