Last week of my son having camp.  Feels like the summer went by so quickly and he was starting only a few days ago.  School starts for me on the 30th too.  So, I think I have some emotional whiplash here.  Swear it wasn’t too long ago that I finished the school year and put my work clothes away.  Time is such a bizarre human construct.

I should start with last weekend, but my mind is a little blurry.  My son and I just hung around putting Lego sets together and playing video games.  The weather wasn’t too great, so we couldn’t out much.  We did go CD shopping for our trip next weekend.  It’s insane how hard it is to find stores with a good CD selection.  Lots of records out there, so I wonder if I went through a time warp.  Low key was good for us though.  He was still exhausted from his birthday weekend and a busy week of camp, which included several trips.  I was nursing a bad shoulder too.  Don’t worry . . . It’s just tendinitis, so I’ve got some meds and a close relationship with an ice pack.

So, the shoulder limited what I could do, especially since I didn’t get it check out until Thursday.  Still, I managed to finish Slumberlord Chronicles: Darwin & the Fate Bracelet.  I won’t get around to publishing it until some time next year, but that gives me time to find a cover artist.  Praying it doesn’t go into limbo like Do I Need to Use a Dragon? since that one needs 4-5 pictures.  Money being tight really kills me, but I hope a single cover is doable.  I’ll have enough time to financially recover from the summer too, so my hopes are high for Darwin getting his chance to shine.

Speaking of Darwin, I did enjoy writing him.  I need to go through at least once to make sure his habits are consistent.  Some got lost and forgotten such as him walking on his toes when moving and nervous.  I remembered his fabric swatch holding and bouncing in place habits.  There was a point where I started making him more confident and proactive because he needed to be.  That’s the big challenge here.  How do you work with a hero who isn’t on top of everything and is more likely to reach victory in a way that only makes sense to him?  Nearly every encounter Darwin had forced me to ignore my notes because he wasn’t that type of hero.  Extended battles like Luke Callindor and Clyde had aren’t possible with him.  Interrogations by villains backfired on them without a paragraph or two.  Darwin drove everybody with a plan up the wall to the point where nobody, including me, can tell how powerful he really is.  Kind of enjoy that fact.

All that being said, I am nervous for the little guy going forward.  I think Darwin & the Halfling Hunt is where he’s going to be a bigger challenge.  This is where he’s fully on his path instead of finding it.  On the plus side, the future books are set up more for his antics, so my outlines are more fluid and malleable.  This one had many sections where I realized I was going in an unplanned direction with a plot point and I had to find a way to get things back around.  There was one time I had to move sections around to make things work too.  Darwin is really testing my plotting side by having my small pantser side come out and play.  Can’t wait for people to give him a try and hopefully they stay for the long haul.

Sales are non-existent, including the free ones.  Just have to throw that out there.

Not much else going on here.  I’m working on the October posts from the Windemere Monster poll.  Tomorrow will have a volunteer call for this year’s MONSTER MAKER FUN!  With the book done, I’m relaxing and sticking to notebook work.  Hopefully, my shoulder will be better too.  Think I need a lazy week because the following week is the trip and then I’m back at work.  Going to be a wild year again since Covid is still running around.  Maybe I shoulder order some new masks to up my collection.  Unfortunately, really cool ones I saw might not be school friendly.  Fullmetal Alchemist symbols can be mistaken for occult stuff and One Piece has the skull and crossbones.  Even with a straw hat, I’m sure that symbol will be an issue.

I know I talk TV at this point, but I didn’t do much.  I watched ‘Rising of the Shield Hero’ and ‘Cautious Hero’ again because I was focused more on writing.  I could put those on and zone out a bit.  I’ll figure out what anime I’m tackling next week later.  Thinking of ‘Fire Force’ since I never saw season 2.  Exciting!  I expect next Saturday’s goal post to be bland.  To be fair, there is a lot going on that I can’t post about for a variety of reasons, so it isn’t like I’m really sitting on my butt.

Goals of the week?

1. Relax!
2. Puzzles!
3. Get car checked for trip!
4. Let shoulder heal!
5. Fire Force!
6. Pizza!
7. Notebook work!
8. Pack for trip!
9. Sleep in a bit!
10. Really should clean that bathroom.

(I liked the intro below, but I’m annoyed that this is a restrained video.  The characters aren’t all shown or moving like in the anime.)