Image: Old Typewriter ~ motionstil

So this is my first update in a little while. I’ve been concentrating on writing my novel for the last few months and I haven’t had much time for blogging unfortunately. I meant to start again a few weeks ago but after the floods in Queensland and the earthquakes in Christchurch and Japan, I haven’t felt like blogging much. A few people have been asking if I’m okay though, so I thought I’d post a quick update now.

I’m okay for the most part. The main thing on my mind at the moment is that we can’t seem to get hold of one of my mother’s old friends after the earthquake and tsunami in Japan. Miyoko was maid of honour at my parents’ wedding and is a pastor at the Hatano Christian Centre in Kanagawa, which we think was hit by the earthquake. We’d fallen out of touch and it may just be that our numbers and email are out of date but nothing seems to be getting through. I’m hoping someone from the centre may stumble across this post on Google and can let us know if she’s okay… we’re getting quite worried and not sure what else to do.

Apart from that, personally I’m okay. My health has been a bit up and down lately; I’m having some treatment on my neck on Wednesday and my insomnia’s come back again as well, but I’m doing pretty well on the whole. I’ve mainly been reading, writing and listening to a lot of Angus & Julia Stone and The Audreys lately, so things could be worse!

My writing’s also going pretty well. February-March is usually when I get a lot of writing done and I feel like I’ve really started to get somewhere with my novel now… I’m about 2/3 of the way through the first draft/outline and should be ready to tackle the main part of the novel in a few weeks. I’m also working on a couple of short stories which I should have finished soon. One of them ties in with the novel and I like what I’ve written so far. The other story is a bit of a character piece about life and death and I’m really excited about that. It feels different to anything I’ve written before and I might even be able to turn it into a novel one day if it goes well.

I’m also still working on Sleepless, my micronovel, although I haven’t updated it in a while. I know a few people have been wondering what’s been going on with it but basically, it just wasn’t working so I’ve had to scrap a lot of it. The idea was that it was supposed to be a novel written specifically for Twitter and Facebook but it never really felt like that and I kept running in to too many problems. I’ve had a rethink about how to approach it and basically I’m going to scale it back a bit and start from the beginning again, so if you’re interested, now’s actually a good time to start following the story. I’ll be posting updates again from Sunday and if you want to follow along, you can follow it on Twitter and the Facebook page.

I’m still looking to get back to studying again later this year as well if I can and I’ve been doing some research into that… the prices aren’t too bad on the whole and I’m still looking at library studies at the moment, which would allow me to teach or do a few other things later as well, or maybe just teaching now if I have the prerequisites. Psychology’s a possibility as well although I’m not sure I’d make a good shrink. I think I’m a little too crazy myself for that!

Apart from that, I haven’t really been up to that much. My writing’s been keeping me pretty busy and I’ve been thinking about moving again as well but I doubt I can afford it at the moment. Unfortunately there’s a huge construction project going on just opposite us which is making a lot of noise at the moment, so I may have to if it keeps up. The rents are so expensive in Sydney at the moment though that I’ll probably have to move out a bit if I do.

I’ve also been thinking about starting my old SF book group again. I loved doing it a couple of years ago but we never really had enough people for it to last, so I think I’d need to know it was more sustainable this time before trying again. I’ve spoken to a few people who sound interested but I’m wary of starting something new if I’m going to be moving as well, so I’m still not sure yet. I might even end up doing something online instead. We’ll see.

Anyway that’s pretty much everything that’s been going on. I’ll probably be offline for a few days after Wednesday but after that I’ll be back blogging again more regularly… I always find I really miss it when I have a break. I plan to start posting more of my photography and I’ve just started experimenting with my video camera as well, so you might see some videos pop up soon. Should be fun!

As I mentioned The Audreys earlier, I thought I’d share this video quickly as well. It’s called Sometimes the Stars and I’ve had it in my head ever since I heard about the earthquake and tsunami in Japan. It’s a beautiful song and it just seems to capture the mood at the moment, at least for me.

Take care, wherever you are in the world. And to Miyoko and everyone in Japan, we’re thinking of you. ~ CJ.

Update: Just got some good news. My mother just got an email from Miyoko. She’s okay. She’s a bit away from where the earthquake hit; there’s some radiation there but it’s not too serious at the moment. Very relieved.