Nothing on the word count. Can you feel the panic? I mean, really, feel the panic? I was looking through this big vegetarian cookbook my mom got for my brother. It's lovely, I mean, really, truly, marvelously lovely, with mouth-watering pictures of yummy type stuff. I was half-inclined to go to the kitchen THAT VERY MOMENT and make stuffed mushrooms, roasted red peppers and a whole bunch of other lovely, wonderful things. Of course, the urge passed within minutes and I'm fine now. Back to normal, but still mulling over adding my recipes - such as they are - to the site. An "In the Kitchen With Seema" kind of thing. Safe foods for the cooking inept, plus tips on how not to burn rice. But still a contemplating thing - something to do over the winter holidays when I'm off. Or maybe, I should just go get that cookbook back from the Kid and teach myself how to cook over the holidays.

But no, the word count is still stagnating and I'm pretty sure, given the crowd of relatives showing for Thanksgiving, I'm not going to make it up over the holiday either. I guess I'm going to have to write 5,000 words a day from here on out to get through it. Sleep, I hear, is vastly overrated.

And oh yes - weird response convo. I wrote: "The muse was very insistent that X tell her story." The response I got back? "Don't ever let Mr. X hear you use the word 'muse' - he hates it."