Counting

I'm listening to Joy Lynn White (she brings tears to my eyes, I love her stuff so much) and drinking AppleBocq (is the sun over the yard arm yet? It's only 3.1% alcohol), and working on the novel. A few days ago, I'd managed about 45,000 words, which was about 5,000 more than a month ago. As of now, I'm up to 56,000, which means I've knocked off 11,000 words in a couple of days. Nice. It's good to know you can still pound it out, after all.

I'd been trying to work my way over the hump I'd reached - let's face it - a year ago, where I had no idea what had happened, or why, and what was going to happen next, and over the past few weeks I just forced my way through it. The acceleration over the past couple of days was the downhill bit. Another 4,000 words, I reckon I'll have a first draft, something to knead into shape, pulling it up to the 80,000 words or so I think I'll end up with.

AppleBocq is delicious, refreshing, a fantastic summer drink. It's not summer, but it was reduced in Sainsbury's, so what the hell. It's got an acid bite to it, but it's not like cider. It's like the difference between pressed apple juice and the reconstituted stuff, a pressed apple juice beer.

That, and the 56,000 words, has made me feel mellow enough that if I had all my readers' addresses, I'd be sending off Joy Lynn White YOU MUST LISTEN TO THIS samplers, so it's prolly lucky I haven't, eh?