Really. It is Sunday night this time.

Nope. I missed Sunday again. There's something about Sundays I keep missing...

Anyway, that doesn't matter right now. Right now, what matters is that the Muse, damn her to all places, has disappeared again. Apparently she's off into the biggest black hole some-thing-or-other with other recalcitrant muses making like they need a holiday. With music.

Muses do not need a holiday! What is that with a holiday? MUSES do NOT need a holiday.

There I was, finishing up a book and lucky enough to have it published. Yep, doing a bit of marketing, hoping my readers enjoyed the story and all that jazz. I admit it was a little different to my usual, but you know - we have to stretch ourselves a bit this way and that.

Well, I learned something. You can hurt yourself stretching ... but the doesn't mean it's not good for you. And that's OK. It's all part of it. After you hurt stretching, your muscles get used to it. You know what not to do again. (Yep, Your readers like s-e-x in their stories. Note to self: put s-e-x in your stories. Next note to self: do it.)

Anyway, that doesn't matter right now. Right now, what matters is finding a solution to this problem about the Muse. A friend suggested that the Muse was absent due to an infliction of a character called Doris (not affliction. Infliction. Really.) Here's Doris... she's a bit shy. Not. (Well, in this pic she is.)

Anyway, this sort of thing takes up a lot of time. But wot FUN!

Then aside from Doris, there's all this interesting stuff on Facebook, and Amazon, and there's other time-wasting stuff like the laundry etc and then -

There's learning about deep POV. (Not time-wasting). I love Kristen Lamb. (Thanks for posting, Kylie Short.) Kristen Lamb makes you realise how long you've been dabbling in the mysterious art of story-writing for the masses. (Let's not go into the other mysterious art of just story-writing for yourself. Or for your mum. Or your PG nieces. But anyway...) She makes you realise that unless you're really awake, the omniscient author-dude voice can still lurk even after careful self-editing and therefore give the game away. You've been doing this a long time.

This revelation was a little startling. I have been around the traps (not doing an awful lot by all accounts) for a LONG time. Then, why do I not have JK Rowling's bank account?

Which brings me back to my original grizzle - where the hell is my Muse?