I’m just now starting to come out of the foggy haze that washed over me last week — a low fever, chills, and not much else to show for it all. I felt bad enough to notice but not enough to take off of work. My coworkers kept offering me various cold medicines, despite my insistence that it does very,very bad things to my personality. It took me a few days to realize they want to see how bad “very, very bad” actually is.

I’m feeling much better now, thanks.

It’s November which means it’s National Novel Writing Month. Regrettably, I haven’t been participating in NaNoWriMo as it didn’t really line up with my work on Pantheon. Maybe next year I can take the time to get to one of the other stories from the Matters of Mortology cycle. There’s certainly more from that world I want to explore and a month should be the perfect amount of time for a little side trip through one of them.

So, no NaNoWriMo for me this year. I am writing but it’s not going to be done in a month. Optimistically, it will likely take another four months before I’ve got the current project to a point where it feels like a solid first draft. Realistically, it could be six months or more. As I learned on Assam & Darjeeling, real life has a tendency to get in the way of real writing.

I’ve enjoyed cheering on everyone else at Plurk and Twitter who are battling their way through NaNoWriMo, though.

It’s a really terrific idea, setting aside a month to push through something towards completion. Too often, writers (myself included) get a little discouraged or distracted by what we’re working on, going back over the same passages again and again without actually moving through to the end. A commitment to NaNoWriMo is a great antidote for that tendency.

(And that’s the last time I’ll use the acronym NaNoWriMo on this site until December — no, wait…)

I’ve written about it before, I know, but I’ve found that writing out a first draft in longhand — and sometimes the second as well — is a perfect way to protect myself from going back and trying to edit and re-edit what I’m writing. I’m not anti-technology at all, of course. But I’ve found that (for me) there’s something very gratifying about having the pages pile up in real time, line by line. And you end up with a very interesting artifact that has heft and weight beyond the amount of space it takes up on the hard drive. The four notebooks in which I wrote the first draft of Assam & Darjeeling are some of my most treasured possessions. If the house ever goes up in flames, I’m diving out the window with them and the family photos.

Another reason that NaNoWriMo (sorry) works is that it forces a writer to stay connected to their own continuity. The past few weeks have been a rough time for me, thanks to unforeseen wrinkles in my schedule and fighting off being sick. And so, when I (for instance) left a dapper little prick named Trip heading down Swift’s Row to teach “Saint” Stephen Murphy a lesson… well, unfortunately I’d forgotten what exactly Trip’s lesson was to be, once I got back to him.

And thus we build our little palaces along the shores of our mind… and then we can only stand and watch as the waves roll in.

I’m sure I’ll think of something sooner or later. If not, I can always count on Trip to come up with it. He is shaping up to be a bright fellow. He’s going to have to be, if this story is still headed where I think it’s headed.

It was just November, and now it’s nearly gone. Thanksgiving next week but there’s already snow falling around the state. I work out near Lake Michigan and we got 2-4 inches earlier in the week. Back in town though, it was sunny. People kept asking where I’d come from, with all that ice and snow on my car. No one got my Niflheimr joke, which was a disappointment.

But I have bigger problems to contend with. Winter is here and the gods apparently decided I don’t really need a functioning heater or defroster in my car. Which is… problematic when the temperature is dropping daily. We’re averaging in the 30′s right now, with 20′s and below overnight. It’s only going to go lower as the world tilts and that long cold shadow slides across us. And ice should not form on the inside of the windshield. So let’s get that fixed this week, yes?

The Winter Chap has sold a handful of copies, which is nice to see. You could even get one for yourself. And it’s seasonal; there’s a Christmas story in there that I’m particularly proud of. Consider it your donation to my personal battle against the Frost Giants.

And next comes Christmas. I don’t have a lot of good ideas for gifts this year, so I’m considering just buying myself some of these to replace the family and friends I’m sure to lose.

Speaking of which, this film is either brilliant or disturbing. Or both.

Either way, I want one of those zombie puppets.

Which gives me a nice reason to mention that the latest episode of the Cthulhu podcast features a recording of my short story “Summer Salt” — which makes me quite happy. New episodes of the Cthulhu ‘cast are one of the things I check for whenever I fire up iTunes, so I was doubly pleased when FNH told me he’d accepted the story.

If you’d prefer to use your eyes instead of your ears, you can read the story here.

But you might soon be outnumbered as there are new subscribers still signing up for the “Assam & Darjeeling” and “Matters of Mortology” podcasts. You could still be one of them, just click on the download links here and here.

I received a very nice note last week from a listener in Singapore who has been loving “Assam & Darjeeling” — which gave me a silly smile to wear for a few days.

And while we’re on the subject of smiles, although The Dark Knight had it’s problems I have to say that I agree with most of the hype about Heath Ledger’s portrayal of The Joker. My only quibble is that it overshadows Aaron Eckhart’s work as Two-Face, which was also excellent. And we got a trailer for the Watchmen movie, which I have no doubt will begin to generate more and more hype until it comes out next year.

And, yes, the “other” hype is true too: The new iPhone is outstanding. I’m still saying thank you to the powers that be for giving me one. Doublestuff kickass, to say the least.

(Oops. I forgot to mention that once the two current podcasts finish up, I’ll be starting a brand new one. This next one will be a bit broader, more of an anthology, and much more collaborative with the audience. Details shall follow later this week.)

On the publishing side, I’m currently regrouping after most of my efforts on the BEA trip this year have yet to produce anything fruitful. There’s still a few open leads that I’m waiting to hear back from but this weekend will mark a change in my efforts to connect with an agent, thanks to some good ideas and resources that proved worthwhile for an author friend of mine. As always, stay tuned.

The new project proceeds apace. The writing is going well. It’s going to be a long book.

For what it’s worth, the new book is called Pantheon.