I’ve gotten some good stuff done there lately. There’s still some stuff to work out in The Monster Within, but I made some serious progress tonight. There was a pacing issue at the end where it when bang-bang! and now it goes bang, rest, rest, blammo!

That’s the idea, anyway. I still have to finish writing it.

There is a Gambrinus shortage here. At the grocery store yesterday, no Gambrinus. That’s OK, there are plenty of other beers and I like to experiment. There’s one beer that’s not so great, but it’s not bad, and a half-liter bottle costs twenty-five friggin’ cents. I got one of those and a few others that cost marginally more, splurging for the Budvar.

Tonight on the way home from Roma I stopped at the little beer store on the corner (New beer run – start with no pants and no shoes. Put on shoes (pants optional), grab two empties and head out. Throw both bolts on the flat door. Elevator optional on the way down. Unlock and relock both doors in front. Sprint to the beer store on the corner. Trade in the two empty bottles and twenty-nine crowns for two full Gambrinuses. Yeah, that’s pricy compared to the grocery store two blocks away but this is a beer run. Return home, negotiating all four locks. No elevator on the way back up. Timer stops when one beer is in the fridge and the other in the freezer for rapid cooling.) and they were out of Gambrinus as well. Choices were limited, so I scooped up a pair of Pilsner Urquell. In general at the store there’s either a kind of grumpy guy (he may not be grumpy at all, he might be telling me all kinds of funny stuff in his gruff voice for all I know) or there’s a woman who calls to another woman in the back for everything she does. Tonight I got some kid. He asked me “blah, bllah blah?” which I think is “Are you returning any bottles?” because the only time they don’t ask me anything is when I return bottles, I made a sweeping negative gesture, he nodded and punched 27 into the register. 27 isn’t a bad price for tow of these beers, considering it’s not the grocery store. Then he hit the button again and I was staring a 54. Two bucks. For two beers. Granted, they were good beers, and large, but I’ve gotten used to paying a lot less, and I’m not going back baby, not in this country. Still, I bought the beers. But just for tonight.

Today must have been some sort of special Sunday. Start of Advent? I thought that should have already happened. On my way home from the bar I met a group of happy kids, dressed like angels and stuff, lighting off really big firecrackers. I had heard distant reports, and then when I was walking past the group I saw that several of them had fingers in their ears. Suddenly, KAPOW! The little bomb went off even as the kids were lighting the next one. Oh, I miss those days. Wher I got to the building there was a van parked on the sidewalk outside, and they were unloading christmas decorations. Apparently we get the christmas cheer here as of tonight.

Working back in time, I observed tonight that when frost and fashion collide, fashion wins. A couple came into the bar while I was writing. The guy looked like he had just come off the windswept tundra; he was wearing an enormous parka with a hood. He was with a tall blonde wearing her kicky little leather jacket over tight-fitting jeans, with a little midriff exposed when she held herself just right, which she did most of the time. I’m not sure they were actually a couple, because while he went to the back part of the restaurant she hung out at the bar, preventing me from writing for quite a while. But my point still stands.

So, uh, happy advent or whatever. Any excuse to blow things up!

Sweet!

Thanks!