8r4d Oh, doesn’t this seem familiar. Back at the #coffee and #writing routine as we dive into the first post-holiday day of 2025.

bradsalomons It’s been a weird week of snow and stuff and such and I haven’t done much #writing or had many #coffee sessions, but with Friday here and the month settling into some end of year finality, I made it out to get some words on the page. Of course, I’m sitting here posting this, so you can speculate on exactly just how well that is working out, but—

bradsalomons The Canmore #coffee scene has a #paranormal vibe that I’ve incorporated quite judiciously into my fiction #writing — that is to say the fictional City of Birchmont and setting for my recent word-craft is based heavily on this little town, no doubt, and influenced by our frequent visits. Yet somehow I hadn’t noticed the #cryptozoology vibe in the town until I started writing paranormal fiction—but now I see it everywhere.

I got a couple scenes written while we visited this weekend, so inspiration meets perspiration, huh? The first book in my Stories from Birchmont series will be completed soon, maybe even by the end of November if I stop goofing around and write the last few chapters!

8r4d Despite the shartyness of the week so far, I have been making significant progress on my #writing and specifically the #editing of the novel. I’m hoping to have all of part one to the next stage by the end of the day, and this #sunrise view and a #coffee is certainly going to help with that effort. [read more...]

8r4d Spectacles, used books and #coffee on a Saturday #downtown adventure.

8r4d Oh, maybe you can’t tell but my morning #coffee and writing sesh has me trapped here while the #rain tuckers itself out. [read more...]

8r4d If you’re curious how the writing is going, here’s the thing: I spend at least three solid sessions per week giving Starbucks a few bucks for #coffee and a table. I sit here, in one of three locations, almost always in the same chair pounding away words on my #keyboard for a couple hours. My goal is to average 500 words per day, including all days, off days and on days, work days and play days, and in the last six weeks since implementing a lovely little spreadsheet to more formally track that I’ve averaged about 650, again, writing about 3-4 days per week. In essence, that’s a handful of 1500-2000 word sessions.

The novel itself is not so much stalled as I’ve slowed construction-proper in favour of doing some shoring up of the backstory foundations. I got to a point about 80% of the way in where I found myself trying to build a satisfying build to the climactic conclusion on a concept that I had loosely in my own mind but for which I hadn’t really done enough world-building. That kind of writing risks plot holes or weak sort-of “because story” justifications, and I wouldn’t have been happy with that and surprisingly its much tougher to untangle bad writing than just writing it right in the first place. So my last couple months has been a twisting whirlwind of finding yet another new routine to settle into and simultaneously punching through what is becoming a novel-length collection of backstory short stories. Really.

And if nothing else, I’m keeping the local cafes on their toes, too.

8r4d I neglected my parental duties this past week and did not post any birthday pictures, yet here I am a few days later with my #keyboard and #coffee resuming the wordsmithing efforts from the local cafe after buying the kid a fancy latte on her way to class.

8r4d This feels write. And they gave me a free banana bread with my #coffee this morning. Back to the grind.

8r4d …Meanwhile, after a week of free fancy #bakery #coffee drinks here I sit, back to #writing and spending some quality time with my #keyboard in my favourite Starbucks this morning.

8r4d After missing my morning #coffee vibe because of a fast (blood work!) I am back in the cafe this morning highly distracted because of all the millions of newsy things happening around the world and closer to home, too. Sometimes my visits here spawn inspiration. Other times they only spawn tiny sample latte drinks delivered by smiling baristas.

8r4d This morning’s #coffee house writing efforts brought to you by something other than Starbucks for a change. The extra fifty cents for my brew might be worth it for the upgrade in atmosphere.