This will be brief. Maybe.

Did you know that if you enter any equation into the search box in Google, that you'll get the answer? Type 2 + 2. Click Search. DING. It's four, baby!

Now maybe the rest of creation knows about this, but as of two days ago, it was news to me. It's called Google Calculator, just one of the many things that make Google so dang googly. It's one of those tiny, slightly life-altering discoveries, like a sand dollar on the beach, still intact, or an arrowhead found while walking through a field, or a five dollar bill in a pair of jeans you haven't worn in months.

So I've been using Google Calculator to calculate what my word count goal is from day to day. If I'm going to meet my goal of 50,000 words in thirty days, then (as I've said before) I'll have to average 1,667 words per day. I don't know about you, but once I get past about two or three days, I just can't do that kind of math in my head. So I must do what all good writers do. Outsource my math needs. Today's word count goal, according to that great googly abacus known as Google Calculator, was 8,335. I am pleased to say that my current word count is 8,367, which means I can go to sleep tonight with a clear writer's conscience.

Speaking of sleep, I need some. I opened this morning, which meant getting up shortly after 3 am, which meant no morning blog followed by a hefty chunk of time spent working on the book. Instead I just had to come home, bypass the traditional nap, push through the post-open fatigue (which is much, MUCH worse than post-close fatigue) and bang out some words. Took a break about halfway through (approx. 7,700 words or so) and headed out with the wife and kids for a couple of hours of window shopping, puppy-looking-at, tea-drinking, and free-massage-chair-sitting at the local mall. Came back, ate a burrito, hit the writing again. Done.

Bed soon. Cheers.