Word.

From an uncited write-in in today's entry of Neil Gaiman's blog:

I read that thingy about authors being crazy/stupid for wanting to write, and it said that writing is no fun, like building a house, and I thought, well, I built a house and I thought it was very fun. Lots of hard work! Many times I hated it! But all the time, even when I hated it completely, I was having the time of my life. And I thought, maybe, for creative people, it's the same way. It's the hardest most aggravating boring exhausting thing, and it's so fun you never want to stop. Is it thus for you? I rather hope so.

Neil says yes, and I think I would too, if I had any functioning verbal skills today at all.

Whee!

I've got maps! Proper folding paper maps, for my upcoming road trip. I got Michigan, and Chicago & Environs, and Wisconsin, and Michigan's Upper Peninsula, and Ontario (which, wow, where do all the roads go, in Northern Ontario? Because my map makes it look like trackless wastes, and, while I grant that it's north of Lake Superior and therefore not exactly a garden spot, well, in Canadian terms, isn't it?)

Hopefully I won't actually *need* any of the maps, mind you, because this is a major-highways-intensive road trip, and it shouldn't be too hard to get from point A to point B. But I might get out of my car and spread them out on the hood periodically anyway, just because I like maps, and, y'know, I'll probably want to get out of the car once in a while.

What I wasn't able to find - pout - was a popout map of Toronto, which it seems I am going to need, since my friend who has for the past three years lived in the very same city with me, and who is spending the summer in Mississippi, is coincidentally going to be in Toronto the same weekend I was going to be in Barrie, so. Might be going to Toronto, and no popout map to be had.

But, still! Maps! I've got maps! And nearly all my hostel reservations!