i know i could look at anyone but you now

Happy birthday Aunt Becky! She turned 29 for the eighteenth time, which is pretty impressive.

Today was a long but v. productive and entertaining day. I made it up to Des Moines in time for normal-people lunch (as opposed to my usual 2pm lunches) -- my parents had gone up early for an appointment with their CPA, and I conned them into buying me lunch (sprout sandwich!) before going to Borders' cafe and settling down to work on my romance novel.

I wrote 6,192 words today! That's pretty great, particularly since I spent half an hour on the phone with Gyre and half an hour on the phone with Laura. I also got completely tweaked out on caffeine -- I had two triple lattes and a whole pot of black tea, which wired me well enough that I was in no danger of falling asleep on the way home.

Before going home, I had a late dinner with Aunt Becky and her scandalous boyfriend -- intruding on their post-movie dinner probably put a damper on her boyfriend's scandalous tendencies, but Aunt B called three times to see if I wanted to go with them, so I assumed that I was truly welcome. It was fun to see them, and dinner was delicious -- I had a creole pasta with andouille sausage that qualified as the spiciest thing that I've had since my return to the Midwest.

However, by the time we were done with dinner, it was almost eleven p.m., and I had to drive ninety miles through snow and suicidal deer to get home. For those of you living in California, please feel free to gloat -- I know I highlighted Iowa's variable weather patterns as a reason to move back, since I was bored with the fairly uniform weather of Northern California. But I conveniently forgot that 'variable weather' makes it quite possible that you will have a tornado warning one day, flooding overnight, and a snowstorm the next. Ha.

The snow wouldn't have been so bad, but there are deer everywhere -- I only saw five (three of which crossed the road in front of me, less than a mile from my house, preceded by two rabbits whose death wishes I thwarted by a timely application of the brakes). But for every deer you see, there are six more fornicating in the bushes and producing more of the little bastards who will try to take you out as soon as they're big enough to do some damage to your car. Luckily they're not kangaroos, since kangaroos will kick you to death if you hit them with your car, but it's still a little nervewracking to spend an hour and a half waiting for something to leap out of the ditch and try to kill you.

I'll have to write tomorrow -- as I told Aunt Becky, I broke off just as Malcolm and Amelia were about to consummate their marriage, and they're probably eager for me to finish the scene. I also mentioned the impending consummation to Laura when we were chatting -- but I was sitting in Borders at the time, and when I said 'they're about to consummate the marriage', the guy at the table across from me looked startled and then stared at me for awhile. Good times. And now I should go to bed -- I need to rest up if I'm going to write a similar amount tomorrow. Goodnight!