Day 27 of #100daysofwriting and my son is sick, so I am scribbling today.
Day 28 of #100daysofwriting go away I am writing. When the door is open you can listen in.
Day 29 of #100daysofwriting and my character Mausu has just compared space travel to a cat’s cradle. I wonder if this is a Vonnegut thing. I’ll have to check, it’s been awhile since I read it. However, part of me is thinking of the TV series, Quantum Leap, which compares time travel to a ball of string. All I know is that it is the heart of the ship now, I am considering naming the ship, Speedwell — for those of you who know Coleridge, there is conjecture that the mariner was based on a sailor called Simon Hatley, he was in the inspiration for Crusoe too, Hatley shot an albatross on a voyage on the Speedwell and this angered the spirits. My character Mausu has also done something bad too, but it is yet to be revealed to the rest of the crew and she too will have to come face to face with evil spirits.
Day 30 of #100daysofwriting and The Bear & The Unconfessed Magician short story is finished. Now to find a publication that takes stories up to 6,000 words. Funnily, the research I did for it, threw up this guy for another story. Now back to cat’s cradle SF.
Day 31 of #100daysofwriting and I am in my notebooks looking for an idea that I had 15 years ago that is niggling me. First thought is that I need an office, so I go off to help paint the kitchen to get books on shelves so I can have an office!
Day 32 of #100daysofwriting and today I am immersed in garden writing. My non-fiction work is actually formed by my creative writing practice, even though I was a BBC Broadcast Journalist, I always had an organic, creative approach to my work. I always sought a different angle, a different way of inhabiting the story I was telling. I once interviewed Bill Bailey the comedian, and we sat for 30 mins talking about Ming vases and my editor had a shit fit when I handed in copy on Ming vases. He printed it against his best judgement and the interview went on to win an award, why? It was bloody funny and revealed Bailey’s ability to just riff on an idea and go with it. Today, because I am writing about November in October, I am inhabiting the first touches of winter, I turn to my garden diary and my drawings of it – yes, I draw, I did art at degree (can’t draw people for toffee, great at landscapes) – I feel my way into winter and creak with it. The language of the column creaks along with me, the rain pours of my brow, the wind dries it. Even when I try to write a journalism piece it turns into a story. For all we leave behind is stories and fact sooner or later becomes myth.
Andrew Oldham's Boneyard 