The Great Avoider
So here’s what I have done today instead of working on my National Novel Writers Month project:

• Listened to Bruce Springsteen’s Devils and Dust CD. (It’s pretty good, but I just don’t “get” Springsteen. Most Patient Wife really loves him.)

• Took down some Halloween Decorations.

• Played Pounce! with Ginger and Lovey.

• Did a load of laundry.

• Surfed the web while listening to the morning show on my favorite local radio station.

• Listened to the Indigo Girls’ latest CD, Becoming You.

• Made a pot of coffee. (Freshly ground Highlander Grogg, thankyouverymuch!)

• Ran to the store to get some fat-free CoffeeMate. (I drink coffee the way my main character, Evan Johnson, does. It’s the only thing we have in common, except the love of word games.)

• Wrote a nice e-mail to one of my favorite writers, telling them that I loved their latest work.

• Looked for a job online.

• Looked at the blank screen for a few minutes, trying to decide where I was going in Chapter Three.

• Wrote this blog entry.

Wowzers, it’s 11 am. I’ve successfully avoided any productive writing for three and a half hours! Who knows what else I won’t get done today.

Well, it’s time to get back to the blank page, and also to put more music in the player. This time it’s Johnny Cash’s American Recordings IV: The Man Comes Around. It’s an astounding CD, and it carries me away every time I hear it. In fact, I can only think of one other CD that moves me so: Van Morrison’s Greatest Hits, Volume Two. (Which had very few actual hits on it, but some of his most incredible songs.)

I’m making Cheesy Potato Soup for dinner. AngryTeen has a choir concert tonight, and I have lots of other non-writerly things to do today.

Nano Day Two
I just uploaded my second chapter of the Woman In Black. Astute readers will notice that it has nothing at all to do with the first chapter.

You can read it for yourself at: Mike's Nano

So far, my word count is pretty healthy: 6285

I hope I can keep up a good word count. I need to average 1666 words per day to meet the 50 thousand word goal by November 30.

Other than that, things are great at Casa de Sawin.

And so it begins...
A moment of silence as we mark the beginning of National Novel Writers Month.

I started at work last night, and I have 2711 words so far. You can read them, if you want, at my NanoBlog

So far, I've not used the phrase "It was a dark and stormy night". But I have used a couple of cliches -- mostly in dialogue, because most people I know use cliches often.

But go ahead and give it a look if you want. The first chapter is done, and so far, I'm happy with it. No murder or crime in the piece yet (unless you count my writing as a crime); just some character stuff -- and foreshadowing.

I'll do my best to keep it all updated.

Sawin Wood

(A tiny joke I thought I would never use, but it actually fits here.)

We're having a cord of wood delivered to the house today, and guess who gets to stack it? Give up? Me!

I don't mind, really. We all love having a fireplace, and since I don't have a truck or anything to haul wood, this is going to have to do.

Besides, it'll be good exercise, so I can skip a trip to the World's Least Intimidating Health Club today.

Strange Pictures
A picture entry for today. First up is Ginger giving me some much-needed instruction on how to carve a pumpkin:





Then, Lovey Gump had to prove that she wasn't afraid of the pumkin, at least as long as AngryTeen was holding her:

And finally, a picture of the Superhero known as MichaelMan, who stopped by Casa de Sawin to hand out candy to the children. He is aided in this mission of justice by the Mighty Action Kitty!



MichaelMann has some silly super-powers: Super spelling (useless without Super Typing), a Magnetic Colon, and of course the supernatural ability to Make A Rhyme Out Of Anybody's Name!

Yes, those are Paisley Zubas, a cape and a duct tape "M" on his chest. AngryTeen was somewhat mortified when MichaelMan was around, for reasons I cannot comprehend.

Today, I decided that I need music and soup to fortify me for the next seven days. For the next seven days, I work ten-hour shifts. Also, NaNoWriMo starts in five days. I have two pieces to write for paper, and who knows what else will come up in meantime.

So Wilson Pickett is singing In The Midnight Hour as I type this. (It's the live version that he did in Watts in 1965, two days before the Watts riots. As he's singing, you can hear the crowd going crazy -- egged on by a radio guy named The Magnificent Montague screaming "Burn, Baby Burn!" over and over. Watts was on fire not long after, and frankly, the whole thing is spooky.)

There's also soup on the stove: Black Bean Soup.

To make it, you soak:

1 pound of dried black turtle beans in at least three quarts of water overnight.

Bring the water to a boil (some folks say to strain the beans so the broth isn't so dark, but I say keep it that way it is. But you do what you think is best.)

Throw in a bunch of ham. (I had some in the freezer from a dinner I made last week. I put the big chunk right in there, with the idea of cutting it up later.)

Simmer the beans and ham for about an hour. As they simmer, cut up some veggies. I use:

1 1/2 cups of carrots
1 cup celery
1 onion
1 large red potato
2 cloves of garlic

Dice them up and put them in a microwave-safe dish. I use a two-quart cassarole with a tight cover. Add about 1/4 cup water and cook on high for about 6 minutes.
Take the ham out of the soup and let it cool for a few minutes.

Add about a cup chicken broth or stock to the beans, then add about a quart of water. You want this recipe to be about 4 quarts of soup once everything is said and done.

Season the soup with about 1/4 teaspoon pepper and 1/2 teaspoon of cumin.

Cut up the ham and return it to the soup. You'll notice that the outside of the ham is really dark -- almost black -- from being in the water with the beans. This is why I cut it up now, instead of at the beginning. I like my ham to look like ham, and not little lumps of coal.

The same with the veggies. I like my soups to be hearty and colorful. That's why I microwaved the veggies enough to cook them, and will add them to the soup a few minutes before I serve it.

So, five minutes before you serve the soup, add the veggies and keep the heat on. Also, correct the seasonings. I deliberately under-season the soup at first, so the flavors have time to blend and mellow.

Adding a dash or two of cumin and pepper just before serving will bring the flavors to the front. A touch of garlic wouldn't kill anyone, either.

Serve this with some cornbread, if you want. We just had cornbread a couple of days ago, so we're having just plain ol' crackers.

And of course, Beano

Back, With Presents For Everyone
Mood:  lyrical
Now Playing: With Wilson Pickett on in the background...
...although when Pickett gets going, it's nearly impossible to relegate him to the background. I'm playing a collection compiled by Rhino a few back called Wilson Pickett: A Man and A Half. Classic R&B is Wilson Pickett, that's all I have to say. But typing while he's wailing is rather difficult. My fingers can't keep up!

So here's the good news that I couldn't share before:

Most Patient Wife and I went to Duluth last weekend. Normally, this would be wonderful in an of itself. As I've said several times, Duluth is my favorite city in the world.

But this trip was also great because AngryTeen got some alternate plans at the last minute, so MPW and I had an impromptu weekend alone! Wowzers.

We got to hear some great music at a funky little bar, we walked along the boardwalk, visited a lighthouse and some antique stores in nearby Two Harbors, and then visited the Great Lakes Aquarium for a couple of hours. We did crosswords and didn't have to worry about entertaining a teen with a short attention span.

It was perfect. And AngryTeen had a great time with her youth group from church, so it was good all around.

I had to work on Saturday night, and we all slept in on Sunday. When I finally rolled out of bed, I spent the day baking and cooking.

This was one of the nicest weekends we've had in a while, and it's the perfect counterpoint to the hectic holiday season that is before us.

Kitty Karma
There's someone who lives in our house who picks fights with Ginger, the most wonderful cat in the universe. Poor Ginger has been pouting for months now, since she's not the only cat around these parts, and a certain someone just wants to play with Ginger and looooove her and be her pal. But Ginger don't play dat.

Yup, she's still pouting.

There's someone in our house who likes to attack The Sheet Monster when people are sleeping in the bed. Sometimes toes are bitten, because the fight is so ferocious.

Somebody in our house jumps up on the mantle above the fireplace and knocks the decorations onto the floor.

Somebody forgets that there's a tail back there and frequently gets freaked out when the tail sneaks up on her.

And then there's the habit of trying to eat off our plates at dinnertime. And the cat toys hidden all over the place.

Somebody keeps leaving black hair all over the house - - in the strangest places. I found some on the range hood above the stove. How in the world did it get up there?

This morning, somebody woke me up by crawling up on the bed and snuggling my Most Patient Wife. She stretched out as far as she could and put her paws on my wife's face and gently petted her. And then the purring started.



It's a little hard to remember all the naughty stuff when she's being that sweet. That diabolical Lovey Gump. It's all part of her plan, I tell ya.

Ummm…wow. Some things are just silly. And then…there’s Benny Hinn’s wife. In this video clip, she says that we need a Holy Ghost enema! You might want to prepare yourself. It’s funny, sad and sorta scary all at once.

It’s stuff like this that makes it hard to be a Christian.

Sawin News
Well,I got some good news today. And man, I could use some. Life has been full of irritants lately...nothing major but like a swarm of gnats.

The 'puter has been really acting up lately. This morning, it wouldn't go more than a couple of minutes without locking up. I rebooted a bunch of times, ran a defrag and a scan disk. It's doing a little better, with a reboot needed only once an hour or so.

The cats have increased thier bickering lately, with a rolling fight that goes all over the house. But they're not hurting each other -- it's just annoying.

My car is great on gas. I have a 12 gallon tank, and I average 360 miles between fills. But, it's leaking and burning oil now. Grrr. The savings on gas is getting eaten up by the using up of the oil. I'm going to have to take it in somewhere before winter hits.

But as I said, I got some good news.

AngryTeen went to Homecoming last weekend. She met up with a bunch of friends and had a great time. This is good. (And since I'm not ready for her to have boyfriend yet, that's good news too.)

More good news: Dwight Williams, an acquaintance of mine from many years ago, has started a blog. Dwight's a storyteller who lives in Canada, and he's always got interesting stuff to say.

Most Patient Wife and I have a friend named Rattie, and she has a blog too. She and her husband were knocked down by Hurricane Katrina, but they are getting back up again. Check out her blog!

The links are right over

<-----there. Scroll up a little....there you go.

When you're done here, check out their blogs!

And more good news...I got the latest Jane Lawless mystery from the library today. Minnesota mystery writer Ellen Hart has created a series of detective stories that are funny, charming and beguiling. The latest installment, The Iron Girl, looks like another winner. I'll probably read it tonight at work.

And finally, Some Really Good News that I'll share with you all in a few days! I'm thinking Saturday -- or more likely, Sunday.

A Great Book
Here’s how to tell that I love a book:

1. I drop everything else I’m reading.
2. I read the whole thing in one sitting.
3. It’s written by Robert B. Parker.

Last week, I got the latest Spenser novel School Days from the library. The Boston detective is hired to investigate a school shooting.

As usual in Spenser books, it’s pretty obvious that the truth isn’t hard to figure out – but almost impossible for people admit without Spenser’s help. He spends most of his time removing the roadblocks people put up to avoid the truth.

This book is different than most of the rest of the series: Spenser’s great love, Susan Silverman, is out of town at a convention. They talk on the phone a lot and are physically in the same room only after the case is resolved. (No spoiler there, because there’s no conflict in the relationship.) Hawk, Spenser’s frequent partner in crime busting, is nowhere to be found.

Spenser is on his own in this adventure, except for his dog, Pearl -- and that’s just fine. The others would just have gotten in the way.

This is a terrific book. The writing is up to Parker’s incredible standard with sparse dialogue and characters that come across as full and complex, even though Parker doesn’t devote a lot of verbiage to their description. At this point in his career, Parker is a surgeon of a writer – he cuts out all the unnecessary words. What remains is powerful and vibrant and a joy to read.

Spenser’s longtime friend, attorney Rita Fiore, appears a couple of times to help him figure out some legal stuff. She knows him pretty well, and they tackle a complex issue at the end of the book. The school shooting involved two kids, and Spenser worked only on behalf of his client – to the exclusion of the other kid:

“Tell me something,” Rita said. “You have stuck by this kid, who you barely know like he was your own. But you don’t seem interested at all in the other one.”

“Grant?”

“Yes. Don’t you suppose he might have serious problems that weren’t addressed? Doesn’t he need help? Isn’t he a kid, too? Should he spend the rest of his life in jail?”

“Nobody hired me to stick with Grant,” I said.

“That’s it?” Rita said.

“Yes.”

“That’s all?” Rita said.

“That’s all there is,” I said.

“No right or wrong, anything like that?”

“Right or wrong?” I said. “Rita, you’re a lawyer.”

“I know, never tell I said that.”

We were quiet for a moment.

“There’s thousands of people need saving,” I said. “I can’t save them all. Hell, I can’t even save half the ones I try to save.”

“So you let chance decide?” Rita said. “Someone hires you?”

“Chance and choice,” I said. “I don’t take every case.”

“How do you decide?” Rita said.

“I’m not sure,” I said. “I usually know it when I see it.”

“You can’t save everybody,” Rita said.

“And if I try, I end up saving nobody,” I said.

“And saving one is better than saving none,” Rita said.



That is a mere 207 words, and look at what they covered. Ethics, lawyer humor, philosophy. I wonder what the unedited page looked like! How many words did he cut? How many ideas were cleared away to make room for this?

Parker’s Spenser novels are just about my favorite in popular literature right now. I can’t recommend this book highly enough. If you like mystery, if you like good writing, strong characters, action, or intelligent dialogue, you’ll appreciate this book. It’s a prime example of the kind of fiction I wish I could write.

So read it already!