It Hit Me

I was driving along, minding my own business when I saw the Asplundh tree guys chopping the snot out of this poor elm tree because his branches got caught up in the wires. I hate those guys. They just chop and chop and chop and don't care how it looks as long as the branches don't hit the wires. I mean, shouldn't they hire a professional arborist to at least make sure they're not killing the thing. And besides, half the time, the way they cut it up, if a strong wind comes in, the tree is going to hit the wires anyway. Stupid Asplundh guys.

Anyway, as I was driving, I saw this old woman on her porch wearing a fuzzy pink bathrobe, white fuzzy slippers, and an old fashioned kerchief on her head hiding an array of curlers. She was standing there looking at the mess on her front lawn that the tree guys left. (In their defense, they do send a crew to clean up, I guess they hadn't gotten to it yet.)

And BLAM, it hit me. A short story, fully formed, jumped into my head. Three characters (sans names), the plot, and the ending. I was happy, joyful even, I had another contemporary romance to work on. (sometimes the whole Regency thing is a bit overwhelming) I drove home thinking I would immediately set to work on it, but of course, once I got there, it disappeared.

But then, over the weekend, I happened to drive past the old woman's house again and the story came back to me. Yay! It even had a twisty romantic angle to it, so instead of three characters, there were four (which may or may not work depending on what I want this story to become).

I'm hoping to begin working on this short story/novella as soon as I finish publishing my latest Regency. And maybe if I'm really lucky, I can finish it in a few weeks.

So that's where I am and what I'm doing. Hey, who knows, maybe I can finish it before next week. *cue snarky laughter*