I'm gonna need a laptop. . .

I've found something else to add on to my never-ending cycle of crazy ideas. Right now, I am a full-time, SAHD, trying to start up one home business, doing demo work for a game company (and various other, time-consuming projects for same), working on research for another home business (of sorts), and training for a marathon.

Obviously, I need to do something to relax.

So, in one of my random forays to the library, I found this book, and checked it out. Now, I have written short stories over the years, and even sent off a couple of (very) short ones to contests. Never won, but at least I tried. I have, in the past, sat down and started novels, but they always seem to peter out about 2000 words in or so.

So, after reading this book, I think I am going to take up the challenge, with a caveat. I know where I do my most constructive work, and it's not where my computer is. Right now, I am trying to raise money for GenCon, but after that, I am going to try to raise cash for a cheap laptop.

It doesn't have to be good - I don't need to play games on it. It doesn't need to connect to the 'Net in any way, shape or form. It just needs to have or do the following:

• work. This is probably pretty obvious, but it's not worth my time (see above for the schedule) to buy a couple inoperative laptops and assemble them into my own Frankenstein creation. This means that I need a hard drive, working keyboard, etc.
• have an OS. Yeah, I could install one. I might, if I have to, but I'd rather not have to bother. An otherwise perfect laptop without an OS would still be an option, but again, it's something that I would prefer not to deal with right now. Later, I'll install Linux or something.
• have either a CD burner or a floppy drive. I'd prefer the former (obviously), but the latter would work. Actually, if it has a USB port and can use something like this, that would work fine as well.
• have Word, Notepad, or some other word-processing program. I could write everything in emacs, and I might, but for ease of transport, it might be best to use a (unfortunately) fairly common word processing program.
• have a battery/all required cables. Again, not a deal breaker if these are missing, but it's a big plus.

Yeah, I know - laptops aren't that expensive. But, since I shelled out a lot of money for some "toys" for my "business" (such as it is), buying a laptop that is anywhere near SOTA is beyond me.

So, anyway, if any of my loyal reader(s) know of a very cheap laptop, please pass word along to me - but not for a couple months.

PS - 50,000 words is about 1700 a day. This post would only grant me about 500. But still, getting into a habit here is going to be good practice for November.