Category: Diary

A drive up to Yahava Koffeeworks in the Swan Valley starts the day. I regularly require vigorous coercion to leave the house, but the promise of excellent coffee is sometimes all it takes.

Our Christmas tree still stands. I fear it may be next weekend before it is packed away. This is, in fact, perfectly routine for our household, so there’s little reason to panic…

Apex Magazine email me to tell me they’ve decided to pass on my story ‘Til Death. Disappointing, but the odds are always against you in this game. I’m still pretty stoked to have gotten a second read. Onwards and upwards.

The Sherlock rewatch continues with The Great Game, in which we finally meet Moriarty. All previous memory of the episode has been completely eclipsed by Andrew Scott’s performance, and he’s still the most captivating thing in an otherwise perfectly excellent episode. To date the Elderbeast claims The Blind Banker as his favourite episode. We’ll see whether that changes with series 2, next week.

The Kinderbeast wakes me at 5:30. Despite my best efforts at persuasion, he continues in his attempts to rouse me from bed. Eventually I relent, make some coffee, and start writing (1,200 words editing a promising yet troublesome tale about a fairground carousel).

Browsing the various ‘educational’ sites I’ve added to my Feedly account, my attention is captured by Alan Bennet’s diary. I’m inspired to write a diary during 2017 – just something to track the minor trivia of the day (and partly inspired an utter and collective failure on New Year’s Eve to remember how the 2015 edition of New Year’s Eve was spent).

This is, inevitably, it.

I have one more holiday goal yet to complete: to tidy up the patio area in a probably fruitless bid to encourage us to spend more time out there. I achieve the goal and spend 5 minutes sitting outside to savour my triumph before retreating indoors to make pancakes.

The Elderbeast, having had his Internet privileges dramatically shortened decides enlists my help in building the balsa wood Apache helicopter kit he got from Andy for Christmas. Surprisingly, this task proves far less annoying than it had any right to be.

Prolonged drama ensues after the Kinderbeast knocks one of his teeth during play. He is mostly miserable for the remainder of the day. Panadol and cuddles are dispensed.

Sherlock, series 1, episode 1 provides the evening’s entertainment at Carter’s request. Still damn telly, and the Elderbeast’s newfound passion for Sherlock appears to persist for now …

The Kinderbeast once again prompts a distressingly early start for my writing, but I complete the second draft of my short horror story, so all is well.

I achieve several small goals for the day: I clean the barbecue (rarely used, but it’s still satisfying to see it once again bereft of grease and cobwebs); I update my writing tracker spreadsheet ready for another year of writing, and I even blog about it;  finally I draft a length post reflecting on my writing progress over 2016. Maybe three people at most will read it, but it’s still good to remind myself that I did manage some writing achievements during what was ultimately a fetid shit of a year.

Twitter is aflame with stories about the GOP gutting the ethics committee in what can only seem like a transparent bid to get away with the sort of corruption that they’ve been so busy accusing the Democrats of. As someone tweets: every burglar knows that you kill the guard dog first.

One outing for the day: a drive to Harvey Norman’s so the Elderbeast can spend some of his Christmas money on some new, much-needed bluetooth speakers. As much as I dismay at giving HN our money, I’m gratified that the headphones (spotted via a casual browse through the junk mail) are 50% off, which makes it feel like HN won’t be creaming too much profit from that particular transaction.

For the evening we watch the new episode of Sherlock. Still entertaining, still first class TV, but occasionally rambling and lacking in focus in the way that Sherlock almost never is. Nevertheless, it’s sufficiently good to inspire the Elderbeast to show interest in the earlier episodes, which pleases me.