First Snow of the Season

Friday night I was writing, trying to play catch up with my NaNo word count. You need to write about 1600 words a day to make the 50,000 words required by November 30^th. I’ve had a few zero count days, hence the need to catch up.

So, Friday night, I’m writing furiously, the wind was howling and I could hear the rain against the window pane. Suddenly, the power went out, and I’m sitting in total darkness, except for the light from the screen of my laptop.

I might have kept going, except I don’t have the greatest battery back-up, and I’ve experienced that horror of losing work because the battery quits. My battery doesn’t like to give me a warning before it dies, a little game it plays with me. But I digress.

It’s dark, I have craft projects sitting on the floor, just waiting to trip me up, and I can’t remember where I put my flashlight when I moved.

I closed all the programs and unplugged the laptop from the now useless power source. With the screen saver to guide my way, I found a flashlight in my bedside table, planning ahead I guess, and useful had I actually been in bed.

It was ten o’clock at night, so I put the laptop away. I added my fuzzy blanket to the bed and climbed under the covers. I’ve learned from experience that if the power doesn’t come back on within minutes, we’re probably looking at hours.

With the covers pulled tight around my shoulders I grabbed my book and settled in to read. It worked for awhile, but then it got tiresome moving the light across the page, holding the flashlight and my hardcover book. So I took a nap.

Taking late night naps is not really something I’d recommend. It messes with your sleep schedule something fierce. When the power came on it was bright lights and the sound from the television, and I was wide awake.

I got up, thinking I might write some more since I was refreshed from my power nap, but the mojo was gone. No more writing that night, totally brain dead.

What was I to do? I answered some E-mails, cleaned up my Sent and Deleted files, checked my bank balance, checked on the progress of my NaNo writing buddies, and drooled over food items I found on Pinterest when I searched baking.

That did it. I was now ready to go back to bed.

I burrowed under the covers, grabbed my book and read a bit more before falling asleep.

So now it’s Saturday morning. I slept in, why not I was up for a few hours last night. And here I am, back at my laptop. I’ve checked my E-mails and the coffee’s on, I should be writing my NaNo novel.

Looking out my window I see snow, big fat fluffy flakes of snow. It won’t amount to anything, as it’s gone as it hits the ground. The skies cleared for a moment and we had a taste of the sun, then the sky darkened to a grey that warns of more snow to come,

Another little storm hit, inconsequential, and we are left with bright blue skies, and sunshine. It looks nice out, and I know if I open my door I’ll shiver with the cold.

Snow in November, not our usual though I’ve seen on the weather channel it’s been an early snow right across Canada.

Last year, after a month of intense writing to finish a novel in 30 days, I had to reorient myself to what was going on. And found to my dismay, we were just over three weeks to Christmas, and I wasn’t ready.

This year I wanted to be better prepared for the holiday, so I didn’t have that panic in December. Did I do it? Of course not.

I’ve done a fare bit of shopping; don’t remember what exactly, or for whom. It’s all being stored at my son’s for the time being.

When December 1^st comes, the book gets set aside and my focus will be the holidays, and those six grandchildren of mine.

I have shopping to complete, and if we’re going to have snow, it better remain inconsequential, or I’m going to get really mad.

It can snow all it wants after the holiday; I just want some clear roads so I can get all my running around done first.

That’s not too much to ask.

We’ll have to see how it goes, for now, it’s back to NaNo.