Yeah, Monday again...

Early rise on a nice sunny morning. Hit the keyboard hard. Was making pretty good progress, till the school called looking to send young M home with a fever. Thankfully, everything straightened itself out after some rest and aspirin.

Got to the gym later than usual, but had a good workout. New routine is tough in ways I'm not used to. Gonna take a few weeks, I supposed, before the soreness settles into something tolerable. Meanwhile, it’s just keep on slugging.

Sent my N critique off this morning. A nice story. Not contest caliber, maybe, but nice.

Last thing. Bought a canoe tonight. Simple little 13-footer that’ll play nicely on the small lakes and reservoirs around here. Give the boys a chance to fish from the water. Should be a lot of fun. It’s supposed to arrive at Sportsman’s Warehouse next Monday.

Rain’s moved in. Not sure what that bodes for tomorrow, but whatever it is, I’ll take it. Grass looks like a million bucks. Like to keep it that way for a while.

Just keep chipping away...

Restless night. Not sure why, maybe the warm weather. Kicked off the covers around midnight, but didn’t get back to sleep until near morning. Up before six, and able to put a finish on the draft of the new story. Feeling good about it. Think it has potential.

Went off to the movies early afternoon. Back in time to catch the late afternoon rains, give my uncle a call and catch up with some of my correspondence.

Mom coming in next week. Looking to get schedules in order, make sure we maximize our time. Gonna be a bit of a juggling act this time, owing to the boys being out of school, etc.

Looking to settle in and get some reading done tonight. Wake rested and push some work out the door. Also going to have to take a look at the workout schedule for next week and see if I can’t convert to mornings during mom’s stay.

Big week coming up. Big week.

Water, water everywhere...

Good day.

Up early, writing. Then off to the park with the boys. Weather was perfect. Cool, sunny, and crisp. Waited in line for a long time for a free canoe run, courtesy of Angler’s Covey, but it was worth it. J and I had a blast paddling around Prospect Lake. Young M wanted to go along, but refused a life jacket and lost out. Next time we’ll get it right. Snow cones and popsicles made up for our sins.

Went hunting for teak later in the day. Not much luck. Looking to build a potting shed on the side of the house, but it appears it’s going to take some time, given a limited supply of both materials and money. Still have a good reserve of brick from the last wall project. May look at something in that direction.

Rain came late in the day. Just a few sprinkles.

Might go to a movie tomorrow. We’ll see. Tonight, just going to hang around, eat pizza.

Friday, and taking it easy...

Good day with work, in general.

Made some nice revisions on the new story, cleaned the house, hit the gym, and finished off the day mowing my lawns.

Taking the boys to the sportsman’s show tomorrow, over at the park. Not sure what to expect except a good sized crowd. Get lucky, we might end up with a door prize or something. Read they’ll be giving a way fishing rods to the first 500 kids.

The H.G. Wells book gets more entertaining all the time. Crossed over from Neanderthal man to Cro-Magnon man last night. Apparently, they wanted nothing to do with one another! Put more crudely, the Cro-Magnon folks found Neanderthals too homely to mate with.

Just glanced out the window. The rains have returned. This is the wettest, coolest May we’ve had in a long time. Let’s hope it keeps the fires down this summer.

Keeping on...

This one went by like a streak.

Got in some early revisions on the new short piece, then spent the rest of the day chasing after the baby. Park, school, store. Lots of outdoor time. Glad we didn’t get the rain they promised. Until now, anyway.

Looking to the weeks ahead. Caley’s wedding in Santa Fe soon, mom here for a week. Other goings on. Schedule’s starting to fill up, and Wyoming’s beginning to beckon, too. Not sure when that’ll happen, but with the snow being what it is up on the Bighorns, late July and early August aren’t out of the question.

Good being away from the long piece. Enjoying this new story I’m working on and think it might be one of the better things I’ve written in a while. We’ll see. Meanwhile, I’m just going to enjoy it.

Reading a 1920s copy of H.G. Wells History of the World now, among other things. Enjoying it more than I thought I would, though Out of Africa is still hanging around my heart. Re-reading McCarthy’s Child of God again, too, for what must be the fifteenth time. Man, the guy can write.

Taking the boys to the Sportsman’s show in the park this Saturday. Should be fun. Just about time to get Jack out fishing again.

Just me being optimistic...

Slept in a bit today. Didn’t get to the keyboard until 6:30.

Working a new story. Feels like a breath of fresh air after the big push with the long piece. Got in some good work, the went to the gym to work on my new routine. Weight stuff I haven’t tried before. Felt all right to step into something new.

Weather was cockeyed today. Overcast, cool, cloudy. Started sprinkling off an on during the afternoon.

M tomorrow.

Hope we can get outside for a while, maybe kick around at the park.

Week’s gone suspiciously fast for a short one interrupted by a holiday, but it ain’t over yet. We’ll see what happens.

So that's nice...

So the day went more smoothly than I figured it would. Maybe because it got off to a good start. Was up early to have coffee with my buddy G, catch up on news of the outside world, then home again to spend the morning with young M, and finish the commercial projects I spent the weekend drafting.

No fiction today, and it felt good.

Tomorrow, back at it.

Didn’t spend as much time outside as I would’ve liked, but was impressed by what I saw of the day. Crisp clear air, blue ski with big, thick cumulus clouds, and an off-again, on-again breeze that was strong but nice.

Read that the snowpack around the state was at record levels. All the rivers are high. Hope it bodes well for the summer, and the fire danger.

Started adding some new stuff to my workout. Need a change of scenery. We’ll see how it plays.

The over and under...

Quiet day.

Up early, and off to the keyboard. Put in most of the morning on commercial work. Three drafts and counting. Needed a break a little after noon and went shopping for stuff around the house. Pretty ho-hum stuff.

Also found an interesting article on Gordon Lish. An interview, really, with a handful of his students.

Can’t claim to have killed any giants, but the day’s not over yet. We’ll see what tomorrow brings.

Calling it.

The start of the weekend...

Running close to burn out on the long piece. Made the last of the revisions for this round and put the ms. to bed. Don’t think I can look at it again for a while, but that should free up some time for the stories I’ve shelved.

Quit on the keyboard a little afternoon, then went out and finished pruning the trees. Made a trip to Rocky Top, cleaned the gutters, and took the truck to the car wash. Not a whole lot of excitement, but the day was clear and beautiful, and it was nice just driving around. The heavy snow really brought out the leaves.

Need to get cracking on the commercial stuff. Thought I’d get a good jump on it today, but was so close to the end of the revisions I’ve been working on, I couldn’t resist taking them to the end.

Yard looks great. The hard work’s paying off. Now to find the time to sit around and enjoy it.

Stay tuned...

Nice day.

Up early, wrote a while, then went to the trolley museum with young J. Played a little T-ball before he left, and embarked a long, serious bug-hunt. All in all, a lot of fun.

Hit the gym later this afternoon, then the barber, then the grocery store. Cut the lawn(s) when I got home.

Not sure what tomorrow’s gonna bring, but I’m guessing it’s going to come with a bit of copywriting, some yardwork, and a trip to Rocky Top. Wish I could say fishing, too, but even I won’t venture up into the mountains on Memorial Day weekend.

Wild times...

Had the boys all day today, so most of it’s a blur. Up early for a quick round of revisions, then straight to the rest. Lowe’s, iHop, a couple of episodes of Baby Einsteins, playtime with every toy in the house, forty minutes of wrestling, ten minutes of pouting… All good.

Young J back tomorrow for another around. M home for the day.

Still have copy to write, trees to prune, flower boxes to re-hang, and a whole lot more. Fingers crossed I make it.

Only a few pages left in the Africa book. Decided to save them for this evening. Gonna hate putting that one down.

Limb by limb...

Big snow last night. Big and wet. Had to go out in the middle of the night, dressed in a poncho, and stand on a ladder and shake the boughs to keep them from breaking. Shoveled the walks, too, which felt very much like shoveling wet cement, and repeated the process again a little after five this morning. Took a few casualties, but not as many as the neighbors, some of whom were hit pretty hard.

Planted a few hundred bucks in flowers on Saturday. Hope some of them survive. Have hauled the pots into the garage for tonight—it’s supposed to dip to freezing—so maybe we’ll come out okay. It was a late snow, even for the Rockies, and the accumulation was heavy. Probably five inches. Hope we’ve seen the end of it, but who knows.

Finishing the last few pages of Out of Africa. Dinesen talks about locusts, how their invasions were so massive, the weight of the alighting insects would break the limbs of her coffee trees. She goes into great description about how the settlers would try, in vain, to ward them off. Sympathized greatly, last night, while trying to save the trees.

No M. today. School out of session owing to the weather. He and J will both be over on Thursday. Hope the sun comes back so we can get outside.

All in a day's musings...

Mist and rain all day, since early morning. Walked out to the cottage in a light drizzle, and had my first cup of coffee at the keyboard.

Put in some good revisions, then cleaned up and got some commercial work out of the way. Hit the gym mid-afternoon and the grocery store after that. Just put a pot of homemade mushroom soup to simmer.

Weather’s supposed to be rough again tomorrow, which’ll mean a few extra challenges with young M.

Still riding the fumes of the Louisiana Lit story. Takes a helluva long time to write something and shepherd it into print, but every now and then it’s worth it.

Overcast Sunday...

At it, early. Started fitting bits and pieces of the long narrative back together, and so far, things haven’t sucked nearly as much as I’d expected them to. Maybe it’s a harbinger of things to come. Hope so.

Worked most of the morning, then put in a little more time policing the yard. Pruned back the trumpet vine, pulled a few dandelions…

Contributor copies of the new Louisiana Literature arrived. They look great. Got a little boost seeing them after such a sluggish spring.

Lazy afternoon. Hope to hit the ground hard tomorrow, and set a good pace for the week.

Feeling it...

Will take a Saturday like this anytime.

Up a bit after five, and straight to the keyboard. Made all the revisions I could stand (and some decent progress while doing it), tidied up the yard, and headed off to parts known and unknown to shop for flowers, food, and a new hedge trimmer. Never made it to the gym, and didn’t care. Nice to have a day off, and even nicer to have a day off with a nap.

Read a little, wrote a little, and even managed a trip to Starbucks.

It was supposed to rain come noon, and continue on through the night, but we’ve barely seen a drop all day. Clouds are sitting low on the mountains and something may come in yet, but so far everything’s high and dry.

Thinking about a movie tomorrow, but there isn’t much to see. Might stay home and work around the house, weather being what it is. Maybe not. We’ll see.

Itching to get back on the water. Take young J along. Maybe next weekend. That’d be fun.

Let's call this one a win...

Got into the swing of it today. Up just after five. Hit the keyboard hard, made some decent work of the revisions on the long piece, then dressed and teak-oiled the patio furniture.

Figured I’d be worn out early owing to an iffy night’s sleep, but found enough energy to make a respectable appearance at the gym, put some time on a new commercial project, and cut and trim both lawns.

Maybe the weather had something to do with it. Beautiful day. Breezy, but in a nice way. Blue, blue sky.

Looking for an early rise tomorrow. It’s supposed to cloud over, maybe even rain. Not thrilled, but rather have that than the way-too-early summer heat.

Quiet tonight. All the neighborhood kids are off in Monument Valley Park celebrating the twins birthday. Cause for celebration, indeed.

Looking ahead, again...

Not sure how it got to be Thursday, but I’ll take it.

Nice day with the boys.

At the keyboard early. Ran hard, made a lot of progress.

Missed getting to the gym today, but made up for with a little extra reading. Nice story in this week’s NYer. “The Presentation on Egypt” by Camille Bordas. One of those, I wish I’d written that, moments.

Got a chance to look up big-game hunter Denys Finch-Hatton, Karen Blixen’s lover. Interesting character. Old school, even then.

Weather overcast. Not sure what the forecast is for the next few days, but will take what comes.

Mid-week ramblings...

Two in a row.

Beautiful day.

Up early, clipping away with revisions on the long piece. Took a break before noon and finished the reviews for the N stories. Cleared my queue then went off to the gym for a short workout.

Finished sanding the back patio settee and left it out for teak-oiling. Pruned a couple of the trees. Picked up some flowers for the front bed out at Hardings. Came home and made a pot of tomato soup.

Gonna turn in early and get a jump on tomorrow.

Read a little more of the Africa book.