Published on October 31, 2025 10:50 PM GMT

It’s November, the month when things die, as any Finn would know. Not the ninth month, as we’re not Romulunians anymore. The Inkhaven is happening. Sadly it’s far away and somewhat expensive. And too awkward for a noob like me to attend. So instead, I’ll be trying alone. At least 500 words, published, every day for the next month. The main goal is just to write more, and to lower my bar on what’s writing- and publishing-worthy.

I'm not sure if I can actually do this. It's a lot of writing, and I usually don't have the imagination or persistence for anything like this. But I've heard that those things might develop if you try, even though I don't actually believe anyone saying that. Either you can, or you cannot. But it's easy, just use chatgpt!? How about no? Anyway, you probably have a probablity estimate by now. Bet on it, as they say!

I decided to do this a couple of weeks ago. I was visiting a friend in London, and somehow the topic of writing came up, and this was the end result. The first night, 3 AM, I was awake at the cheapest hostel I could find, I couldn't sleep. I never can. I wrote some ideas down. After that, whenever I got an idea, I added it to the list. I have a list of 34 them now. Not all are good. But the month doesn't have 34 days, and maybe I'll come up with new ones. I was debating just pasting the list here. Not going to happen. I'll write about it later.

Ok I guess that's enough of an intro. I have a story for today, too.

Recently I was staying at a hotel, traveling for work, this time in Istanbul. Me and my colleague had adjacent rooms. One day when I decided it's time to pretend sleep for a while and headed for my room, it had disappeared. I mean, there was a door around where my room had been, but the number was different and my keycard didn't work. I was enjoying a profound sleep deprivation at the moment, so naturally I though I was having my very first complete mental breakdown right there. Elevetor back to the lobby. Climb stairs to the correct level, just to be sure. There's a sign pointing to rooms 410-426. My room number was 426. I always take a picture of the little envelope they hand over the key cards in, so it's impossible to forget. I follow the signs, until I see 424-426 to the left. It's my corridor. But my room is still missing. The only potential candidate has number 425. Off by one.

Oh well. I go downstairs and fetch my coworker to look at this, making a joke about having to delay getting medical health care as I don't really care to be involuntarily hospitalized abroad. We arrive back to our floor. The first sign doesn't say 410-426 anymore. It says 410-425. I ignore this. He confirms that his room is missing too. Or not missing, exactly, but the number is different. Off by one. We're both programmers, so that's just a normal Thursday. His key card doesn't work either. At least I can still pretend to be sane. I proposed the obvious test, and his keycard unlocked my door. My stuff is still in there, it seems.

We head to the reception. I do my not-so-great best to explain the situation, and the receptionist seems unfazed. "Maybe we reorganized some rooms today?" he ponders, "What's your room number?", totally oblivious to my internal screams. "It was 426 before, and 425 now", I manage. "I'll just make you a new one" in the helpful customer service voice. "How do I know nobody else can get into our rooms now?", my internal head of security blurts out, while I'm pondering if stealing the tip jar or ironically tipping a single 10 TRY would improve my mood enough to be considered an objectively virtuous act. Hands me a new card along with "Don't worry about it!", without any proof that anything I said was true. We'll see about that.