Derry, Northern Ireland

Derry, Northern Ireland
A book I'm working on is set in this town.

Monday, December 19, 2011

This is ridiculous

I'm not used to having insomnia. Normally when I hit the pillow I'm out within a few minutes...mainly because I keep going till I'm about ready to drop. But the last two nights, I've barely gotten any sleep. It's like my brain kicks in and I can't shut it down. So at 3:30 this morning I gave up, turned on a light and read for an hour, then was able to drop off and get some ZZZs. I never was one for the Tylenol PM crap; makes me a zombie the next day.

Okay, I have had episodes like this before, but what surprised me was that this time, rather than me fading out at about 2pm, I was fine till I got home, ate dinner and was checking e-mails. Then the tiredness swooped down like an owl on a field mouse, so I took a catnap and we'll see what happens tonight.

This brain restlessness may have something to do with the story. I worked on it, yesterday, and tonight I got to about the halfway point in corrections and changes. I did have some things out of order, and not deliberately so. I also decided to go whole hog on the Sixties scene in NYC and added in Vinnie going to some parties with a guy he knows who knows people in the know, and having to deal with the explosion of drugs not only on the streets among the low-lifes, with hints of it in his own family, but in the parlors and discos of the monied class. Certain appetites get awakened that will bear fruit later. These will probably need to be fleshed out more in the next draft, but for now they work to carry the story forward and build his reasoning for what happens near the end.

So by the time this draft is done, it'll really be a second one...but my seconds are always my firsts, at least, they're the one's I'm willing to let people read.

Or maybe I should wait till I figure out how the hell Simon and Garfunkel were able to worm their way into one of those parties without even being there. I know, I know, but it makes sense in the story.

I think.

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