Last night I tracked down some MP3’s of Zooey Deschanel — one of my favorite actresses — singing some old tunes.  I’ve decided that I really like her voice, especially when on the track where she teamed up with Leon Redbone to sing, "Baby, It’s Cold Outside", which is one of my favorite songs.  Tonight I listened to those and then I tracked down a station on Live365 that plays that kind of crooner music, with artists like Nat King Cole, Bing Crosby, Ella Fitzgerald, and Artie Shaw.

What, I can’t like pre-war balladeers?  Sheesh.

Anyway, the music seemed to help me find my writing groove tonight.   I’ve written nearly 1,300 words so far, a great number given how things have gone over the past couple of months.  Mostly it was a scene with Hector, whose head I’ve managed to get into really well.  And why not?  Hector was the angry nerd I was so often in college myself (and if you don’t think "angry nerd" is just as much a stereotype as "teen rebel", you just haven’t been paying attention).  Gems from this evening’s writing session include passages like:

Asking pretty girls out on dates was no worse than getting a root canal; the anticipation was the worst, though sometimes the Novocaine shots were pretty bad, and then the sweating and pain afterwards could be a killer as well.  Oh, and sometimes there was facial numbness afterward as well.

…as well as a description of Hector’s emotional state that invokes fractal geometries.

I know this isn’t my best, but I think the analogy is, at least, accurate.