AlphaThoughts: New leaf

Shameful.  Utterly shameful.

I have left my blog to gather cobwebs for nine months.  Call myself a writer and can't write a few hundred words every couple of weeks - shocking behaviour.

New leaf starts today, with a modest goal of an absolute minimum of a post a week.  Preferably witty and intelligent, but won't be allowing the pesky internal editor to get too hung up on that.

So what have I been doing?

• A couple of days after my last post, I received a proposal of marriage from AlphaBloke.  So much of my time while failing to blog has been devoted to wedding planning!  Everything is pretty much in place now though (I hope), so no wedding-related excuses allowed from here on in.
• I have taken a 60-credit Creative Writing course with the Open University (UK).  My first novel was dying on the page and the internal ed was screaming that it was no good, so if I'm honest I took this mainly to gain some confidence.  I am yet to receive my final mark, but have done well in the assignments so far, and confidence has indeed been gained.
• I've also been communicating with many others on the OU course about writing, and am grateful for their continuing support.  In our circles, they are known simply as the Dark Side.
• I am gearing up to turn 30 later this year, and have developed a list of '30 things to do before I'm 30', which I will post some updates on here.  Tasks achieved so far have been clay pigeon shooting, 4x4 driving, and a botched attempt at giving blood that ended in a massive bruise and no blood given - will need to attempt that one again....
• I've ditched AlphaBook 1 on the basis that I don't know how to make it interesting.  It will remain in the mists of my computer and my mind until it has germinated into a more interesting flower.
• I've embarked on AlphaBook 2 which is going very well so far - I think it's a good story and I'm loving writing it.  Since I started it at the end of May, I have written nearly 16,000 words and still going great guns.
• And I'm planning a wonderful African honeymoon, to fit neatly between completion of AB2 first draft and first major edit.

More on all of this to follow.  Good to be back.

AC