Never argue with your characters; they know themselves better than you do. (Laurell K. Hamilton)

I just spent some time working out on the porch. The yard reeks of dog shit right now, since our eighteen year old lab/rott can’t make it far from the house to crap. I’m not ranting, I just wish the old man could take it elsewhere. But, contrary to the people who keep hassling us to put him down, Max isn’t ready to go yet. He’s still happy, if somewhat arthritic, and not in pain. He’s just happy to live minute to minute and in hope of pizza.

I’m procrastinating on the book today. We made great progress yesterday, until we got to a certain point and said “wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute! This ain’t workin’.” So I’m doing yet another rewrite (third ending so far) for the climax. The second showdown, let alone the first, just didn’t work for the characters, the plot, the pacing, or anything. I still want a big showdown, and so does Taylor, but we’re changing it (again). Besides, Bryen really got tired of being the bad guy. I’m trying so hard to plot and choreograph this escape/fight scene that I think I’m blocking myself. I keep moving around the house, my room/office, the porch, the kitchen right now, even the local bookstore for awhile today. How sad is that? I don’t usually write action, like who hit who and now who’s bleeding kind of action. So it’s a delicate thing for me to imagine and get right. So far part of the scene’s working. I keep pecking at it, then going on to something else. Not a very effective method. Maybe I need to get angry. It’s easier to beat the shit outa bad guys in paper when I’m pissed off. Should have done that last week when I had stupid boys to contend with. :-)

In the time in took me to put this post together, I finally got my four pages!!!! :-) It took me ALL DAY but I got them and this ending works SO much better! Oh this is such a relief. I better leave off here before I start gushing too much. But goddamn this makes me happy.