The End is Near

I've been making progress with my writing this week. I've reached the big love scene, which was part of the plotting issue I was having. There were two places I could have had it happen, and trying to figure out which worked best proved a bit of a headache, but I think I've got it in the right place now. However, since I was experiencing a bit of a roadblock with my writing, I did what I normally do in cases like that. I moved upstairs to the couch with my Alphie and my notebook. The first part of the scene I wrote on the Alphie. When I started to blank out though, I switched to the notebook and that's what I've been working on for the past two days. My work is slower, but it makes me think more about what I'm putting down which in this case works better. I feel like I've stopped running in sand though and am back on solid ground.

I am also in the last day of the pedometer challenge - whew! It was beginning to feel like this day would never get here. I'll be happy to return to my regular 5.5K walk in the evenings instead of walking every spare minute I was upright. Oddly enough, I haven't lost a bloody pound, but my legs feel as solid as tree trunks and I swear to God you could bounce a quarter off my ass. So I tell myself I'm merely exchanging muscle for fat.

Unfortunately, after all that hard work, I don't think I'm going to win the challenge. Each of our offices across the country sent in their office averages and top three highest steppers. My office was in the lead, and the top spot for individuals was a close race between me and another lady in Ontario. Unfortunately two days ago I learned a guy in our Mississauga office apparently had an average of 30,000 steps a day. I went back to the sheets that were sent out. How had I missed that? Turns out I missed it because the Mississauga office never reported their totals either time the sheet went out. And now, with only 4 days left, there was no way I could catch up to overtake 30,000 steps. Which was disappointing. It would have been nice to have had that information back on the 13th when the first totals went out so I at least knew what I was up against. Some suggested that now I could at least kick back and relax. If I couldn't catch up with him why kill myself trying. Oddly the thought never even entered my mind. I figured, if I was going down, then I was going down swinging, and I upped my daily totals from 23,000 steps on average to 28,000 steps. I may not catch up to him, in fact I know I won't if his total really is 30,000 steps, but damned if I'm just going to roll over and die without at least trying.

In other news, I finished Susan Elizabeth Phillips book, Match Me If You Can last night. As some of you might recall I had tried to read it before after finishing Ain't She Sweet and loving it. But I couldn't get into Match Me. So I tried the book on CD, thinking maybe that would help, but, well turns out books on CD aren't my thing. Then I read Natural Born Charmer. And I loved it. So, I decided to try Match Me again. And I'm glad I did. It was great. So great that I don't even know why I couldn't get into it in the first place. Maybe I just wasn't in the right frame of mind. Have you ever had that happen? Pick up a book and not be able to get into it, and then go back and read it later and have it be the best book you've ever read?

And so that is what I've been up to this week. Walking, reading and writing. Although I just picked up the first season of the HBO series Carnivale on DVD from the library, and now that I'll have my evenings back, I'm going to kick my feet up and watch the circus freaks. After reading Water for Elephants (awesome book!) I'm obsessed with the Big Top.