Day Twenty-Seven: When Car Buying Interrupts Writing Sessions

So yesterday, Kaitlin and I sat down at Delice Bakery at Midtown to try someplace new. The parking was interesting, but it was a really swank place in a cute neighborhood. Way too many sweets for someone who likes sweets. Just look at that writing snack. A mousse cup AND a cookie? Not pictured is the buttered croissant I ate afterwards. Why did it all have to be so good?

We'd carved out like five hours to work. The first hour was a huge help; Kate helped me talk through a bunch of problems I was having with my manuscript, and it gave me the confidence to keep going. Then Alex took a break off work to remind me that he'd found the perfect vehicle for us.

A Prius. A Prius that was affordable. What?!

Writing session quickly dissolved into phone calls to arrange a trade-in and down-payment and test-drive and parents-coming-with-us and everything else that goes into buying your first big-girl car.

I then had twenty minutes left to write before I had to go to the car cleaning place and clean out my poor old Impala.

I was proud of myself, that I stood up for those twenty minutes. I got through a scene in my book, and when everyone kept bombarding me with car questions, I kept texting, "Give me until 5:00." And I was productive in that way!

Buying the car was the real stress of the day.

And that is why you see a very blurry, very dark picture of the inside console instead of bright and beaming pictures of the red beauty in daylight. We didn't get home until about midnight.

I could write about how sad it was to turn in my old car, Serenity Arabella (and it was sad. I felt like I was taking my soon-to-be-ex-boyfriend out on a date to break up with him, or driving my family dog into the woods to abandon him). I could write about how patriarchal car buying is (the dude talked to Alex the whole time and kept putting his last name instead of my last name behind my first name). But I'd rather focus on how I still got writing done yesterday. It wasn't a lot. It wasn't five hours' worth. But it was still something.

Also, I am going to be so fat if we keep going back to Delice.