oh sweet lord....

I'm amazed I can actually type this, as my fingers are slowly being worn down to stumps with a combination of gnawing and pressing the delete button.
That's right, I've gone over my word count. Damn me and my verbosity.

So, I'm now involved in a 'hatchet job' on my beloved umpteenth draft. This is a highly emotional process... my poor little babies (paragraphs, that is) are being heavily denuded of floral prose. I just hope it still reads like 'me' at the end of all of this.

Ho hum. Three and a bit days to go. Around 1000 words to trim and then replace with a nice watertight (as if that's possible with the level of subjectivity here!) conclusion.

Then I'm out into the 'real world'.

I think that's possibly slightly scarier?

Custard

Why, oh why did I tell my tutor I'd have a chapter and a half finished by Friday?
Probably because I will!
Hah!

No, really, I can honestly see myself getting somewhere with the interminable mass of words I have floating in front of me on my screen... Currently it's a bit like when you mix a little bit of water with custard powder. Its sloppy and runny, but when you hit it, its hard. So, I just need to keep whacking it with all the ideas I have, and good things shall come of it, I'm sure(ish).

The chapter I'm working on at the moment is a bit of a tense one in numerous ways- it's all about purdah, so it has an element of 'hot potato' about it. I remember listening to a recording I made once (Apathy, anyone?) and thinking 'god, I sound so white and middle class.' Well, I feel a bit like that now- desperate not to write anything condescending, but having strong opinions nonetheless. Quite a difficult one to get past, unfortunately.

On the home front, the entire clan has gone gallivanting off to France. I wish I was there too. There is something about Taillet that is quite inspirational- a complete lack of material distractions, whereas sitting in the Library here, there is a man using a power drill not ten feet to the right of my head, and no toilets anywhere for half a mile. (Closed for renovation. The evil black blocks of doom are finally made spacious and light just in time for my departure. Thanks, guys, for four years of incendiary graffiti.) If only Taillet had a very well stocked library, a reliable power source and a shuttle link to Wide and Snapper's houses, it would be perfect. Sadly, these things only exist in Brighton.

S the Studded has now moved into a new house up the top of a hill. I shall be helping him with the burning of stolen dead animal carcasses on Saturday. (oh how I love my little PC dictionary- the definition of milkman is even worse...) yes, a barbecue. Joy! I can't eat any of it, of course, but I have threatened to make rice-crispie cakes....
And then it's off up to the land of tumbling tornadoes and flat-pack fiascoes... sunnyish Brum, (oh-ho, I know Wide doesn't like that, but I think it sounds like a cute little inoffensive car, so much nicer than Beeeeehming'am) to see my most wonderful other half on his return from playing with little kiddies and even littler kittens. He rang me the other day and all I could hear was incoherent squeaking. From him, not the kittens. He has been staying with Catwoman and Kes whilst running a theatre week... and now wants a kitten for himself. I wouldn't mind, as long as we can call it Fido...

Right!
off to slap the custard a bit more... (gosh, that sounds a little cheeky on a second reading....)