40,000!

Over 40,000 hits on this humble little blog. Whew. That’s a lot of ‘hitting’ for about 20 people!

My alleged novel – about halfway there!

200 pages written so far!

Monte Cristo ‘ghost’ image

Last week, I posted about my visit to Monte Cristo homestead – “Australia’s most haunted house” – in Junee, NSW. As an open-minded skeptic, I was interested to explore the place and see what all the fuss is about. Having taken the tour, then slept there the night I am somewhat disappointed, though not really surprised to report that it was nothing more nor less than an old house with an interesting history.

Natural World: 1/Supernatural World: 0

Oh well.

I included a shot I took in the front parlour and speculated about the ‘ghostly’ shape that I captured in the mirror. The shape was actually there – that’s why I took the picture – but it was only reflected sunlight coming through the window, all broken up by the deteriorated state of the mirror silvering. How curious that the shape of the flaking silver just happens to resemble a human figure! A camera flash glancing off that mirror from just the right angle would probably produce a somewhat creepy effect on a photograph taken at night. Or, just perhaps, it is the shape of the light coming through the open curtains?

Anyway, I darkened the image before I posted it, to make it look like it was taken in low light, just to see how it would look. It has created a storm of controversy, with no fewer than 2 people commenting on the post.

Oh well.

Here are the untouched originals.

Did I photograph a ghost at Monte Cristo – ‘Australia’s Most Haunted House’?

A couple of weeks ago, I went on a 3-hour ‘ghost tour’ (supplemented by an excellent 3 course dinner, a bed for the night and a cooked breakfast) at the notorious Monte Cristo Homestead in Junee, NSW. It has been dubbed ‘Australia’s most haunted house’ and has a long history of ghostly shenanigans. The resident flesh-and-blood family, the Ryans have built it up as a paying concern for aspiring ghost-hunters and tourists, with the grudging co-operation with the resident spectral family, the Crawleys.
The place has an interesting history, dating back to the 1870s, and has been meticulously restored by the very talented Reginald Ryan, who died just a few months ago, and – of course – continues to live there now in spirit form – or so his widow told me.
Anyway, I found myself the sole self-confessed skeptic in the motley bunch of believers, several of whom tossed the term ‘skeptic’ about with a knowing wink and indulgent smile, and some of whom clung tightly together for reassurance as they reported chills, heart palpitations and creepy brushes with the cobwebby fingers of phantoms. We trudged around the house by candlelight and listened to horror stories spun with showman-like eloquence by our host, Lawrence ‘the Legend’ Ryan, who grew up there and has decades of creepy experiences to draw upon.
I found the whole experience interesting, slightly amusing and even a bit disappointing. Seriously. I sensed absolutely nothing of the supernatural, even after spending a night with an open mind in the most haunted house in the country. Either I’m tone-deaf to the spirits, or of no interest to them so they ignore me, or…as is overwhelmingly probable, they don’t exist, except in our imagination!
Anyway, to conclude. I took this photo with my dinky little phone camera. Look in

ghost? Mrs. Crawley?

the large mirror. What can you see? Could that possibly be a ghostly figure standing there?

my mobile writer’s studio

2014 New Year’s resolution…what, nearly three months ago?

I aim to add 20 pages per month this year to my so-slowly-developing novel manuscript. This should see a stack of about 300-350 pages out of an expected 400 or so by the end of December.

In order to achieve this (and I’m happy to report to all my loyal blog followers that I have managed, in the 10 or so weeks of 2014 thus far to add about 45 pages) I peck away at the keyboard each morning for about 45 minutes before other duties beckon, plus…drum roll…, thanks to a recent change in Tamara’s work roster, I AM NOW ABLE TO SET ASIDE ONE DAY A WEEK TO GET AWAY AND WRITE!

Here you see my new mobile writer’s studio, equipped with: comfortable seats, music-on-demand, BYO food and drinks, a nice place to lie down and nap after lunch (ie., the backseat), surprisingly private ambience (OK, being a head-turning classic auto, it is sometimes not totally private), and mobility, which allows for a change of scenery when inspiration is needed. You can see two of my favourite studio locations – Moffat Beach, Caloundra and Mary Cairncross Park, Maleny.

Throw in a MacBook Air (10 hour battery life) and a personal internet hotspot via my iPhone for those moments when a spot of research is needed, and a pair of boardies and good walking shoes for post-nap exercise, and I think we have a winner.

Oh, and one more thing to make this scenario perfect. Tamara is tasked to interrogate me after each day in ‘the studio’ to ascertain just how many new pages were completed, and why,  god forbid, the number is so pitifully small. (Yesterday, I think I achieved about 4 pages, BUT (and any would-be writer will empathise here) I achieved a small, but significant break-through in resolving a plot dilemma.

I LOVE the Impala – a gorgeous, glossy black throwback to 1967 – and she is now doubling beautifully as my mobile writer’s studio.

Command and Control Centre

Christopher turned 17 a couple of months ago. If not for his quadriplegia, we probably would have looked around for a small used car to give him to mark the occasion. As he will never drive a car (unless Google can perfect its self-driving car anytime in the foreseeable future), we opted for a new computer of equivalent value to help set him up in his ambition to pursue video post-production as a career.

He was sorely tempted by the new Mac Pro, soon to be released; but chose – sensibly in my view – to settle for a top-of-the-line iMac and some additional bits and pieces – hard drives, displays, etc.

It arrived yesterday.

To his great delight, I spent most of the afternoon and evening cleaning and refurbishing his desk – inspired a little bit by the flight deck of the Airbus A380 – and setting things just right so he could take his new ‘car’ for a test drive. Here he is running it up to full speed this morning. Fortunately, we don’t have to worry about him driving it into a tree.

taking the new rig for a test drive

3 reasons why this stack of paper grows so slowly

Almost 4 months ago, I posted to this blog about the ever-so-slow progress of my novel. At that stage, I had completed the first two chapters.

posing little danger to rainforests thus far

Today I finished the umpteenth draft of Chapter 3 and here you see the printed manuscript thus far – a pathetic stack of paper which is all I have to show for my efforts over the past 12 months or so – a Prologue and three Chapters, amounting to just over 17,000 words on 68 pages.

And this is just the first proper draft!

Why is it taking so long for this stack of paper to grow to its intended height of approximately 300 pages?

Reason 1: I am slack.

Writing – sustained, regular, consistent writing – is much harder work than I realised. I have discovered that it requires what I call the 3Ds: discipline, determination and sheer doggedness. (OK, ‘determination’ and ‘doggedness’ are almost the same thing; but I like to get things in 3s). I suppose I average about 30 minutes a day working on the book. Apparently, I lack a sufficient supply of the Ds to keep at it any more solidly than that.

Reason 2: I constantly fear that what I am writing is ‘crap’.

This tends to put a bit of a crimp in the old motivation. I admit I lack the bullet-proof self-belief of, say Kevin Rudd or Tony Abbott. That is how I know I will never be Prime Minister. But, will I ever be a novelist? Still, as Andy Ihnatko says, “Remember: perhaps the only reason that someone else’s crappy novel has been published and yours hasn’t is that THAT OTHER PERSON HAS FINISHED THEIR NOVEL AND YOU HAVEN’T!”

Reason 3: I am an obsessive proof-reader

Honestly, to complete a chapter to ‘draft’ stage; I find myself worrying it and nibbling at it and shifting paragraphs around and re-writing sections and substituting better words, etc, so obsessively that the ‘draft’ chapters you see are really in fact the 40th drafts!

Anyway, I am pleased that the little stack is as high as it is, and will now take a break before taking a deep breath and tackling Chapter 4.

There Are Little People Inside My Head: Novel-In-Progress

Today, I was able to summon the courage to hand Tamara, TOPITWRMNIP  (The-Only-Person-In-The-World-Reading-My-Novel-In-Progress), the Prologue and Chapters 1 and 2 of my NIP (Novel-In-Progress). Chapter 3 is about half done. I am aiming for 20 chapters in about 300 pages.

Some Bloke (Not Me) Writing A Novel

I started this project in earnest last June, so, what’s that? 12,000 words in almost 10 months. Hmm. At this rate, should be ready for it to be rejected by a publisher by June 2019.

Oh well, it is helping to keep me out of mischief.

And I am meeting all kinds of interesting new people – none of them real, of course. They populate a fictional Australian town named Carlyon and they come to greet me each morning at 6:00am and we spend time together for an hour or so; although, annoyingly, they began bothering me at around 3:00 this morning. You may have noticed that I am blogging about writing, rather than actually writing. As the Americans so quaintly put it: my bad.

Hills Family Odyssey

Duck over to our travel blog (hillsfamilyodyssey) to view the latest video installment, a 6 minute video: Episode 3 – “Two Lonely and Pathetic Men”.

 

hunker in the bunker

The lashing we got a few weeks ago from ex-TC Lee Harvey Oswald gave me a rude shock. I took it a bit personally, as I am the one responsible for keeping my family well-fed,and Oswald’s shenanigans put a crimp in my ability to do that.

I plan not to be caught out like that again.

We have had very heavy rain here on the Sunshine Coast before. Our record in the 6 years we’ve been here was 873mm in January 2011, but there have been several months when rainfall exceeded 500mm. Every time this happens, the road bridge over the South Mooloolah River goes under. When it does, we have the devil of a time getting to shops and petrol stations. We are used to it. We live with it. Before Oswald (B.O.) we had never been cut off for more than 24 hours.

We have had power outages before; quite often in fact. The infrastructure around the Coast here must be a bit below par, or else I can’t understand why. However, we have met that challenge with a 2.8kva petrol generator, hard wired to the house via a change-over switch, giving us perfectly acceptable stand-by electricity to power the water pump, the fridge and freezer, phone and internet, Christopher’s high-tech special equipment, and about half of the house lights. We are used to it. We live with it. B.O., we never had to run the generator for more than a few hours until mains power was restored.

Thanks to Oswald, we were cut off for about 48 hours. We had no power for 3 days. The entire village was without power, so no fridges at the supermarket, no EFTPOS(!), and no pumps at the service station. The phone lines went down for 3 days. So no internet. Then the mobile phone service went down for about 36 hours, so no outside contact at all. Oswald effected such a wide area of QLD to the north and south of us, Energex crews had to wait several days before they could get to areas where damage had caused interruption to power supply.

I got to thinking…what if we have another event that cuts us off for 3-4 days AND the generator conks out?

My contingency plan B.O. always managed to keep going for about 24 hours.We now have a contingency plan that will hopefully cover us for up to 4 days.

feeding the family

It involves getting cash and petrol (about 60 litres). I always have about 10 litres on hand, but I needed about 40 litres for 3 days, and that was with the generator shut down overnight.I was able to borrow 10 litres of fuel from a neighbour down the road, and that got me out of trouble on day 2. After things got back to normal, I bought him a roast to help restock his freezer – he has no generator and lost everything he couldn’t cook and eat.

I also now have a little bunker supply of non-perishables in a corner of the pantry. I always had some  bits and pieces, but only enough for a day or two. In addition to what you see in the picture, I also have a 10 litre water bottle for drinking water; but, even without power, I can always head down to one of the tanks and draw off more from a gravity-fed tap.

I have a gas stove, emergency lights and a portable transistor radio. What have I missed? Maybe a little gas-powered fridge for the insulin?