Brag time.

Interesting times indeed.

I have just had a novel accepted for publication - the first one - so you will excuse me if I seem a little less than sober. Tomorrow I will work out what all the forms mean. It has to be tomorrow because next week is Serious Sample Week and one novel won't wipe out the day job. When my demons are childrens' toys and lunchboxes, maybe I can realise my dream of buying a big house far from people and selling this one to radical extremists for one pound.

It's hard going, this writing lark. It took three attempts to find a publisher for this book. Maybe the next one will be quicker.

I like to smoke and drink while writing. It's relaxing and inspirational. Shapes in the smoke are enhanced by the alcohol haze to give a corneal reality that has no bearing on the real horrors of modern life. Take any situation, give it a little twist, and you can scare the shit out of just about anyone. None of this 'writer in remote house' bollocks for me. No attics or basements either. I'm in your kitchen and your bathroom, I'm in your shiny Ikea wardrobe and your lovely new Prius. No matter how post-modern your lifestyle, I'm behind your sofa and under your bed. My tales are not in the remote countryside, they are in the middle of the city and in the little shop down the road. In the wine bar and in the pound shop. In everything you touch and see and hear, in your coffee and in your beer.

They'd be in the pub if there were likely to be any of those in the future.

By strict interpretation of the law, now that I am to be a proper published author (short stories are not an income generator unless you can do at least one a day), this tatty old Dell is now my place of work and it will be illegal to smoke here.

But if I can't smoke here, I'll never write again.

Therefore I will need WiFi and a laptop in the greenhouse. No problem is insurmountable.

Greenhouse... hmmm.