Summertime, Summertime, Summertime, Summertime, Summertime, Summertime!

What is UP with this fog, cold, wind, and downright crappy weather. It’s like the sun has left and is never going to come back.

I admit that it’s been affecting my mood this week. Too many gray days in a row can just suck the energy right out of me. I’ve been pecking away at the keyboard every day—just showing up—and am managing to make progress in my novel. It hasn’t been the great week that I had hoped for, but I’ve gotten about 25 new pages or so done so far, and I know I’ll do more tonight and tomorrow. It’s all progress and that’s something to be grateful for. I had to backtrack in my writing this morning because I had a (supposedly) brilliant idea last night as to what I SHOULD write, as opposed to what I DID write. But if I’d never written the first draft, I would never have thought of how to write it differently.

This is not something I normally do. Usually, I like to just keep going until the novel is finished. But this was something that would affect the rest of the story and really highlight one of the big themes that, so far, the novel had been lacking. So now when I start writing again later this morning, I’ll be on the straight and narrow. It’s really beginning to feel like it’s coming together. I can see exactly where it’s going now and how it has to end. More importantly, I’ve written enough fresh material that I now know who the characters are. I’ve had to get re-acquainted with them because it’s been a few months since I spent any time with them.

This is pretty much how my summer will go, I’m sure. I’m still aiming to finish this novel (Darwin Day) by the end of May. Then I’ll revise and finish my other one (Finton Moon, which won the Percy Janes First Novel Award a few years ago), and all will be right with the world. Then they both get sent out to editors and/or agents, hopefully before the end of summer. We’ll see about that, I guess. (I’m hoping that “summer” is one of those words like “Candyman”—if you repeat it enough times, it’ll appear.)

One of these days, maybe I’ll post an excerpt or something, in case anyone’s interested. I’m not usually much for sharing my work before it’s done, but maybe I should do that, since I’ve been talking about it so much.

I’m thinking that exams are pretty much over now. I’m not sure of the exact last date, but I guess the summer break starts for a lot of you this weekend. Granted, summer is not exactly bursting out all over. But there are signs. The snow is mostly gone, all except for a few mountains of it here and there throughout the city. There’s garbage everywhere you look. Most of my favorite t.v. shows are in re-runs, preparing for the last few shows of the season to run in early May. Soon, there’ll be no more NCIS, Lost, or Jericho. And the hockey playoffs are in full swing. Wish they were over. It’s no fun for me to watch unless the Bruins (my team) or Leafs (my wife’s team) are in it, and they just aren’t. But I’m not bitter…

American Idol is almost done, thankfully. The talent just isn’t there this year. There’s nobody with any star power like in past years. I’m quietly rooting for that young Jordin chick because she’s got the whole package (for retail purposes). But at least Mr. Smiley-face Sanjaya is gone. Maybe I’ll watch it every week now until it’s over. He just irked me. When he smiled, it was like his teeth took over his whole face and he looked like one of those those big Yahoo! smiley faces.

It’s not that I care about American Idol, any more than I care about any particular t.v. show. It’s just entertainment. If we lost cable tomorrow, I don’t think I’d be lost© or anything. I’d just find something better to do. Like watching the Blue Jays. And I don’t mean the birds that have returned from down south only to wonder why. Damn instincts. There’s got to be a better way.

Gerard