I’m on page 57 of “Isle,” as I do the final proof and edit of the manuscript before submitting it for pre-order and handing it off to my trusty proofreaders for their perusal.

I expected to be finished and working on “601 Suspense Street” right now.  The kiddo is supposed to be at camp right now too, but… it was cold, it rained, the tent flooded, her foot fell in the lake (I was glad to see she still has it), her shoes were ruined (need washed), there was pre-teen girl drama between some of the girls in her tent, and… more than anything else, she talked to one of the campers who was crying because they were homesick and they got each other worked into a frenzy.  She missed her cat, she missed her pillow, she missed us (wow, did not expect to hear that–ever), and the Youth Director called last night.  They made a valiant effort to distract her, but it was impossible to do so.

And so, I drove to the campground and picked her up.  Let me just say the navigation system that comes installed on the iPhone 5s leaves a lot to be desired though.  It fails far too often to give me accurate directions and frequently claims there is no such address as the one I insist on going to.  I thought–fine.  You think the campground doesn’t exist?  Well I don’t want to go to a hospice with the same name thank you very much, so I attempted to download another app in the hopes it would have better sense.  Forgot my apple id password, and apparently my userid is not msimonin, and let’s just say I about lost my last shred of patience!

So I aimed for the hospice, thinking it would get me to the right town anyway, and was very pleased not to get a speeding ticket, the very nice officer only gave me a warning, and tried to help me figure out how to get where I was going as well, and I better remember to tell Brad why there’s the business card for a policeman in my Highlander before he drives it next or he’ll really wonder.  I was also pleased a couple hours later when I pulled over hoping to find an app already installed on my phone that would tell me where in the world I was (because I had no idea, “somewhere in the mountains of Colorado–I think” was as close as I could narrow it down), to find that at some point in time I’d downloaded the Google Maps app.  It knew where I was, and it knew where the campground was too.

At last I arrived, loaded the cold, tired, at least no longer damp and with both feet intact, homesick kid, and headed for home.  She sounds like she had a blast, made friends, and yet… I guess it was just longer away from home than she could take.

We stopped for gas on the way home and I thought hm, there’s a Sheriff vehicle parked in front of the convenience store.  It’s probably pretty safe in spite of the late hour and seedy atmosphere of this town that didn’t seem even to have a name.  Went inside, and there was a Sheriff there, taking a statement.  The place had just been robbed.

We got home around 3:30 a.m., and the point of all that is to take as long as possible to say I did not finish proofing “Isle” last night as I’d expected to.  I have no more children at camp however, so I’ll finish tonight.

Barring further calamity of some kind, of course.