I still haven’t written anything but the weekend beckons and it’s my chance to get the proverbial ball rolling on this year’s novel attempt. One might say actually getting some words down at this point would be novel, ho ho.
I kind of wish weekends were three days long, though. It would help. Also helping would be if the goal of NaNoWriMo was, say, 10,000 words. I could churn that out in desperation on the final weekend if I had to.
Not that I’ll need to, mind you. No sir. This weekend (the first weekend) I’m going to catch up on word count (from zero to greater than zero) then keep flying through to victory by the end of the month.
There was a thin layer of crunchy snow on the ground this morning. It disappeared quickly and it was actually sunny for much of the day after, but the mountains are still bedecked with the white stuff, even if it’s now gone from down here.
But the point is it’s November 3rd and we’ve already had snow.
I forbid any more snow this fall or winter. It can go to the same place as pumpkin spice. That place is not here.
But I’ve settled on an alternate plan, which is to rewrite my failed 2013 novel, which had the awkward working title of Start of the World. I’ll spend time tomorrow mulling and then tomorrow evening I’m going to start writing. I have some ideas.
I can’t say I’m confident in how this will turn out, but I am genuinely interested in tackling this particular unfinished project again, so I have that in my favor.
Also, while I’m not yet changing the description of the novel, I am probably not going to keep the title of Cosmic Tingles. That might work better…elsewhere.
Run 549 Average pace: 5:23/km
Location: Langara Trail
Start: 12:32 pm
Distance: 2.62 km
Time: 14:10
Weather: Heavy rain
Temp: 5ºC
Humidity: 96%
Wind: light to moderate
BPM: 160
Weight: 158.4 pounds
Total distance to date: 4265 km
Devices: Apple Watch, iPhone
With a cold front and rain in the forecast I was a bit wary about today’s run. Indeed, by the time noon rolled around it was raining heavily and the temperature had gone from 8ºC down to 5ºC. This was my first big test running around the golf course–would I let bad weather scare me off?
The answer is both yes and no.
No, in that I did indeed go out and run.
Yes, in that I only ran one loop, about 2.62 km, before abandoning the run. Why did I do that?
I am used to running in the rain. I am used to running in the cold. I am used to running around puddles and occasionally through them.
What I am not used to is doing all of these things with each condition turned up to a ridiculous degree.
It was raining so hard at times that it felt like hail. The low temperature felt even cooler because of the heavy rain assault. Adding to this was the extremely poor condition of the trail. On the east and west sides it slopes, so during rainfall you get run-off streaming down the trail. (more on the steeper west side). The volume of rain water was so heavy, though, that the bulk of the west side of the trail, spanning a length of about eight blocks, was more akin to a shallow river than a trail. At points it was so wide it was unavoidable. Puddles of water were pooling so wide and deep that they were merging together to form virtual ponds along long stretches of the trail, with no room to bypass them.
For a few moments it was almost fun to just surrender and start dashing straight through these monster puddles. But after nearly 15 minutes of the relentless storm assault I was drenched, cold and in no mood to continue.
I was actually boggled at how poorly the trail handled the rain. It’s simply not fit for use when precipitation turns heavy. I imagine all the patch work done on the gully carved down the center by previous rainfalls has been washed away.
Anyway, it sucked. It was the coldest and wettest run I’ve done since…I can’t even remember. Bleah.
I’m actually halfway considering getting some road runners (beep beep) and planning an alternate route on the sidewalks for days like these. Maybe, maybe.
It’s just after 10 p.m. as I type these words and my story progress stands at zero. I have written nothing. The previous two sentences are two more than I’ve written for my NaNoWriMo 2017 project.
If the evening ends with me writing nothing–and that seems rather likely at this point–I will need to double my effort to 3,334 words tomorrow to stay on track. Am I already doomed? Perhaps.
But perhaps not. Maybe in desperation I will find inspiration. Maybe I’ll dig out some old unfinished work and pick up where I left off, the words gushing forth like blood from a skewered artery.
It’s funny how something that only happens once a year can sneak up on you. Or how when you try to think of ideas your brain just seizes up and refuses to even offer up anything, even objectively terrible stuff.
But I will ponder tonight, evaluate my back-up plan and make a decision tomorrow on how to proceed.
Well, oops. The month started well but the last week or so my noon walks dried up as the weather turned soggy, I missed some runs and I found chocolate chip cookies and blueberry muffins.
In the end I picked up a hefty 2.8 pounds on the month, going from 155.2 to 158 pounds.
But I’m back on a regular run schedule and the muffins have been banned, so I’m reasonably confident the weight will start dropping consistently again.
Stats:
October 1: 155.2 pounds October 31: 158 pounds
Year to date: From 165.9 to 158 pounds (down 7.9 pounds. Last month I was down 11.4 pounds)
And the body fat:
January 1: 19.1% (31.7 pounds of fat)
October 31: 16.4% (26 pounds of fat–up two fatty pounds)
Run 548 Average pace: 5:20/km
Location: Langara Trail
Start: 12:36 pm
Distance: 5.02 km
Time: 26:50
Weather: Sunny
Temp: 10-11ºC
Humidity: 71%
Wind: light
BPM: 156
Weight: 156 pounds
Total distance to date: 4262 km
Devices: Apple Watch, iPhone
With the days already too short to keep running after dinner, I made the decision to resume running along what is officially known as the Langara Trail, the 2.74 km path that loops around the Langara Golf Course. Today I rented a locker at the school gym and was given the combination to the lock. I think the last time I used a combination lock was in high school. I got the lock open right on my first try, unlocking an achievement. I’m also kicking in an extra $5 to use the towel service, saving me from having to take stinky damp towels home every week.
The run itself went perhaps a bit better than expected given how long it’s been since I ran the trail. I managed to skirt around the tree roots and some patch work has made the trail a bit smoother–at least until The Rains return. It was cool but not uncomfortable so shorts and t-shirt were fine, with minimal sweating. Predictably, my pace on the west side (downhill) was notably brisker than my pace on the east side (uphill). I don’t expect that to change.
Pays off in the sense that I have no idea what I’m doing. Which isn’t much of a payoff. The irony is I just finished a book a few weeks ago (Story Genius) that specifically lays out, in great detail, how to plan out a novel.
For NaNoWriMo 2017 I have made it as far as the “I think I may write a novel” stage.
I have gotten no further.
Well, that’s not entirely true. I’ve set up Scrivener again so I’m ready to go with that if need be. But as far as what I’ll write…no clue. My success rate when going in and latching onto some plot device at the last minute is not terribly good. It is more terribly terrible. This means my effort will likely crash and burn.
Perhaps, though, something fantastic will come to me in a dream tonight. Or tomorrow night. Or maybe the first night of NaNo. After that it probably won’t matter.
Maybe for the eve of NaNoWriMo (tomorrow) I’ll try to inspire myself with another patented* list of lovingly handmade writing prompts.
This is in reference to fall the season, not fall when you snag your foot on a tree root and splat on the ground.
Coming back along the Brunette River trail from my run two days ago, I took this shot. It was tricky to get one without people in it because it was mild and sunny and the weekend. I’m not anti-people, mind you (unless they’re cyclists at Burnaby Lake), I just prefer my scenery shots without people wandering through them, unless they’re people I know.
Mid to late October is that one time in fall I can enjoy. It’s not always raining, it can be fairly mild (today I went for my noon walk wearing a t-shirt) and most of the trees still have their leaves and the leaves have donned their pretty autumn colors.
Brunette River trail, October 28, 2017
I adjusted the white balance a bit in Affinity Photo, using the default “warm” setting. It actually makes the colors, especially of the leaves on the ground, more accurate. My iPhone 6 tends to take photos with a cool tinge to them, which is handy for giving everything a vague dystopian quality, but not entirely accurate vs. reality (or is it? Dun dun dun.)
In a few more weeks it will be much cooler, the trees will look like the blasted skeletal remains of the post-apocalypse and the daylight will last for about twenty minutes. But at least it’ll be nice to snuggle under the blanket on the couch.
Run 547 Average pace: 5:37/km
Location: Burnaby Lake (CCW)
Start: 12:04 pm
Distance: 10.02 km
Time: 56:22
Weather: Sunny
Temp: 14-17ºC
Humidity: 61%
Wind: light
BPM: 163
Weight: 156.8 pounds
Total distance to date: 4257 km
Devices: Apple Watch, iPhone
This was a bit of a strange run in that it was both slow and good, like rich Corinthian maple syrup.
Wait, that’s not right.
But the run was still fine. I started out briskly then fell into a much more relaxed pace and in fact from the third to the seventh km my time kept getting slower and slower, even though I wasn’t feeling tired or experiencing any discomfort. I was definitely not pushing as I’m still off peak form and working my way back up. It wasn’t until the final km when I began to step on the gas again and my pace did indeed pick up a fair bit. The average, though, was still 5:37/km.
Interestingly, the bear warning signs have been taken down. I’m not entirely convinced the bears know this, but I didn’t spot any notable wildlife on the trail.
The pending work on the bridge at Still Creek is still pending, as there was no activity there. The lack of rain over the last few days also meant no puddle jumping, today, but a new hazard was in play–the gorgeous yet slippery fall leaves.
The leaves actually weren’t too slippery–though I still have to be careful on the boardwalks because they definitely take on a banana peel quality when laying atop a damp set of wooden planks–but they still present a danger in that their currently copious number means they can fill up large puddle holes, making them appear deceptively non-hole like. They also tend to obscure a lot of the exposed roots, especially along the Cottonwood trail, which, as you might guess, has a lot of cottonwood trees along it.
It’s very pretty, though.
I started out a bit later but in doing so it appears I missed the morning rush, so yay. There were runners and walkers and people with dogs, but everyone was friendly and aware, possibly because it was so dang nice out. It was 14ºC when I started my run a few minutes past noon, already quite warm for October 28, but it then rose to 17º by the end, which is downright comfy for running. This turned out to be a record-setting high temperature, so thank you global warming!
I’ve purchased a knapsack with the plan to rent out a locker at the school gym, so I can run at lunch hour during the week. It’s pretty much too dark to run after work now, which makes me sad in a weird way I can’t quite put into words. Though I’m not crazy about the trail around the golf course, it will have to do. Maybe if I stick to shorter runs I could even consider increasing the number of times I go jogging. We shall see.
