Springing

I seem to have developed a raging case of spring fever yesterday. As in, I actually finally acknowledged and accepted that, yes, it really is spring. I've given up whimpering and clinging to the electric blanket and teapot while insisting that we could still get another cold snap -- after all, we have had snow in April here before. Now I'm embracing the warm weather and all that comes with it -- the blue sky, the flowers, the green grass, the birds singing. I opened windows and turned on ceiling fans yesterday, and instead of wanting to curl up under a blanket with hot tea I wanted to sit on the patio with iced tea.

What I didn't really want to do was work. There was some thought of frolicking, but I'm not entirely sure how to go about doing that, and I suspect that whatever I did that felt like frolicking might be alarming to the neighbors.

I was having some serious attention span issues, possibly due to the influx of outside world sound from having windows open. So, since I eventually need to plot this book in order to write a synopsis, I settled down with a notebook to do that. And then a new character appeared out of nowhere. This character was probably the missing piece to make the plot work, so he's utterly essential, and I like what he adds to the theme and conflict of the story. It's just weird that in all my planning and development for this book, this character had never occurred to me until now, and yet now I can't imagine telling the story without him. The problem at the moment is that although I know the plot function he plays in the story and what he will do, I'm not entirely sure what kind of person he actually is, what he looks like, how he'll act and how the other characters will relate to him. I have an inkling that's starting to show up when I think about him, but there's a possibility that going in that direction could be borderline silly. Oh, but it would be sooooo much fun. I think this means I have to write at least to the point where he appears on the scene so I can "meet" him since how I end up dealing with him will make a difference in the synopsis.

The song "Gaston" from the Disney Beauty and the Beast is currently stuck in my brain, so that may give a hint as to the direction I'm tempted to go. I'm just not sure that fits in this story. On the other hand, maybe the story needs to adjust to fit this. I haven't been writing it as comedy, and comedy is what I seem to be known for.

However, this is giving me incentive to write because I want to get to that point. It's amazing how motivating a good idea can be. And sometimes I think that the distracted/don't-wanna days may be my subconscious brain's way of getting the conscious out of the way so it can work without restrictions. It does seem like every time I have one of those days when I just can't seem to think, at the end of it I come up with some huge breakthrough idea that changes everything.