So how goes it?

My week off real-life work gradually filled up with non-writing chores and appointments. I spent a whole day wrestling with The Stuff That Lurks under the Bed, which was a bad move, as once The Stuff is out, it rarely wants to go back quietly. I also spent a disproportionate amount of time playing with the cats, watching history documentaries in the name of research, and going for long walks. In fact, it was perfect time to recharge the flagging batteries, and when I did begin redrafting again, I managed to sort out two whole chapters, leaving me on chapter nine. Happy days!

I redraft in blocks of three, so once I finish with chapter nine I will do the usual - print out chapters 7 – 9, read them over and over, prune a little, and then send them off to lovely folk T and M for a read-through. Chapter nine is a little sticky in places, and needs a desperate chop, but I am hopeful to get it done by the end of November.

I am still feeling a bit down with myself, but have begun two hopefully very positive things in order to help me through – counselling, and sorting out a Big Thing that I had been putting off as too big to contemplate. Both make me feel like things are slowly progressing… and this helps me with my writing, although I must admit I spent the past weekend just staring at chapter nine without actually doing anything. But you know, I think this just happens occasionally. It won’t send me to The Pit of Despair (oh that evil pit!).

Another good thing is that I have decided on the next novel idea. I am very excited about this! There are a few ideas I have been gradually expanding on in daydreams over the last few years, and one was starting to stand out as a fully fledged story with a beginning, middle and end. I tried out the synopsis on J last night, in amongst a few other ideas. J is the best person to try ideas on as he will see immediately if there are plot-holes, or if something doesn’t sound right, or interesting. And he liked it, so in my mind it has now been given the Green Light of Glory. What I will do now is write a vague chapter-plan, get everything out of my head onto a page, and then leave it alone until I finish the current redrafting. But I am very happy with the idea, and think it definitely has potential. The only slight problem is it is very different to my current idea, so I might be genre-skipping, not sure if that is a bit problematic, but hey-ho.

And a final good thing, although this will be a little way off yet, is that I have a little children’s book I wrote and illustrated nearly ten years ago. It has mainly been sat under the bed gathering dust, but I have decided to find it, spruce it up and then send it out. I am also going to look into self-publishing, maybe just for my friends with small children, as I think kiddies and their parents would really enjoy it, and as such it shouldn’t just be part of the Stuff under the Bed. This is something for the New Year, but I will research into it for the rest of 2009, and make sure it is all ready to go for January.

Gosh, this all makes me sound like I actually have a clue of what I am doing! I like it!

Scrabble of Doom Strikes Again

As a writer, you’d think I’d be a shoo-in for winning at Scrabble. You’d imagine I’d be able to think up all sorts of clever winning words, and walk off smugly with triple word scores dripping from every tile. I’d throw words such as ‘quixotry’ into the mix with ease. I’d even know what they’d mean, being the visionary that I am.

So why when playing a game, can I only spell the word ‘suds’? I am hopeless at scrabble. Hopeless. The game generally goes like this…

Pause as me and J pick tiles. Silence as we think.
Me: Ooo. If I had an ‘E’ I could have spelt ‘exit’.
J: Do you have an ‘E’?
Me: No…
J: Do you have an ‘X’?
Me: No…
More pause for thinking. J meanwhile has laid down ‘qualm’ and won himself 40 points.
I lean over to look at his word. Look back at my letters.
Me: Is MIT a word?
I show my tiles to J. He considers for two seconds, and reconstructs my tiles into a word.
Me: Ooo ‘acquit’! Funny, I was just thinking of that.
I lay down word, win 60 points.

Somehow I always win the game between me and J…

More scrabble woes here

Meetings

Fireworks at Ally Pally

Fifty-five thousand people made their way up to the top of the hill, to where Alexandra Palace looks regally over north London.

Waiting...


Ooo!

Ahhh!

Gosh!


Yeay!

And then fifty-five thousand people marched their way back down again.

Que Sera, Sera

I sometimes wonder whether I have chosen the best occupation for myself, and whether writing ‘a book’ is the way forward for me. This is mere speculation, as the path I have chosen is the path I will follow for a time at least, but sometimes I do wonder if perhaps something else would be more suitable.

When I was just a little girl and if anyone asked me what I would be, I never replied that I’d be famous or rich, I replied instead that I would be a cat. (You can see where it all went wrong, can’t you?) Later, this became an author. I have been pretty much single-minded about that ever since (while losing a fair few years to socialising, working frantically, and being just generally scatty). Becoming an author would still make me very happy indeed. (As would becoming a cat, if only it didn’t involve scary surgery, mental health issues, or my sad demise to allow reincarnation). But what else, what if?

I can quite easily see myself looking after an archive. Something small and specialised, rather geeky – something connected to TV or film history, or nostalgic pleasures. I can see myself carefully writing up notations and leading guided tours of equally geeky people around my small musty space, and all of us being thrilled with seeing a piece of the yellow brick road used in the original Wizard of Oz film, or a crumpled prop cardboard box as bashed into when filming The Sweeney. Or maybe not even as glamorous (she says, wondering if the above mentioned things are glamour), but more social history – how ordinary people got on with living in 1940, in 1910, and so on and so back. So maybe this puts me in the realm of a museum curator – but then I’d like to be the person that decides the exhibition, the person who rummages around to find the old stuff. So basically I want to be someone who gets to poke around in the secret stash of stuff museums and archives have out the back. Is there even a name for that job role besides Bloody Nosy?

Leading on from above, I quite like preservation work. I’d like to keep history alive. Time team, archaeology, digging around in the mud wearing wellies – this all appeals. Re-enactment also appeals. Travelling around the country being the world’s foremost expert (and no doubt complete bore) on Agatha Christie appeals, as does being the person television people contact when they want to make a scene authentic for 1970, or 1950. Continuity appeals. Buying ‘antiques’ for pubs to look rustic, reorganising books in some gorgeous old library, and traipsing around car boot fairs with more knowledge then ‘ooo that looks pretty’ also appeals.

So it seems there is a theme. Old tat, mainly. I want to collect it, display it, wear it, and possibly roll around in it given half the chance. Not quite sure what that says about my psyche, but it is rather funny.

What would you be?

Five Obsessions

Kit over at Kit Courteney Writes has passed me an award that apparently stands for integrity, commitment to excellence and stubborn optimism, and means I get to fill you in on five obsessions of mine. I then get to choose five victims, um, five nice blog folk to ask what makes them tick as well. An opportunity for writing and being curious! Bring it on.

NB: It has actually been harder than I thought to write down true obsessions. I like a lot of things, but I am not obsessed by any of them. So the things below are the closest I have to obsessions and rituals.

One: My novel

I think about it day and night, to be honest, which is a perfect example of an obsession! It will pop into my thoughts in the morning, while on the tube, at work, in meetings, on the tube again, in the evening, before bed. I think about it far more than I seem to do any work on it.

Two: Story ideas

If I am not thinking of the current novel, then I am thinking of other story ideas. I usually have a few going around the merry-go-round that is my mind, and sometimes I stop the ride and examine one idea, play with it awhile, add a few embellishments and then send it off again. After a while of doing this (it could be years) I will pull it off the ride completely and write it down. That is the best example of how I get ideas for stories.

Three: Second-hand book shops

I can’t pass one of these (or an antiques fair) without stepping inside. I simply can’t – what if one of these shops has a Graham Oakley Church Mouse book that isn’t £30? What if they have the 1965 Fontana editions of Agatha Christie books? What if they have the red Tiswas annual? What if, what if… no matter where I am, I will have to have a look. If the shop is closed I will stand mournfully outside, nose pressed against the window, in the manner of a Dickens urchin at a bakery window.

Four: Making a cup of tea as soon as get to a B&B room

I love staying in hotels and B&Bs, and one of the first things I always do is seek out the little kettle, awkwardly fill it with water from the sink, stare in bemusement at the walls until a plug socket reveals itself, and make myself a cup of tea. I then perch on the end of the bed with my cuppa, and eat the little free biscuit, and everything will feel all right with the world.

Five: My Remembrance Day poppy

I buy a red poppy as soon as I see a poppy seller. I carefully attach it to my coat and stride off for the day. When I look down again the poppy will be gone, and I will have been proudly wearing a pin. I will then buy another poppy. And so it will go on. So far I am on poppy number three, and I am not even sure it is still pinned to my jacket. I will have to go and check, and later no doubt I will have to buy another one. I don’t want to buy a poppy badge, as ultimately I think I give more money this way, so really everyone is a winner. Just don’t frown at me when you see me without a poppy, I will have no doubt already donated a tenner.

And so, I nominate A Letter From Abroad, Aspiring Writer, A Rose Beyond the Thames, Music Obsessive (should be easy for you!) and A Cat of Impossible Colour. Please don’t feel you have to by any means, but if you fancy sharing your obsessions please go ahead!

Autumn Stomp

I thought it might be a nice idea to go for a brisk stomp today. So I set off across the dale (alley) by the bubbling stream (brook decorated with shopping trolley), across fields (scrubby park) nodding to neighbours (keeping an eye on scary looking bloke with his three dogs). I then passed the farm (allotments) using a well-trodden track (pavement by motorway), until I ended up in yonder village (the high street). And I thought I'd share some pictures with you...




What gorgeous colours everywhere! But London is such a busy place - if you stop to take a picture someone bumps into you. Everywhere you walk is a person - washing their car, driving, walking dogs, on bicycles, digging in their garden, tidying leaves, fixing telephone wires, delivering pizza leaflets, trimming hedges, playing football, carrying bags of shopping - you cannot be on your own for longer than a minute.

This is the 'bubbling stream' - as a child I played near it, wrote stories about it, and finally fell in it as a curious but overly stupid nine year old. The moral of that tale is never cycle with your eyes shut down a slope towards water 'to see what happens'.

When I got home I played in the garden with my cat Abigail. She is very fascinated with falling leaves, and spends a lot of time pouncing on anything that moves in the breeze, including my shoes. We played catch with the yellowing leaves, and then we both explored what lies beneath the tree. My exploration stopped when I saw a huge spider. Abigail is fearless when it comes to spiders. Besides, she'll eat them if they come too close.

And since she is so pretty...


She is sitting on my lap at the moment purring. I think she knows what I am typing!