What's New

Dog Eat Dog 72,000 words

¦ dialling in from Sky Bunker ¦

19:28 GMT, Thursday, 7th Jan 2010.

Thursday already. Where has this week gone?

Monday was first day back at work after being off 2 months.  Compassionate leave. A little bit of a bumpy re-entry but fundamentally fine.  I work with good people.  A positive crowd and a lot of love.

Monday night saw me freak out a little at the fact I'm back to squeezing all the Me-Time into tiny bundles of a couple hours either side of the work day.

I was still living in Jesmond Bubble mode.  Being able to stroll up to St Georges road during the mid-morning.  Being free.

Wednesday morning woke up to 20 cm of snow.  The city ground to a halt.  Even the buses stopped.  No way to get to work for Jo or I.  I trudged to the local garage and bought 10KG of smokeless fuel and two sacks of logs.   Got the fire going in the lounge and settled into alternating between watching Poirot, playing PS3 or spending 45 minute slots upstairs writing Dog Eat Dog.

I'm 72,000 words in now.  Onto Chapter 20 after finally nailing that bloody Ch18... however I have to come back and write Ch 19.... I skipped it because it's a Carlos Revira scene and I'm currently into the mind state of Mikhail Drobna.  I find it easier to write a couple chapters within one mind state, and then go back, rather than chop and change between mind states each chapter... it takes a lot of mental energy to move between these two characters.  Still loving them though.

I popped outside and watched a car coming slowly but persistently down hill.  Bloke behind wheel had window down. He looked at me and said, I've got my brakes on.  I looked at his wheels are saw they weren't turning.  The whole car was just sliding out of control.

I took a 15 minute power nap.  I tried to listen to Fungi From Yuggoth audio (Lovecraftian prose accompanied by eerie sountrack) and was thrown into a state of intense reverie: sitting in my old bedroom in Jesmond, listening to this same thing, gazing at eerie sunlight flooding through the forest of the Dene…. I wished I could be back there.  

I feel like an automaton. I’m not myself right now.  I’m missing a big chunk of me.

Thursday, it’s stopped snowing but now the temperatures are dipping deep into the minus figures.  I didn’t want to risk Rocket on the icy roads.  Took the bus to Bath.  It turned up 50 minutes late.  I was frozen to the pavement, almost.