Write and Drive

Still school holidays and I'm on a driving trip with the girls to visit my Dad in Brisbane. Right now I'm blogging from MacDonalds in the country town of Warrick (thanks to their free WiFi).
 In my suitcase I have, not only clothes, undies and pyjamas for me and the kids, but a whole stack of books to attack during this short trip. Amongst them are books on editing your novel, writing mystery novels and the one I'm excited to finally try: 'Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain'. There are also an endless number of e-books and PDF files I have on hand on writing and editing.
 You'd think this would be enough to keep me busy for 4-5 days in the sunshine state, but yesterday (while at another country MacDonalds), I managed to sign up for Holly Lisle's 'How To Revise Your Novel' course (check out my friend Inky's page for a link to the course - she offers a discount). I've been doing Holly's 'How to Think Sideways' course on novel writing and have found many parts extremely helpful to get me started writing. Thanks to that course, and NaNoWriMo, I now have two manuscripts to edit (and yes they are also in my suitcase).
 Although I don't expect to get through even half of what I've packed, the best part of the holiday is not having the day to day distractions, or guilt (I can't sit down and write in my messy house, but I'm pretty sure I can happily write in someone else's mess).
 Travelling also provides lots of anecdotal opportunities to record for inspiration or straight-out life plagiarism for future novels. Will I write about the pub food in Goondiwindi (isn't that the best sounding town name?), that it was so slow, pretty ordinary tasting, but at least it was expensive? Maybe not, but it's recorded in my notebook - just in case.  :-)  Or maybe I'll want to capture the feeling of being in a town where most people are wearing Akubras (our cowboy hats), or how it felt to notice for the first time ever that Akubras are pretty sexy, when I always thought I was attracted to suits and ties?
 Plus the drive is even time spent wisely now with the wonderful invention of iPods, I listen to podcasts and audiobooks on writing and writers and when I need a break from that, I've got the audiobook 'The Thief Lord' playing.
 Have notebook, pen, laptop, iPod and imagination - will travel! Now I think I should pick up one of those Akubra hats to take back for my husband ;-).