It snuck up on me, it did.  The Holidays came and went, and I’ve been on a “learn all about typewriters” binge since I got my Smith Corona before Christmas.  I almost pulled the trigger on an early 1970’s Olympia SM9, considered by some to be the finest manual typewriter (portable, though it’s a big portable) of all time, but balked when the price rose over $60, though I’ve seen them go for well over $100 and it looked like it was in perfect condition.  But, I need to stick to my eBay rules of setting a limit for price plus shipping and not going beyond it, and it broke well past $80 total.  $70 is my firm limit, and $60 and below would be preferred.  But I’ll keep my eyes open for an SM9, SM7, or even the previous generation (but gorgeous in look and – from what I understand – every bit as excellent to type with) SM4 and 3’s.  Maybe even a Royal Deluxe Quiet if it’s cheap enough.

But interrupting all this typing fun came an email about classes.  I’m starting on a second bachelors degree, this time in English, and the first class starts next week.  Good thing they emailed me, I thought it started next month.  I’ve logged in, posted to a discussion thread and taken the lay of the land.  And it means I’ll be writing the first fifty pages of a new novel, literary in focus (but the setting can still be genre, which is nice, since I tend to gravitate towards urban fantasy or magical realism).

Tons of reading involved as well it looks like.  I’ll have to cut back on my novel reading, which is fine, I was sucking down books like milk shakes.  Between class, the writing I’m already committed to doing (350,000 big words in 2016), trying to get an agent for the first Mercy book, etc… yeah, that’s enough to keep me busy this year.

Welcome to 2016 and welcome back to school.  Here we go again.  Sing it, Alice….

Leave a Reply