When a librarian finds a murdered historian in the undocumented vaults of the library, she discovers that magic, unusable for centuries, is returning to the world, and those who once wielded it are returning to take back their homeland.

This year marks my eighth year participating in NaNoWriMo and my fifth year as a Municipal Liaison for the St. Louis region of said program. That means that I've written at least 350,000 words in the last seven years, and I plan to add another 50k onto that this year. Maybe more, if I can cudgel a few more ideas out of this brain of mine. So I think I have a pretty good idea of what makes for a good time while you're on your crazy experience with literary abandon.

From the oneword prompt "romantic."

There was a bottle of wine and a candle on the table when I got home. Next to the candle was a matchbox and a note:

"Light the candle and drink the wine, and think of me. I can't be with you but know that I'm doing the same thing, wherever I am. Love you."

I started to cry.

Yesterday was like any other day. It was Sunday, so I could sleep in. I met up with some friends for an early lunch, read a book or two, did some laundry, worked out, did my part to stimulate the American economy, watched a couple of movies. Aside from the hopefully not stray cat* it was a pretty normal day.

I know I must be an adult now, because I can no longer go to the library, check out 14 books due in 14 days, and read them all without renewing. This makes me sad.

The library was this wondrous place when I was growing up. I could check out all the books I wanted and just read. But now there are things like work and sleep that conspire to keep me from reading all that I want to. Don't get me wrong. I've read 90 books this year (yes, some of them are short, or graphic novels, but they're still books) and I'll try to read many more before December 31, but I could be reading so much more. I once estimated that I read 600 books in five years. I'm below that estimate now, but this year I seem to be reading faster, so go fig.

Of course, part of the problem is that I also do other things with my free time, like, say, eat, or play softball, or, you know, write...and obviously I can't do all of them at the same time. I can read and have dinner all at once, and I've even been known to read while knitting, though that's rare.

What's the point of all this? Well, I restrained myself and only checked out two books at the library on Tuesday. See, I'm growing up.

Everybody must know by now, that the name that has haunted America for a decade is gone and good riddance to him. I love that there were celebrations at Ground Zero and I hope that the survivors and relatives of lost ones can feel some closure. But there's a lot of sadness that such celebration happens. I'm relieved he's dead, and no one can dispute that he did horrible things that no one, American or not, deserved, but then I think, "someone died." Quite a few someones, really. That's not usually something to be happy about.

I'm conflicted, I suppose. Happy he's gone, but not liking that I'm happy. Maybe this will make life a little safer. Maybe some of the restrictions on travel will be eased. Maybe the troops will be able to come home sooner.

But maybe nothing will change. There are still crazy people out there, and there are plenty of other agitators in other places, and that also depresses me. But you can't live your life waiting for the sky to fall. So I'll rejoice that a bad man no longer can inspire hatred in his followers, and I'll hope for good things in the future.