Back at last.

Well, leaving my blog for a few days turned out to be a wild miscalculation. My surgery to put a new knee joint in my left leg left me feeling like death for two months. I have only recently been able to sit on an ordinary chair for more than ten minutes and my brain has been so fuddled with feeling ill and taking lots of drugs that I haven't been able to do anything writerly at all. I had a bit of a shock when my publisher emailed to say that they needed a cover from me. I had thought that they would sort out cover art. They will if needed but I thought the challenge might be good so I enlisted Harry's help(he's much better on the PC than I am) and we set to to create a few cover mock-ups using Word Images and other functions I hadn't known existed. What a learning curve! We ended up with six reasonable cover mock-ups that have been sent off to the publisher. I'm waiting to hear whether they will think they are ok or just plain rubbish. Time will tell. Of course my jumbled head had forgotten that publishers deadlines fall well in advance of actual publishing. Thankfully I had done a lot of work before going into hospital so I don't have a huge amount to finish. I have edited a number of times and will soon be sending the manuscript off. H is helping by casting his eye over it too. He's very good at punctuation and pacing so he's a great ally. I have done a bit of poetry writing and entered a couple of competitions. The crime story though has ground to a halt. I'm not concerned as it was, and is, a winter/ rainy afternoon project. I will finish it by the end of next winter but for now the poetry collection has priority. I've missed not going to poetry readings and workshops and can't wait to get out and about again. This brain needs stimulation. I can't be too bad though. Graffiti magazine recently accepted a poem written post-op so that cheered me up immensely. I hope all you other writers are going strong-or are you being pulled by the lure of the sunshine. I know I am.