i sprinkle holy water upon the vampire

I'm making progress with the synopsis - somehow I'm pulling a story out of thin air, and it seems to be coming together even though I still feel like I'm completely flying in the dark. I learned a lot about the hero today and wrote up twenty reasons why he might decide to finally come back to England. I brainstormed twenty challenges the heroine might face as a result of him coming back. I also listed approximately 55 scenes that could happen someplace in the book (I probably need 60-70, and some of what was listed could either be split into two scenes or would not make it into the final draft).

In other words, I'm happy with where things are. I need to do some research about what spies did back in the day (when in doubt, make your hero a Regency version of Jason Bourne), and I need to figure out which conflict/geographic location the hero spent his time in, and then I can start plotting in earnest. I also need to figure out exactly who the villain is, since that's the biggest piece I'm currently missing. But, once I figure that out, I can storyboard everything and write up the synopsis - easy peasy, right?

This is basically all I did today; I was going to go to the gym, but I skipped it (Alyssa will not be happy with me - I haven't been in a week). Upon eating stale rice cakes and peanut butter for lunch, I decided I should make some time to go to the grocery store this afternoon, and the errand was duly accomplished. I also folded the clothes I washed two days ago, swept and vacuumed, and cleaned my bathtub while procrastinating/thinking through the next bits of the plot. And, I took a bath in some sort of eucalyptus/spearmint scented bubble bath that was supposed to reinvigorate the mind - perhaps it did, but I also somehow cut the top of my thumb in the bathtub (extremely inexplicably), which was quite disconcerting because I didn't notice until I realized that my bathtowel was streaked with blood. Perhaps this is a good thing - it's my right thumb, aka the smartphone thumb, and so I might be less inclined to thumb through twitter on the phone for the next couple of days.

I finally wrapped up for the night with some quality time brainstorming new titles for my books - not that it matters, since the editors will change them anyway, but you do want them to be as catchy as possible, so I'm making one final attempt to see if I can come up with anything better than what I've got. And now, I think I'll go to sleep - I am going to the gym tomorrow if it kills me, and then I'm going to get to the point with my plot where I can start writing up the synopsis. Goodnight!