My brief hiatus from novel writing about to end

VALOIS, New York - Since the arrival of sons Dylan and Dustin - along with nephew Alex - to the Valois Point Yacht Club cottages, all work on the draft of the novel Jack's Boat ceased.

At the helm

It wasn't so much that I couldn't have carved out a little time to write here and there. But the hubbub has been waaaaay too much fun.

And amazingly, the weather turned out to be absolutely Seneca Lake perfect. That meant days of sailing the Crimson Tide and motoring about in the Spirit of Louise pontoon boat. The two kayaks were pressed into service along with the Captain's Gig rowboat, too.

All that fun is about to come to a crashing end Monday morning when it's back to the keyboard to write next Friday's Write On column for the Finger Lakes Times.

But equally important is to get back stacking paragraphs on the draft of Jack's Boat, where I left two characters rushing to the scene of a big fire in which it's possible loved ones have died. Have they perished? I won't know until I start typing and the story reveals itself.

When the draft of Jack's Boat is completed and sent off to the editor, I am playing with the idea of putting together a collection of my Finger Lakes Times columns in a book tentatively titled, Don Quixote At The Keyboard,  before tackling Fracking Evil, the third book in the fracking trilogy.

I just completed four years of newspaper columns - 208 consecutive columns. The book would have perhaps 50-75 with commentary about why I wrote what I did and notes on what I would write today on the same topic.

But that's Monday. And it's only Saturday.

Loosen the lines! Raise the sails! The wind is up!