Earth Shattering Kaboom

Cuillean

Yesterday, this lovely lady thought her world had ended.

Let me start at the beginning. I write slowly. Some days are slower than others. I made ten + pages yesterday, but it took more than twelve hours to do so. It's one of those things. I'm not happy with how things are going in the story, but the only way to resolve that is to keep going with the story even when every instinct is screaming 'Wow! This sucks rocks through a cocktail straw!'

I'd been toiling away for a few hours when KABOOM! A compression wave hit and I felt that explosion in my chest. The entire boat dipped and reverberated with the sound. KABOOM! By this point, Cuillean was on full alert staring at me as if expecting me to explain. "Darlin'," I said, getting up to see whether or not Seattle was still there, "I got nothing." The cat decided that hiding the bedclothes was her best option. She beat a hasty retreat.

I sat back down and realized I'd been writing in silence until whatever had just happened had...well...happened. Huh. My heroine in this book is deaf. No wonder I'm writing without music. How interesting that out of the blue, I should get such a graphic demonstration of what it's like to *feel* sound. I went back to work with the inkling that the rocks getting sucked through the cocktail straw of my writing were getting a little smaller. Maybe. (Problem solved after calling it a day and whilst washing the dishes - If you don't like the scene, maybe you should change the POV character, silly. Duh.)

The earthshattering kabooms? President Obama had come to Seattle for a brief visit.  A private float plane pilot failed to check air space restriction bulletins before taking off that day. He violated Air Force One's air space. The Secret Service scrambled a pair of National Guard F-15s out of Portland and gave them 'get there yesterday' clearance. They took off and hit their afterburners. The cat and I had nearly wet ourselves over a pair of sonic booms. I'm an Air Force brat. I grew up with sonic booms. You'd think I'd remember - at least enough to trust my city was still standing.  I'm so ashamed.

But not as ashamed, I bet, as that float plane pilot.