From today, we have a week-and-a-half of early starts. Today one of the cars has to go in for MOT and service. Tomorrow, we’re at the hospital. We have a teatime gig on Saturday, so we have to get up early and do all of our Saturday stuff early. And on Sunday, we go and collect grand-doggy #1 for a week, and that means a week of getting up early with him.
So I gave myself a day off from my earlier starts and had an extra hour, pushing my day along by an hour but hoping I could catch up along the way. Before breakfast I put some washing through and fed and watered the garden birds. I made it to my desk on time-plus-one-hour and went straight into Week 5 of my advanced depth workshop.
While I was watching that, I ran the tech scan I always do on a Wednesday, so saving some time there. I had some catch-up from the admin woes of the previous 2 days too, though, and tried to bear that in mind. And I put my phone on do-not-disturb.
Every time I got up out of a chair, I did it 10 times, and when I was in the garden, I did 20 step-ups, 10 with each leading leg. Well, I have to start this exercise lark somewhere, and my thighs are really weak. Next week I’ll be walking an energetic dog every day and I need to start on both my strength and my stamina.
There was no rain forecast, so I took a punt on the weather and hung out the washing. I made myself a cup of tea, started today’s blog post, and settled down to finally do some writing for THE HAUNTED HOUSE HOTEL, trying to channel both everything I was learning in the depth workshops with how prolific I was when I was ghostwriting.
I struggled quite a bit to get going. But I managed to set the opening scene, I hope from my main character’s viewpoint. And we met two of the series repeat but secondary characters. I had a full two hours on it and only managed 887 words. I’m aiming at 2 x 1,000-word scenes per chapter, so I have wiggle room. My target for the day was one scene, though, and I managed that, even if it did come in short.
I also created those 2 characters for the first time and I’ve tried to allude to the haunted house of the title in as mysterious a manner as I can without ramming it down the reader’s throat.
It was dinner time by then and the weather was holding, so I switched off my do-not-disturb (I hadn’t missed anything) and made myself something to eat. But instead of eating at my desk, I took it into the dining room and watched the birds from the dining table. I started to read a new cosy mystery, but couldn’t get into it.
After dinner my next job was 12 STORIES IN 12 MONTHS, FIREWORKS AT KILLIECRANKIE. I’d already brainstormed and planned the story, all I needed to do was write an initial 750 words and slide in this month’s prompt. I wondered how I could shoe-horn in 400 words of depth for the opening of such a short story, and decided to go for just a percentage instead.
My target for the day was the whole story, but I only managed to write the opening, which turned out to be 200 words in the end. It was a start, though, and something to build on today.
We watched England beat the Netherlands. Things are still going mostly in the right direction…
Early start today with 3 errands: take car to MOT/service, collect car from MOT/service, and a dental appointment. Fortunately, the dental appointment isn’t mine, although it is only a visit to see the hygienist. I wonder how many jobs I’ll clear in the very short hours in between.
Sounds like a good day’s work. I hope it’s not as hot over there as it is here.
It’s cooled down a LOT and is now raining again more often than not.
Well organised as ever!
Thank you. I try. 🙂