Let me start out with a surprise I got today. My story, Don’t Use the Phone, got reviewed over at The Digital Inkspot. I was greatly surprised and delighted by the review. I saw another review for the same story that I somehow missed and was also happy with that review as well. It’s a great story (in my own opinion) and it’s still free. So go on over and grab yourself a copy!

So I was away for a few days. I did a LOT while up in the bay area. So much in fact that I’m surprised that I got any blog posts done. It was up early, to bed late. The last day it was in the second day of rain up there. My sinus gave me a reprieve the first day of rain. Perhaps it was all the Chinese and Indian and Sri Lankan food I ate while up there. But Wednesday did not agree with me at all. I was a slobbery mess and felt sorry for the kid sitting next to me on the plane ride home. I kept asking for more napkins from the stewardess and putting the used ones in my pocket. It wasn’t a happy trip home.

On the plus side, despite my head feeling like it was being crushed underwater, I wrote. I decided that I needed to heed my own advice and stuff head be damned I was going to write. I wrote in the airport… hold on, I’m missing a little point here.

I had left for the airport with ample time. Silly me, I said I’d fill up the rental car before I dropped it off. Silly mistake. There is apparently a law that forbids a gas station from being with 20 miles of the airport. Therefore I got to the airport, spotted where I needed to drop the car off, then remembered I needed to fill it up. I drove, and drove, and drove and even told my GPS navigator to find me a gas station. It did. I went there. Gas Station #1 didn’t take credit cards. Well, this was a company business trip, I needed to put the gas on the card, right? Gas station #2 also did not take credit cards. CONSPIRACY! Gas Station #3 did take credit cards. I locked up the pump and the guy said “Make sure you use the right zip code” I had, I tried again, locked up the pump again. He was busy under the hood of a car and said to try another pump. I did, it locked up also. I went to a third pump with my personal card, it locked up. I went to a fourth and tried it as debit. Locked that pump up. Other people started to arrive at the gas station so I left not wanted to feel the wrath of the man when he realized I’d locked up four of his gas pumps during the soon to be rush hour.

I went back to station #1, used my ATM to fill up the tank, and went to drop off the rental car. I dropped off the car and God decided I wasn’t damp enough and opened the sky a little bit more. Of course I didn’t see anyone so I flagged down a kid in a rain suit and he told me to quit standing in the rain and just leave the keys in the car. I did and made a bee line for the bus to the airport. God must’ve felt bad for the bus waited for me.

Getting back to the airport I took off my shoes and socks and put on filp flops. SO much easier to go through security. I stood that looking at my wet shoes and my carry on. I looked at the wet shoes again, gave them a shake and stuffed them in. I got my boarding pass, still tried to figure out why the crosswalk was outside saying “Walk, gotta get on” and decided that it was just some weird local custom I’ll never understand. People in line were friendly as were the TSA folk. My stuff made it through unscathed.

I sat in the airport and wrote. I wasn’t in the fiction writing mood, but I did write something that I will post here in the future. I wrote a lot (nearly 2000 words) before I got on and on the plane. My sinuses nearly shut me down, but we still went to the in-laws house and said hello and talked for a while before my father-in-law said I looked like I was going to fall out of my chair, which I nearly did, and we called it a day and went home. I took my hard core medicine and dumped my suitcase on the floor and at 7:30PM went to bed.

I woke up at 5AM, read for a little bit, went back to sleep, and woke up again at 6AM. I decided that was enough sleep and got up.

I like the Bay Area even if it did try to kill me, but hey, San Diego has tried to kill me before. I don’t hold it against them. I’m just happy to be home. Rain is scheduled for this weekend. I hope it doesn’t run me down too badly.

For those keeping score, I missed my 2000 word daily goal two of the three days I was away from home. That puts me a little behind, but as I keep saying, I can get caught up. Just you wait and see! Just you wait.