Unexpected Hiatus

This is my first post in eight days. that wasn't a deliberate thing, life just got in the way.
Sunday I drove my wife and daughter up to the airport (they're away to visit our other daughter in Edinburgh), Monday my ME/CFS hit hard and I rested, Tuesday through Friday I was working and, because of the ME/CFS, by the time that was over ALL my spoons were used up and writing was not a viable option, even writing for prompts. Saturday I meant to write, but expended too much energy on a DIY project (watchout for Tuesday's post).

I think I only managed a day of @dreemport curation as even sitting to read posts was in the 'too taxing' region of existence.

The intention had been to load up one of my These United States stories for the week, and through the week write the next chapter of the LA noir novel I'm writing. The first of those got lost in the fog of ME/CFS. The second has much the same excuse apart from the fact that even without it this would have been a tricky chapter to get written.

It's a chapter which goes to the heart of the why of the what which happens to whom and is about psychological and verbal abuse. Some of that has already been seeded into the first two chapters, but this is the one which lays it out plainly.

Thankfully it's not something I've experienced and my wife seems happy I don't do it her - as if I'd survive attempting to.

But I'm aware it happens to lots of people, mostly women, and I want to provide a portrayal which is suitabley realistic, without being gratuitously offensive.

I've workshopped a lot of the scen in my head, but not committed any of it to paper, well, computer, yet. I'm going to try and spend half-an-hour on it after finishing this post.

This week I have another busy week. Three days of work, collecting wife and child from airport, building a shed. The reality is writing and posting will be difficult this week also. To mitigate that I've prepared posts for Monday and Tuesday, and am considering a story to split up for the days after.

As a curve ball, the story is a HFN (happy for now) Romance which includes a a mad night-time drive across the heart of America. At 17,300 words it will take time to work out how to split it up.

Or, is anyone interested in a romance? should I stick up another These United States story. I have a great alien invasion one; or one about a lighter which, erm, starts fires; or a WW2 era one with a butter cow.

Let me know.

Oh, the picture is of the area I've been working in. Cornwall really is a lovely place.

Text & picture by stuartcturnbull