How things begin

A bit chilly and damp at the moment after two gloriously sunny but cold days. It's a bit more like an English winter at the moment here on my bit of Vancouver Island. Drizzle and damp.

Dog gave me cause for amusement last night. We were taking our usual perambulation through the woods when a Deer spooked nearby. Much to my amazement, instead of running for home as he usually does, Dog up and chased the Deer with much woofing and bouncing before returning to me a few moments later with ears and tail decidedly in the up position. Made a big fuss of my chickenhearted mutt because I feel he needs a little confidence boost like that every now and again, and I'm happy that he still has a little heart in him. I hate to see him cowering at every strange noise. I feel responsible somehow.

Dissimilarly; was walking through downtown Nanaimo earlier on today and picked up some details of a local short story competition. On the drive back home I was thinking about whether to enter or not when I passed the sign for the Jolly Miner pub just off the downtown section of the island highway. A song that was played a lot on the home service when I was very little popped up from the jukebox in my head "Big John". A little imagination later from my mental card index of character traits and the story arrived complete in my head. I could even see and hear the characters in my minds eye.

Well, I'd better get researching and writing. Tie it in with a couple of current news items.