I’ve known for years that if you want to be a writer, you need to carry around a notebook. Inspiration may strike at any time. So I diligently bought a notebook, used about 1/3 of the pages and lost it. Repeatedly.

But I get older, and wiser, and I’ve finally finished a whole bloody notebook!

It was well worth picking up that writerly habit. Now I need never forget:

• my inability to let go of a bad idea (on three separate ideas-generating pages, having completely forgotten the last time I wrote it down, and with escalating insistence):

Before this genre-shattering twist occurs to me:

•  This rather optimistic bit of self-interrogation:

(Spoilers: I am, if anything, less subtle and complex than a chase-y shooty plot and doubt if I could pull one off with any competence or flair.)

• Finally, this terrible decision: