BH: 1040

So we got up today and went to the garage sale mentioned yesterday. Turns out it was on a different street (Audrey…Adrian…whatever) than Ken had been on yesterday, so pooh. Of course the saw was gone. Ah well. We also went to a sewing machine place and got oil for the industrials and more cone threads for one of the sergers, and talked to them about fixing the Viking and the other serger.

Then we trundled home and ate lunch and watched some of the Columbia stuff, to get a handle on what had actually happened. One of the crew members was born in Plattsburgh and was also stationed at the base there, albeit before and after I was there. But it brought things home a little harder, if you’ll excuse the pun.

Then I did some copyediting and Ken did some work outside, and then Lasairfhiona and Wulfric and daughters showed up. W helped Ken finish up the woodwork for the outbuilding roof and move the solar panels over there from the house roof. L and I hung out and ate popcorn and cleaned the hot tub and talked about gardening. She knows a lot about gardening. I will be picking her brains a lot lot lot over the next month or two. We made salad and ordered pizza and all talked until about 8:30, when they packed their kids in the car and headed home. Thank goodness for wonderful friends who will come and help out, just because.

We were going to sit in the hot tub, but it’s still reheating. Phooh. Ken was reading Neil Peart’s Ghost Rider, but now he’s in here noodling about on the web figuing out exactly where Neil road on his trip. He’s a map fiend. I’m one, too, actually. One of the reasons we get along so well.

Ya’ll may have noticed that I haven’t mentioned the crow story recently. Well, here’s the thing: I have ideas, I have bits, I have theme-y type things. I have no characters, and no real plot, and no idea if it should take place in the present or in the past. So I’m letting it rattle around in the back of my brain, hoping that eventually my subconscious will cough up something useful. It will. It always does.

Meanwhile, last night I realised that Chapter 9 moved too quickly; that things resolved to easily. So I dredged into the middle of it and split it up (with an argument—always handy). Tonight I finished the argument and wrote the transition scene. Next I have to go through the final scene and change all the minor things that make it sound like it came earlier.Not a difficult thing to do, but I’m getting tired. I’m just glad I trusted my instincts and went back in to rework the chapter. Tomorrow I should be able to finish Chapter 9 and start Chapter 10. The draft is going to be about 10K too short, I think, but given that I have a number of places where it says “{add xxx here]”, I think it’ll be fine in the end.