Last weekend, I was out at the park from 9:30 am until 7:30 PM.  Both days.  This was for Pokemon Go-Fest, which was fun even if my luck was bad.  My son had a blast hanging out with his friend all day.  He had much better luck them me.  Totally worth the exhaustion, tan, and aching feet.  Needless to say, I entered the weekdays powered by fumes, so things were a slog.

That isn’t to say I made absolutely no progress.  I managed to finish the chapter section of Darwin & the Deadland Queen, which I had to stop halfway through.  I’m hoping to finish the whole chapter before Monday.  If I can get into chapter 3, I’ll be happy.  Not sure if I wrote myself into a corner though.  My notes on the next section don’t feel right, so I might wing it.  It’s a chase/recovery scene with Darwin having a competitor and much of his magic being blocked.  Depending on how long family stays, I might even get to write this scene today.  That will ensure I make some extra progress.  Don’t know if I’m going to get to it this week, but there’s a chance I can finish chapter 3 before next weekend.

I wrote more of the Coven of the Gray outline too.  Not much since I didn’t have much time before school started.  I’m going to try to slip more of that in this week since I should be more rested.  Unfortunately, I haven’t figured out if I want to go with chapters or short stories to tell this tale.  Some of the coven members are coming and going within a chapter, which feels like they’re getting robbed.  Others are sticking around for a while since they wander in and out of the action.  Part of the issue is also that my brain keeps thinking I have to do 13 short stories and that isn’t possible, so I’m not leaning heavy into that idea.  Maybe I need to suck it up and do short story to see where the outline goes.  I know there are smaller numbers that are magical like 9, which is a possibility

Another obstacle to regaining my energy was the heat that kicked off on Tuesday.  It was really rough, especially on Wednesday.  Bad enough that my son and I couldn’t bring ourselves to go outside for Pokemon.  Once the heat starting getting more tolerable, the haze and poor air quality from the Canadian fires showed up.  It wasn’t as bad as it was two or so years ago where the entire area went eerie yellow and you couldn’t see very far in front of you.  The air was still smokey and made it difficult to be outside for very long.  It eased up on Friday, but not enough for my son to go out without a mask and his inhaler unless we went to the coast.  Rain today should clear some of it out.

This coming week is going to be messy.  Not only because of the rain, but the life event will be advancing.  So, I have to put some time aside earlier in the week to go through things and send stuff out.  Will this be where it ends?  I doubt it, but it will be nice for some closure to appear.  The biggest reason I can’t do much writing this summer is because of the fallout from this event.  This is more important than writing and it’s draining my mood, which makes it hard to make Darwin a happy, positive character.  Being able to free myself from any level of stress would be nice.  Another reason I need to rest up this weekend, but I’m really only going to have tomorrow.  Family is visiting today and I promised my son I’d take him to a One Piece store opening this morning and then a Pokemon event later.

I’m also trying to think of a new trip to take with my son in the future.  It has to be by car, which limits what we can do.  Moreso if gas prices get any higher.  I swear those things were going down at the start of the month and suddenly they jumped up again in the last week.  Anyway, I might use this as a way to distract myself from stressors when I can’t get to my writing.  Pretty much when I’m so tired that I lie down, but my brain decides I’m not allowed to pass out.  Part of me feels bad that I can’t take my son to places that require plane travel on top of a hotel.  That’s just how it is, I guess.  Simply existing is really expensive these days, so special things are a challenge.

Goals of the week:

1. Keep affording to exist.
2. Write more Darwin & the Deadland Queen.
3. Work more on Coven of the Gray.
4. Time with son when he’s here.
5. Might as well go to work.
6. Prepare for and deal with life event.
7. Stay dry.
8. Get a rice bowl for lunch or dinner at some point.  Been a while.
9. Lego work when I need a screen break.