And so, today, ...

... I'm keeping as busy as I can.

I was up a few minutes before 6, cleaned up, talked some with Joyce before she headed off to the health club, did a little work in my study, then walked over to Open Door Coffee Co., where I read the New York Times via Kindle, checked/responded to email and Facebook, then read/took notes on the first fifty pages of Jennifer Egan's first book, a collection of short stories, The Emerald City (mid-90s). As soon as I finish it, I will have read all of her books--except the new one, Manhattan Beach, which I am really looking forward to ...

Then I pencil-edited some pages from Frankenstein Sundae--hoping this will be the final draft: I'm ready to move on ...

Home: I talked with Joyce a bit (she'd noticed a typo in my Daily Doggerel; I fixed it). I decided it was time to bake some baguettes. It's been some months since I've done so--and I don't want to lose the "touch" (to whatever extent I have it).

Baguettes are not nearly so complicated as the sourdough bread I bake on Sunday mornings. No, baguettes require only water, salt, yeast, and flour (I mix in a little whole wheat with the white). And time. I've got lots of that, right?

After I got the dough ready and set it aside to rise, I started the chicken soup going in the Crock-Pot (for supper). I'd made the stock yesterday from the carcass of the roaster we'd consumed last week ...

... I just realized, writing this, that I'd neglected to put the seasoning in with the stock. So off I hurried to the Crock-Pot to do so ...

In a few minutes I'm going to open the Word file for Frankenstein Sundae and enter the pencil changes I made this morning.

That will take me close to lunch time ...

After that, I'll walk back over to Open Door, read the Cleveland Plain Dealer and Akron Beacon-Journal online, write a book-doggerel for later in the week (I try to stay several days ahead: You never know what can happen!). I'll read some more Egan, fuss with a poem I've been working on for a week or so. Maybe post it on FB, if I'm okay with it.

I say okay with it because satisfied with it or happy with it seems far too excessive. I never really feel happy or satisfied with something I've written. There's always something ... wrong ... something that could be better, you know?

After a couple of hours at the coffee shop, I'll come home and take a nap. Then up to start fussing around with supper. While we eat, Joyce and I will probably stream a little Vice--or maybe just talk.

After supper--maybe an errand. Or a coffee somewhere?

I'll head upstairs around 6:30 (yes, you heard me right!), where I'll read a bit from each of the six books I'm reading right now (the 1st 3 are actual books; the latter 3 are on Kindle):

• Wilkie Collins, Armadale
• Mark Seidenberg, Language at the Speed of Sight: How We Read, Why So Many Can't, and What Can Be Done about It
• Dennis Lehane, Since We Fell
• Craig Johnson, Dry Bones (a Longmire novel)
• Ken Bruen, Priest (a Jack Taylor novel)
• Colin Harrison, You Belong to Me

Then, maybe, we'll stream some of a mystery series--Vera or Line of Duty. Maybe some of Olive Kitteridge. Maybe ...

And then--I hope, I hope, I hope--I will drift off ...

And not think about tomorrow, when I begin my second round of immunotherapy. Akron Red Cross. Eight in the morning. I'm keeping busy today because Fear doesn't know how to cope with Busy.

And the reason I'm taking a nap this afternoon instead of going to the health club? I'm not allowed to work out the day before a session. I must ... rest, you see.

And so I will.