51,112 Words and I... AM... DONE!!!

Yay! First, an apology. I have fallen behind on the blogs because I have been so busy with wrapping up my novel and so depressed by it, but finally finished today in a marathon writing session which work kept getting in the way of. I also really didn't have anything to post because I didn't want to give anything away and also, it hasn't been very fun or interesting. Ugh. Anyway, here is one short excerpt, and then I'm off to read Katie and Heather's blogs. Enjoy!

Jake and Gordon drove into Black Wood, the whine of the car’s engine dissolving into sputtering coughs as an unhealthy looking black smoke poured from the tail pipe. It was the White Rabbit’s last ride, and it had been glorious. As they had taken the exit toward Black Wood, Gordon had asked Jake, “do you have a preferred entrance song?” to which Jake had naturally replied, “what the fuck are you talking about?”
“You know, like when you are making a dramatic entrance, what is your song?” Jake continued to look at Gordon with an incredulous look on his face, but the impact of his look was greatly reduced by the fact that he also had to keep his eye on the road. This was precisely why he hated driving so much! Truthfully, Jake did have a preferred entrance song, he was simply having an internal debate about whether or not he wanted to share this information with Gordon. Gordon, sensing that he had lost Jake, continued to speak.
“I think that this moment calls for an entrance song, as we are clearly entering into a dangerous situation in which we are armed with the facts and about to make a daring rescue attempt against all odds.” Gordon said, pouting slightly. He greatly hoped that Jake’s overinflated sense of his own masculinity would not interfere with his dramatic entrance. Jake was moved by Gordon’s speech.
“Ok…” he said, pausing, “I have always imagined myself entering a press conference to the song ‘Let it Rock’, by Kevin Rudolph and featuring Lil Wayne.” This was only half the story, as he also imagined all of the other reporters cheering and pumping their fists in time to the music, and creating a line of high fives for him to run through. Jake had always wanted to run through a line of high fives, but the nearest he had come to this experience had been during his days of playing Timbits soccer, when he ran through his own high five. But Gordon got the picture. Oh yes, indeed.
“Triumphant, Jake!” Gordon actually clapped his hands in glee at this revelation. “What a perfect choice, however, given the intrigue and mystery surrounding this situation we have unwittingly found ourselves in, might I suggest…. ‘Gangsta’s Paradise’ by Coolio? Please don’t consider Coolio’s misguided sartorial choices as you weigh out this option, it truly captures the mood, I think.” Jake briefly considered this, then lifted his fist to shoulder height. Gordon was certain that Jake was about to punch him in the face, until Jake said “pound it out.” They bumped fists, and then made an exploding gesture with their fingers. It was the closest Gordon had ever come to being accepted, and he had tears in his eyes as he pulled out the Dangerous Minds soundtrack that he had packed in advance.
And so it was that as Jake and Gordon made the final turn onto Slanted Road, the top down on the dying white rabbit, the opening strains of “Gangsta’s Paradise’ could be heard throughout the town of Black Wood, Ontario, the sound of a string orchestra against a hip hop beat lending an eerie tone to the darkened street. All of the residents who heard the sound felt their hearts uplifted, as two unlikely heroes rode to the rescue, courage in their hearts and he bonds of fellowship that had been forged between them making them strong.

45,237 Words... The End is Coming?

I have no idea how my novel will possibly be over in 5,000 words. I am seriously going to have to make some things happen. What I had imagined happening throughout the entire book at the beginning is now going to happen in 5,000 words. In any case, one way or the other, it will be over in 3 days.
I have a couple of excerpts for you, trying not to reveal too much, not that anything much is happening, but my characters are figuring things out... too bad I don't really know what is going on!
First, here is Alice and Jackie...

“I’m not sure. I believe they are hiding. I believe they feel, as you do, that the storm is about to break. I believe these people have learned the hard way to steer clear. I hope that’s what it is. The truth is, though at some point we may have to care, we are going to have to set them aside for now. What’s comin’ will come, an’ we’ll meet it when it does…” Jackie finished, a far off look in his eyes.
Words cannot describe how Alice felt as she heard these words, but I will try anyway. First, she felt annoyed to once again hear what she considered the completely forgettable line from Hagrid’s film, The Devil’s Lube. Its ubiquity never failed to astonish her and irritate her in equal measure. Second, it once again brought back memories of Jake, and his insistence on speaking the line in his wretched version of Hagrid’s thick West Country accent. Third, the actual meaning of the words, which she felt had been lost in the shockingly underwhelming context of ‘The Devil’s Lube’ finally struck home. She knew, as she contemplated Jackie’s words, that she would find the courage to face whatever was coming, but most importantly, Jackie had used the word ‘we’, and for perhaps the first time in her life, Alice had someone to share her burden. She wasn’t quite sure yet that he was a friend, and maybe he wasn’t, but they were in this together.
She smiled, tears in her eyes as she outwardly calmly managed the emotion that was overwhelming her on the inside. “Ok,” she said, “I’m ready. Tell me what we’re up against.”

Second excerpt... on to Jake and Gordon...

“This doesn’t make any sense” Gordon intoned, for what was perhaps the fiftieth time that day, as he rummaged through the papers. Jake and Gordon were well over halfway toward their destination of Black Wood, Ontario. Jake had been pressing the pedal of his 1986 white convertible Volkswagen Rabbit to the floor the entire way. This was considerably less impressive than it sounds. Jake had bought the car on a whim, in a fit of nostalgia over the movie “Can’t Buy Me Love,” one of Jake’s all time favourites. The car had not been in ‘mint’ condition at the time of purchase, in 2005, and it certainly had not improved with age. He rarely drove, and when he did, it was usually short distances and typically under duress. Jake suspected, and was quite right, that if the classic car that the film had made the most popular car for teenage girls for 1987, 1989, and 1990, made it to its destination, it would be its last hurrah. Even as the pedal touched the floor, the car was barely making 70 kilometers an hour.
A particularly aggressive driver in a red Nissan Juke had been so incensed by Jake’s highway speed that he had slowed down as he passed the Rabbit, rolled down his window, and yelled something incoherent. Jake had been glad to not understand the advice the driver was offering, but even happier when Gordon had unceremoniously flipped the man the bird. Gordon was a much better road trip mate than he had imagined he could be. Despite this, Jake was losing his patience with Gordon’s repetitious denial of the sensibility of the facts they continued to uncover as Gordon waded through the documents they had taken from the underground archives.
“Okay, let’s just both agree that none of this,” Jake gestured at everything within range “makes sense, and move past it. What have you found out?

43,520 Words.... Iyiyiy am getting nowhere!

Aaaaahhhhh... my story is proceeding at a snail's pace, but I have all the pieces lined up, and now they will start to fall. I think. Unless I somehow manage to spend the bulk of my word count on describing outfits. Here are a couple of excerpts that I think you will enjoy. I had to include both because I couldn't decide which one to include.

Jackie did not rise from the armchair, but instead took a moment to straighten the doily on the left arm, whilst commenting in a surly voice “can’t you read?”
Alice was a bit taken aback, both by his words and the barely concealed aggression beneath them. “Uh… I did see that you were closed, but I hoped…”
“No! Not that one, the other one!” He said, pointing to a small handwritten sign that was taped to the window at the front of the house. Alice approached the sign, and saw that she would have had to have been standing on the front lawn of the home/bar in order to read it. She could just make out the words as she approached the glass, though she was reading backwards. It said ‘This Ain’t The Hilton.” She straightened up, then bent back down, rereading the words just to make sure she had them right. What a strange place this was!
Jackie was looking at her expectantly, and she realized that he expected her to understand the meaning of the sign. She decided to go with asking the obvious.
“Why would I think this place was the Hilton?” she asked.
“You tell me, City Slicker,” he replied. Alice was indeed confused. She looked down at herself, to see if there was any hint that she might have given that a) she was a city slicker, and b) that she was looking for the Hilton. She was dressed casually, in acid washed jorts, a graphic t, and a fitted red hoodie, artfully faded to add to its casual allure. She had purchased the outfit at a local boutique in Toronto, called “Iyiyiy Am Wearing You!” just for the purposes of traveling incognito throughout small town Ontario. The small blond imp who ran the store had assured her she would blend in perfectly. Perhaps she shouldn’t have taken his second piece of advice, which was that when you were feeling conspicuous, the perfect cover was to pull out your phone and text someone… ‘1-4-3’ being the perfect text to send when words failed you under pressure. Alice knew in her heart that pulling out her phone and texting someone was bad form, and she was reasonably certain that she it would not make her less conspicuous under these circumstances, but she had gone ahead and done it anyway upon entering the bar. Damn her infernal nerves! And damn the blond imp with the adorable dimples! It was the last time she took advice on how to behave socially from a 12 year old.

And the second excerpt...

If there was one thing that Joanne didn’t want to hear about, it was the importance of love. But she had heard what she needed to. They weren’t planning on using the research for their doctoral dissertations. Joanne was sick to death of self-important blowbags coming in here and acting like their doctoral research was life or death. They never wanted to hear about her Master’s thesis, and sneered in the face of her credentials. If there was one thing on earth that Joanne hated worse than people who misunderstood the Dewey decimal system, it was doctoral students. She had heard everything she needed to.
“Okay. You can take the documents.” Jake and Gordon both breathed a huge sigh of relief. “BUT!” Joanne pronounced loudly, her finger raised didactically in the air “…so help me God, if you do not come back here within 24 hours with those documents with you, INTACT,” she issued a warning glare with this word, “I will not hesitate to contact my union president and I will complain bitterly.” Jake and Gordon had no doubt that Joanne had every intention of doing so. Librarians were well known for not being afraid to go straight to the top with their bitter complaints. They nodded vigorously, scooped up the documents, and fled to the elevator before Joanne had the opportunity to change her mind.
Gordon pressed the button to the top floor, the location of the offices of To(Ron)To(!).
“What are you doing??”Jake asked, chagrined. “We need to get to the lobby! We have to get out of here!” he cried. He was truly panicking in his desperation to get to Alice.
“I have a couple of things in my office I just have to grab. It will only take a moment.” Gordon said mysteriously. When they reached his office, Jake was trailing behind him and whining like a sulky child. “Enough!” Gordon said imperiously. “I cannot travel like this.” Jake raised his eyebrows. “I must change.” Jake was slightly grateful for this. Though being embarrassed by Gordon’s gothic creepy demeanour was the last thing he was thinking about, he would feel better traveling with a companion who minimally appeared slightly less insane than the situation they were racing to encounter. He took a seat and waited as patiently as he could while Gordon slinked into his office.
True to his word, Gordon was quick. He must have had what he referred to as his ‘traveling garb’ packed and ready for just such an occasion as this. Strange behavior, but this was to be expected by To(Ron)To’s brilliant but incredible strange editor. His ‘traveling garb’ consisted of a blue tank top (a tank top!?!) with a white triangle pattern and white trim, paired with grey sweatpants that were more tailored and fitted than any sweatpants Jake had ever seen before (and this was saying something, as at one point in his life, Jake had considered himself something of a sweatpants aficionado.) Finally, Gordon was wearing a pair of bright white sneakers that were obviously just out of the box. They had eyelets for laces, but no laces. Must have been slip-ons, Jake mused.
“I thought it best to try something new for this road trip. The cape is a poorly understood item of clothing, and I believe it is our desire to appear inconspicuous. The young gentleman at “Iyiyiy Am Wearing You” assured me that this outfit is de rigeur among the farming communities of Southern Ontario.” Jake highly doubted this, but there was no time to argue. But he made a mental note to check out this boutique Gordon had spoken of. It sounded like the young gentleman really knew his shit. It was then that Jake noticed the leather bound volume that Gordon had tucked under his arm.
“What is that?” he asked, though he had his suspicions that he knew exactly what it was.
“It is my doctoral dissertation.” As always, Gordon pronounced this ‘doc-TOR-al’. “Just in case.” He said, and with that… they were off, to parts unknown and quite possibly to one or both of their dooms.

40,046.... A New Alliance...

Wow, I did not want to write today... and man, no idea how I'm going to wrap this up in 10,000 words, but I've really got no choice. So close to the end now, I really can't wait to be done!
So, Jake continues to search for clues and today formed an unexpected alliance.

Jake popped his head into Gordon’s office, intent on controlling the conversation this time around. “Hey Boss, got a second?” he asked. Gordon primly looked back at Jake, and opened his mouth to launch into what surely would have been a lengthy diatribe about the meaninglessness of time as a measure of anything, given the fluidity of reality. Jake anticipated this move, however, and used a countermove of his own. He interrupted.
“Great. So listen, first I’m going to need access to the basement floors, as I need to do some research.” Gordon looked at him agog, this was a word that Gordon would have used, and Jake cursed his internal narrator for choosing it at this moment but this was not a time for internal reverie. It was a time for action.
Indeed Gordon was surprised at Jake’s request, because the historical archives located on the bottom three floors were rarely used by any of the reporters, least of all those on the sports beat. Jake once again interrupted before Gordon had a chance to speak.
“Ok, awesome, and second, I’m going to need to take a leave of absence, so get someone else to cover my articles. I don’t know how long I’ll be gone.” A voice inside his head said I don’t know if I’ll ever be coming back, but he ignored it, as he was not a man prone to flights of fancy.
Jake paused expectantly hoping for a simple yes, Jake, here’s the key to the archives, and yes take all the time you need. What he expected on the other hand, was either a series of relevant, hard hitting and difficult to answer questions, or a lengthy soliloquy with little relevance to anything. What greeted him instead was a protracted silence, though Jake was happy to see Gordon reach into his desk to retrieve the key to the archives. After a long pause, Gordon spoke.
“First, a leave of absence will be no problem, since we will not be covering the sports beat for the next few issues, maybe even weeks. We’re up to our eyeballs here in the shitstorm that has emerged with the shock engagement of Avril Lavigne and Chad Kroeger. I have to dedicate at least one entire article to educating the unwashed masses about the correct pronunciation of the rock legend’s name, the prime minister has asked us to run a full page photograph of the Canadian homegrown supergroup receiving the Order of Canada, accompanied by a pleading note to name him as Best Man at what is sure to be the wedding of the year, if not the decade (yes I am including the Royal Wedding in this assessment). I think also that this is the moment we’ve been waiting for to write a stunning expose on the role of mommy bloggers in the both the election of the prime minister AND the decision to award said Order of Canada to the much maligned Canadian supergroup, as well as the connection of these events to the complete and utter demise of Paul Martin as a public figure in this country.” Gordon pause to take a breath. He indeed seemed to have his hands full. “So, I guess that yet another article bemoaning the state of Toronto sports teams will not be missed.”
Jake disagreed on that score. Gordon obviously didn’t understand the rabid nature of Toronto sports fans, nor did he understand the extent to which they are reliant on a steady diet of cynicism, bitterness, and disappointment. But Jake had bigger problems than the peculiarities of Toronto sports fans and the media outlets that serve them. He needed to find out more about what exactly Alice was mixed up in, where he could find her, and how he could help. Jake remained silent, and waited for Gordon to finish.
“Now,” Gordon continued, “with regards to your other request, I have two questions. Does this have to do with Alice?” Jake nodded. Gordon nodded back, considered for a moment, then responded. “Okay. My next question is… how can I help?”

38,392 Words... Things are Progressing

Hey everyone, my writing has been progressing, as I said previously, I have a lot to fit in in the last week of writing but it hasn't been particularly fun or interesting. A lot of it is dark and kind of sad, or kind of boring. I haven't had any fun little excerpts, though I expect I will have some more in the future as there will be some surprising collaborations as the story nears its conclusion. Here is an excerpt showing I guess how emotionally invested Alice is in both Jake and her dog, Queenie. I'm trying to make someone, anyone care that something terrible is happening to them.

Queenie once again whined deep in the back of her throat, a low sound in the dark car. All of a sudden Alice was struck by a memory so vivid it took her very breath away.
She remembered the moment she had realized that she was in love with Jake. It had been at the office, and she had been hard at work at her cubicle, lost in the story she was pursing, its twists and turns having pulled her far away from the real world for a time. What pulled her back was the sound of laughter. She had looked over and had seen Jake at the office coffee maker, which as in many office spaces had become the unofficial gathering spot. Around Jake were three or four other reporters, Alice didn’t even notice who they were. Jake, as he always did, had them in thrall. He was recounting a story, she couldn’t hear the words and she didn’t know what he was saying, but she could hear the soft rise and fall of his voice, and she could see the way people listened to him. He just had a way about him that drew people in.
It was because she had been so far away that she was struck in that moment, her normal defenses lowered. Luckily for Alice, she couldn’t see what she looked like as she watched Jake, because she truly looked gormless, with her head tilted to the side, and a look of such love on her face; it was as wide open as she had ever been in life. At that moment Jake caught sight of her, and in that way he had, though he was across the room and talking to a group of people, he made her feel like she was the only person in the room that mattered. He smiled at her, a secret smile just for her. In that moment, Alice realized that she loved him. Giving in to that feeling was just about the easiest thing she had ever done in a life full of complications, but the force of the feeling and its implications overwhelmed her. It was such a bittersweet feeling, of happiness and love, heavily tinged with sadness and loss, for she knew she would have to leave one day. She knew that it could not last.
“Oh, Lord, what have I got myself into this time,” Alice had wondered aloud, and was surprised to find herself close to tears.
As the memory faded, Alice was struck by such a longing for Jake that it was almost physically painful. She saw that Queenie had rested her head on Jake’s t-shirt, and for the first time, Alice felt a rush of guilt for the life she had imposed on this beautiful, loving dog.
“There’s no going back, Queenie,” Alice said, her voice raw with emotion. “We can’t go back to Jake, not now.” Queenie looked at her, her eyes still sad. “But I promise you, that if we get out of this, that we will go back, and we will find him.” She realized as she said the words that she meant them. She realized how little she had ever thought beyond the moment, beyond the now, to consider what it was that she wanted. She was always driven by the impulse within her to go, to move, to keep running. She had not realized until that moment how much she had become a slave to it, how much she had sacrificed to her personal demons.
She continued to speak to her dog, who had been her only companion, and who in this moment was her only friend in the world. “But right now, we need to get out of this car, and we need to walk into that house and meet whatever is there. I need you to do this with me, Queenie, because I’m afraid and I don’t think I can do this alone. Will you come with me this one last time?” Queenie looked back at her with mild reproach as if to say ‘of course I will follow you. How could you even ask me that?” Alice knew in that moment that Queenie would follow her to the very gates of Hell and beyond, if she asked her to. Alice fervently hoped that that was not where she was leading her now.

35,199 Words, and Shit is Getting Real

I knew I was going to reach 35,000 words last night, and I knew it was time to get my story rolling. I still only vaguely know what is going to happen in these last 15,000 words, but it was time to get on with it. I thought about including another excerpt about Torts, but decided to include this longer, semi-serious one, so you can get a picture of where things are headed. Tonight I will start 'Part 3' of the book, and I think I'll have no choice but to push the plot forward, as much as I have enjoyed wasting words on overlong descriptions of things that are not even in the same vicinity as the point.

So, here it is... interspersed storylines of Alice and Jake as they both come to a realization...

Anastasia Pemberley was a woman that Jake had always imagined meeting. He was that sure of his relationship with Alice. After all, even the most heartily disapproving mothers wanted to meet the people their children considered important. Eventually. He knew very little about Alice’s mother besides the fact that she and Alice had a strained relationship. That they had moved around a lot. That Anastasia had been a single mother, Alice’s father’s whereabouts unknown. It wasn’t a subject that Alice was wild about discussing, and he had never pressed. He thought he had time to get to know those things. Also, Alice was a woman who could not be pressed. She could not be rushed. She took her own time with things.
Though he had been confident of their meeting someday, he had never imagined that he would be meeting her this way, in Alice’s absence, having achieved her phone number through somewhat clandestine means, but here he was.
“Mrs. Pemberley, my name is Jake Dempsey…”
“Who?”
“I’m a friend of your daughter’s. Alice.”

When Alice opened her eyes, at first she only saw a sea of faces, looming over her. They didn’t look quite right; they were overly pale, and their eyes overly dark, as though they had no corneas. She sat up quickly, suddenly and overwhelmingly terrified, and the darkness swam around her vision again, drawing her back into unconsciousness.
“Easy…” said a voice, soothingly, softly. It was a voice Alice could listen to. Alice slowed down, breathed deeply, and the blackness faded away, and the faces returned to normal. She looked into the eyes of Si(mone), the woman who had sent her away to oblivion, and was now bringing her back.
“Where am I?”

“Where is she?” Anastasia asked, an edge of hysteria in her husky voice. Whiskey and cigarettes had deepened her voice, but it was still a musical voice. Jake remembered that she had been a singer when she was younger. Alice had mentioned it once.
“That’s what I’m calling about. I need to find her. I think you might know where she is.”
“Who did you say you were again?” she asked, hysteria giving way to suspicion.
“Jake Dempsey. I work with Alice at the paper.”
“Ah yes, the sports writer. Dempsey. Yes, she did mention you. I thought you sounded like an idiot,” she said, and Jake felt a twinge, not for his own sake… he was quite used to being called an idiot. But for Alice’s sake. A woman who could be that casually cruel to a stranger must have done a real number on her daughter.
“Yes, that would be me. I am a bit of an idiot,” Jake said, trying to make it a joke and failing. Anastasia did not laugh.
“I’ve read some of your work.” Anastasia said dryly. Jake waited patiently for her to continue, but apparently that was the only comment she intended to make about his work. Whether it confirmed or disconfirmed her belief that he was an idiot remained unspoken, but he would have erred on the side of idiocy, as was his custom.
Jake made an uncomfortable throat clearing sound, as he wasn’t sure whether he should say thank you or not. He thought small talk a waste at the best of times, and he certainly wouldn’t describe this phone conversation in that way. He thought it best to get straight to the point.
“She said she was going home, do you know what she meant by that Mrs. Pemberley?”
The gasp that he heard on the other end of the line told him that she did know what it meant. That she knew it very well.

“Where you are isn’t important, you know that, don’t you?” asked Si(mone), still using a calm, soothing tone. Alice looked at her, and knew she was right.
“No, of course.”Alice said, shaking her head slightly, smiling at her own foolishness. It didn’t matter where she was at all, only where she was going.
“You ought to wait until the morning to go there. It won’t do to arrive in the dark. It won’t do at all.” Si(mone) said, and once again, Alice knew exactly what she meant. She also knew it didn’t matter.
“I don’t have a choice.” Alice said, her voice soft, dreamy, but determined. She knew that for her, time had run out. It was time to go.
“I know,” said Si(mone), not unkindly. She would have helped Alice if she could, but she saw that Alice’s immediate future was set. She would have to go, and she would have to go tonight.

33,385 Words on Day 20

I am going to post a longer excerpt than usual, I just really loved this press conference that I wrote today, it was very fun to write, and inspired by a friend who gave me a list of questions that he thought would be funny to ask Ron Tortellini. Naturally, I borrowed heavily from others. Those of you who aren't Katie, please excuse the lengthy hockey reference, I think you'll be able to battle through it though. Ron Tortellini is becoming a bigger character than I had imagined he would.

If he would have been paying attention, he would have seen that the press conference was a real ‘corker’, not that Jake would have used the word, since he generally disapproved of its use. It seems that all the sports reporters in the room, not just Jake’s friends, had cottoned on to the fact that this was quite simply, a clusterfuck. Tortellini was uncharacteristically unflappable. Perhaps it was because the season hadn’t started yet, and he hadn’t yet had to endure the Leafs firecracker October start, only to slide into a winless funk sometime in November, which would run until some time in April, at which point the Leafs would wake from their narcissistic slumber, take a look around, and notice that they were sharing the shit bottom of the standings with the likes of the goddamn New York Islanders for Christ’s sake, as well as the Montreal Canadiens, who absolutely fucking imploded this year and yet here we are. Yes, perhaps it was because that was not only something he had not yet had to endure, but something he might not have to endure at all, given that the season might not happen. In any case, Tortellini was in a fine mood, which led to a complete devolution as the questions ceased to even be about hockey, but just to try to piss of the man who people loved to see pissed off.
“Ok…” Ron looked around the room, “Phil Carr, let’s hear it.”
“Yes sir, I was just wondering, briefs or boxers?”
“Damien Cox.”
“What do you think are more effective, toothpicks or dental floss?”
“Christie Blatchford, what are you doing here? You don’t even report on the news, you just write slanted, right wing bullshit for the worst paper in town. Shouldn’t you be somewhere writing an article about how global warming doesn’t exist?” Ron asked, sneering.
“Well, sir, I’m actually here because I don’t need to do any research or background work to write my articles. In fact, I often find that the facts get in the way of the stories I want to tell.” Christie Blatchford replied. “So, what I want to know is, can you confirm that despite statistics gathered by pinko commie ‘criminologists’ that demonstrate that all types of violent crime are on the decrease in all of Canada’s large cities, and have been since the 80s, violent crime is in fact on the rise, that anecdotal evidence is vastly more useful than carefully gathered objective data and also, while you’re at it, that most modern day scientists are indeed in league with the socialists who want to turn Canada into the next Cuba?”
“I cannot confirm that. But I would like you to quote me as saying that Farmers Feed Cities.” Ron responded. It was the only question he answered that day, and he answered the question, not out of respect for Christie Blatchford, who he knew would never publish a word of it, but for the cameras. He was hopeful that it would make its way onto YouTube and that people in cities everywhere would rise up in support of farmers, when they realized the shocking truth. That farmers provide food to cities. It was a brilliant manoeuvre. Well played, Torts, well played indeed.
The questions began to come faster now, with Ron no longer even calling upon reporters to ask them.
“Do you like pasta, Ron?”
“Did you see 24/7?”
“Were you a fan of Happy Days, and if so, do you remain a fan?”
Jake heard none of this, though later he would have the opportunity to perform a google video search, where he entered the words “Toronto Sports Reporters Drunk”, and if he scrolled down, it would be the fifth video on the list, and he would be able to watch the entire press conference. If Jake would have been paying attention to the press conference, rather than to his inner turmoil, he might have delivered the question that might have shaken Ron Tortellini to the core. “Is it true that a secret organization exists in support of fighting in hockey, that this secret cult calls itself ‘Five for Fighting’, that this group is often confused with the American singer-songwriter with the aforementioned stage name, despite the fact that those goons clearly couldn’t write a song as tender and insightful as ‘100 Years,’ or as pain-ridden as ‘Superman (It’s Not Easy), even if given liberal access to 100 typewriters over the course of 100 years?. And further, is it true that Justin Bieber is widely believed to be not only a member, but the group’s choreographer?” Sadly, Jake was not paying attention, and this insightful series of questions would remain unasked by the Toronto sports journalism representatives.

A Gordon Excerpt

I am including another excerpt from yesterday's writing session, because I thought that Esmondes would really enjoy this... hope you like it! Please note there is no picture because apparently my search function for 'Vampyres Drunk' has been disabled. Actually, I just didn't like any of the pictures. In desperation, I googled 'David Boreanaz drunk', sure I would get something worth using, but instead, there were only near pornographic images of David Boreanaz topless and/or in a bathtub. Weird.

“No, Gordon…” he said, trying to force patience into his voice. “I don’t at all feel that this is an epistemological question.” Jake was of course sure of no such thing, since he had no idea what the word epistemological meant. He was sure that no one knew what that word meant, and it was only used in conversation by pretentious assholes who were trying to make others feel stupid. This was one of Gordon’s mannerisms that drove Jake out of his ever loving mind. He continued to sit as calmly as possible in the tiny chair opposite Gordon nonetheless, a sure demonstration of his commitment to getting answers. It was normally about this time that Jake stormed out of Gordon’s office, muttering insults under his breath.

“Naturally you would think that.” Gordon said, the smug smile on his face making Jake want to plant his fist in the middle of it. “You are nowhere close to understanding the power of be(coming) animal. It has always stood in your path to true enlightenment. You are still caught up in the cycle of attaching discursive meaning to what you should be considering using the concept of signification. Foucault wrote about it extensively in his childishly simple volume “The Archeaology of Knowledge,” though it was explained far more thoroughly and convincingly in my brilliant doctoral dissertation. I was robbed of the award for dissertation of the year. Apparently they considered GRE scores in their evaluation of the various qualifying dissertations. Hard to believe, but some person actually scored higher than I, but of course I didn’t study.” Gordon said by way of explanation, which is to say, it was no explanation at all. For good measure, he flourished his cape and leered menacingly at Jake. It was true, there was a person who had scored higher on the GRE than Gordon, and there was a reason why Gordon had relocated to Toronto, Ontario, though his PhD from Berkeley would surely have granted him any number of academic positions. He had followed his nemesis across the continent, and would not rest until complete victory was his. But that was another story, for another time.

If Jake were a man who believed in using a word like gobsmacked, he would have applied it to his feelings here, but Jake did not approve of the word, even in internal dialogue. Jake closed his eyes and thought of Alice, thought of her smile, and the way the wind blew her hair in her eyes. He breathed deeply and told himself that Gordon was the only one who had information about where Alice was. He needed to get through to him.

Gordon took the opportunity to fill the silence. “You should read it.” He said, lowering the cape and then returning it to cover half of his face.
“Read what?” Jake said, not being rude but truly disoriented. Talking to Gordon usually made him feel that way.
“My dissertation. It will explain everything,” he said, his voice slightly muffled as he spoke through his cape. He lowered the cape, pulled a black thread off his lower lip, looked at it, then moved the cape back to its position and resumed looking at Jake. His desperate need to have someone, anyone read his dissertation was transparent to the point of being pathetic.
“I’m not reading your dissertation, Gordon.”

Day 19, 31,697 Words...

Hi everyone! So sorry for my long absence, but I have been away from WiFi all week!! I am back to work tomorrow, so I will have more regular Internet access, and more things to procrastinate so I will get more fully caught up tomorrow.
Wow, I am so impressed with the quality of what people have put up on the blogs. indigo and Katie, you are both really bringing the noise and I'm sorry I haven't been able to support you more fully. That will all change as we find ourselves on the home stretch. 11 days... I hope to finish in 10.

My novel has not had much happening in it, as you would expect, but I did write in a couple of things I hope you enjoy. Katie, we both oddly enough included many of the same details from Degrassi! And I had Alice make a brief stop in a small town outside of the small town of Black Wood, where she visited Buns of Steel for the Guac-Off.
Here is an excerpt of the conversation between Alice and the young ingenue from the bakery, please enjoy!!

For the first time, Alice noticed a table that had been set up, with three panelists seated in front of microphones. She quickly recognized 2 out of the 3 celebrities, as would any person with eyes. The actor who had played Joey Jeremiah in the hit television series Degrassi Junior High and Degrassi High was easily recognizable in his patterned vest and jauntily tipped fedora. The actor who portrayed ‘Snake’ was also recognizable, once the context of ‘Degrassi Junior High’ had been established. He was wearing printed parachute pants that had been so popular in the 1980s, along with a tie-dyed shirt. The third member was not at all recognizable, but bore a startling resemblance to Sybil Trelawney from Harry Potter fame. But instead of the round glasses favoured by the psychic witch, she wore the square framed lenses made popular by Derek ‘Wheels’ Wheeler, the third member of the band “The Zit Remedy”, which later was name simply “The Zits”. Instead of the flowing floral dresses that Sybil always wore, this woman wore a denim jacket paired with Mom jeans, the look made famous by ‘Wheels’. And instead of wild hair contained by a long scarf, this woman wore what was rather obviously a wig, fashioned in a classic 80s mullet.
Alice knew that the actor who had portrayed the much loved character ‘Wheels’ had recently died. To(Ron)To(!) had run a full page obituary in tribute to the actor, although they had only focused on the ‘Wheels’ years, commenting only on the various story lines that had involved Wheels throughout the 9 year run of the Degrassi series, from the ill-fated attempts to ‘go all the way’ with class president Stephanie Kaye, to the shooting of the music video for the Zits smash hit ‘Everybody Wants Something’, to the darker turns his character took involving the death of his parents and his own struggles with alcoholism. The obituary had been a hit, with the newspaper selling more copies of that edition than any before or since. Alice felt that it was in very poor taste to try to replace what was surely an irreplaceable member of the much loved Degrassi triad and told the young man holding the tray as much.
He nodded with understanding, he too had a reverence for the character Wheels, as did anyone who had ever watched the show. “Of course we would never try to replace Wheels,” he said. “The third celebrity judge is actually a psychic named Si(mone) Greengage. She is channeling the spirit of Neil Hope, the actor who played Wheels. We had a bit of a rocky start when she was trying to call up the spirit of Wheels but couldn’t remember the actor’s name who portrayed him. None of us could, and apparently the spirit did not wish to answer to the name Wheels. Crazy I know. Anyhoo… a quick google search turned up the name Neil Hope, and things were smooth sailing from that point forward.” He said, audibly breathing a sigh of relief.
“You’re lucky that no one had disabled the search function that would allow you to perform such a search,” she said wisely.
“I know right?” he responded. Clearly he had dodged a bullet, and he knew it. “I’ll catch up with you later…” another glance at her chest, “Alice.” Alice hated to see the young man go, but she loved to see him walk away.

21,936 Words... Week 2 Blahs

I actually did enjoy my writing session, but I am still technically experiencing the Week 2 Blahs, as I need to start making things happen, but am not quite sure how to write what is coming next... so I just write a lot of description. Ugh. Anyway, here is an excerpt from what I wrote, hope you enjoy.

That night the locals of Black Wood, Ontario all went to bed early. Even Jackie, who never closed up shop early, had no choice. For once, no one came in. In the eerie silence of his living room, Jackie sat, alone, a sense of foreboding in his belly and a song in his heart.
They all went to bed early, and so no one was there to witness Alcantara putting on her Sunday best and preparing for a guest, the first she had had in days without count. For houses, as I’ve said, keep their own time, they leave the counting to the rest of us.
The oil lamps that had been left sitting on the mantel were lit, how this happened without human hands to light them I don’t care to guess, but lit they were, and in the warm glow cast by an oil lamp, does not even the dustiest living room seem a welcoming sight? An old fashioned gramophone sat on a solid oak side table. If you’d seen that side table yesterday, you’d have thought it dull and in need of a good polish, but that night it gleamed with a warm glow, as did the dusty carpets, their faded colours picking up the warmth from the flames of the lamp. And somehow, the gramophone had been wound, and was playing an old song, a happy one, one you could dance to if you had the mind to do it. Would you care to dance with the devil by the pale moonlight? I think you’d be best to choose to pass.
In the dark of that August night, the dog days of summer as they are called, Alcantara did her very best, like a young woman preparing for her first date. Sad it might be, if you look at it in that light. How she wanted to try. That night, Alcantara put out the equivalent of a welcome mat. But perhaps it isn’t the type you’re thinking, a warm brown shade, somewhere to wipe your boots before entering a home where loved ones await your arrival. Perhaps it was more like an unseasonal pink fuzzy mat, not even intended for outdoor use, with a creepy, disembodied hand clutching a revolver. And perhaps instead of the word “Welcome” scrolled in a pleasant cursive, which would have indeed indicated comfort and warmth. Instead, it might read “I don’t dial 911”. Indeed, as Alcantara was cut off from all lines, electrical and otherwise, it seemed highly unlikely that she would consider such a thing. For Alcantara had her own way of dealing with those who have the audacity to enter her walls. It wouldn’t do to dial 911, it wouldn’t do at all.

FINALLY... the breakup, at 20,610 words!!

Ok... so everyone knows I planned to write this breakup somewhere around Day 2. I have been putting it off for 10 days, which in a 30 day writing period is way too long. I almost put it off for another day, but soldiered on, going over my goal for word count to just PULL THE TRIGGER!
I feel really free, in fact, writing the breakup scene I channeled a lot of my own feelings about writing the breakup scene. So here it is, in all its glory...
finally.

Alice felt electric with unencumbered fury and a soaring sense of freedom. Jake either felt or saw the change, it’s not clear. But the phone loosened in his hand and slipped away from his ear as Alice rose from the table, her chair making an ugly screeching noise as she went. She liked the ugly sound it made. It matched the ugliness she felt it inside. She liked it so much she wished that she could rise from her chair again and make the same sound. But even in her enraged state she knew life didn’t work that way. It was like when your shoe made an embarrassing farting noise as you were walking with your friends. Try as you might to recreate it to prove it was your shoe making the noise, not you, the universe would always conspire against you to ensure that you can never make the same noise twice. And so Alice stood her ground.
She liked being in the higher position, standing while Jake sat at the table with what was increasingly becoming a gormless look on his face. She liked the feeling she had of power, of knowing what was going to happen, of finally taking action. The voice inside, the new one, the dark one, liked it too.
She found her voice, and though it was shaky and she sounded close to tears, which she might well have been, there was a strength in it she hadn’t expected. “You… are… everything… they said you were.” These words came from nowhere, she had never imagined herself speaking them, and yet she knew as they left her mouth that they were the right ones. In this case ‘right’ meaning the ones that would hurt the most.
Jake looked as shocked as he felt. He looked helplessly at the phone, as though it might somehow provide some answers, and then back at Alice.
Every time Alice had thought about breaking up with Jake, she had thought she would deliver a long speech. She had thought she would explain, or at least try to explain that she loved him, that she didn’t want to leave, but that she had to. She thought she would try to make him understand, and failing that, she might try to make herself understand. She had imagined this so many times that she was very surprised when she did none of those things. This new power coursing through her veins and this voice in her head said ‘you owe him nothing’. And because she liked what the voice was saying, she listened.
She cast aside her useless anxieties about what Jake would say, or would he cry, or might he get angry, and would she be able to do it… all of these things she tossed to the wind, where they belonged. What Jake did, or said, was meaningless. She was leaving, and that was that. She didn’t even slam the door behind her. She just left.

15, 081 Words... My plot derailed again...

I honestly think that if I didn't have lengthy stretches of internal dialogue, dream sequences, and karaoke nights I would not have any novel at all. I returned to Jackie's Place today, and included a karaoke scene that had absolutely no relevance to anything. But I got my words in for the day and am pleased with the effort.

I apologize for the length of this excerpt, but I really didn't know when to stop. I think everything I wrote today was intended only for an audience of Esmondes (and Heather) because this would make absolutely no sense to anyone else.

I hope you enjoy, and please, click on this video and watch it... so amazing.



Jackie refused to run the air conditioning that summer, some said to raise beer sales (this was truly unnecessary) some said in a bid to rid himself of his customers, who seemed to annoy Jackie, especially when they wanted to order things. Others said that Jackie had spent a significant amount of time in tropical climates, and was prone to feeling a chill more than others. Others said that Jackie liked the way he looked when he was sweaty. This was a feasible explanation, for Jackie looked quite terrifying as his muscled arms (which looked like they had been treated with an excellent spray tanner) glistened, and sweat collected on his brow, which was frequently furrowed in what looked like anger but might have just been his face. Whatever the reason, it was a hot summer, filled with soaring highs (not just the temperature, but the news that Forever 21 had discontinued its stock of purple harem pants, which brought a rousing fist pump from Freddie Sands, the second oldest resident of Black Wood), and heartbreaking lows, when the Canadian Women’s Soccer Team lost their match to the United States due to some highly controversial decision made by a Norwegian referee. That afternoon Jackie bought the house a round and burned all of the Norway themed ultra suede classic IPod cases he had painstakingly crafted earlier in the summer. Originally, he had just made one, using ultra suede scraps he had laying around, but after he had made one, he found himself making them for all of his friends, or perhaps more accurately, as Jackie did not strictly have any friends, he had made them to use as prizes during his infamous poker nights.
In the heat of the moment, and in solidarity with Canada’s brave women, Harold Pawson came close to sticking his foot through Jackie’s corner television unit, an old model that had dominated the corner of that living room for as long as anyone could remember. Harold was stopped dead in his tracks when Jackie calmly and quietly cleared his throat. Harold turned around just as Jackie raised his blond eyebrows slightly. Harold lowered his foot and returned shamefacedly to his seat in the floral armchair, which predictably, had doilies on the arms.
In mid August, the weather cooled slightly, and the farmers breathed a sigh of relief as the rain finally came. It was of course, too late for this year’s crops, which had for the most part been destroyed by the hot, dry summer, but it was welcome nonetheless, and many a resident of Black Wood was seen standing in the rain, palms upward, the cool rain hitting their faces as they grinned upward at the skies. They most decidedly did not look anything like Usher in his groundbreaking video for You’ve Got It Bad, in which he brazenly danced in the rain with no shirt on.
In celebration, Jackie decided to host a karaoke night at Jackie’s Place, a rare occurrence, and one the locals always looked forward to. Everyone arrived that night dressed in their Sunday best, their thin hair combed heartbreakingly with some sort of bryl creem, and some with flowers in their lapels. The farmers brought their wives, who rarely appeared in Jackie’s Place, but were a welcome addition to the usual crew of octogenarians, farmers, and traveling farm equipment salesmen (who truthfully, were not welcome at all). Brenda Simmonds kicked things off with a wavering but in key rendition of Patsy Cline’s well-loved ballad, Crazy. It was a safe choice, to be sure, but most of the riskier choices would begin once everyone was well into their cups.
Harold Pawson and Henry Cavill performed a rousing version of Aerosmith’s “Dream On,” pouring all of their considerable farming rage and angst into the lyrics in what could only be described as a tour de force performance. What everyone was most looking forward to, of course, was when Jackie would set down the filthy rag he used to polish the floor and the glasses, and take the mike to perform LFO’s monster hit, Every Other Time. It was truly eerie how Jackie had managed to perfect every nuance of Rich Cronin’s masterful performance, replete with kneeling, back somersaults, sitting and letting his arms hang down to the floor, pointing directly in people's faces, pointing at the ceiling, pointing at women, and grabbing his crotch. When Jackie sang the line “sometimes we swim around, like two dolphins in the ocean of our hearts”, which is arguably the best lyric of all time, the locals cheered, giddy with pop music love and booze laden cocktails.

11,744 Words...Plugging Away

Last night I wrote about 1500 words, including some great Gordon material, a classic EsNoWriMo moment where my main character realized that she had been lost in her thoughts for some time and had lost track of a conversation she was in the midst of (what would a novel be without multiple such moments?) Since our characters have very rich internal dialogues, this is a sure occurrence, I know both Indigo and Katie's characters have both already been caught out.
In my book, Alice's dreams are intensifying... this is a sure sign for her that she needs to move on, as she has been doing her whole life. Here is part of a description of her latest dream (which she is thinking about while she is in the middle of a conversation with Gordon the Vampyre, her editor).

In the dream she was driving her blue Ford Mustang Boss 302. When Alice first heard the song “Fast Car”, she, like most people with functioning sensory organs had immediately fallen in love with Tracy Chapman’s bittersweet account of love, hope and loss, but she seemed to have gotten the message backwards. Alice had determined upon hearing the song that she would always own a fast car, and that she would always keep on driving. The song to her was about the freedom that a fast car represented. Since that time she had promised herself she would be the one to do the driving. She didn’t want to rely on a man for the feeling that she could be someone.
Though she could have driven fast in that car, she was driving slowly, upon residential streets, if the streets she was driving could truly be described as residential. The houses were very few and very far between, and there was no traffic on the street. Sometimes when she passed a house she could see faces in the upstairs windows, indistinct, but pale and ghostly in the fading light. Her heart began to beat faster, as a certainty set in that she was in grave danger. The faces, instead of bringing a comfort of human presence in an isolated place, filled her with dread. They were not friendly faces, no, not friendly by a country mile.
Somehow, though she had no idea where she was, the car seemed to operate on its own, the steering wheel moving beneath her hands, left, right, straight on. It should be said that in no way was this experience similar to that of Michael Knight and his car, KITT, in the hit television series, Knight Rider, which had a successful run in the 1980s. Michael Knight, expertly played by the inimitable David Hasselhoff, drove a trans am outfitted with an artificial intelligence unit. Together, they were a successful crime fighting unit. Alice’s car wasn’t really operating on its own, and it certainly wasn’t speaking to her, okay? Alice’s hair was also not coiffed in a bizarre combination of a white man afro and a mullet. It was a creepy experience, but not that creepy.


It should be noted, fellow novelers and supporters, that I in selecting this image of Knight Rider, I did not use the word 'drunk' in my google image search. I think this was a wise decision.

10,273 Words... I Think Something Might Happen Sometime Next Week

I am actually quite taken with how nothing is happening in my book right now, there's plenty of time for that! I do feel as though I am building up to something happening... the breakup that I thought I would be writing about on Friday has yet to happen, but it's coming. Soon Alice will be leaving Toronto and heading to Black Wood, Ontario.
Last night I watched the Woman in Black, starring Harry Potter. It was a very creepy movie, I highly recommend it. It was great inspiration. I had already planned on writing in a creepy rocking chair, but my resolve to do this was strengthened by this film.
Here is a brief excerpt... hope you enjoy!

Academia had been good for Alice… it allowed a lot of opportunity for travel, and academics were a group of transients, not unlike gypsies (some of the things they had in common were that people generally mistrusted them, and at various times throughout history, people wanted to kill them). This provided Alice with a sense of community, a feeling that she was among others like her, that is to say, social misfits with vast yet completely useless knowledge on a topic so narrow as to render normal human conversation difficult, if not impossible. But as time went on, she realized that she felt very disconnected from her work, which seemed to her utterly meaningless. The breaking point had been a misguided venture into mommy blogging, where she had erroneously believed that she could rouse mommy bloggers from their narcissistic slumber and mobilize them against the injustices affecting their own and their children’s futures. Her complete and total failure had opened her eyes, and she had left academia, with no idea of how she was going to earn a living. Freelance writing had at first seemed a dream come true, so well suited was it to her lifestyle. But she earned one job, then another, and then another. She had never looked back.

Throughout her thirties, Alice had gradually come to accept that perhaps her wanderlust was as much a part of her as her hazel eyes. She stopped fighting it, and as a result, caused less damage to herself and to those around her. It was sort of like that scene in the first Harry Potter film, where Hermione directs Ron and Harry not to fight the Devil’s Snare. Hermione quite rightly pointed out that the more they struggled, the more they would become tangled in the deadly magical plant intent on killing them. Alice adopted a similar acquiescence (following Harry’s lead in the pivotal scene, not Ron’s), and gave in to her pathological need to stay on the move. When she needed to move on, she moved on… she stopped trying to hold onto things. A sort of acceptance that this was what her life was going to be like settled over her. That is, until Jake.

7,706 Words... God Bless These Blogs

Katie and I had a two hour writing session last night, which led to much hilarity, but for me, very little story development. This is ok! Every word I write is a good word, because it pushes me closer to 50,000 words. I went off on such a tangent I lost my way back to the story, but I think I've found my way back now. Thanks everyone for the continued support, and for posting such great excerpts on your own blogs. I have been without Internet the last couple of days, but I should be in more regular contact with the blogs this week. I can't believe how far ahead everyone charges! It has always been my style to plod along. I run out of things to write and write really stupid things for a while, then begin the next writing session trying to make sense of what I've done and who I've introduced. I have spent that last two days writing about a character who I have planned to get rid of... his only part in the story being that Alice breaks up with him... but I find I like writing about Jake Dempsey, and so I keep writing about him. Here is an excerpt from last night's session with Katie... sorry about the sports references but Jake is a sports writer, and I stole a large chunk from Katie's blog. "As Damien was escorted out, Jake saw that his moment had come. “Jake Dempsey, To(Ron)To (!)” Jake announced, using his hands to create parentheses. “You’ve continued to demonstrate support for star player, Phil Kessel, despite the fact that he has shown himself to be a defensive liability… he scores goals, but perhaps you should consider getting together a search party to locate Kessel on the backcheck.” Jake made no attempt to make this seem like a question. Torts raised his eyebrows incredulously. Jake continued, seeing that Torts was obviously close to the breaking point. “Given the weak state of Toronto’s defense overall, do you think it might make sense to bring back some of Toronto’s star defensive players, such as Aki Berg and Jeff Finger, to strengthen the blue line?” Jake waited for, and received the response he was looking for. There was a classic Torts line that had been delivered to Jake on so many occasions that at this point it had almost become Jake’s alone. Ron Tortellini looked both contemptuous and amused as he delivered it: “Stop coaching, Dempsey.” But then, as Dempsey’s coup de grace continued to sink in, Tortellini grew increasingly agitated. Perhaps he was remembering how particularly useless those two defencemen were… Torts had once famously pulled Aki Berg out of the lineup and replaced him with an orange construction pylon. To be fair, the pylon was more effective. When later asked about the move by reviled sports reporter, Pierre Maguire, Torts responded mysteriously with a guarded “I’m not going to tell you.” When Pierre Maguire turned tail and hustled away, his pink cheeks blazing with embarrassment, Torts had smiled and chuckled to himself, clearly amused with his own wit, as though he had told someone he was ‘trying to quit’ or perhaps called someone a ‘cheesester’. Whatever the case, whether it was remembering the desolation of having Aki Berg and Jeff Finger on his blue line, or Jake Dempsey’s continued insistence on offering ridiculously stupid coaching advice, Torts lost his Fonzarrelli-like cool. “Get the fuck out of here,” he grumbled, running his fingers through his salt and pepper hair, and looking as though he were about to charge over the top of the podium and strangle Jake. The press conference had instantly become a YouTube classic." I would also like to include a quick excerpt featuring Alice's dog, Queenie, who is obviously an older version of Pixie.

Queenie had been so immediate in her uncharacteristic approval of Jake that Alice had been caught off guard. Prior to allowing Jake into her apartment, she had prepared him for the fact that Queenie was really a one person dog, and would likely retreat to a corner, casting resentful looks in his direction whilst simultaneously delivering hurt looks of reproach in Alice’s direction. It was a peculiarly well-honed canine skill that Queenie had mastered. “I’m sure it’ll be fine,” Jake had said, in that annoyingly self-confident manner in which he said everything, “I’m a dog person.” Alice rolled her eyes in exasperation. “I’m sure I’ve never heard that one before,” she replied. Jake just smiled at her with calm self-assurance. At that point, Alice sort of hoped that Queenie would bite him when they entered. But contrary to her possessive nature, Queenie had frolicked like a 1 year old pup when Jake entered, bringing him her favourite toy, a pathetic tiger whose tail and one leg had been chewed off, and who looked the worse for wear to say the least. Queenie had had the tiger since she was a puppy, and she presented it to Jake, proudly wagging her tail, with her tongue hanging out of her face in a most undignified way. By the way, is anyone experiencing difficulties with getting blogspot to recognize paragraph breaks? And is anyone else finding it increasingly difficult to prove you're not a robot?

3,445 and Man, Do I Need Some Inspiration

What a shit writing day I had yesterday... I have so much to write but just can't seem to figure out how to pace appropriately, and am not finding the words! I think today is the day I stop caring about what I write and it's early in the process for that, but usually that's when writing becomes fun again. Sigh... I have Week 2 blues on Day 2... never a good sign. I introduced Jackie's Place today, just because. Jackie's Place in this novel is in Black Wood, Ontario, a South Western farming community, which I described as a barren wasteland for some reason. I have been saying a lot of really inaccurate and uninformed things about farming. Yikes. Well, here is an excerpt, and please, be heavy handed with the enthusiasm, I need the cheerleading today! I imagine Jackie looks like Kiefer Sutherland, I'm not sure if this is exactly as it always has been, or a weird twist in the EsNo Multiverse. I'm becoming increasingly disoriented by the 20+ novels we have churned out.

So here it is, in all its glorious hyperbole in inaccuracy... Black Wood, Ontario and Jackie's Place. In every inhabited area of the planet, no matter how remote, there is always a place for people to gather. So it has always been, and so it remains, even in the much maligned farmlands of South Western Ontario, where, if you were to have the misfortune of driving through these deserted wastelands, you might come to believe that life had never touched this corner of the Earth, and that if it had, it certainly would not have the modern day equivalent of the watering hole. But people are people, and even in Black Wood, they come together. In Black Wood, there were two places the locals liked to gather. Every town in Canada has a Royal Canadian Legion. I believe it has been put into law, but cannot strictly say that there is any evidence that this is the case. But the Legion was usually deserted, as the locals favoured the colourful exploits of the grumpy proprietor of Jackie’s Place. As is often the case in small towns, the restaurant/café/bar was located in what had once been a home, and the décor had changed little since it actually had been a home, which added to the peculiar sensation when you were in Jackie’s Place that you were just hanging out in the proprietor’s living room. Against his will, since he generally seemed to wish that everyone would leave. This did little to dissuade the locals, who flocked to Jackie’s Place like a group of enthusiastic physiotherapists to a pile of jock straps. At the best of times, farmers have a tough lot in my life. It is my understanding that virtually all levels of government care little for farmers, and in fact have put laws into existence that oppress and otherwise make life difficult for farmers. Apparently, reminders are frequently needed that farmers are in fact the producers of food that feed cities. Or so I’ve heard, but I know little of such things. In times of particular stress, like during the drought they were all experiencing in the summer of 2012, the locals of Black Wood, who were almost all tied to agricultural industry in one way or another met there with even more regularity, much to the chagrin of Jackie, who prayed for rain more vigorously than made sense for a man who had no concern for the wellbeing of his neighbours. Or perhaps more appropriately, a man who disbelieved in the power of prayer. But Jackie is a complex man, with complex motivations, and above all else that we can say about Jackie, we can all agree that he is not who he pretends to be. Let’s leave it at that.

1,716 Words... Finally a Human

Alice is the main character of this novel, a 40 year old writer with a pathological fear of laying down roots and a habit of having nightmares. She finally decided to show up, and here is a brief excerpt of her waking from one such nightmare... Katie, my first shout out to your novel. I'm sure there will be many along the way. "She couldn’t remember the particulars of the dream she was rising from now, slowly as ever,

but her skin felt ice cold despite the humid air of her apartment, and she was uncertain whether she were laying in her bed at all, or floating on the surface of frigid water. She couldn’t move, not yet, her body hadn’t let go of the dream enough, but she began to take in the details of her bedroom: the poster of Sidney Crosby, celebrating one of the most important goals in hockey, the ‘golden goal’ as she liked to call it and probably others with equally good taste did as well. How often had Sid been the first visible sign of sanity in the insane sleep world she occupied? She had lost count, or perhaps more truthfully, she had never counted at all, being the sort of person who didn’t believe in the power of counting."

942 Words So Far... Meet Alcantara

Ok, so I'm off and running, I will be writing more later today but right now I need to go to bed. I have written almost 1000 words and haven't yet introduced my main character. It seems like the house is going to emerge as almost a character in and of itself, strangely. The house is named Alcantara, a gaelic name meaning something like a Crusades battle site. Here is an excerpt, describing Alcantara (which I am beginning to think of as 'her') What would we see if we dared to swing open the gate( also once painted white)? We would hear its creak, and if we loved the house as someone once had, we might remind ourselves to oil it later. But Alcantara’s gate has not seen oil since time out of mind, and it creaks still. The creak of the gate would send a frisson of fear up the spine of even the most courageous of explorers, but we have steeled ourselves, and will continue our approach up the stone path, with weeds shooting up between the cracks. They will brush along our ankles, up as far as our knees even, making our skin crawl as we slap them away. You would think, given the abandoned air of the home that silence would reign, but despite the strange lack of wildlife around the home, the home is not still, and it is not silent. The wind echoes through the limbs of the big willow tree in the front yard, a rustle normally so comforting becomes the chilling sound of a death rattle. The wind catches every loose board, every space between the wooden boards, causing a series of creaks, and groans, and sighs, and whispers. If we listen closely, we might even believe we hear our own names being called. Will we make it to the porch? No one has, not for a long while. If we made it there, if we opened the door, and stepped inside, would we be surprised by what we found? Perhaps so. For no one has entered the house, not for many a year, and yet somehow, it has the feeling of a house waiting for someone to return. The wind is scarcely heard once inside, for the house is old and well built. The walls are thick and intended to protect what takes shelter within. It will hold on to heat in the winter and it will stay cool in the summer because back then they knew how to build homes for the seasons. What happens to old houses? Why are they as they are? We might find ourselves wondering as we stroll the empty corridors. For somehow, when you walk the empty halls of an old house the past seems closer, like if you closed your eyes and let your mind wander free you might begin to hear things, a piano playing, maybe fading laughter, maybe the sobbing of a child. We won’t hear them, but we’ll sense we almost could if we tried. Part of us will feel horror at this, the other part will feel a strange exhilaration that’s hard to explain.

Down The Rabbit Hole (Again)

Welcome to my 2012 blog... I can't believe I am about to embark on this mad adventure again. Well, 5th time's the charm or so they say... My main character, Alice, is about to plunge herself down the rabbit hole, and I guess I have no choice but to follow her and see where it goes. A return to the horror genre is just what the doctor ordered. This year, I think it will be a haunted house.

At midnight tonight the train departs... again. Are you ready fellow novelers?