Er. Mah. Gerd.

Okay, so explanations are deserved. Excuses, which aren't wanted (I know, I hate them), will be given.

Things have been kinda-sorta crazy. As I've explained recently, that's the way things typically trend in retail.

Case in point - a fine fellow has an emergency the evening of Black Friday, guess what happens? Yeah. My day off, and I'm no longer off. The emergency carries over into Saturday, so I'm working two days I was supposed to have off.

On top of that I then go back to my normal schedule, which I always work Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday. So I've pretty much been working since Thanksgiving. Yes, it's frustrating to a point, but I know that my paycheck will be glorious so there isn't really much complaining on my part. Case in point: today I worked an 11-hour shift. From 8am to 7pm. Yeah.

So, some random little tidbits...

- I got a new Razer keyboard, which is backlit. My last keyboard was some default thing that I got with my computer (I used to build my own but I just didn't have the TIME for this one, so I bought a custom job from IBuyPower) which was admittedly nice but I like to sit in the dark because I like the full 'experience' of my 24-inch monitor. Or maybe I'm just crazy. Anyway, sometimes the no-backlight could make it frustrating to locate specific keys.

Take into consideration that my normal typing speed is 72 WPM.

Of course with a new keyboard the keys are different. These are a little bigger, or at least it feels that way, so I'm having to spread my fingers out a little more when typing. It won't take long to adjust but it just feels strange for now.

Oh, and this thing has a nice touch panel (yes, touch) that adjusts volume, can control pause/play/ff/rw on videos, and can change the backlighting of my keyboard to off, on, or just WASD.

Yes, just WASD. I laughed. Hey, they are known for making gaming peripherals.

- I haven't touched any of my stories. I know, I can hear the yelling and screaming and gnashing of teeth, and of course all I can do is apologize. But work and real life comes first, everything else is secondary. I probably would have posted the ending by now if I hadn't gone back and done those edits, so I'm partially kicking myself, but my writer-side knows that the ending I have now is much better.

Or at least it's shaping up that way. I swear, sometimes I just sit and stare at the screen for minutes on end. I'll start to type something and then stop it with a 'no, that's too cliche'. Or 'this is good but I've seen it done before'. Or even sometimes 'this relies a little too much on the suspension of disbelief'. For any fellow writers out there that bother to read this, I'm sure you can understand my pain, even a little bit.

- I'm off work tomorrow. I plan on writing all day. If I completely finish Rewritten, I may post it before it's beta'd, just to get it off my chest. My only words of advice are thus: Do not hold your breath. I hate making promises, especially ones that I can't keep. I know I won't get called in tomorrow (because I can't, company policy at this point) but who knows what may happen to me next. Maybe I'll get lucky and have the whole day free.

This is why the majority of my chapters for Rewritten was done during the spring/early summer, because that's when the most of my downtime is. Right now is just Crazy.

Yes, with a capital C.

Anyway, stay tuned here. If you don't see the chapter tomorrow I'll be posting here again as to why not. Otherwise expect the usual review responses, though there won't be many since it's technically the end. Until B-Side, anyway.

P.S. I had 44 emails when I got home from work today. How long do you think it's been since I've been online? (Note, this question is rhetorical.)