Abattoir

In order to write Book Number The Forth (which has a working title, but I don't like it, so I'm not going to mention it here in case the bloody thing sticks) I need to complete some research. A big chunk of this involves learning what sort of whacky japes they get up to in Meat processing plants. It's that kind of story.

In theory this should be an easy enough subject to research -- one phones up the abattoir, tell them that one is an write-ist* and they suddenly come over all enthusiastic and keen to help.

Not this time.

The trouble is that butchers don't do the same kind of work they used to do 20, or even 10 years ago. And that's the time span I need to research. So to find out about this stuff I have to take one step back through the process and speak to the people who perform the happy dispatch upon the moo-cows, fluffy-baa-baa-lamkins, and piggies. Only none of them seem too keen to have a bearded write-ist poke about their slaughterhouse.

So, does anyone out there own, or know someone who owns / has a controlling interest in / can smuggle me into an abattoir? It's a strange thing to ask, but I get the feeling things will get stranger long before I get to the end of this book.

* A fact that can be verified through Google, thus proving I'm not some sort of weird-arsed vegetarian eco-terrorist / veggielante.

Trouserpress

For some reason, coming back to Book Number The Third after an brief work-related hiatus, it's not a dreadful as I'd feared. Maybe this is because I've not just finished reading THE MERMAIDS SINGING this time round. Not easy to compare oneself with Val's writing at its very best -- it's no surprise the thing won the Gold Dagger, it's a bloody good book. But whatever it is, I'm thinking that BROKEN SKIN isn't actually all that bad after all.

Of course the proof of the pudding is in the blurbing and the ordering. The Bound Galleys arrived on Friday, (or ARCs if you're all transatlantic and don't mind the people in Otterstones taking the piss out of you for using the American terminology, like you're some sort of rock star) and they'll be going out to all the booksellers and reviewers so that they can line the bottom of their bird cages with them.

The really odd thing about the Galleys is that they're going to be different from the final, finished book. Previously they've all been identical, but for some reason the whole process seems to be running a little behind the thing. Probably something to do with me sodding off to the Midwest this August when I should have been editing. Bad Stuart, naughty Stuart.

Something else that's going to be different is the cover, which needs a new bedstead and fewer shiny pee-stains (don't ask).

I've been sending them out to those kind souls that have promised to blurb the thing, if they've got the time -- which as we know from last year is the 'get out of jail free' card, in case they hate it with a passion most people reserve for Lawyers, Traffic Wardens, and other assorted cock-weasels.

I however will go back to obsessing over the first four chapters, convinced that if I go off and read something else, then come back to it again I'll suddenly see why I should stop pretending to be a write-ist and go crawl into a darkened cupboard and never coming out again.

And for those of you keeping score, the work / writing debate has taken a lurch to the left. More news as events warrant.

Stinky Spam Poo-head Monkeys

Has anyone in the history of the internet ever looked at their inbox and thought, "You know what I need? A dirty big pile of unsolicited shite in here." More importantly has anyone looked at said big pile of unsolicited shite and thought, "Excellent! That's just what I need! I was worried about the size of my mighty man-truncheon / wanted to give some arsewit I've never heard of my bank details / am really needing naked photos of Anne Widdecombe..." Well, OK, maybe the last one, but we're only human, damn it!

For some reason I've been plagued of late by some halfwit trying to peddle insurance and loans. Not all in the same email, you understand, no: lots and lots of different emails. Lots and lots and lots of them. And all they are is a big list of morons' websites.

Who thought it was a good idea to bombard people with this kind of garbage? That we'd all rush out and enthusiastically click our mice on their stinking links? Not only will I not click on their stinking links that stink of stink, I'll ridicule their masculinity too. YOU ALL HAVE TINY MAN WINKIES, AND YOUR MAN WINKIES ARE SOFT AND FLACCID AND NOBODY LOVES THEM BUT YOURSELVES. AND YOU DO THAT ON A REGULAR BASIS. AND YOUR PALMS ARE ALL HAIRY BECAUSE OF IT. AND NOBODY LOVES YOU!

So if you're an insurance company and you've got a website on xoomer.alice.it, or galeon.com/all4u/, or even doc.lld.dk/Members, please go fuck yourself with a cheese grater. OK?

Hit Man

One of the benefits of working for INoGITCH -- other than the regular paycheck and daily adoration of my fellow wage slaves *ahem* -- is the fact that I can go to the shops at lunchtime. OK, so I could always do this while being an at home write-ist, but it always seemed to involved a big kafuffle of driving to Inverurie and all sorts of associated tractor-related nastiness. And nice though Inverurie is, it's not the bustling metropolis that Aberdeen can claim to be. Third largest city in Scotland, etc.

Now I am what is known as 'delicate'. My skin is soft and silky smooth, and She Who Must Take Care To Make Sure That When She Beats Up Her Hubband She Does It So The Bruises Don't Show anoints it with lark-grease* on a regular basis, just in case I need to expose any of it to the vulgar gaze of the public. And that means these cold morning starts to get into INoGITCH often result in my delicate artist's hands freezing to the steering wheel, like frozen porck, apple and rosemary sausages. Only with fingernails. Which a reputable butcher will usually remove before selling.

Being of a logical bent I decided to purchase some gloves this very day: leather ones, so they're not all slippery slidey on the steering wheel, resulting in my careening off the road into a ditch, tree, or sheep. Black leather gloves. And luckily enough Tesco in Danestone had just that very item on sale for £10.00, with an extra 20% off! Woo and indeed Who!

I've never had a pair of black leather gloves before, and I have to confess I really liked them. There's something very satisfying about knowing you're not leaving any fingerprints. Plus it makes people look at you as if you're about to whip out a firearm of some description and pop a cap in their monkey asses. Especially if you're wearing a black suit, white shirt and red tie at the time. Very hit man.

I wore them for most of the afternoon. I wore them and didn't leave any fingerprints, right up to the point that I noticed that the bloody things were falling apart. Poop. No more pretending to be a hit man for poor Stuart. And worse still, when I finally managed to extract myself from INoGITCH this evening, Tesco were all out of man-sized gloves, so I couldn't even swap them for a new pair. All that was left was a pile of small gloves, for angry little people who want to be secret agents. Provided they can reach the shelf the gloves are on. Maybe they could all cooperate and make some sort of small human pyramid?

Tomorrow afternoon I'm off into town to meet up with someone from BBC Scotland to do some research for Book Number The Fourth. Maybe I'll pop past Markie's and see if they have another pair of OJ-style gloves. One feels naked without them. Especially while typing nude...

* Because let's be honest: no one wants a squeaky lark.

In which our almost-bearded protagonist wonders if he hasn't made an mistake...

Today doesn't really mark any sort of anniversary, or a significant date: it's just a Tuesday, five weeks since I went back to INoGITCH. And in those five weeks, do you want to know how many new words I've written? How much progress I've made on Book Number The Fourth? Bugger, and indeed, all. Nada. Not so much as a syllable has plonked itself from my fingertips onto the old electronic page.

Worse still, the three days a week I was going to be working (thus leaving four days for writing) I've had to jiggle about to accommodate the demands of work. And as if that wasn't bad enough, I had to work late tonight, so all the stuff I was going to do remains undone.

This is not good enough.

The problem I have is that we're wheeching towards the end of the year faster than... than... than a very fast thing*. We're five and a half weeks away from the end of the year, and far from having the bones of a book and it's opening innards, I've got an empty whiteboard and a dose of the terrible wind (excuse me).

I did sit at my desk this evening and think: if this doesn't work, I'm going to have to give four weeks' notice. That means even if I walk into the office tomorrow, hurl down my flimsy A4 pad and generic Bic biro, stamp my little feet, and cry that I'm not doing this no more, it'll already be five days to Christmas before I'm actually done. Unless they gave me garden leave, but it's far too cold to be sodding about out there at this time of year with a pair of secateurs and a trowel.

The really weird thing is that I've fallen right back into the whole 'project' / 'IT' way of thinking. The way I used to think before I became a gentleman of leisure. Which for some strange reason involves many made-up arguments, where I fight imaginary battles with people who haven't said anything wrong in real life. I used to do this a lot back when I worked at an ISP -- I'd fantasize about shouting at people, then spend a happy hour or so planning how I could walk into the building one lunchtime with a gun and kill every last one of them without anyone having time to raise the alarm. It passed the time.

Not surprisingly, I left not long after and went to somewhere a lot more fun. The new place was a complete shambles of a company, but I managed not to kill anyone there either.

But I'm wondering how long my tenure at INoGITCH is going to last this time. In private I mock the preciousness of the whole 'protect the work' thing that some people talk about, but I'm beginning to think that one's contractual obligations to HarperCollins might consider the opportunities for alternative, additional employment to be contraindicated. Or a daft fucking idea in other words.

Right now I'm in two minds, which is a pretty impressive position for someone who barely has half of one at the best of times. Plus my nose is bleeding and my socks hurt. And music these days is mostly shite.

Whine, whine, whine...

* Did I mention that my... thingie with words that mean things... you know, the word thingie -- it's not as good as it used to be.

Pain = bad

Pills = good
Beer = good

Pills + Beer = bad

And don't let anyone tell you any different.

Keira Knightley is my bin man

I made a surprise and welcome discovery this afternoon -- some pills leftover from the last time I was on the surgery merry-go-round. Quite a lot of pills actually. Back then I was still in my naïve 'let's get off these things as soon as possible' phase, believing that painkillers were the Devil's Smarties. This time I'm more inclined towards the 'Oh dear God, make it go away NOW!' way of thinking.

Not content with the general discomfort of having someone root about inside my nose with a carving knife, and hacking out vital sections of throat, I decided to throw my back out on Friday as well. Luckily it's not bin day till Monday, so it's still sitting by the side of the road, alongside the wheely bin. Which probably means it's got about as much chance of being picked up by the dustbin men (or 'Scaffies' as we call them up here) as a fat spotty bloke with greasy hair and an 'I Love Blake's Seven!' T-shirt does of being picked up by Keira Knightley.

Our local council, in a fit of its infinite wisdom, has decided to restrict rubbish collection to once a fortnight, instead of once a week. This, they tell us with perfectly straight faces, is to 'save the environment'. Bollocks. This is to save them money. With fortnightly collections they have half as many bins to collect in any given week -- the volume of shite being thrown out remains constant, only now it needs to be stamped down into the wheely bins by the time anyone comes to collect it. And they'll only collect from wheely bins too, none of those nasty garbage cans so beloved of Top Cat for us! And the wheely bin has to have a sticker on it from the council, or you're stuffed.

BUT, they did give us a special blue-lidded wheely bin to put our paper for recycling in. That gets picked up once a month. So whereas before to perpetrate identity theft a naughty individual would have to root through a bin-bag full of old coffee grounds, snotty hankies, mouldy chicken carcases and nappies, now he's got a whole month to dig through a nice clean pile of bank statements and junk mail in a specially marked bin, to make it easy for him to spot.

Being paranoid I've freecycled a shredder from my parents, who for some strange reason had a spare one. We've not used it yet, but it's there, ready to accommodate anything that might give a potential scammer access to our identities. Like all the crap from credit card companies insist on sending us every week. "Congratulations Mr McBridge, you've been selected to participate in our platinum-coloured credit card with optional picture of a rabid penguin sexually violating a yak on it. At only 375% APR and nothing to pay till you've forgotten all about it and are probably a bit stretched that month!"

Anyway, these pills I found are bloody great. Not as great as the ones my mother gave back to the pharmacist at Boots a few weeks ago -- vintage morphine and assorted heart medicine that my late grandmother was taking following a heart op. She doesn't need them any more, being as she no longer with us. Or anyone else come to that. Now I'm not needing any warfarin as we've got a cat to keep down the rodent population, but the morphine would have come in bloody handy this weekend.

And in the interests of leading a full and varied life, some bastard at INoGITCH has given me their cold as well. Every time I sneeze, blood clots fly out. I can make really pretty patterns on handkerchiefs -- just be glad I don't have a scanner or I'd post them. Maybe I should save them all, just in case I get a shot at the turner art prize. I could pin them all out on a collection of empty tins of Tenants Export and call it, 'Blood Snot and Beers'. It'll offend loads of people, and I'll be rolling in artistic kudos and big fat cheques. Then Keira Knightley will be desperate to come collect my household waste.

See: never throw anything away. You know it makes sense.

Pain

That's the word I have to use to describe my first week back at work following the op. And if I'm allowed another four words they'd be: "Lots and lots of". I shouldn't be surprised, I suppose. When I went in to see my surgeon last Saturday and he asked how I was doing, I said, "My throat hurts."

"Oh," says he, looking a bit puzzled, "I wonder why that is."

There was a small pause, while I composed a benevolent expression on my be-stubbled features. "Because you cut a big chunk out of it. Remember?"

"Oh, so I did..."

I don't think he was going to give me any more pills till that point. Darn it. I've been eking out the happy-la-la medicine to make it last as long as possible, but it's all gone now. No more yellow brick road for me. Which is a shame, as the damn thing still stings like a bastard.



In an effort to self-medicate this evening, I'm sat in front of the computer with a Kitten stuffed up my jumper and a tin of Greenall's London Dry Gin Tonic. Given the fact I've barely been able to eat this week, and only just managed a Cup-A-Soup today, this should be a great plan. No booze for a fortnight and an empty stomach? Three sips and I should be giggling like a politician in a brothel for underage hippopotami, in gymslips. Instead of which it stings and burns on the way past the site of my surgery in eye-watering nastiness.



This is not good. If I can't consume alcohol, how am I going to cope with a visitation this weekend from She Who Must See Her Progenitors From Time To Time's parents? In-laws, while SOBER? What sort of a plan is that? All they'll want to do is watch soap operas and horse racing on the telly (She Who Must's Mum won't watch the Simpsons because they're a funny shade of plastic yellow -- I kid you not), read the Sunday Post, and hunt through Teletext for the Raith Rovers* score.



The way things are going I may not survive till Monday. Or they might not... but I'm in no position to destroy the evidence by eating the bodies right now. If I call for a last-minute barbecue party at my house, there's nothing suspicious about it, OK? I'll just happen to have a lot of meat that needs consumed**. Fifeburgers anyone?



* Let's see if mentioning them works again this week.

** Dear Lord, how rude does that sound?

Making the world a safer place (one idiot at a time)

There was a thing on the radio yesterday where people were phoning in to complain about the dangers of tea lights. Up till now I'd always thought of them as nothing more than little candle things that seem to be needed with almost everything She Who Must buys these days, but how wrong I was: they're evil! And dangerous! And one concerned caller even went so far as to say they should be banned for our own good!!! And why? Because if you don't put them on something like a coaster, or a saucer, or something else that isn't likely to burst into flame (a big square of carpet impregnated with petrol for example -- that would be a bad idea) it might get burnt! You could accidentally set fire to your house! The government must act now!!!

Given that tea lights are a little puddle of hot wax, with a naked flame in the middle, contained in a metal cup so flimsy you could push processed peas through it, I would have though it was bloody obvious it's going to be a fire hazard. The fact the bloody thing's on fire should be a pretty good clue to the fact it's going to get hot.

But, mindful of the need for touchy-feelieness in all aspects of life I have come up with a plan to make the world a safer place: IQ test. Everyone should be forced to undergo an IQ test and carry around proof of the result before they're allowed to buy things. Think how many truly idiotic people could be saved from their own ineptitude?

"I'm sorry, sir, but you've ordered the steak and I see from your IQ Card you're not bright enough to be allowed steak knives. As such you'll have to either saw your way through it with plastic cutlery, or have the soup instead."

BANG! That's one accident prevented. And I'm pretty sure half the bastards out there wouldn't be allowed to buy cars either, so that'll solve the traffic congestion problems in one fell swoop! Swooosh! Social reform.

Not only that, we'd have a central register of all the thickies in the country and we could make their lives infinitely better by going round to their houses and confiscating anything they might accidentally use to injure themselves. Like cardigans (you may laugh, but 964 people are admitted to accident and emergency wards every year from cardigan-and-jumper-related injuries!*) socks and tights result in tens of thousands** of hospital admissions every year. CONFISCATE ALL SOCKS AND TIGHTS! And trousers too -- 9,410 thick people injured themselves in 2002 by not being bright enough to operate their trousers safely. In fact, taken together: Cardigans, Cotton Wool, Nappies, Socks, Trousers and Underwear result in nearly 70,000 people ending up in hospital every year. And they wonder why there isn't a British empire any more?

Anyway, once they've been identified, and all the dangerous things have been taken away, all the truly stupid people could then be given jobs reflecting their minimal skills -- like designing reality TV shows, or being politicians.

Lets stay safe out there people!

* And believe it or not, that's an improvement on 2000, when there were 1,863 serious cardigan accidents.
** well, 13,407 -- which is more than one ten of thousands, so technically speaking I'm right on this one, and you shouldn't complain.

Edity plot, plot...

Well the WHITEBOARD OF DOOM is now all a-covered in squiggles, only some of which say, "What the hell am I doing?", I'm halfway through the page proof edit (only mildly panicking about chapters one through four inclusive, even though it's too bloody late to do anything major to them), three quarters through THE MERMAID SINGING* and so far so good.

I realised this morning that what I had been planning as a sort of pain in the arse side issue for Logan is in fact a plot device gift from the bearded gods of crime fiction. Which is nice. I always like it when stuff like that happens and the back of my skull (that would be the end with no holes in it) finally proves that it's still working after everything I've done to it in the last week and a bit. This lot device *should* make my life a lot easier and let me go places I wouldn't otherwise be able to without screwing around with the internal logic of the story or drafting in HUGE coincidences. Which I never like doing.

"The beard?" You ask, winsomely -- well it's getting there, but slowly. I think being under the weather is impeding its progress. I've tried rubbing salt into my chin to make the hairs thirsty, naked pictures of Gloria Hunniford to make them stand up, and duck fat for... well, that was just for the fun of it. But I'll still be returning to work looking like Captain Mr Designer Stubble Man. Which is something of an coincidence in itself -- this being 'Children In Need' week. A couple of years ago I let someone at INoGITCH talk me into shaving off the beard and hair for charity. We raised a lot of money (and INoGITCH doubled it), but I vowed never, ever to do anything like that again. When I eventually do go bald it'll be kicking and screaming. And probably crying like a little girl too. A little bald girl. With a beard.

Maybe I'll train Little Miss Kitten Cat to perch atop my head, so when the fateful day comes no one will notice. Plus she can swipe other people's canapés at swanky publishing parties when they're not looking. Assuming they invite beardy bald blokes with cats on their heads to swanky publishing parties.

One never knows.

* Damn you Valerie McDermid and the feelings of inadequacy you create in poor lowly write-ists. I'm talking creatively, 'coz, you know, I'm all man when it comes to that kind of stuff. We'll, obviously not when I'm on twelve different types of tablet and feeling a bit sick, but generally, on a good day and with a following wind.

One step forwards, half a dozen back

Ah yes, just when I thought it was safe to go back into the water, the sinister notes of a double bass sound and everyone fills their swimming trunks with dread. And other less-wholesome things. For today the page proofs for BROKEN SKIN have been delivered to Casa MacBride, by a rather frightened looking delivery man. It might have been because I was still in my jammies and dressing gown, or it might have been the suspiciously lobotomy-like patch of white bandage on my forehead, but something had him spooked.

Now I come to think of it, I think he crossed himself on the sprint back to his big white van, vowing never to touch another drop again.

So, rather than forging ahead, I'm forging behind (which sounds rude, but isn't), trying to make sure that I've not screwed anything up in the book before it hits the printers. Mind you, going on past experience I'll miss something -- I always do.

But I suppose it'll give the back of my head some time to work on the things I've been thinking up in my more lucid periods this week. I enjoyed embroiling PC John 'Spanky' Rickards in the third book and I'm thinking of doing the same thing to someone(s) else in the fourth. Only trouble is that I know this kind of thing can rapidly degenerate into an in joke that's funny for about three people and makes no sodding sense to anyone else. Which is fine, only as long as it doesn't distract from the story.

Anyway, in other news I see that the great V McD's GRAVE TATTOO has won the <b>Portico Prize for Fiction</b>! Which is a strange coincidence, as I just finished reading that very book not half an hour ago: very inventive and different and damn that rotten Fifer if she doesn't come up with some bloody clever stuff. Who says coming from a long line of people who live underground in t'mines, breathing linoleum fumes and reading the Sunday Post is bad for you?

Congratulations to Val on yet another trophy to dust ;}#

By the hairy scrotum of our risen Lord!

Yes, I've actually done some work on Book Number The Fourth today. Not a huge amount, it must be said, but more than bugger all, which is something. Due to the nature of the beast in question I've been mapping out the past history of the case, which goes back for decades, so there's quite a bit of it. I suppose I could just make it all up as I go along (and I'll probably end up doing a lot of that anyway), but this way it feels like I'm a proper write-ist what does plan stuff and things.

Of course, helpful though this will be to the finished article, it's all just faffing about. What I SHOULD be doing is making with the big decision: the one that will determine the entire feel of the book from Logan's perspective. It's a sod whichever way it goes, and I'm still very much in three minds. Some of which have holes in them*.

But I need to get this stuff ironed out quickly and get on with the book, or I'm going to be no further forward than I was with Book 3 by the start of the year and mighty will be mine wailing and gnashing of teeth, as my editors remove important -- and fun -- parts of my anatomy with their Berber spoons!

Maybe going back to work wasn't such a good idea after all? Still, I just have to hope that my return to INoGITCH represents a return to my former wordcount levels.

If not, I'm screwed.

* Damn -- nearly managed to go for a whole post without any post-operative whining! Better luck next time, that's what I say...

Hole in the head

I have become obsessed with the holes they drilled into my skull. This is possibly not a healthy obsession, but it's hard not to be intrigued when every time you catch a glimpse of yourself in some reflective surface -- like the highly polished arse of a baboon for example -- there's a dirty big square of white bandage slap between your eyes.

The surgeon said he would do his best to minimise the scarring by drilling them little holes as close to my eyebrows as possible, hiding them in the tiny wrinkles that are caused by marrying a woman from Fife. But I've not seen them yet. They were all bandaged up when I came round after the operation. Yes, I saw the results on the white gauze -- little dots of red that spread out into darker brown and black stains, but when the nurse changed the bandage, so I didn't scare children on my way out of the hospital with my blood-soaked head, I didn't get a chance to see the aftermath of this trepanation.

I wonder if all these little holes in my head will make a difference to my writing? Will I become shamanistic, channelling voices from the spirit world to populate Aberdeen? Will be able to see into the future, like that made up monk bloke in THE THIRD EYE? Or will I just end up with some weird little scars and a bit of a headache?

Perhaps it's none of the above? Perhaps this obsession with my sieve-like skull is just the result of prescription medication, little sleep and less food... Or maybe it's all the fault of the voices!

Hmm... I think we should end this post here, before it gets a little strange and people start to talk.

Letting the Devil out

WARNING: NOT TO BE READ BEFORE TEATIME!

They drilled four holes in my skull. Not one, not two, but four, with a little drill, right there in my skull. Apparently my cranium is a damn sight thicker on the left than it is on the right, which is odd: I thought both sides of me were equally thick. The surgeon gave up drilling holes after the third attempt to get through to my left frontal sinus in case he ended up puncturing my brain. Which is nice -- I like not having my brain punctured, it barely works as it is without any extraneous holes.

But this does mean that I've got a fetching big rectangular white dressing in the middle of my forehead. I suppose I could rent it out as advertising space -- 'Your company name HERE!', but I doubt anyone would be daft enough.

Other than that there's no sign of my having been back under the knife. Not externally anyway. No excessive bleeding this time, and no ulcerated uvula either. It's a funny word 'UVULA' sounds all... gynaecological. Like a cross between a vulva and a uterus. And the reason my secret lady bit isn't ulcerated? Because the biopsy has wheeched a lot of it away. Wheeeech! It's off to the lab for analysis and prodding, while I'm left with a strange sensation that something hard's been stitched to the roof of my mouth -- like a chunk of burnt steak. The nose didn't hurt at all, neither did the cranial trepanning, but the throat aches like a bastard.

The weirdest thing about the whole experience -- other than the fact it wasn't a complete sodding disaster this time -- is that I got a lot of thinking done about Book Number The Fourth. Well, there was little else to do in the wee small hours, unable to sleep till the latest batch of painkillers kicked in. I wrote it all down. Just have to hope it'll all still make sense when I'm not whacked out of my gourd on opiate-based happy-la-la pills.

And now I'm back from hospital with my blank advertising billboard, punctured skull, fixed sinuses (hopefully!), burnt-steak mouth, and enough pills and potions to open my own pharmacy:

• Otrivine
• Betnesol-N
• Stérimar
• Ranitidine
• Co-Amoxiclav
• Tramadol
• Co-Dydramol
• Ibuprofen
• And last but not least a big bottle of Lactulose solution

I will rattle when I walk, with clenched buttocks: because the big bottle of Lactulose is for 'gentle, predictable relief' and I don't trust it. You know where you are with prunes, but this chemical stuff is just asking for trouble.

And now, if you'll excuse me, I have a large quantity of drugs to take.

Dick Vandyke

Ah yes, "Chim, chim cher-ree," indeed. Though I suppose in my case it should be "Chin, chin cher-ee," but who's counting?

Unless you're totally immune to whinging you'll know I've been banging on and on of late about my upcoming nasal surgery (Monday, 08:00 I'll be slipping off into la-la land for another dose of 'Oh dear GOD, why did I ever agree to go through this again?'). Not surprisingly, this cloud of portentous doom is hanging heavy over me like some sort of un-popped boil, full of puss and ouchiness. Mmm, isn't that a pretty image? To say that it's getting me down is a bit like saying people who wear white socks with black trousers and socks need a stern talking to*.

In fact it's caused such a dose of the blues that I shaved off my beard last night. And before you ask: no, there won't be any pictures. I can't stand to look at myself right now, so why the hell would I take a photo, load it up on the computer, resize it, fix the colour balance, FTP it up to the website and stick it in a post so everyone else can see what an arse I look like? Take it from me - I look like an vast arse.

But you see, I have a cunning plan: I am bearded. Beardiness is in me. It's who I am. By shaving the beard off I become someone else, and that's the poor bastard who'll have to go and have the surgery and suffer and bleed and feel like shit and wondering if life just isn't a big fuck-off bag of rusty razorblades into which we are forced to poke our genitals. And by the time the beard grows back and I am me again, the worst of it will be over, and I should be back on the road to recovery. See - CUNNING!

Assuming of course that Beardless Stuart wakes up after the operation.

He's exactly the sort of bastard who'd screw that up just to spite me**.

In the meantime I've got a little under an hour before I'm into 'nil by mouth territory', and as they're going to do a happy-fun biopsy on my throat tomorrow I'll probably be on 'nil-by-mouth for sodding ages after it as well. So if you'll excuse me: I have some hedonism to catch up on.

* When we all know that what they need, is taken out and have nails hammered through their testicles, because it's always bloody men who offend.
** And yes - I know it sounds all melodramatic and stuff, but I am seriously freaked out and worried this time. Much more than I was either time before***. So why the hell am I doing it? Because my quality of life is a hell of a lot worse than it was before that fateful first operation back in March. Hindsight is a wonderful bastarding thing.
*** Of course, the fact that this time I've been told one of the side effects is blindness (in addition to the whole 'accidentally draining off all the fluid from my brain' side of things), maybe that's not too surprising?

Unto darkness.

I've always wanted to write something truly dark. Something like TOKYO, or THE MERMAIDS SINGING, something that makes people shiver as they read it in bed, while the bleak night roars outside their window. Stealing reason and warmth... Only trouble is I don't seem capable. I've said several times that, "This time, it's going to be bleak-tastic! It's going to be dark and nasty and scary..." and yet it never is.

I'm not sure if this is because my writing just isn't good enough to give full vent to mine bleak side, or if I'm just not cut out for that kind of thing. Take, as an example, Mr Steve Brewer -- his normal writing style is much like he is in person: entertaining, humorous, likeable. Bearded. He even has a regular, syndicated, light-hearted column, for God's sake! And yet his story PAYOFF in the DAMN NEAR DEAD anthology is pretty darn bleak. Clearly he can do the 'funy -- ha, ha' stuff and the dark and nasty too.

So why can't I?

OK, so here's a tiny spoiler-ete for you: at the end of Book 3, BROKEN SKIN, I've done something pretty bloody rotten to poor old DS Logan McRae. It should open up a whole cupboard of dark and nasty, but I don't know if I'll be able to carry it off. And even if I do, will the people who read my books go along with it? Or will they be really bloody disappointed? "Where's the funny stuff, you fat beardy bastard?" Where indeed...

Of course, a lot of this is 'new book jitters' where it doesn't matter what I do, I know it's going to be 156.7% more crap than my last book. And everyone's going to hate it, and I'll be chased through the streets by irate publishers and readers, wanting to take a cheese grater to my sinful-man-nether-portions. You leave my private areas alone! They're private! And She Who Must Patrol The Grounds With a Shotgun, Looking To Blow The Arse Off Anyone Poaching disapproves of such things.

Where was I? ... Ah, yes, stuff and things... Er... OK, so in order to pretend that this is some sort of cohesive article, rather than a somewhat shamefully incoherent ramble, I'll come back to the whole 'Dark And Disturbing' thing with a question:

Darkness -- is it a good thing in books? And exactly how dark are you prepared to go?

Grindstone*

Something I hadn't been counting on with the whole 'returning to work thing' is having to go back to commuting on a regular basis. It's only about 45 minutes, but I'd forgotten what a pain in the backside it is. And how terrible everyone drives. Everyone except for me, of course, coz I'm gosh darn perfect, thanks for asking. After a whole five days back on the road to work I have come to the following, logical conclusion: the world is full of idiots and they all try to drive into work at the same time as me.

Now I'm sure not everyone starts out that stupid, so I can only presume that the DVLA hands out free lobotomies with every other driving test. "Congratulations, Mr Smith, you've passed! Now If you'll hold still for a bit, I'm going to stick a fork up your nose and scramble your frontal lobes…"

These people should not be allowed to buy cars. They shouldn't be allowed to rent cars. They're a menace to themselves and others. In fact the only way these people should be allowed into a car is if they've been blindfolded, hogtied, and stuffed in the boot where they can't cause any trouble. Or strapped to the roof rack -- that'd do too.

The only reason the morning traffic isn't liberally festooned with crashed cars and upturned minibuses is that everyone else on the road is as clueless as each other, and their complete lack of common sense achieves a critical mass of stupidness that keeps them from ploughing into each other via the mechanics of quantum idiocy**.

Worse yet, the kiddies are back at school this week so the roads are even more packed than usual as the collective IQ of the driving public takes a lurch downwards into single figures. Apparently 'research has shown' (which is another way of saying, some scientists got drunk at lunchtime and came up with a great way of scamming cash off some unsuspecting thickie to keep the team in booze and crisps for the next six months) that kids are fat these days because they don't get enough sleep. The suggestion is that the little darlings be allowed a lie-in and not start school till an hour later. If it'll get the little sods off the road I'm all for it. They've got these private hire minibuses up here that drift around the rush-hour roads doing 40 miles an hour with a big yellow sign in the back, stopping at random intervals on blind corners to take on more kids. You can't get past them, it's not considered socially acceptable to blare your horn and swear at them, and car to minibus missiles are difficult to get hold of without a licence.

Back in the good old days (i.e. last month when I was still a stay at home write-ist) my commute was simple -- from the living room to the study. Sometimes there would be a tailback in the hall involving an overturned kitten, but other than that -- no traffic. OK, so a sprawled fuzzy cat can cause serious delays, especially if you pick them up, turn them on their back and blow raspberries on their soft and furry tummies***, but mostly it's not a huge problem. Certainly not a cat-alyst for road rage anyway.

*Actually, I quite fancy that as the title of a book, or a short story.
** Quantum Idiocy being the principle upon which all governments operate.
*** Ask your cat's permission before trying this at home, or you could end up losing important parts of your face when they take violent offence.

How nice

Well that's 4 days back at work and I think the top prize for 'Oh you're back' has to go to the bloke who cornered me by the ho beverage machine and said, "Oh right... Back at work, eh? Hmmmmm, books not going so well then?"
"Err..." says I, "Actually, they're doing pretty well."
"Ah." Some sage nodding and sucking of teeth. "So... Second book out yet?"
Me: "Yes, May this year."
"hmmm..." thoughtful pause, "Second one not doing as well as the first then?"

Ah yes, back to work, gotta love it. There seems to be a strange thing in the UK where if you try to do something, you're getting ideas above your station and need to be taken down a peg or two. Preferably with a big pointy stick. A big pointy stick with dog poop on the end. That'll bloody teach you...

And I always feel like such a tit saying stuff like, "Oh, well, yah, it's like totally a Sunday Times bestseller..." and "Oh, wow man, like completely won the Barry for best first novel..." and "Huh, did I mention it was in its fifth edition...?" and "Well, Bernard Cornwell said to me..."

Ah well. In writing news I've done bugger all but think since last Saturday, but things are stirring. The only trouble is the impending surgery which dreads the living pants off me. Oh dear God, no!