Laptop possibly on its last legs, coal spillage, sourdough flop & writing issues

29. Tuesday 3 February 2026

I’ve slightly lost track of how many chapters I wrote today, not because I wrote so many but because I’m amalgamating and changing things quite significantly. In many respects, I’m seeing this as a good thing but the sections I’ve read back haven’t been great. Well, I’m being unfair on myself. I know I’ve said this a few times now, but I had convinced myself that version 3 would be brilliant, greatly improved from versions 1 and 2. I thought it would be mainly copying and pasting and making it all look better. I knew it needed a lot of work still, but I didn’t expect to be doing pretty much another rewrite. It reads more like another draft. I know that’s okay, and I know it’s a better draft than the previous two, but I suppose I feel disappointed that I’ve taken a side step rather than a forward step.

                My plan is to finish this rewrite, then read it all the way through (trying not to get distracted by errors). I will then stay in London for a week or two, catching up with friends and living a very different life to up here in the middle of nowhere in Scotland. I really enjoy and appreciate the extremes but, at the moment, I feel ready for a break from my story and from the quiet life.

                Today, thankfully, unlike yesterday, I got on with writing and it was all fine. I think being within the final five (ish) chapters of the fifty (ish) is also a bit of a challenge. There’s a part of me wants to rush through and finish. But I’m “having to” change so much at the moment that I keep realising I’m missing sections that I know need to be included. Then I keep wondering if I shouldn’t finish it slightly earlier – there’s one event in the next few chapters that gives the characters a lot of clues but I’m increasingly thinking it might not be needed. And I also know that I need to write a new chapter and, being optimistic this book could one day be published and I don’t want to drop a spoiler, it will be hard to write because it’s sort of the story of what happened to James, the member of Crime Writing for Beginners who died. Yeah, so kind of a big deal for the book.

                I can hear myself today (and for the past few days at least) sounding gloomy. I’ve been through phases like this with everything I’ve written and I know it will pass, but it’s really difficult when what you’ve been working on for almost eight months (my first of six notebooks about this story, albeit massively changed since book 1, started on 12 June 2025) seems little or no better than the previous version and you know it isn’t anywhere near good enough.

In other news, I think I’m heading for my first sourdough fail. It’s risen but it’s too sticky and runny at a stage when it should be fairly firm and springy. I have decided against taking drastic remedies and am going to put it in the fridge and hope it firms up enough to bake and not be too stodgy and inedible.

                Oh no, there’s a theme to today, fails. My laptop today has been astonishingly slow, which hasn’t helped with anything I’ve done on the laptop today. There have been quite a few warnings over the past couple of weeks that all is not okay with this laptop. I am not in the market for buying a new laptop and I also have a horrible feeling that the very, very old software (and hardware key) I have for Eclipse (steno programme) won’t work with Windows 11. I foresee problems ahead.

                Haha, continuing this downward summary of my day, the photo is of the “coal” that fell out of the coal bucket between the outdoor “coal bag area” and the fireplace. I say “fell”, the handle came off the bucket. Some of the coal was a bit wet. Messy. And it's been snowing on and off all day.

                Here’s hoping for a more positive day tomorrow!