And then, and then, and...

Went out for a spot of shooting yesterday. God, I wish it was summer. Open blue skies are so welcoming versus this curtain of perpetual grey. I guess my shooting skills have really anthropied since the last time I seriously picked up a camera for any extended period of time(circa 2002).

Went for a 2 hour long blood test too. Kind of ridiculous, but it can't really be helped. The doc wants to check for diabetes, which means drinking a cup of sugar water and being poked every 30 mins to check glucouse absorbtion over time.

Wrote out a timeline for the story though. And I got some reading done.

Speaking of writing, I slogged through the last bits of chapter four of my 'novel' (to borrow Cheryl's term), but got pretty smooth at chapters five and six. I think the main reason why chapter four was such hard going is because it's a set up for subsequent character arcs. It's necessary, but not all that exciting to write about.

Plus I do write short chapters, so it's not really all THAT much words.

I think Wally's getting a bit antagonistic though. I know he's just hurting, but I really should try and rein him in a bit.

Random things.

Haven't shot anything yet. The on again/off again rain is really irritating, plus the cloud cover means pretty bad lighting. I have been rummaging through my stuff, and have taken pictures of a whole bunch of items which I'm now attempting to flog off on Ebay and make some cash!

Written some story, here's a list of characters populating my little world. Some have made an appearance, some haven't. The ones I've already written about are in bold.

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Wally - He owns and runs a comic cum hobby store. Is obsessed about comics and Magic: The Gathering. He's a little emo.

Amanda - Wally's high flying lawyer ex-girlfriend who's just broken up with him. She's very demanding and aggressive.

Dick - Works at the comic store. He's overbearing, pushy, and has an encyclopedic knowledge of comics which he likes to flaunt. He's also quite desperate.

JD - Also works at the store. He's intelligent, sarcastic, and gets the job done with minimum fuss. He's also quite intuitive when it comes to people.

Liz - Wally's best friend. She used to be very into comics and stuff, but gave up 'trivial pursuits' for a career (she regrets the decision). Smart and speaks her mind a lot. Secretly loves Wally, but knows that they'll never work out.

Barry - A guitarist from the store next door. Loud, arrogant, and dislikes 'nerd culture'. Bully who goes out of his way to aggravate people. Barry seems driven by a need to 'one-up' everyone else. Wally and him hate each other.

Abby - An indie musician. She's soft spoken and from out of town.

Melisa - An ex-girlfriend of Wally's.

EDIT: Abby is now named 'Marie', she's an indie/folk musician who's in art school. She's currently working with Barry to produce an album. She's got an amazing voice.

New story idea.

I just got back from a quick drive around town. I was doing research for a story I'm writing, and I wanted to get some places fixed firmly in my mind.

I'm writing a story about a thirty-something-year-old guy who's never really had to grow up. He runs a comic cum hobby store and doesn't have any real goals or ambitions besides slacking off and cruising through life. Plus he's a massive geek. In short, he's never been able to hold on to romantic relationships. The story will revolve a lot around his love life or lack of one.

He's surrounded by a couple of quirky uber-geek characters. They don't really help him much in his quest for the next shag, but they're awful fun to be around. And I anticipate that they'll be awful fun to write!

The story opens just after he gets dumped by the latest girlfriend. I'm looking to follow him over the course of a year, and see where his story goes.

I think it'll be an interesting journey both for my characters and I.

I'm determined to finish this story. Got a bad habit of putting things aside, and I think it's high time I sat down and actually finished a story I started writing. Wish me luck!

Oh, and my lead character isn't named yet (although the rest are). Trying to find a name that feels right. Suggestions anyone?

EDIT: It seems that calling my character a 'geek' is a wrong choice, as he isn't a full-on geek. He's not exactly a nerd either, and he's not just another slacker. Guess I'll need to define him a little better.

Trying to write.

I can't write with all this noise around me. I do wish Mum would just quit complaining about things. The walls of this house are thin enough that I can hear almost anything that happens anywhere in the place. All this talking and puttering around is absurdly distracting.