Distracted By a Shiny Red Ball

I have a story I can't shake out of my head. If you write, you know what I mean.
Here I am, rolling along working on the WIP and along comes this killer idea that is so different from what I'm doing. The new idea beckons with a grass-is-greener intensity and I long, passionately long to metaphorically get up and walk away from the characters I've been with for too long already in order to go play kickball next door with the cool new kids.

Don't get me wrong: I know the new kids are simply diversionary tactics my brain is employing to avoid the tedioius work on a manuscript that is already DONE but for the polishing. In other words, it doesn't need me anymore and why can't I go play over there with that shiny red ball?

Why, indeed. Because I don't have the editor yet. I have to pick up on and then correct all the little mistakes in that manuscript myself. And if I don't pick up on them, no editor is ever going to want to work with me. They'll see my pages and call me a slacker and pass the pages around the office and mock me and my stupid commas.

I assume.

Regardless, I'm working on making it perfect. And if I'm down to spelling and grammar, cliches and commas, it's just about there.

Blessings to everyone else struggling with character arcs and trying to ignore shiny red balls of their own making. My plan has me tackling those new characters inside a month. And a year from now, I'll hate them just as much as I hate the ones I have right now.

I assume.