So we got the snow at last. Threeway snowball fights after school, hot chocolate and toasted sandwiches to defrost afterwards.

All in all, not a bad afternoon.

Look what we did today!

Yes, I finally came over all christmassy and got the tree out. After half an hour of fashioning a new stand out of an old plant pot, some playpit sand and a couple of chunks of concrete (because for some reason the original stand went walkies), the girls spent a very seasonal hour dressing the tree.

Now, I know it looks like a dog's breakfast in that photo, but we happen to think that a thoroughly chaotic christmas tree looks very happy and festive!

* * *

My mum phoned yesterday to ask me if the MP3 player she was about to buy was actually the one I wanted for Christmas. Yay! Now I can play the "Randomised Playlist Oracle" game! Although I do have serious doubts what question would require the answer "'Lost' Podcast".

A word about That Memo:

Anyone else get the impression that Bush is just predisposed to attack anyone called Al?

In the absence of anything contructive to write about, except a rambling piece on the mysteries being written into "Lost", here's a Meme I swear I've done before but which everyone else seems to be doing:

What is your idea of perfect happiness?
Whatever it is, it would have to be a state everyone on earth reached at the same time, otherwise, I'd be sad that someone wouldn't be experiencing it.

What is your greatest fear?
Some brain disease or other. Being trapped in a body that doesn't work, feeling your memories and intellect dying when there's nothing you can do.

What is the trait you most deplore in yourself?
My temper.

Which historical figure do you most identify with?
I am the emperor of Rome and the Visigoths are at the gates.

What is your greatest extravagance?
Probably the new computer.

What is your favourite journey?
Birmingham to Harlech via Bala.

What do you like most about your appearance?
When I walk out the house, I look just the way I want to.

Which living person do you most despise?
The kid who burgled us. I'd love to say Blair and Bush and so forth, but really they're just the focus for the corrupt and evil Libertarian states who control them. We look at them and condemn them while behind their facade of rulership, the real power strips away our freedom and dignity.

What is your greatest regret?
I can't make a difference yet.

When and where are you happiest?
No gout, no IBS, kids are behaving (or at school), I've had enough sleep, Charlie's happy, etc etc etc.

What is your current state of mind?
Trying not to go to the loo because I know it'll hurt like fuck. Wishing Bethan would leave the rabbit alone. Trying to watch Doctor Who.

If you could change one thing about yourself what would it be?
It'd be nice to make my body work properly for once. Failing that, I'd like hair that was less grey.

What do you consider your greatest achievement?
The kids.

What is your most treasured possession?
The kids.

What do you regard as the lowest depth of misery?
Giving up.

A graphical meme blatantly stolen from various residents of Swansea:

This is how you play: do a Google image search of the following and post the first (or favorite if you want to cheat, but label it so) result for each::

The name of the town where you were born
I live in the same town, so I've googled for the district instead


The name of the town where you live now
As above, this is froma search for the district


Your name


Your grandmother’s name (just pick one)


Your favorite food


Your favorite drink


Your favorite song
So many to choose from...I dunno...


Your favorite smell

What's on my mind today?

The country's running out of flu vaccine, and pretty obviously it's being blamed on scared people thinking the jab will protect them from the dreaded bird flu.

Excuse me, but how thick are these people? Have the people asking for the jab not considered tht if bird flu was susceptible to a normal flu vaccine, that dozens of people in China may not have already died? Do the GP's have no clue why they're constantly having to order more phials, when usually they can't give them away?

No, something's fucked up about that, really. We need a definitive advertising campaign telling people to lay off the normal vaccine if they want protection from bird flu. It might help if they stayed away from Essex animal quarantine centres because that's the only place where bird flu's turned up in the UK.

As a small aside, Roman Abramovitch, owner of Chelsea Football Club has been granted special permission to take his parrot to New Zealand. So if the bird flu does surface in the wild over here, blame Chelsea.


* * *

Parents are calling for guidelines on how much help they're allowed to give their kids with their coursework.

This comes back to my favourite pet soapbox subject.

Here's a really easy thing to understand: If your kid can't do the coursework, if everyone is needing help to complete it, then it's either genuinely too hard, or they're not being equipped to complete it either mentally or physically by the schools.

The solution? (long-term readers will recognise this) Stop pissing around with the syllabus. Let the teachers alone long enough for them to get a grip on the criteria neded and to come up with workable, non-baffling courswork assignments that the kids can actually have a hope of completing.

The outcome of this request from parents? Education secretary Ruth Kelly is calling for a widespread reassessment of the syllabus.

AARGH!

* * *

Gary Glitter is being accused of fucking a 12 year old girl in Cambodia - by the 12 year old girl.

Good.

Someone on the radio made an excellent point that might not have occurred to many people. In the countries in question - Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, etc, sex tourism is big BIG business and corruption is rife. Despite all efforts to cease the sick trade in young children's bodies, it continues relentlessly. The obvious conclusion one must reach? That the economies of these countries actually rely on the sex trade. And that's just sick. Continentally sick.

* * *

OK, I'm never going to make the 50,000 WriMo target by Nov 30th, but I am going to keep going with Tapestry because it's all mapped out in my head.

The reasons I'm citing in defense of my faliure are 1) 20 days of writer's block and 2) having just too many other things to do.

I really did want to do it, too. Damn.

* * *

Coming soon - A day in pictures, as inspired by Mark's recent spate of atmospheric urban landscapes, pregnant chavs and commuting endangered species . Now all I need is a nice day and something interesting to do.

And now...to bed.

I sound like a frog.

I'm coughing extremely cautiously.

My phlegm is the colour and consitency of lime blancmange (oh sorry, were you eating?)



"I'll take 'Common Winter Ailments' for 500..."

I've been reading Indymedia this morning.

Not something I usually do, as the site's vast bias leaves me cold, but I thought I'd venture into the pit and have a look at some of the comments made about the articles being published.

Thankfully, the screaming paranoia and self-righteousness rampant in the submitted articles isn't followed through in the comments, with a mix of eyewitness accounts and analysis bringing a balanced air to the pieces.

One article I looked at in particular was the events following the Anarchists Bookfair in London recently, where an incident in a pub after the Fair led to some heavyhanded riot police arresting a number of said Anarchists.

The original article reads as if the peace loving and mild mannered poor little people were being randomly attacked by viscious and bloodthirsty heavily armed police thugs.

The comments afterward paint a different picture, where what seems to have happened is that a couple of idiots took a ghettoblaster into a Wetherspoons pub, got themselves into trouble and left when someone smashed one of their speakers. By then, it seems someone had pressed a panic button or phoned the police, as the landlord closed the bar, which pushed a couple of hundred disgruntled Anarchists into the high street, where riot vans were waiting for them.

As one poster mentioned, putting Anarchists and Police in close proximity is just begging for a riot.

There seem to be a few people on Indymedia who hold the belief that we should not be held responsible for our actions, that one can do whatever one likes without fear of the consequences.

Luckily, there are also plenty of people who do take the "personal responsibility" ethos seriously.

I carried on from there to look up a definition of "anarchist" and found a dull but informative essay written some years ago by a University student. It includes definitions of the various disparate forms of anarchy and non-anarchy, including one I found fascinating and enlightening:

Libertarianism: Libertarians are often confused with anarchists and do, in fact, overlap in many respects. Both share an emphasis on individual freedom and the desire to do away with the state. Many libertarians assign primary importance to the individual and emphasize the principle of enlightened self-interest. Many anarchists tend to focus more on mutual aid and efforts to improve the circumstances of all members of the community. Libertarianism is most often characterized by its economic viewpoint, which places maximum value on unimpeded free market capitalism (some proponents call themselves "anarcho-capitalists"), condones the use of force in the defense of private property, opposes any governmental interference that impedes efforts to maximize personal economic gain, and discounts values that can not be measured in economic (typically monetary) terms. While libertarians are anti-state, they often are not opposed to domination and hierarchy in all its forms (there is often a strain of "survival of the fittest" or "[economic] might makes right" in the libertarian philosophy), and do not seek to radically alter societal power relations, especially those based on economic power. Anarchists tend to have a more socialist perspective, and favor doing away with any system in which the wealthy can achieve disproportionate benefit while the less fortunate suffer undue hardship. While anarchists value individual initiative, intelligence, and creativity, it is recognized that those who possess such talents to a lesser degree should still be treated with respect and justice. Objectivists are an extremist type of libertarian. The Libertarian Party is relatively moderate, and tends to focus on issues like electoral reform, abolishing drug laws, and reducing governmental regulation. Many libertarians are "minarchists" who believe that some form of government is necessary but that it should be as minimal and unobtrusive as possible. The question of what type of economic system would exist in an anarchist society is an open one. Some anarchists believe that all forms of capital and the market economy must be abolished, others favor a system that promotes worker ownership and full participatory democracy within a market economy, and still others believe that a variety of economic systems can co-exist as long as they do not try to impose their systems and values on each other.

Just to be absolutely clear on the part that fascinated me - "Libertarianism is...characterized by its economic viewpoint, which places maximum value on unimpeded free market capitalism, condones the use of force in the defense of private property, opposes any governmental interference that impedes efforts to maximize personal economic gain, and discounts values that can not be measured in economic terms."

When I was growing up, we called them Yuppies.

Here's the Wikipedia entry on libertarianism. It goes on at length about how libertarians believe in the free will to go about whatever business they desire, so long as it doesn't interfere with anyone elses' free will.

A long time ago, I dabbled with this philosophical idea - the idea that you should be allowed to do whatever you want as long as you don't affect anyone else. I found that it was largely unworkable as whatever you do has an impact on someone, somewhere.

Libertarianism also stands for the abolition, to a larger or greater degree depending on the person, of Government control - which includes the cessation of state-funded healthcare, education and social security, preferring instead that a totally free private market economy take care of these issues.

It mystified me how anyone seriously thinks this kind of society is desirable or workable. Then I started thinking about the world we live in, and everything I know about what's going on in the world around us. It occurred to me that the only people who could gain by living in this libertarian society were people who had enough money to do whatever they wanted, the libertarian world order would ensure that the rich got vastly richer while the poor got ignored and sidelined, impeded from improving their lives by the central liberterian principle of non-agression. And then something very disturbing occurred to me.

The libertarians are in control. The society I've just described is - in broad terms - exactly how society is being run at this very moment.

And that is the scariest thing I've ever realised, because a world run according to libertarian politics is a world that inherently rejects everything I stand for and believe.

But anarchy is not the answer. At least, not the anarchy propounded by the likes of Indymedia. Unfortunately, I'm not sure what the answer is, but I think I might work on it.

It's hard to believe a little bird just like this can generate a huge reaction in anyone, but this site (in Dutch - Babelfish is your friend) is the forum for an outpouring of Dutch grief for a sparrow which was cornered and shot after finding its way into a warehouse where a world record domino toppling attempt was about to take place.

It proceeded to knock down 23,000 of the four million poised dominoes, so a pest control officer was called, who proceeded to corner the little bird and shoot it.

It's hardly believable.

OK, it's freaky coincidences time.

While it's terrible that a policewoman has been killed in the course of an armed robbery, the odd thing is that it's the main focus of the BBC ten o'clock news on Children In Need night.

Why is this a freaky coincidence?

Just a couple of miles outside Bradford (scene of the tragedy) is a town called Pudsey.

No really!

I've broken the ten thousand barrier!

Just another 39,000 to go - 2700 a day - and the 200 I just wrote took me ages.

But you know what, I'm determined to reach the end. It's a point of principle now, a target I have to hit.

Just one problem - the muse has left me.

I know where I want to go now with it, but I can't bloody find the words.

And just to prove it...

(Oh god, I nearly started this post with "Well...")

Flushed by last weeks' success, the Tories are trying to notch up another Government defeat with their loophole commons vote on the extended pub licensing hours due to come into force next week.

Anyone who wants to watch Blair squirm almost as much as last week should tune into the Parliament channel or a news channel around 7pm local.

Thing is, hardly anyone has took up the new legislation - which allows pubs to open all day. Publicans mostly feel that it's unnecessary and punters just can't be bothered, so the chances are that the bill should fail.

Now, to lose one vote is unfortunate, to lose two is...well, let's say the fallout could be...interesting.

Big post disappears!

Where's it gone?

I'll tell you where it's gone, it's gone here.

According to my WriMo Meter, I need to write 10,000 words today to catch up.

Fawk!

Wondering what to get the man who has everything this Christmas?

How about a Lego Death Star?

On the left we find the new design for Dr Who's Cybermen.

On the right, we have Fritz Lang's robotrix from Metropolis.

So...no idea where they got their inspiration from, then.

Wilfred Owen
Dulce et decorum est

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of tired, outstripped Five-Nines that dropped behind.

Gas! Gas! Quick, boys! – An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling,
And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime. . .
Dim, through the misty panes10 and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie; Dulce et Decorum est
Pro patria mori.

Memories of Auschwitz

"Sometimes I was too sick to eat my soup, but I treasured it so much that I hid that little soup behind my bunk. One day when there was an inspection, the guards found the soup I was hiding. We weren't supposed to have any soup in the barracks. They took me outside and beat me. I passed out after three blows. A friend gave me coffee. He saved my life because I felt so sick I couldn't even move. With the coffee I was able to stand up when the camp officials came into the barracks for the next inspection. Anybody who couldn't move from his bed was taken away during the day sometimes.

One time I was taken to do a little work carrying steel beams. It was winter time, very cold. Fifteen or twenty guys were lifting each side of the beam because it was a wide beam. Eventually they told us to place it somewhere. But when we tried we couldn't tear away our hands from the steel because they were frozen to the beam. The skin came off and started bleeding. They didn't permit us to put any kind of cloth over our hands. We had to carry it bare. The next day we put this same beam back in the original spot.

The SS loaded us into cattle cars and took us to a forced labor camp in western Germany called Sachsenhausen. There was no crematorium, so it was by far a better feeling...We could hear the machine guns and the heavy artillery booming and they told us to march. The Allies were getting closer. I marched for about five kilometers to Allach which was a tiny little camp. Then I felt I couldn't walk anymore. The rest of them continued walking. The Germans killed all the people who kept walking. That was the death march. I survived because I could not walk."

Because it's not just about the Gulf.

Points to ponder:

I'm starting to think the world's going to hell in a handbasket...

A restaurant in Baghdad - a favourite of secrity staff and police - has been blown up by a suicide bomber. Now, forgive me if I'm wrong, but havent the security services and police been particularly targetted for some months now? How many have to die before they start not hanging around in one place and offering the perfect target?

****

Tony Blair's facing his "blackest day" according to the press.

I know this'll make me sound like the biggest Blair apologist on the planet, but bollocks!

Every government gets its motions defeated sometimes. That it's taken eight years to come around says more about the bullying tactics enforced by the whips and the size of Labour's majority than any measure of faith in their glorious leader.

Imagine, perhaps, that someone had decided that this was to be a "vote of confidence" and left Blair no option but to step aside. There'd be a leadership election. Effective immediately, Two-Jags would be in charge. Then, after a very perfuncory leadership contest, Gordon Brown would become our unelected leader.

Last time that happened, John Major proceeded to run the country and the Tory party into the ground.

Consider why this was not called as a Vote of Confidence then. Should be obvious, shouldn't it?

Consider now what this defeat means in real terms. It means that a few disgruntled backbenchers sidestepped the whips and the rampaging cabinet and stepped to the other side of the hall. It means that the public and the commons will happily accept a doubling of the period one can be imprisoned without trial without so much as a nod of the head.

I've done it a million times. Ask for more than anyone's likely to give you and let them dictate the maximum you can have. Bartering, in short.

You've all been conned, but nobody's noticed.

****

The government is to announce that "alternative" fuel sources should account for 5% of production in the UK within five years. Most of this new fuel will come from the burning of imported cane sugar.

Will this sugar be traded fairly, with the suppliers earning a good, western equivalent wage for their goods? Will the government use this necessary import as a part of their commitment to reduce world poverty?

What makes me think of the word Bollocks again, here?

And I can't help wondering how the sugar will be getting here. They won't by any chance be putting it on cargo planes will they, thus defeating the whole object of trying to create greener fuel production methods?

And in a country on the gulfstream and with thousands of miles of coastline, how come the financial and legislative infrastructure isn't in place to research, develop and implement environmentally friendly power production methods?

I have to go ignore NaNoWriMo so that I can cobble together a pathetic excuse for a Business Plan.

Is there anyone out there?

Hello?

I have downloaded what is quite possibly the most evil Firefox extension ever.

It sits in your statusbar and quitely ticks off your predicted word count on 30th November.

By the hour.

This morning, it was predicting I would manage a total of 35000 words. It's now down to 32700.

Bastard.

And the terrible thing is that I will get nothing done tonight and probably nothing done tomorrow as I have a business meeting that's taking up all my creative energy. I can see a marathon writeathon on the cards very soon if I'm to have a chance of getting anywhere near the 50,000 mark.

Get ready to pat me heartily on the back if my word count soars past 25000 this weekend.

I've been working on my plot options. I now have a sheet of paper upon which I've done some brainstorming. It looks like a spider massacre at an ibiza foam party. Lots of jagged lines and bubbles. But I think I might have almost maybe decided on something approaching a direction. What I'm going to have to do is just write and see where the writing leads me.

In other news, I've discovered a wonderful way of decimating my site hits. Ah well.

Well, that's the computer ready for christmas, then.

This is my current desktop. Yes, I'm still using windows. I've made quite an effort to disguide the fact however. For instance:

This is a tabbed dock courtesy of Stardock's excellent Objectdock Plus.






This is "Holiday Lights" a nifty little program which puts flashing lights on the borders of your desktop.





And this is a Christmas Windowblinds skin.





Finally, this is the desktop wallpaper. I think I got it from Wincustomize.com

Um, yeah, things have changed a little bit, haven't they?

If you're here, then you've made the change from the old hedgewitch blog to www.lithaborn.co.uk

What do you think? Bit of a shock? Good? Bad? What the fuck have you done you idiot?

Thing is, I bought the URL ages ago and just had it sitting around doing nothing.

And then I realised how many different blogs I was actually signed up for, so I just decided this morning to consolidate everything under one banner. So, much like the local council who, upon realising they had far too many sub-committees, decided to convene yet another sub-committee to investigate why they had so many sub-committees, I made another blog.

That blog, Lithaborn Central, will simply be a notification site so you can see at a glance what's going on in my online world.

Maybe it'll take a bit of getting used to, maybe it's a wonderful idea. Time will tell.

1. Were you named after anyone?
No, deliberately. There is a family name that goes back generations. My parents decided to deliberately not carry it on with me.

2. When did you last cry?
Oh god, I dunno. I’m well known for getting a lump int he throat and leaky eyes at the resuscitation scene in The Abyss though.

3. What is your favorite lunch meat?
It’s a toss up between Luncheon Meat and Chicken. Oh, and bacon.

4. What is your most embarrassing CD?
The DVD full of christmas music I’m currently transfering back onto my hard drive in order to avoid the wrath of my other half.

5. Where is your second home?
Pick a cave, any cave.

6. Do you trust others too easily?
That way lies madness.

7. What was your favorite toy as a child?
X-wing fighter

8. Would you bungee jump?
How many pints am I allowed first?

9. Do you think that you are strong?
Mentally, yes. Physically…I have my moments.

10. What are your favorite colors?
Dark green, purple, burgundy

11. What is your least favorite thing about yourself?
The belly, my gouty feet, my overwaxed eardrums.

12. Who do you miss most?

Deceased?
Isn’t that terrible, I can’t think of anyone. A few people I know have died - family members - but none I can put my heart on my hand and say I miss. I’ve come to terms with it and made peace with my grief.
Living?
Some of the girls I used to hang around with at pubs and clubs.

13. What was the last thing you ate?
Mint chocolate fingers.

14. If you were a crayon, what color would you be?
Gotta be the gold. Everyone would be after me!

15. What is the weather like right now?
Fucking miserable. But at least I’m not too hot.

16. Last person you talked to on the phone?
My mother in law, the dragon.

17. Do you wear contacts?
I did, but the left eye never fitted well, so I left them.

18. Last Movie You Watched?
Serenity. Excellent, excellent film.

19. Favorite Day of the Year?
Midsummer (Litha). I’m pagan and you’re supposed to celebrate by doing a ritual naked, eating fairy cakes, drinking wine and then shagging all night. One day I will.

20. Where Would You Want to Go on your Next Vacation?
The seaside. Wales.

21. Favorite Smells?
Pot, chinese, chlorine, the smell of the seafront - candyfloss, fish, salt, donuts. Oh man!

22. What’s the furthest you’ve been away from home?
The Isle of Wight (stop laughing at the back!)

Ack! I've stalled!

I'm 5,000 words short of the schedule and I don't think I'm going to be catching up anytime soon.

It's not a problem of plot - I've got an idea where to take it, but last night, I added a twist which I'm not sure I can carry off. I now need to do some emergency exposition to explain why I didn't mention it until that point.

Of course, I could take it out, but it's a good twist and works well with where I want to take the plot - it's a good third layer.

I might skip ahead a bit and write the meeting between two main characters which I have an idea about, but then it's a problem of keeping the continuity when I write the intervening chapters.

Right: That makes no sense really, so here's the plot (I hate doing this as I'm obsessionally secretive about my in-progress projects, but I'm breaking the habit of a lifetime just for you!):

A guy has a a nice life doing a trivial buit engaging job at the seaside with a lovely family, only he has a deep dark secret: When he was fourteen or fifteen he lost his virginity to his childhood sweetheart, who he later told to forget he existed. Eighteen years later a kid claiming to be his tuns up on his doorstep.

He accepts it straight away as he heard about her baby and always wondered if it was his. But there's a twist: they won the lottery six years ago and just recently he was interviewed for a vox-pop TV show on lottery winners.

So, is this kid conning him to get hold of some money or is he genuine? Is he actually the man's son? Is he a delusional psycho? Is the mother prompting him or using him to get revenge for years of shitty single parent life? What connotation of possibilities is going to play itself out?

Damned if I know, I haven't got that far yet.

Interesting points to bear in mind: The story is based on an aspect of my own life. I did go out with my junior school sweetheart when I was fourteen or fifteen and the split up happened just as I describe it in the story. She did get pregnant and it is an outside possibility that it might be mine. So it's a situation that's played on my mind for...um... seventeen years?

The story's set on Yorkshire's east coast where I've been on holiday three times - twice in three years and once a decade or more ago. So I know the territory reasonably well, which is why I'm setting it there. I'd be incredibly flattered if anyone can tell exactly where from my descriptions.

There will be a watershed meeting between the "hero" and the mother. When I've decided what twist is to be put into play, that will be the "reveal" where everything becomes plain. Or maybe it won't. Maybe there'll be another secret which only comes out later. Yeah, I like that.

I'm not sure whether to have the hero's family life come apart. I like how I've written the family and I want them to be a strong unit, but that robs me of a fair amount of plotline. Also, I don't like family breakups and would rather not write about them. Would be a nice change, as most of the chick lit and lit fic I've read involves some kind of family breakup. You don't usually read about a strong family reacting well to a situation. Maybe because it's boring. I guess I'll find out.

The narrative alternates between characters, but I don't know whether to do this on a strictly per-chapter basis or just as and when I reach a natural point in that characters' story.

The story is written in "first person present" style - "I am", "I do this, then I do that." - because I find that easier to write in and because I think it helps bring out the feelings and indecisiveness of the main characters. And I've always been crap at tenses.

I'm publishing it myself here because I crave validation and acknowledgement that I'm not writing a bunch of unreadable shite. I think that blog may turn into my literary outlet: a portal to put all of my writing efforts online.

So anyway, I've come to the crunch, where Ive got to decide which twists to use and I know I'm going to take days to work it out - which will probably mean some obsessive pondering and plotting, taking each connotation to see which one excites me most. Hopefully that excitement will transfer to what I write. I reckon once I've decided, I can knock out a good 3-5000 words a day. I'm finding 2000 words absolutely no effort - indeed all of the writing I've done so far has come together incredibly easily.

So anyway, is anyone else mithering this much over their story? Still feeling confident of reaching the fifty thousand target? Am I the only one obsessing over this shite?

Aargh!

Chapter three is done. Slight drop in the word count because I noticed I'd witten something twice.

When I've got a minute, I want to say something about the lego Death Star I found in a shop this afternoon.

There's a few other things I want to chat about but right now I've got to quickly get out the way so certain of my offspring can draw pictures.

Want me to post a couple of their creations?

Chapter two of my masterwork has been published on my WriMo blog.

I'm actually quite happy with this one, even though it's taken three days to complete.

Now what?

At last! Something non-NaNo courtesy of the Peanut Queen.

Name someone with the same birthday as you
Malcolm McDowell, the man who killed Captain Kirk.

Where was your first kiss?
At Junior school. My terrible memory won't let me be more precise than that.

Have you ever seriously vandalized someone else's property?
Nope, not really had cause to. A friend once borrowed my bedsit and broke the bed shagging in it, though.

Have you ever hit someone of the opposite sex?
In anger, yes - and by god she was asking for it. Divorcees have put up with less than I did, and I really didn't want scalding tea thrown at me.

Also as part of foreplay, but we'll gloss over that one ahem...

Have you ever sang in front of a large group of people?
Actually, I have. I was in a choir at Senior School and we put on a musical about the Siege of Troy. It was quite an experience.

What's the first thing you notice about the preferred sex?
Footwear and bum. Don't ask.

What really turns you on?
If I listed them all, I would never meet my WriMo target. In short, one word - Charlie.

What do you order at Starbucks?
Coke and a muffin. Coffee bad.

What is your biggest mistake?
Blimey. If you'd asked me fifteen years ago, I could have given you a list as long as your arm. Now? Perhaps staying with my ex - the one I hit in anger - too long.

Have you ever hurt yourself on purpose?
Only in the sense of going for a walk when I know my Gout will be bad the next day, or having a drink of milk when I know what it'll do to my stomach, that kind of thing.

Say something totally random about yourself
I can neither confirm or deny the possibility that I might have more children than I think.

Has anyone ever said you look like a celebrity?
Yes, but drink and lust were involved, so I can pretty much discount it. Also, I don't look like them.

Do you still watch kiddy movies or tv shows?
I have to.

Did you have braces?
Gawd, no.

Are you comfortable with your height?
I stopped growing at five feet ten inches. Always wanted those two extra inches to make six foot.

What is the most romantic thing someone has ever done for you?
Oh no. I'm not falling into that trap. She reads this, and if I don't get the right answer, she'll kill me.

When do you know it's love?
When she can fart infront of you.

Do you speak any other languages?
French and Spanish, very very badly.

Have you ever been to a tanning salon?
Wild horses wouldn't drag me into one of those places!

What magazines do you read?
Thanks to t'internet, I haven't felt the need to buy a magazine for months. When I do, it's the occasional issue of MicroMart.

Have you ever ridden in a Limo?
A surprising amount of the taxi drivers around here own Mercs, and I got a lift home once in a Jag. That's as close as I've got so far. Thing is, those stretch limos are all plastic and fake leather and I'd really rather not bother if it's all the same to you.

Has anyone you were really close to passed away?
My Granny and Grandad. I was as close to them as anyone ever gets in my family, which isn't very, but enough to still miss them.

Do you watch MTV?
Only when flicking past on the TV. They censor too much.

What's something that really annoys you?
Mediocrity. Platitudes.

What's something you really like?
Syrup sponge pudding with cornish ice cream.

Do you like Michael Jackson?
No. I pity him.

Can you dance?
Well, I think I am.

What's the latest you have ever stayed up?
I've stayed up all day quite a few times. On Tuesday I got just half an hours sleep, if you want a recent example.

Have you ever been rushed by an ambulance to the emergency room?
Not rushed as such - it wasn't all sirens and flashing lights, but I cut my foot open on a glass - it was on the floor and shattered as I accidentally kicked it. Charlie was seven months pregnant and just about had one foot in the bath when I called her to help. She ended up washing the dog's bowl to clean the wound in, and when it was obvious it wasn't going to stop bleeding without stitches, she had to tourniquet it and get me to hospital. Thing is, I was quite calm and actually inspected the wound for shards of glass before I called her. She came in and panicked because she doesn't like the sight of blood. All in all, it was far more comical than it was a desperate emergency.

Do you read these when someone fills them out?
Of course. Voyeurism good!

OK, I'm turning into a WriMo bore.

Just one thing this time: I've started a blog where I'll be posting my efforts as they get done.

Check out Lithaborn's WriMo Tapestry.

And yes, I did spot the overabundance of commas and the glaringly obvious bad spelling. I think I'll pass it through the spell checker tonight before I get on with Chapter Two.

Kudos to whoever gets the name of the song I'm taking my chapter titles from (without using Google).

Well, I've started.

Nineteen hundred words, which amazingly took just under an hour to bang out. With interruptions! Only problem is, I might have got the pacing of the story slightly wrong. It may take a few thousand more words to finish the first story, which would leave me either facing a revised 70,000 word target to get everything told adequately, or scrimping on one or two of the other stories.

Oh I dunno, I'm playing it largely by ear, anyway.

By the way, loving the swish preview Author's Profiles!