At first I was going to post this pic because is there anything more precious than a little girl wearing a dress and snow boots walking in the snow with a cute mutt? But then I found it more compelling that it's been approximately one week since a snow event and my road still looks like a snowmobile trail on a mountain pass.

One of my New Year's resolutions is to take more of these pictures. And indulge in their many stories.

Today was supposed to be DAY 1 of my new hobby. Today was going to be the day that I replaced my grease-stained NaNoWriMo sweatpants with a fresh pair from the dryer at 6 AM-ish and embarked on my quest to become A RUNNER. Inspired by my daughter Toni, my sister Irene, my wonderful friends Russ, Laurie, and Jay, the ever-inspirational Dooce, and even the mother in my new story, I decided that maybe it was time I do something other than drink wine to ward off the depression that lurks behind me at all times, tapping me on the shoulder and raising its eyebrows seductively while whispering, "Meet me in the coat closet at noon, baby. And bring some rope."

But I woke up at 5:30 as I always do only to curl the blankets tighter around my neck because it sounded like I had been transported into a Snoopy novel. "It was a dark and stormy night." An hour later my bladder yanked me out of bed and so obviouslyI had to peek outside at DAY 1. This, friends, is what DAY 1 looked like:

I felt completely justified in putting off DAY 1. For the love of God, several inches of snow were blowing sideways, backwards, AND diagonally. So I drank coffee and read. I played Words With Friends. I attempted to wake up my daughter via text message. I fell in love with products that I don't need. I ignored my dirty kitchen. 

FOUR MORE hours have passed since then. In that time I've seen two runners blazing a trail along the bank of the river. And then to add insult to injury, this guy shows up as if to say, "Get your lazy ass out here, you good-for-nothing writer."

THIS IS SO NOT MY IDEA OF A GOOD TIME. But I'm strapping it on (the running shoes of course) and going for it. Because fuck the coat closet.

Those of you who know me well know that yesterday was a monstrously important day in my life for at least two reasons, maybe three.  The first and least important reason is that it was my and Mark Twain's birthday. Google chose to honor Mr. Twain with a sweet yet predictable picture of Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer whitewashing a fence. And maybe someday in the far far off future when I'm cold and dead in the ground, they'll honor me with a picture of a hairy boy looking at some flashing green lights with a pair of binoculars. You will get that eventually. Today, only my two oldest kids do. Lo siento.

Anyway, the SECOND and slightly more important reason it was important was that I not only had a birthday but I had a FORTIETH birthday. I am FOORRTTYY. If I say it enough times maybe I'll actually start to believe it. I still feel every bit of 38.5.

But the THIRD and most important reason yesterday was so important was because it was the final day of National Novel Writing Month. *drumroll please* Wait for it... wait.... okay, there's no easy way to say this. I didn't win. In other words, I failed. By my quick calculations using a phone calculator I was 72 percent done when I called it a night. Put another way, I needed 13,813 more words to call myself a winner. Put yet another way, I AM A NANO-LOSER.

Now, I came to this blog post fully prepared to list all the reasons why I couldn't do it, like the fact that I have FLU and thus went to bed two hours early last night. And THANKSGIVING happened. A thousand other things went wrong for me throughout the month. But, you know, that's the human condition, and all those people who won the big 50k-word bragging right had crap happening to them as well. So.... I'm going to spare you the list of the thousand other things. And I'm going to finish this novel which, according to nanowrimo.org, isn't going to be until maybe December 12 at the pace I'm going. Gee, thanks for that nifty feature, wrimos.

The good news is that I've got this unbelievably compelling story. I send my oldest kid chapters every few days and she keeps asking me to hurry up and finish so she can know what happens in the end. Dudes, that's a really great 40th birthday present right there.