Nell in French

So, writers procrastinate.  When I am noodling around a sentence, trying to make it fit, I lift the pieces and try them one way and then another and then I start over and then I sometimes get frustrated and wander off and google vaguely related and therefore somewhat justifiable, random stuff.  How is Nell doing on Amazon?  Where were the bus stops on Picadilly in 1906?  When did the Savoy Hotel open on the Strand?  Did people have birthday cakes in 1909?  How much did a really nice hat cost in 1910?  That kind of stuff.  Useful for the second book but not over the moon important at that particular moment.

Today, I unclicked the chunks of a paragraph and moved them around like lego and then quickly realized I was doing more harm than good.  You know when you pass that point of critical mass and you are now doing damage to the writing and making it worse?  Time to stop!  I quickly stepped away from the paragraph and gave myself three minutes of random noodling to refocus.  And in my first random google noodle, I bumped into Nell--in French!

It was the French edition and it came out last week and I had no idea!  In French, she is taller, wearing a red dress, and has hair I would kill for.  I love it!

Since June...

I have not written a new plumbean since June!  June!  Since then I have: gone home to Hawaii for the summer, written lots, deleted lots, written more, spent the autumn in the London rain, been rained on, read at least 900 WWI letters, taken notebooks full of notes, walked miles, broken my foot, been on crutches, fallen over on crutches, read lots, taught lots, bought new boots, seen dear friends, been terrible about phoning people I love, watched Downton Abbey, cut my hair even shorter, walked more, taken more notes, and come back to the States for Christmas.

Why did I stop plumbeaning?  Last May I started receiving uncomfortably rude notes at the plumbean.  I changed the settings so no one saw them but me but they were nevertheless distressing.  I thought about upping sticks and moving plumbean to a different zip code but that just felt wrong so we waited it out, plumbean and I.  And now, tentatively poking our heads out of the hedge where we have been hiding, we are back...