A day in the life of a romance novelist

​Oh my, doesn't that title sound all romance-y and idealistic? Does it conjure up images of a perfectly groomed office and a woman in a fur-lined robe, madly typing away all day long, no cares in the world, eating boxes of perfectly packaged gourmet bon-bons whilst classical music wafts in an inspirational manner in the background?

So, here's the real day in the life of a procrastinating wannabe romance novelist.

Woke up to a cat grooming my head. Do you know what that weird kitty tongue does to hair? It pulls each individual strand, one at a time. Dammit, it's Saturday and I'm up before 7.

Kitty leads me to the fresh puke on the floor. Stares at me with a glint in her eye and then returns to bed where she promptly falls asleep. I am, unfortunately, wide awake. Snores from hubby emanate from the bedroom. Fabulous. Time for breakfast.

Yippee, Saturday. Sure, I'm on call, but there'll be plenty of time to get lots of writing done, right?

2 hours of my life, gone. Apparently the internet has taken me from Twitter to cute puppies to ASPCA videos to pitiful animals to news articles about animal cruelty. I'm mad about the pitiful animals, but haven't accomplished much more than wanting to get another pound kitty.

All right, after I check the Twitter feed, I'll be ready to write.

1.5 more hours later have elapsed. It's like I was in a coma. There are no memories of this time. Perhaps aliens have abducted me.

Even though I'm still in jammies, it's now time for lunch. Yes, in jammies. At some point, I should brush my teeth.

Out of jammies, finally. On treadmill, with freshly-brushed teeth, watching Game of Thrones. I'm going to say it: there are some really high quality abs, pectoralis muscles, and…other anatomical parts on these episodes. Walking faster through those aforementioned high-quality segments of the show.

After a shower, I'm ready to sit down and do some writing for the afternoon.

Until phone rings and emergency c-section ensues.

Dear lordie, that gal was 300 pounds and shaped like a sphere! I pulled an armpit muscle trying to get baby out of her pelvis. And the uterine repair was an adventure. Now all I can think about is wound healing, bleeding, and secondary infection, since her sub-q space (adipose layer) was 5-6 inches thick. That's a lot of space to have stuff go wrong. Dadgum.

Need a shower again. Between working hard and getting flop sweat when I couldn't get the uterus back into the abdomen for a minute there, and for the benefit of humanity, another shower is in order.

On a whim, hubby and I go out to eat and invite colleague and his wife to join us.

Colleague (old enough to be my father, by the way) proceeds to drink all of us under the table. I'm impressed. And thankful he's not on call. He apparently likes to say the word "cock" out of context and loudly. It's a small town. At least 3 patients I know look over at our table. I'll be hearing about this come Monday.

Back home a few hours later. Time to really REALLY work on writing. After checking Twitter and email first, that is.

Seriously, am I in some kind of time warp? It's already 10 pm? What the heck happened? Well, can't start writing now. I'm tired.

But there is time to do this blog about a day in the life of a (non writing) romance novelist….