THE STORY SO FAR: PART 264: THURSDAY

A VERY PLEASANT MELLOW DAY—AND, AS IT HAPPENS, MY BIRTHDAY

THANK YOU ALL FOR YOUR GREETINGS!

Many thanks to all who sent me greetings. I am much moved. It’s going to take me a little time to thank you all individually. As always, rightly or wrongly, I feel writing and related activities have to come first—and they constitute a formidable workload.

In truth, I don’t make much of my birthdays although I intend to celebrate my 70th in reasonable style—assuming I make it that far—one never knows. Far too many relatives and friends have died before their time, and I confess I think about them and miss them—especially on such days as today.

I awoke today feeling very good about life—for no particular reasons except pleasure from the challenge of the screenplay, a good night’s sleep, and a feeling that it is rather good to be alive. And perhaps I should confess to an extra element: I am reading a particularly good book, INNOCENT, by Scott Turrow. The man can write!

For a change, I did not work on the screenplay. Instead, I worked hard to try and catch up with this blog—and I’m glad to say succeeded. I really hate being behindhand with it. I haven’t yet completely managed to balance intensive creative writing with daily blogging—I do fall behind on occasions—but I intend to. 

I really can’t justify this blog in any financial sense but it has become really important to me as both a discipline, a writing exercise, and a way of keeping in touch—particularly as I don’t plan it in advance. I just hope my brain will come up with a theme which I can develop adequately—and to my pleasure and surprise, the damn thing does (and quickly at that).

I find this particularly surprising because I didn’t take to blogging initially at all, but I guess it is a good example of how you can train your mind if you are really determined. And where writing is concerned, I am nothing if not determined.

All in all, it was a pretty good day.

The illustration is of a new vehicle designed for the V-22 Osprey. Quite why the V-22 was designed to be as narrow as it is is a question that has bothered me for years ( not that it keeps me awake) but such was the way of it. The solution would appear to be to produce a range of narrow vehicles which can be squeezed in. This one is called the Phantom Badger—and it is from Boeing. Cool name but looks remarkably like a Jeep to me.

The V-22 has been something like 30 years in development. A reasonable person might think the need to transport a military vehicle might have been anticipated.

Our tax dollars at work.