Days Of The Phoenix - August 12 2002

07.26am. Spent another hour or so on the forums reading whats been
said since I looked last time. One thread has gone great guns, and
others are still walking about with just a couple of posts.

Unlike last Monday, I woke up with a song in my head and a smile on my
face. I put on Insomniac to listen to, and I fed the cats who tucked in
straight away.

Yesterday (11) I woke at 9.00 and forgot to feed the cats, on account
they were still asleep upstairs. I wrote up the previous days journal,
and my handwritten diary, and then my wife went for a run, and I
messaged Erin, and then a moment later rang her and she was up, just
and we had a chat. And she said that I could send her this book I had
bought for her Saturday (which I mentioned in another diary entry). I
said I also had a pile of stories to read through and critique, and
write another chapter in the novel I am working on for the Orbit group.
Then I had to go as my wife had just come back.

I played guitar for an hour and then went over to my Mum and Dad's to
feed their cat.

A while later, at lunchtime, my wife went round to her Mum and Dad's as
she does from time to time. I sat in the garden and read three stories
back to back then wrote critiques for each story, which unlike previous
efforts are longer than usual. I feel guilty because I have avoided
doing anything with the package until the last minute. Then I had to
write Chapter Five of my novel. This took two hours or so, and the last
time I had written anything on it was in April. There is no real plot
either. I dont think I can write novels, I tend to stick to short
stories or a series of short stories. If I do write a novel I tend to
write in episodes. I think the current chapter is a bit comic strip.
Its only 2,000 words and a lot of things happen in the story.
Occasionally I like to experiment, tackle scenes I would normally find
embarrassing to write about. Curiously all three pieces (other writer's
next chapters)featured male-female interaction, but only two of them
had a romantic element to them.

I went online at 5.45. Erin had sent me an email, and I chatted with
her. We talked about writing, and poems and music and lots of other
things, while we listened to AFI's "Art Of Drowning" over and over.
This is a favourite album of ours. The thing was we were listening to
the same album at the same time (almost) and it was a way of being in
the same place at the same time. I think if we're apart it's important
to do this, then all that separates you is distance alone. About ten I
had some tea, and we continued chatting, occasionally getting
disconnected from the web as we did so.

About 11.30 I had to go offline, my wife standing there pointing out
that I had to log off there and then. So I only had time to say a brief
good bye to Erin. We chat for hours and its good.

Apparently there was big Elvis feature on tv which I didnt watch as I
was busy doing other things. It'll probably be on video anyway, they
usually are.

I have changed a lot, I don't even wear the same clothes I used to. I
think differently too. Erin thinks I look younger without my glasses,
but I am shortsighted and I need them to see properly.