I watch the ripples change their size
But never leave the stream
Of warm impermanence
And so the days float through my eyes
But still the days seem the same
And these children that you spit on
As they try to change their worlds
Are immune to your consultations
They're quite aware of what they're goin' through

Friday, November 12, 2010

I listen to preachers, I listen to fools

Well, at the doctor's office yesterday, in six months I had basically gained all the weight I had lost. Bummer.

This weekend looks like a busy one because all the future weekends are busy. So I'll probably be out using the leaf blower, working out the snow blower, doing one last mow of the lawn, going up on the roof to clean off the gutter areas, and generally killing myself while not feeling like I'm progressing.

I'm getting an internal feeling of deep dissatisfaction with not writing. Really want to get moving on these projects that are languishing so I can get to the next thing.

And I know I can. I've been letting myself feel okay with coming home after a 7am to 10pm day and just vegging in front of the TV until I feel tired enough to go to sleep (commuting always gets my systems pumped). So I've identified time I could be writing and am not. Now comes the hard part of getting butt in chair and without the TV in front of me.

Joshua Palmatier talks about making time jumps. I haven't had time to read it all, but it looks good. So this is sort of my own bookmark.

Beautiful Absurdities (on miniature scenes that twist reality, some very dark humor here)

Tell me again about the high ground. Again, the difference between the left and right 1) we don't nominate our crazies to office and 2) we don't play the bully.

And another article on just WTF is going on as we head into a discussion over taxes and cuts. Yes, Mother Jones is biased, but again, refute the argument. The HCR Act reduces the angle of that top line in the chart (for Medicare and Medicaid). Not enough, but better than the Republican plan which would actually increase the growth of M&M spending.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I know that commute time is prime listening to NPR time (besides, you got the good NPR station in Cleveland) but have you considered dictating while driving? There are a few mp3 players I've seen that have recording options.

Anonymous Cassie

sheila the fabutronic said...

Your work/commute time takes you away from home from 7 am to 10 pm? Wow! I can't figure out when you sleep on the weekdays, no less when you write.

Unless you can try a short writing session before bedtime, perhaps using this handy free Apple widget as a timer:

http://www.apple.com/downloads/dashboard/status/meditationtimerwidget.html

I find that I can make progress if I can give just 20 minutes each day toward a particular goal, rather than trying to block out a larger chunk of time on any particular day.

Steve Buchheit said...

Cassie, I've already done that with both the voice recorder (I bought for classes) and with the Touch. But mostly that's been for poetry fragments. I have had sections of stories come to me while driving, unfortunately not lately. What I really need to do is rewriting, which involves but in chair with a red pen. When I start working on new projects I may be able to integrate that into the working paradigm.

Sheila, yep, that's Mondays and Wednesdays (and was Mon-Thursday all through the summer). Tuesdays and Thursdays are typically 7am-8pm (on average). Fridays are typically 7am -7pm (that's when I run a lot of errands).

With writing I find that while the best lines comes when I'm in that fugal state, but I can't focus on story, plot, and character arcs in that place. Also, when I start typing in a manner that I normally do when writing, that I'll be awake for a long time (sort of like with commuting, my brain goes "ON" and then I need to intentionally relax for some time to go to sleep).