After being up until the wee hours writing, then rousing myself briefly from 6:30am to 7:00am to help my wife get ready for work, I finally rolled out of bed at 10:30am, shaved, and took a shower.

Exciting, I know.

Then I grabbed a quick breakfast of cereal and coffee, after which I hurried out of the apartment. I took the subway into Manhattan and got my hair cut by my usual stylist around 1:00pm. By 1:45pm I was at my publisher’s office, picking up a few early copies of my new novel, The Calling.

To answer those who inquired recently, the cover has a matte finish, which was my preference. I think the book is darned snazzy-looking, and I’m grateful to all who worked to make it so — especially the cover artist, Cliff Nielsen, designer Alan Dingman, headshot photographer Dave Cross, and editors Marco Palmieri and Jennifer Heddle.

Books in hand, I returned to my neighborhood for a dentist’s appointment at 2:45pm. No cavities, no problems — way to go, teeth and gums!

Now I’m home, sorting through the day’s mail and decompressing before I start on this day’s batch of pages.

And I am mildly distracted by the stink of rotting vegetables, which my wife insisted on saving for our neighbor’s compost pile but that are now sitting on our kitchen table and decomposing in the humid summer air.

Ain’t life grand?