Today: 1,675 words
Total: 28,518 words

I’m sorry, but I think this is the last NaNoWriMo post for 2023. I am getting slammed with all the cleaning I need to do for the oncoming visitors, my right shoulder and left knee are screaming at me from all the activity, and I just don’t have the extra spoons to chunk out that much wordage every day. I already know I’m going to finish this book. I just may not do it by November 30th.

On the plus side, I discovered that there is a shoulder brace available on Amazon that should give the pranged shoulder a certain amount of relief. Truly, what I really need to do is stop cleaning but that’s just not an option at the moment so mechanical help it is.

Today: 1,689 words
Total: 26,843 words

Today, I did something that I haven’t for quite a while. I headed out on a road trip. A writer buddy of mine lives out in Tyler, which is about two hours east of Plano, and I drove out there to have lunch with her, hang out, play with her cats, and talk writing.

Despite the construction hell that is I-635 and every truck in Texas picking today to travel eastbound on I-20, I needed this. I’ve been doing nothing but writing or cleaning this month and I kinda needed a chance to let some fresh air through my mind and decompress my subconscious. Also, we went shopping and I bought some really smenty wax melts, which is always fun.

Even better, we may be able to get her back into my writing group (she was one of the founding members) since they’re virtual these days and she has Zoom. I’ve pinged the group leader to extend an invite, and I really hope she joins us next Tuesday.

Today: 1,690 words
Total: 23,465 words

I’m approaching the midway point for NaNoWriMo, which feels good considering the other fifteen million calls on my time this month.

What are those calls, you ask? Let me tell you. So I have seasonal decor in our home. We have a wreath or some kind of decoration on the front door, garland that hangs in swags over the front door (plus a little wreath or decoration if I have one), flowers in tall tin vases in the sidelights flanking the front door, and as of last year a garland different from the one over the door that is swagged on our fireplace mantle and entwined with fairy lights (we did this last year with our Christmas swag as a kind of nightlight for J.J. and realized it looked really cool so we added lights to all the other garlands).

Normally I change out the decor at the beginning of each season. The winter decor goes up in January, the spring decor in April, the summer decor in July, the autumn decor in October, and the Christmas decor goes up with the tree. Needless to say, this year I was a bit preoccupied with other things in October and the summer decor has stayed up. Since I’m cleaning the house, however, I figured what the hey, even if it only stays up for three weeks I’m gonna put the fall decor up.

Cut to me climbing a ladder and swearing under my breath as I try to get the door garland hung evenly, then discovering that the new wreath hanger I got to replace the old one that broke a couple of weeks ago doesn’t have a little loop on the inside for the small decoration that I usually hang there. Climb down the latter swearing out loud now, hunt around for a big ol’ pushpin, climb back up the ladder and stick it over the door right under the fan light … and realize that I can’t put the usual cornucopia there because it will hit the door every time we try to open said door.

The cornucopia is now hanging in the kitchen (hey, it’s apropos) and a little autumn fruits wreath is hanging on the pushpin. The autumn flowers are in their vases, the fireplace garland is up and glowing prettily, and I even completed my NaNoWriMo word quota for the day, so there, nyah.

Today: 2,350 words
Total: 20,107 words

Et voila, my shortfall has been made up and I am back on track.

Of course, the moment that happened I had yet another brainstorm about a character that is supposed to be an antagonist to Poseidon and realized, “Yeah, that’s not a good idea.” So I had to switch the antagonist position to a third character, go back and make all of those changes and hope like hell that I haven’t missed something, then update all the changed pages in Vella so that anyone reading along will get the most updated version.

And then I started cleaning again because incoming relatives and all that. As a result, Jeremy and Jemma are not pleased with me. For lo, while Ramón did battle with the backyard fence I began the process of digging out and cleaning the guest room (which they assume is their bedroom).

They weren’t allowed to come back in until all the crap was moved out, everything was dusted and vacuumed, the furniture was moved into guest arrangement (the last person to sleep in there was me after my knee surgery and I shoved the bed into the corner because I like sleeping with my back to a wall), and the freshly laundered mattress protector was on the bed. Worse, they’re going to get turfed again tomorrow while I dust the blinds, wash the window, and put the newly laundered curtains back up along with the quilt I made for the room.

Look upon me, Catdom, and know that I am cruel. Muwahahahahahaha….

Today: 234 words
Total: 17,577 words

Yeah, yeah, I know. But it’s Saturday, I’ve spent the entire bloody day putting stuff away and fixing stuff in addition to doing the regular shopping, laundry, cooking, and cleaning.

Not to mention the little adventure I had today. I was sitting at the laptop working when I looked up and saw a little white poodle in a blue harness trotting across my front lawn. I waited, but there was no human following with a leash.

Well, crap. We don’t usually have dogs running around unleashed here—if they are, it means they’re lost or they’ve gotten out of their yards. Plus we have coyotes and bobcats (and some large raptors) who would look at that poodle and think, “Mmm, lunch.”

So No-Bra Muggins here headed out the door barefooted to try and grab the damn dog before it could trot out onto Hedgcoxe and get hit. By the time I got to the sidewalk it was only a few houses away from that very busy street and was having a merry old time sniffing bushes, running up to various houses, and blithely ignoring my claps and calls (since I can’t whistle with a numb lip).

As I inched closer an SUV pulled up and my heart went into my throat as the dog darted towards it. A woman got out and I explained that I saw the dog running around and was trying to capture it.

She replied, “Oh, that’s my dog. Someone must have let it get out the door.”

I figured “good enough” and headed back home so that the dog wasn’t scared by me and she could grab it. Anyway, good deed done for the day, I now know where that white poodle lives in case of future escapes, and I got some fresh air. But I didn’t make word count for the day as a result. Never mind. I’ll just have to hit it hard tomorrow and make up for lost time then.

Today: 1,699 words
Total: 17,344 words

We are slowly but surely creeping up towards the midpoint of the book and the main action. Which will, of course, be a battle scene because I write romantasy and like to have battle scenes in my books. Ahem.

In other news, I am married to an enabler. That’s all there is to it. Ramón claims that he isn’t, of course, but when he sees me crocheting a TARDIS beanie for my BFF and says, “You know, if you want to be a completist, that needs a flashing light on top.” And then when I google and find miniature battery operated flashing lights that can be clipped to things, well…

No, I’m not putting a flashing light on this thing. Unless I make one for myself. I do have enough yarn left over to do that, hmm…

Today: 1,693 words
Total: 15,644 words

And lo, the temperature dropped as I thought it would, plus we had a day-long rain. In light of this I thought that tonight would be a nice night for bangers and mash (or as Ramón calls it, “The food of my people”). I already had bottled brown gravy, onions, and a packet of instant mash at home so I headed over to my butcher’s to get the sausages (and some eggs)…

…and spotted a box full of lush, fat russet potatoes. I use instant mash for the convenience but it’s dreadfully salty, so I thought, “What the hey, just make some homemade mash” and grabbed three potatoes.

That, dear reader, was my first mistake.

My second mistake was thinking I could boil these taters in my large saucepan. Hahahahaha. After gazing at the mound of chopped up potatoes on my cutting board I put the large saucepan away and got out the soup pot. The potatoes alone filled it over halfway full, which led me to realize that my two quart kitchen bowl (which is usually what I prepare instant mash in) was not going to be nearly large enough to hold this amount of cooked potatoes plus the cup of rosemary/thyme/butter infused milk simmering next to the soup pot.

The two quart bowl went back into the cabinet and out came my four quart bowl. I put the cooked potatoes in there, added the infused milk, used a chopper to chop down the potatoes before switching to my hand mixer, and lo, I had about four quarts of mashed potatoes. For two people.

But they were delicious. Fluffy, creamy, redolent of rosemary and thyme, and not over-salted at all. And they went beautifully with the bangers and onion gravy. We currently have a smidge under three quarts left in the fridge and Ramón will lower that level when he has the leftover sausages and gravy tomorrow, but that’s still gonna leave a lot of mashed potatoes. Looks like I’m making cottage pie tomorrow night.