Today’s a tough, rainy day. I almost ducked out without writing, but here I am. Not so much wide-eyed and bushy tailed, but at least typing and trying to say enough to meet the day’s quota. (I don’t know how I’m going to get a real word count without including these asides about quotas and moods—you know, consternating about writing. I know, I know: it’s so rare and unexpected that I would do such a thing. Just as an example, this useless parenthetical is good for at least thirty or forty words.) The caffeine has only started to flow, and it might take me a bit to get into this.

I just returned from a wet golf outing. We walked around nine holes while the weather alternated between cold mist and freezing rain. Before driving to the course, we looked outside and seeing the rain assumed that the outing would be cancelled and we would bask in the warmth of free beer and the after-golf party food. The powers-that-be (and I’m still not sure exactly what they’re being, but I do know they weren’t being considerate in allowing us to stay dry) had other thoughts. From what the only real golfer on our six-some told us, golf, for golfers, was fun even in bad weather. He went on to say that there was little difference between golfing in the rain and the sunshine. You hit about the same, and it’s never as good as you were hoping. While I wasn’t too concerned about how well I hit, I was hoping not to stand out in the rain for two hours. I’ve been told that there’s no medical basis for the old wives’ tale that promises terrible, deathly sickness if you run around with a wet head in the cold. I’d like to present some anecdotal evidence against that: I’ve been coughing pretty heavily since returning to work after running around for two hours with a wet head on a cold, Seattle day. (Update: my cough has since gone away. I give credit to the cure-all that is caffeine.) As for my hitting (golf hitting, not general slapping-game skills, which are excellent, if you ever want to challenge me), I did take a couple of good whacks at the ball, but I don’t think I’ll be leaving my day job (or evening quasi-job—you know, writing) anytime soon.

I ended up leaving the golf outing early with a good excuse. My commuting buddy had a 4pm meeting. I missed all the yummy free food and drinks, but it was a small price to pay for getting back here in time to type. I was afraid if I put writing this off until tonight it would not get done, but I’m getting ahead of myself.

The golf outing was the first time I played golf since I was 9-years old or so. I am not counting mini-golf, or putt-putt, as it is not-so-affectionately known to those who play golf, because “real” golf can have no name-relation to a game where you shoot a ball into a clown’s mouth; and I’m not counting the driving range because that’s not much of a game. You just hit the ball as hard as possible in the direction of the guy driving the cart trying to pick up the hit balls. While it is a sport in some senses of the word, it’s certainly not golf. I don’t remember why we went golfing at the time, or with whom, but I do remember it was a short nine-hole course and I did not show the promise of a young, budding superstar. Remember, as a child, I wasn’t much of an athlete. I only grew into my lanky body late in college. I was a late bloomer, if you will. I think it’s the price that all of us immortals have to pay for being immortal. But I digress and reveal too many secrets. Except for the weather, the outing would have been fun. As it was, plodding through mud and dodging lightning bolts wasn’t much of a good time, but that might just have been me.

Doolies is arriving tonight for the weekend. Yeah! It has been a long week for me, and I’m looking forward to relaxing with her. If you asked her, Doolies would claim that her week has been longer, but I know better. She’s no longer on her hell rotation (you remember, the OB night-float where she would come home every morning more exhausted than the last one only to fall asleep and wake up less than eight-hours later and drag herself out of bed, kicking and screaming, to drive back to work), and I’ve told her that it’s time that she return to her normal state of happy-go-lucky, optimism, the you-know-that-large-flowers-will-grow-even-on-that-huge,-smelly-mound-of-shit-attitude. You see, it is my heartfelt belief that Doolies and I cannot both be complainers. As a general rule, in any relationship there needs to be a complainer and complain-ee. It is like the cycle of life. If everyone, all willy-nilly, complains, then the cycle of life would stop turning and, well, you know, bad things would happen: death, destruction, John Ashcroft would get his own talk show, and the gods will be angered; we’re talking apocalypse anger. To avoid that unpleasantness, I volunteer to assume my natural role as the complainer. With that settled, Doolies must resume her role as the complain-ee, i.e., someone who listens and provides sympathetic nods and sounds. It’s either that or the Early Morning show with John Ashcroft. I’ll let Doolies decide.

I already warned Doolies that I will continue writing the 2,000 words on Saturday and Sunday to warm up for the Marathon. Chuck has decided not to post any of his consternations or thoughts before the November start. Perhaps it would be better that way. My fear is that if I keep writing this drivel (and, yes, I will use that word in every musing from now until the start of the Marathon), I will wear myself out before I even start. But I’m lying to myself. The only reason I think it would be better to forgo this warm-up period is because I’m tired on this gloomy Friday. The words aren’t flowing like they have the last two days, and the caffeine hasn’t taken hold. There is a company party going on in the other part of the cafeteria where I usually write. One of the partygoers is giving a speech, which I can almost hear but not quite. I definitely heard a top-ten list, but he has since moved on. The speaker must be good because the audience roars with laughter at intervals, strumming my buzzing nerves. Ah, now there’s a second person talking. He’s obviously not as funny as the first, because the audience is only giving him polite chuckles, as if to say, “you’re not as funny as the last guy, but you probably have some say over my career, so I’m going to at least make an effort at appearing amused, or at least as amused as the girl next to me.”

But that’s enough of that. I’m going to pull myself through this low energy part and continue typing even if I have nothing to say. That’s what I’m here for: to try to learn to say something when nothing is happening. As for my lame excuse, one of my hopes after finishing Nanowrimo is to continue writing at least 2,000 words every day. The more you write, the better you write, and the easier it is to write. It’s like going to the gym: if you go every day, then it’s not a chore. But if you skip a day or a week, getting back into it is difficult. (I don’t even want to think how I’m going to go back to the gym after I’ve taken the last two weeks off.)

Sorry for the delay, but I had to leave the cafeteria. The noise level combined with my impending anxiety caused by the caffeine rush placed me a state that made it impossible to stay where I was. Now I’m in the lobby on my customary, evening cushy chair pounding away on the keyboard. I’ve gone back up and edited the entry. Now that the caffeine has kicked in, I was able to rewrite my previous thoughts to increase their breadth, length, and amusement value. I know I said I wasn’t going to edit, or at least try not to edit, but I want to make a revision to that rule: it is okay to edit if either (a) by editing you will significantly lengthen the writing; or (b) you’ve finished your writing for the day and feel energized enough to edit it.

You’re probably wondering if I have anything of importance to talk about today, or if I was just going to babble my 2,000 words away. I was leaning toward the babbling choice today, but I guess I should at least talk about my story. To recap, last we left our hapless hero, he was wearing a magical pink sweater. We knew nothing else about him, except that he was probably cynical and was telling the story about his sweater. I’ve already chosen the voice, as I indicated last time: it’s going to be told from the first-person perspective, from his perspective, that is. What I haven’t decided was whether it would be present or past tense, and why he would be telling the story.

For short stories, it is now acceptable to use the first person, present tense. While present tense would be the easier tense (since I wouldn’t have to explain why he is telling the story—it would be assumed that the reader would just be watching the narrator as he lived his life), my gut feeling, which will probably change many times before I start, and too many times while I’m writing, is that the story should be told in past tense, where the narrator is looking back over what has happened. That opens up two more choices: will the narrator explain why he’s telling the story, or will the reader not know the purpose of the narrative. There’s a term for all of these mechanics, but I’m not a lit. major. I do remember reading about all these choices with glazy eyes when I was trying to better myself by learning the mechanics of storytelling. (It’s now obvious, in retrospect, that all that studying did not amount to much.)

It will probably be easier to figure out these answers once I have a better handle on the plot and characters. Seeing as I don’t think I’m going to accomplish much today in the way of original ideas about the story—I’m finding that I do my best thinking right before bedtime, when I lie in bed and stare at the ceiling, trying to see my story’s characters living their lives—I might as well organize the questions that I will have to solve before I sit down to write the story in ten days.

(Damn, ten days does not seem like a long time. Skimming through the message board, I’m reading posts by all these people who are excited about starting the storytelling. Hell, even Chuck, for all his screaming and bitching like a little girl—not that little girls bitch more than, say, little boys, but I did grow up sexist and it’s difficult to not make fun of guys by calling them girls or lay-off the fat jokes, but I am trying!—is excited about starting the writing. I’m more nervous than anything else. I know that the first few days will determine if I can move from writing 2,000 word musings to 2,000 word stories. And, yes, I’ve already accepted that the story won’t be up to my usual requirements for a good story. Hell, none of my stories have been up to my requirements. What I do know, however, is that it has to better than some of the unpublished (or, worse, self-published) shit that I’ve been reading from the aspiring writers that use Nanowrimo to further their writing skills. Damn, there’s my egotism again showing its scary fangs. I guess I shouldn’t make fun of those writers. Many of them are high school or college students who are trying to develop their writing chops. Imagine if I had done that while in school! But we won’t go there now. I can have a long, long discussion about missed opportunities and where I would be today if things were different. But as my good friend Steven has told me, if I had taken different paths, I would not be the person that I am today, and that would change everything, even my writing skills and desires.)

Okay. I got off track on that last paragraph. I did want to talk more about my story, but I have passed my quota for today and I have to getting moving. If I leave now, I might be able to get home and take a shower before Doolies gets here. Here are some final thoughts that I didn’t get to: questions for the story: narrator’s name; what type of job; any relationships; and in general, who is this guy?

Writing time: 2 hours (some time should be taken away from that for ceiling staring and moving around waiting for the caffeine to kick in); Word Count: 2,178; Caffeination: Tall Mocha. After edit word count (including this paragraph): 2,257; Edit time: 20 minutes.