Painful Rewrites

I'm revisiting the beginning of my Work-In-Progress before I write any further (I'm almost halfway done with the first draft of the novel). Chapter 3, I find, is devoid of any meaningful conflict; it's mostly just the introduction of a couple new characters, a few clues, a few more steps forward in the plot, and some witty banter. Yawn. I think I just fell asleep.

So, I'm doing something weird. For me, anyway. From a link provided by the ever-helpful and encouraging Karin Gillespie, who writes a killer blog, I am rewriting chapter three the Ingermanson cum Swain way.

It is a strange and wondrous activity. And painful, really, since I have such limited time to write. It's like when you fall down in some dirt and gravel and cut yourself, and the cut is really full of crap, and you know you've got to clean it out so it can heal up right, but you know it's gonna hurt, so you just grit your teeth, and clean that sucker up. Okay, so I think I just compared my novel to a wound. Hmmm. I'm gonna let that one stand for now.

Anyhoo, Ingermanson's article outlines one wild way of designing and executing scenes. I'm up for it. We'll see where it takes me. I've already created a new character who is temporarily named HOT BABE DANGER STRIPPER. With a character like that, how can conflict be far away?