Writing Wednesday - Side Tracked, But Only Slightly

So my 'plan' for Sundays is to relax and do my weekly posts after work. Sunday is our busiest day of the week at work, so I'm there to play 'catch-up', cutting and dicing fruits and veggies. 

However, I have gotten sucked down the rabbit hole of games on Steam. And I really wanted to be able to hook up a controller to my laptop. And Mac being a Mac, means it's just not straightforward. So I went over and visited 'Tech Support' with my laptop and the controller I bought. Four hours later, pizza was consumed, and after trying out 3 different controllers, the fourth one finally worked. Of course, it does happened to be the most expensive option, but Mr. Cobra is loaning me a controller until I find and cough up the money for my own controller.

Anyway...

That put me behind a day.

So I had it all figured out. My house was reasonably clean (for me) and I was going to come home on Monday and do the post writing I was going to do on Sunday afternoon. This despite the pouring rain, snow flurries and a 30 degree drop in temperature. 

And as I was getting ready to exit the house Monday morning, this happened...

Those 'stripes' down the right side are the results of the cats knocking a clear piece of acrylic onto my laptop, me not seeing it and closing the lid. Therefore, a cracked screen. And being a 6 year old laptop, it is no longer under Apple Care. Still usable, if I can get over the 2 inch strip of color down one side hiding everything.

Needless to say, I was a trifle upset.

I messaged the girls their mother was going to work and she might not come home (just kidding). but cooler minds came through for me.

So a little under $200, rather than the $2000 for a new computer I was going to have to save for, and I have a nice, workable alternative. 'Tech Support' has multi-monitors for work and play all set up in their computer room. A quick demonstration of what needed to go where and I was off monitor shopping.

The hardest part of doing this set-up was moving the cords around. And unearthing the keyboard out of the back of a large storage closet. The laptop will be replaced shortly. It was purchased to see about making an old computer work, so it's inexpensive (read cheap) and I really don't like it, but it works for now.

So now I have about twice the screen space I had before. All I have to do is open up my laptop, log on, and then shut the lid (but not on something) and away I go. I'm very happy. Now I have an even larger screen for playing games and doing digital art. 

While I will still be saving for a new computer (I miss my desktop Mac), at least I have a very nice setup until then.

But...

It meant my writing STILL didn't get done on Monday. Therefore, Tuesday morning was spent writing my posts and scheduling them for the week.

And pulling out information for what I am going to start back on for the New Year.

I have been 'playing around' with the same story for two years now. And frankly, I just don't want to deal with it anymore. At least at the present time. I have a really good base on it, but I just can't bring myself to look at it at the moment. 

So I am going back to basics, so to speak.

I have pulled out what is probably the first story idea I ever started writing down. This is actually set up as a trilogy, a la Nora Roberts-ish style writing. 

What has been written over the years (we are talking over 30 years - YIKES) has been pulled and I am setting up my project binder and starting on a detailed outline of the books. Or at least book 1 in the series. 

Plotting has been allotted three days. So by the 11th of January I should have a working outline for book 1, even devoting part of Tuesday to playing catch-up on post writing.

Also, something I am going to try, is to include a snippet of where I am in the book on the posts weekly. Sort of an 'accountability' check-in. 

Here's to a good, solid plan and more writing in 2022!