My Father. My Brother. My Father. My Brother.

I'm just back from haircuts and lunch out with my mother.

Ordinarily that would be noteworthy only to myself and my mother. But since the last time we did it, my mother fell in a pothole and cracked a rib, I thought it blogworthy.

Also the woman who cuts my hair marvelled I'm getting more and more blond rather than more and more grey. I felt you should know that.

And because I like to be the first one to announce these things, I got my October TCM magazine and their star of the month for November is Charles Laughton (their star of the month for October is Carole Lombard, and I really hope they show Bolero because I've always wanted to see that, but I haven't had the time to look through the listings, since I wanted to be the first to let you know about Charles Laughton, who would look very silly dancing to Bolero or most anything else).

Since my editor seems to be losing interest in a third book, I spent a couple of minutes last night trying to come up with a plot idea for something completely different. It's hard though, when you've killed off all humanity not once but twice, to find a story that doesn't seem anticlimactic.

So I did what I always do under those circumstances, and thought about previously published works that I might use as a starting off point.

I began with the Bible. A number of years ago, I wrote a story with the best title I've ever had, "Cain And Abel Double Date." It was about Cain and Abel double dating, in case you're wondering.

So I played with expanding it to a book. But I immediately fell into that what do you call the parents problem.

"Hey Mom, that smells great," Cain said.

"I baked another apple pie," Mrs. Adam replied.

Crossing the Bible off the list, I went to the other great work of early YA literature, Antigone, to see what I could steal there. But I ran into other problems.

First of all, there's that nasty business of Antigone's family. The odds are your average twelve year old isn't familiar with the Oedipus story, and every time I tried to figure out how to explain it, I started picturing Jack Nicholson and Faye Dunaway in Chinatown.

Then there are all those (no insult intended to the ancient Greeks) ancient Greek names. Frankly, if I didn't know better, I'd pronounce Antigone like antifreeze. For some reason, I keep getting Antigone mixed up with Electra, and to make matters worse, I have it in my head that Electra's father was named Richard (he wasn't even named Richard in Mourning Becomes Electra; I checked three times just to make sure).

"You must be King Oedipus," the man said. "Antigone's told us all about you." Realizing his faux pas, he immediately added, "I'm Electra's father, King Agamemnon, and this is my better half, Queen Clytaemnestra."

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Your Majesties," Antigone's dad replied, sticking his hand out in their general vicinity.

"The pleasure is all ours," Electra's dad said. "And none of this Your Majesties business. All my friends call me Richard."

"They would if he had any friends." Mrs. Agamemnon muttered.

Hmm. Maybe if Cain and Abel double date with Antigone and Electra this might all work out. What a family problem/problem/problem novel that would make!