We're in a new reality now where I am a schoolteacher at my alma mater.

Yesterday, I stopped on my way home from school to walk with Nicole. I told her it had been a million years since I really sat down and worked on GCMB (that's Golf Course Murder Book. Book 4), or really on any writing.

But then, I realized that statement wasn't true at all. I turned in my final revision of Home or Away at dinner time on August 15th, about 15 hours before I was due at this new teaching job for my week of workshops. In between, I've written a couple of thousand words and thought about which of my suspects might actually be a murderer.

Sometimes, when I feel like I've been lazy, I really haven't been lazy at all.

And, in the meantime, I've learned a new course management system, planned a month of lessons, organized my classroom, reacquainted myself with Catholic ethos (the school is Catholic and all-girls), and optimized my cheery disposition. 

So it's not like I've been lazing around.

But still, routine is good, so I'm excited to slide into it on Monday. I teach in the afternoons, so I'll be writing in the mornings. Although I only teach afternoons, I have well-lit and comfortable classroom to myself all day, so I'm going to use it as my office. Noise-canceling headphones and a desk and I just know GCMB is going to flow out of me.

I actually do think it will. It doesn't hurt to practice joyful optimism. In fact, it's one of our "little virtues" at school, so it's sort of my job.