Writing class yesterday was good. As I predicted, a few of the students did not re-appear for the second week, which is the case in just about every post-college class I have ever taken.

We discussed detail again, and were given an excerpt from On Writing, which I bought on Friday. I meant to get started on that book last night, but was instead lured to bed by The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle.

Every time I think to myself, “My book will never be published,” another voice responds, “You are doing this for your own pleasure.” Then they kind of go back and forth for a while.

Last night I did part of my homework assignment, which was to write a little scene using some detail picked out of my real experience. So I picked the sound of pigeons courting on a window ledge outside. It reminded me of staying alone in a hotel in Amsterdam four years ago, and the pigeons that would stand there making noise all morning, no matter how many times I shooed them away. I turned it into a fiction piece, and went ahead and used a character from my book. I would post it here, but it is filled with spoilers, since it’s going to be used near the end of the story. So there.

This morning I am making the apple oatmeal. Then I am going to walk somewhere and read. I haven’t been reading enough. I blame it on my back, but it’s not a very good excuse.

The weather today is good. There is a thin sheet of grey covering the city, but just enough pockets of sunlight are getting through to give the appearance of a crisp, bright autumn day.