14Nov/090
NaNoWriMo 2009: An Orgy Of Words – The Halfway Point Review (2)
Act II: Deep Sixing the plot
At the end of day 5 I had all sorts of things in my head, but when I awoke on the morning of day 6 I couldn't think of what to do, so in a slow day of writing I only managed to write 1000 words despite it being my day off from work and I had hoped to get in at least three thousand words to put me further ahead. But this wasn’t to be.
And as any NaNoWriter lost at sea knows the quickest way to add words is to create a flashback scene that builds up into a scene that you have already written. The only thing of note that happened was that my main character got a name. And so, here in its entirety are all the words that oozed out from my brain on Day 6:
It was not long before the Ass was snugly secure in his own stable. The whole process had been quite smooth not counting saying “Hello and goodbye” to the night watchman both on the way in to the stables to drop the Ass off and again on the way out. Jonn hadn’t been sure which security guard he had said hello to. It was a well known fact that there were a set of identical twins that worked the night shift at the stables and if neither wore the name badge then it was difficult to tell them apart. Though why management refused to buy a separate name badge or each of them and forced them to share was unknown though there was source in the accounting department that had confirmed a guess by some that is was down to the credit crunch. Now that Jonn thought about it more he had never seen the twins in one place at the same time. May be it was all just a big scam by one security guard to get two pay cheques for one job. Whether it was a scam or not, they were having to do an extra hour’s work for no extra money tonight, judging by the time on the clocking in machine which had already been set back to 1 thanks to the end of daylight savings time. Jonn Baldmur nodded his head in a final nod to the security guard who was already placing the newspaper over his face and reclining in the chair settling in for another few hours of hard labour before clocking off for the night, or day whichever he called it when the shift ended. He walked out onto the street and crossed over at the lights to avoid a Jay Walking ticket. Less than twenty minutes later Jonn unlocked the door to his apartment building. Next to a defunct pharmacy that had gone out of business after labelling mishap that saw teenage acne cream be labelled as Viagra and acne cream be labelled as Viagra. Many of the customers had been either too happy or too nervous to take back their mislabelled purchases. Can you guess which group was which? I can, but just so that we have some fun, please let me know your opinion. The answer was in the article in the highly respected news paper several months ago but just as it came to the interesting tid bit of information the article had a “to be continued on page 7” strap line and when Jonn turned to page seven found that the remainder of the article was printed on the back page of the coupon section and his room mate had already taken liberties with a pair of scissors and gone to town on the coupons and then actually gone off into town before Jonn had a chance to get his fair share of the discounted delights. Not that that mattered now as both the room mate and pharmacy had moved on within a couple of weeks of one another. Especially since the room mate could no longer steal the newspaper from the door step of the pharmacy before they opened at six every morning. Jonn climbed the stairs and became depressed with ach step. There were a lot of steps as he lived on the fifth floor so by the time he found himself at the front door of his apartment, Jonn Baldmur was really pissed off. He opened the door and the misery didn’t end there. Jonn could hear water coming from the bathroom. “Damn it.” He cursed to himself. There was a note stuck to the shade of a nearby table lamp. It simply read: remembred. It wasn’t a typo, he was up early that morning and he had run out of bread (and not that the bread had run out on him, he hadn’t been unfaithful o the bread, even though he had been temped by a rather soft tiger roll), but when he went to write himself a note he could only find one en and that pen was fast running out of ink, so he had to improvise and decided to cut down on the number of characters that he would write and there came a rather snappy and appealing new word that he would have to remember to send to the Oxford English Dictionary for inclusion in their next revision. But the fact that he had forgotten to buy an extra loaf on his way home wasn’t what was concerning him most at that very second. No as it was written earlier, it was the noise of the running water from the bathroom that was at the top of his priority list. When h got the call at 4 in the afternoon on the preceding day, Jonn had just finished at two hour session working out on his exercise bike. The phone had rang while he was towelling himself down to stop the dripping of sweat onto the carpet. “Hello.” “Hello Marty, its the Colonel.” The voice on the other end of the phone had said. “Meet me at the diner tonight at 11.” “11?” Jonn had asked. “Yes, you know the time when the Nightly news comes on.” Jonn Baldmur shook his head as a bead of sweat dribbled down his nose and collected in a ball before plummeting down to the end table that held the cordless phone base. He tried to say something else but got nothing but the low tone of hang up bouncing around in his head as Colonel Andre DuBois had put the phone down and severed the connection between them. Jonn had hopped in the shower, because he was still annoyed that he had not gone to a Halloween party as Kermit the Frog, and had instead gone as a Ugly Sister from Cinderella. That didn’t have much relevance upon what happened next. Jonn had taken a shower knowing that a meeting with the Colonel at that time would no doubt turn into an all night rendezvous. He had showered and dried and then decided to get a few hours sleep before the meeting, turning his light out and tying to block out the street lights and the noise from the city at that time of day.
Day Seven: Picking up Steam.
One day the words didn’t come so easily but then the next things start to go right again. There was a flurry of activity now that our main character (well, mine at least, not yours you character stealer, you) was safely back in his apartment. Things couldn’t possibly go wrong now, could they?
Things hadn’t been the same since he had emigrated from England with the promise of a place at a prestigious University. Unfortunately on arrival his place was lost due to a clerical error and to avoid deportation he had to take a less than ideal and frankly less than well paid (the legal definition, which he decided to look up was in fact called “Pro bono” though he didn’t really care for the man’s politics though some of the sketches that he had caught on late night TV re runs weren’t too bad, especially the ones that were written by Steve Martin.) assistant job at what he originally perceived to be a low grade institution but turned out to be the home of Colonel Andre DuBois, though with the large stacks of books lining the corridors of the old home, Jonn Baldmur didn’t figure this out for a good couple of months. Yes despite all his “qualifications” from the esteemed Distance Kentucky Finance College run by one Colonel Andre DuBois that he wasn’t very smart. It is at this point that we must stress under threat of legal action that Distance Kentucky Finance College is in no way connected with that other Colonel and we must say that the Distance Kentucky Finance College only has two herbs and spices. So in reality you could say that it has only herb and spice and perhaps no t much else that is anything nice – and that quote comes directly from the online brochure. We also must stress that nor is Distance Kentucky Finance College in league with the Continuity KFC or Real KFC, these being splinter groups and not distance learning accredited institutions. But now Jonn Baldmur stood in the entrance hall of his small sub sub sub let apartment and though about the disaster that may be awaiting him in the bathroom area. He placed his keys on the faux end table and put his jacket on the chair. The shirt that he was wearing was stuck to his back from the walk across town from the diner close to the Colonel’s own home. He breathed hard thanks to the stairs that had finished him off and sapped the last of his strength. He regretted working out today. Well, working out yesterday. He hadn’t done any exercise in a few weeks thanks to a cut on his foot that had prevented him from working out on the exercise bike but he had attempted it and as soon as the phone rang he knew that it would be the Colonel and knew that the day would be ruined. The cut on the top of the foot was starting to irritate him. It was just as well that he was already home. Jonn Baldmur disconnected the phone from the wall socket and went into the bathroom to see what the extent of the damage was. He flicked on the light switch just by the door after a few moments the energy saving bulb was up to its full brightness and Jon was able to see the problem. The bath was overflowing and there was a pool of water on the floor. There wasn’t much water on the floor. The faucet was still on but it was only dribbling out. Jonn pulled the plug out of the bath and grabbed a towel from the nearby rail. The towel was monogrammed with the initials FC. Jonn had no idea who FC was, a set of these monogrammed towels were bought from a thrift store over on Twenty Second Street. Occasionally when he was sat in the bath or drying himself off after a shower or a bath Jonn liked to imagine who this FC was. His current theory was that FC was some sort of former world famous explorer who was on the run from a loan shark or perhaps a mob boss thanks to a shifty dalliance with a moll or even a family member and was forced to liquidate all his assets before he himself was liquidated and his only stop on the way to the train station was a lowly thrift store on Twenty Second Street. Jonn would often spend time mooching around the thrift store in search of more items from the Explorer’s collection. So far the only thing that Jonn had found, in adition to the towels was a soap dish. He had refrained from buying it thanks to it not going along with his eclectic decor of his apartment. Jonn Baldmur stamped on the towel to sop up the last few puddles and squeezed and wrung the towel out in to the bathtub. Jon cursed under his breath. He stretched his arms over his head and yawned deeply. He was over tired now. Sleep would come, eventually. And may be tomorrow would be better. A new dawn and all that. Well, it wouldn’t be light for a good few hours yet, but Jonn knew what he meant. He made his way to the small bedroom and undressed along the way, dropping each item on the floor as he went. At least the bathroom hadn’t been as big a problem as he had anticipated. He could feel his eyelids drop, which for each brief second made him feel as though he hadn’t even tned on the lights in the apartment. He wondered if any other regular person one had this feeling when they happened to blink or if he was the only one. Jonn had often considered the possibility of asking someone else, but the only person he was in frequent contact with was Colonel Andre DuBois and there were many a medical professional who had declared that the Colonel could be described as any thing but normal. He brushed the though out of his hair at the same time that he brought an antique brush to his scalp and ran it through the thinning hair that had not escaped the flesh on his head. “I don’t remember putting that there.” He said unto himself in lieu of any one else to talk to. There were a few wisps of hair that had made the leap from his scalp and he plucked them from the brush and placed them into an old tobacco tin that he was eventually saving to create a toupee or a knitted sweater from his own clothing collection that he may sell down at the very same thrift store on Twenty Second Street where the monogrammed towels had been purchased. It he kept losing hair at this rate, and this rate kept up forever he could make a transition to the clothing industry. There were a few kinks and issues with the initial draft of these ideas but Jonn knew he would fine tune them before he went to the bank to ask for the business start up loan. Jonn stretched again and placed the hairbrush down on the floor by his bedroom door. He would put it back in the morning, or when he finally tripped over it and had to put it out of the way or cause himself further injury. He opened the door and is it creaked a little he had to remember to remind himself for the fifth time that he should really put some oil on the joint and prevent him having to remember every time he passed through the doorway. Down to his underwear now, Jonn slipped these off, which was quite difficult in the darkness thanks to the long johns that he was wearing. But eventually, after just falling over three times, and cursing aloud seven times, he was free and hanging loose. A quick scratch of his undercarriage (or kibble and bits as it is sometimes known in the medical profession) and soon found himself under the covers trying to relax and stretch out. Jon felt his eyelids drop which was convenient as he had willed them to close and after a bit of bribery on the muscles in hid face they had done exactly what was asked of them which was not too shabby in Jonn’s estimation. As he splayed his finger tips out, he could feel something trembling at the touch of his skin. There was a soft sobbing. * * * All that walking and embarrassment had made him thirsty. There wasn’t much in the fridge apart from a bare bulb and a jug of water. There was some wafer thin turkey, but it had been genetically engineered by the Colonel. It was there just running around the refrigerator. It was surpringly good at handling the cold and as was to be expected its body was completely in proportion to the wafer thinness of its body. Technically, it was a marvellous achievement, but the Animal Protection Agency hadn’t been called due to them only having the refrigerator to house them. In all there were 5 of these scientific marvels. The genetically freaky turkeys, and that was the official name for them according to the Colonel, had food and water and a running pen but that left little room for food for the humans (and near humans if you counted the boyfriend of Stacey) in the house. The real tests for these freaky things, and that doesn’t mean the humans, was Thanksgiving holiday in a few weeks. These turkey’s had been bred so that they would fit snugly between two pieces of bread without all the need for plucking and trussing. Jonn Baldmur’s stomach rumbled. He didn’t think he had been that hungry, but now watching the wafer thin turkeys do laps of a little running track (of which Jonn had the occasional flutter but nothing really took off – Ha ha), he felt the need for food. “Soon my pets, soon.” Jonn licked his lips in anticipation at the imminent national holiday but tried to shift his mind on to easier food stuffs to prepare. Though who would know? Jon asked imself and he asked the turkeys. When they couldn’t come up with a more intelligent answer than “gobble, gobble” even after Jonn allowed them to confer with one another in a group huddle, he changed his mind. He need the five of them for Thanksgiving and in all honestly he didn’t think that he could trick the remaining four into a turkey orgy in the hopes of creating another insult to God in just a few weeks. Especially since all these little abominations against God’s will had been bred as sterile creatures. The how to documentation written by Jonn but based on the mad scribbling of Colonel Andre DuBois was sealed away under the floorboards of a non distinct brownstone in another part of town just in case they were raided by any government department. Jonn shook any thought of government subpoenas out of his head and concentrated on what else was in the refrigerator. He looked to the second shelf from the bottom which was where they kept the food fit for human consumption. There were also some wafer thin turkey ham slices but they were a supermarket own brand value range and Jonn was sick of biting into them and crunching on the odd bit of bone that was present in them. One of these days he would bite down hard on some of this food and it would either bite him back (or more accurately peck him back thanks to the wafer thinness of the live turkeys) or it would break his teeth because due to being English all be it with a slight American Accent the bones of the turkey would no doubt grind his molars into a fine powder. “Damn it.” Jon said.
Day Eight: Reality Go Bye Bye
From this point onwards the genetically engineered wafer thin turkeys running around a silver service tray in the refrigerator would prove to be the highpoint and the most grounded part of my literary effort. From this day forward it became increasingly difficult to think of something that would likely happen in real life. Plot wise, Jonn the assistant was still trying to sleep in his apartment when the Colonel arrived seeking a continuation of their earlier meeting:
The knocking And pleading from the other side of the front door continued. Jonn was fully awake now. He lay in bed and tried t block out the noise generated by the Colonel (or which ever other mysterious stranger it might have been, if you don’t like spoilers and prefer to wait a couple of paragraphs to see who it actually is, if we make it that far) by placing a pillow over his head. It blocked out the light and the air but not the sound. Jonn didn’t feeling like dying to the sounds of the incessant stranger at least not in his own bed, so e reluctantly got up and searched around on the floor for his long johns in the harsh (at least to his sleep fill eyes any way) light. Without buttoning up the arse panel Jonn Baldmur padded over to the hallway leaving his bedroom behind for the moment, and he hoped it wouldn’t be long before he was able to go back to sleep , Jonn would just have to get rid of the mysterious stranger and then he could return safely to the confines of his bed and fall into a restful slumber dreaming dreams of lamb and steak. In the hallway Jonn placed his finger on the wall and traced his usual path to the bathroom before flicking on the over head light. He splashed water on his face to make himself look halfway presentable (if one ignored the sticky out hair that was protruding from has head and ears) and remembering the mess he left the facilities but a few short moments ago before he went to his chamber, he decided to forgo using them and off their use to the visitor as sort of a pay back. If the visitor refused, he could always get Stacey or her “fucking door” boyfriend (and that was the most words he had ever heard the boyfriend string together) to be the next victim of the toilet seat of terror. Which, to Jonn Baldmur, sounded like a theme park ride only the splash down wouldn’t be nearly as fun. Though he was tempted to charge admission or at least just pop a turnstile out side the bathroom proper and charge admission. May be then he wouldn’t have to worry about rent so much. Though he would have to think about installing a camera and maybe some guards in place to stop people hopping over the turnstile so in the end may be it wasn’t the most viable solution in these wintery and harsh economic times. Jonn Baldmur left the bathroom left the scene of many of his victories and defeats and turned off the light after him. “Marty.” The knocking stopped and so did the voice as though the person it was attached to was liatening for a response from within, or perhaps the tape player that was projecting all this vocal noise had just reached the end of side A and was in the process of automatically turning over to side B before continuing with the laid down tracks in a kind of none hip hop way, innit. Jonn Baldmur listening closely putting his ear to the door. He thought about the time when he moved in to the place and was a little annoyed that the door that had been attached to the front of his apartment did not have a peep hole. Both he and has former room mate had chosen this apartment because it had been readily available foe immediate rent. What they didn’t find out until the day they moved their stuff in was as they crossed the yellow police tape and chalk outlines was that this particular apartment had been listed for rent about 9 days after a murder / suicide had taken place. Apparently the murderer (and future suicidee) had gained entry by shooting the victim through the peep hole when he rang the door bell and the victim had moved to the door to get a closer look at who was calling at such late hour. The murderer had then gained entry into the apartment and proceeded to slip on some of the quite runny blood that had begun to pool around the door frame area before doing a double somersault and splits and then cracking their skull open in the bathtub and slowly bleeding to death from a massive contusion. From later police and toxicology reports it was confirmed that neither the murderer or the victim knew one another it was just a robbery perpetrated by a klutz gone horribly wrong. Shortly there after the landlord had decided that the peep hole was just too dangerous to have (many would say that due to the rent that was being charged the peep hole was classed as a luxury and way above their price range). “Marty, are you there? Marty?” The voice said again. The voice brought Jonn back from his night time daydream and he opened his eyes and found himself transported back to the dimly lit hallway tat was his apartment. He crouched down. “I’ll be there in a minute,” Jonn called through the open mail slot or letter box as it is known by some in the mail delivery business. ”Just hold your horses.” This seemed to startle the voice over the other side of the wooden divider or door as it is known in layman’s terms. “Horses, erm?” The voice tailed off. If the voice had feet, Jonn couldn’t hear it walk away. If the voice had feet, it would be very unusual if it also didn’t have a body. Jonn scratched his head and a wisp of hair came away with his hand. “In the box you go, little fellow.” He said as he placed the hair strand in the tobacco tin with great care. “I’ll deal with you later.” He whispered to the box. The voice from the other side of the door piped up. “Are you talking to me?” Jonn Baldmur said nothing and just shook his head. “Bare in mind, Marty.” The voice began, and Jonn did. He could very well picture himself naked at that very moment. After all he was a part from a thin layer of long johns with an arse flap that was suggestively open and allowed a nice through breeze. “Bare in mind,” the voice repeated as though it could sense that Jonn was thinking about something entirely different. “That I am on the other side of the door.” “I am aware of that.” Jonn said back through the closed door. He coughed and felt something loosen in his throat. He knew he was getting a cold, it was only a matter of time. He should have put his slippers on before coming into the hallway. The lack of carpet was sending chills up his legs. A bedroom door swung open and Stacey’s boyfriend stalked out. “Will you two shut the fuck up? People are trying to sleep around here.” With that, he turned and went back into the bedroom and back to his girlfriend. Jonn called after him. “I would if people would stop SHOUTING.” When he sensed that the boyfriend wasn’t going to make another imminent appearance he turned his back on Stacey’s room and once again faced the front door and all the mysteries that lay behind it. “What do you want?” Jonn cold hear the voice thinking. “Well?” He called again. “I’ve told you already Marty.” The voice said after a few moments of silence. “Will you let me in?” Jonn Baldmur rubbed his face. “Not by the hairs on my chinny chin, chin.” He said, which reminded him to create another note that told him to shave in the morning, his stubble was becoming a bit of a nuisance. He looked around for another Post It and a pen and made a mental note to write on the paper later. “You know how I don’t like these sorts of references, Marty.” The voice said with a certain disappointment in its tone. “How would I?” Jonn called back with a rye smile on his face. “I don’t know who you are?” “Balderdash.” The voice said. “Careful,” Jonn replied, “I’m not sure but I think that may be a copyrighted brand name.” “Piffle.” “No, Balderdash.” Jonn corrected the, as yet unknown, voice. “I’m pretty sure it is a board game from Milon Bradley or the same people that make Monopoly. I’m not sure but I’m betting theta they have enough money to sue you ito the stone age.” “They have enough money to have built a working time machine?” The voice contemplated. “That is interesting. Interesting indeed.” “I don’t mean that literally.” “What have books got to do with it? I thought you were telling me about board games.” The voice seemed a little confused now. “I was.” Jonn said. “I was talking about board games. What I mean to say was that the company would no doubt have a lot of money but they wouldn’t have enough to build an actual time machine to fire you back to the stone age.” “Well,” the voice replied, “when you say it like that it is both longwinded and quite possibly the dullest and most disappointing thing that I have heard in a long while. A long, long while. A long, long, long -” “Okay, yes I’ve got that. But I think you’ll find that is three things if my counting can be believed. And usually it can’t, but in this case I’m almost certain that it may be true. I used my fingers and everything.” Jonn hadn’t used his fingers for the counting, but the voice over on the other side of the door wouldn’t know that, unless it eventually applied for a transcript of the conversation by sending a cheque or money order off to the BBC, PO Box 90210, London, Ontario, Canada, so Jonn Baldmur felt no reason not to lie to it as he didn’t think that the mysterious voice would have that kind of scratch. “well, yes. I was aware that there were up to and including three items on my list, but i did that so that I cold find out if you have learned to count yet. Ah, Ah Ah. You see aFTER all it is the 40th Anniversary of Sesame Street this year.” “I did read abut that in the news paper. But you are not the Count. You’re one letter off.” “Cont. That’s an abbreviation for continued. And i hope to continue this conversation in more detail if only you would open the fucking door.” “You don’t hear that kind of language on Sesame Street.” Jonn Baldmur insisted. “Actually there was that one episode where Grover found his way into a crack den and learned what an ounce was,” The voice countered, with more knowledge than was strictly necessary. “but I think there was a complaint from Bill Clotworthy in the Standards and Practises department at NBC so thy never bothered to rerun that episode. It’s a real shame, as it was a real gritty episode directed by Quentin Tarantino. The people who saw it say they learned a lot. Especially how to administer an adrenaline shot though the breast plate with a single stabbing motion.” “I never saw that episode, but I hear it is available on bootleg DVD from e-bay. But I really think you should really tone it down with the Sesame Street references unless you want to be haunted by the Ghosts of Marley and Marley and Henson.”
