I need to be at home with my novel now, but I will be at work tomorrow thinking about it. Then the weekend, in which I’ll finish it, and then the week after, in which I’ll bask in the finishing of it, and then of course the revisions.

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves—it helps, so you know, when in the final days of finishing a novel to pretend you are more than one person. That’s more hands to do the typing. It also helps to give yourself leave to be an absolute and utter bitch. You have full permission to sit in the aisle seat on the D train instead of the inside seat and if someone wants to sit down in that window seat they’ll just have to climb over you. Make them climb. And, also, if you’re not finishing a novel but you live with someone who is, it helps to meet that person at the door with a chunk of dark chocolate and slip it into her mouth before she says anything and then back away while she chews it because she probably won’t be such an absolute and utter bitch then. (Thanks, e.)