When I used to watch Seinfeld, one of the most annoying things about his comedic style was that he always seemed to take the funny moment one joke too far in the moment. One too many "Really?"s or one too many "Helllooooo"s in the moment makes a big difference to how you experience a story. We've all seen one of those moments, right? Where someone is riding the waves of humor, and they forget to end on a high note. They push the moment, and then it gets un-funny really fast.

Stories are like humor. There's a delicate balance between too much information, and not enough information. As a writer, walking that line is very difficult.

I entered a contest with a less-than-stellar ms a couple of months ago, and am just getting my feedback today. When I opened my files and read the judges comments, a lot of the things they liked the least was my tendency to take the description or the sexual tension "one joke too far". Too much information or too many inferences or too many touches. I didn't do a great job of reigning in my tendency to do "too much."

Now, I pride myself on never taking humor too far. I know humor well. But description and sexual tension are not as familiar to me. I have a harder time knowing how to walk the line between TMI and JEI.

How about you? How do you know? How do you walk the line between too much information and just enough information when it comes to your writing?