Sometimes, I visit the neatest places!

As most followers of this blog know, my job often sends me out of town to do research. Recently, though, I've been getting to do a lot of day trips to Tacoma, Puyallup, and other locales in Pierce County. Sometimes, these trips are to really neat places.

Today I got to visit the Points Northeast Historical Society, which is in northeast Tacoma, right by the water. There's a lighthouse (not the original one), a museum, and the historical society offices. But one of the really nifty things about this place is that they have a little cottage that they rent out for a week at a time. Since the cottage was empty this week, I got to go on a tour of it, especially since I mentioned that when I told Jeremy about it, he said he wanted to go stay there. :)

Cutest. Cottage. EVER. It's got 3 bedrooms, but only one bathroom, and a modernized kitchen. Otherwise, it's furnished with antiques and photos of historic stuff from the old lighthouse and other stuff nearby. The museum is in the basement of the house. The rates are surprisingly reasonable, too, though there is the trade-off of being responsible for opening the museum on a couple of days if you stay anytime other than in the winter. Now, to figure out how we can take an entire week off work... :)

The noveling continues

I'm just shy of 40,000 words on my novel, and am well on pace to finish my 50,000 words by the end of the month. Of course, last night was when I got the first glimpse of just how much will be unwritten by the time I get to 50,000 words, as I have just started tapping into the fictional history part of the novel. I want to write pages and pages of history for this world that I've made up, but it really doesn't have a place in the narrative portion of the story.

I think that there are parts of my novel that will get yanked when I sit down to edit it, and maybe then the history can be worked in. But I think that what I'm really looking at is a whole other book for this fictional history... and of course, that's what my brain is stuck on right now. *sigh*

In other news, Jeremy and I have stumbled across a vast cat conspiracy. Whenever we are getting ready to go out of town, one of the cats gets sick. First it was Delilah, then it was Gabe, and now it's my new kitten, Black. :( I'm taking a short lunch today so that I can leave work early and take him to the vet, and Jeremy will bus straight to the vet from work. I have, of course, been freaking myself out by looking up what his symptoms might mean, and finding all sorts of gloom and doom. Hurrah for the internet, right?

Seeing as there are only 2 more cats who could possibly get sick to continue this trend, and only one more trip for us after this weekend, I'm hoping that our conspiracy is not real. I'm also grateful for the fact that we've managed to juggle the finances sick cats and Christmas shopping pretty successfully, and that D and Gabe are both better now.

Think good thoughts for my kitten, if you're so inclined. I would be thrilled if I get home to take him to the vet and he's already healthy again...