Strangely Socialised

Still unemployed. Still okay with it. I like to think I’ve been making good use of this time, though. I told myself that as of September 1st I would be making a genuine effort at writing, and I have been doing exactly that. It won’t be too much longer before I have a couple of things ready to go out on submission.

It’s both an easy and a difficult thing not to just throw my resume out to anyone who could hire me. Easy because, well, it’s nice not to have to worry about that; difficult because it’s not going to be too much longer before I start to worry about money. But I know that if I do I will get a decent job in an office somewhere, and I’ll spend another few years getting by just fine and not doing what I really want to do.

And frankly, that’s just not what I want my life to be like anymore.

I don’t seem to be very good at unemployment. I’m in a position to be able to actually enjoy my summer without worrying about working, and I still keep feeling like I should be doing something, anything, other than what I’m doing. It doesn’t even have to be work; I think I’d be content with something that consistently takes up my time. So I’ve decided to compile a list of possible summer unemployment activities:

* groupie
* fine art model
* burlesque dancer
* marathon runner
* vibrator salesperson
* twitter stalker

I think any one of these is absolutely within my grasp.

And now to more pressing matters: is four a.m. too late to eat a cheeseburger?

I haven’t forgotten you exist. No, that’s a lie. I have forgotten you exist. Frequently. But only because I had other things on my mind. Important things. Like boxers or briefs, and paper or plastic.

The truth is that I’ve written over a hundred thousand words in the past couple of months and I’m feeling pretty good about it, but there is a great deal of editing in my near future.

I think I know what I’m doing with my Christmas vacation.

The girlfriend is off on vacation with the family which in theory means I have more time to write, but in practice means that I have no one to prod me onward when I’m not. A revelation was had regarding a particular story that I’ve been picking away at for… god, probably a year now, on and off. It’s not going to be an easy change for me to make to the structure of the whole thing, but not only is it a good idea I think it’s a necessary idea to pull the whole thing together.

I finished reading The Prestige a few days ago, which prompted a new idea that I’ve sort of been aching to explore, but there just aren’t enough hours in the day to do everything I want to do. But doubling (not cloning, but doubling) is so mentally problematic. I just really want to sink my teeth into that idea.

There are some days when I feel like what I really need to do is make a list of Practical Advice for Living. On this list would be such things as ‘buy toilet paper before you run out’, ‘wear a warmer jacket when it’s cold’ and ‘don’t watch Supernatural before bed’. I’ve managed to violate all three of these in the past week or so, most memorably (re-)watching two episodes of Supernatural last night before going to bed and having the unsettling dreams to show for it.

Yesterday was a complete wash on the writing front, but at least I entertained the clientele of Urbana with an animated phone call. (I exaggerate; I promise I didn’t make a spectacle of myself. But I did do what I normally don’t and took a – very urgent – call.) Today, however, was productive, despite the fact that Second Cup is no longer serving Belgian chocolate orange lattes. (I cannot express the sheer bliss of these lattes; maybe they’ll still make them special.) At least five hundred words on two stories, plus a bit of administrative work I needed to get done. And, more importantly, I managed to finally rewrite the beginning of a story I’ve long been picking at in a way that I think sets the right tone for what’s to come. Sometimes writing two paragraphs of really good stuff is more productive than two pages of work that you’re less than enthused about.

So I’ve made my bed, organised my files, done some RPG administrivia, caught up on Supernatural, caught up on Torchwood, reorganised my website and changed my desktop background. I have not written one single word since Friday afternoon. One might think that being snowed in would increase productivity. One would be wrong. And if I wanted to continue my streak, I have a couple of thousand books that need organising, but perhaps getting myself into some pants and out of the apartment would do wonders for my frame of mind. If nothing else, it’ll get me a latte and some snapshots of the latest dumping of snow on Toronto this year.

I keep meaning to do a roundup of all the things I’ve been reading, but apparently there wasn’t time to fit that in between alphabetising my DVDs and swiffering the library.

I started out the year thinking that I was tired of the local Starbucks and Second Cups (after they renovated and thus destroyed my favourite Second Cup) and that this year I would go on the quest for the perfect coffeeshop. Not the perfect coffee, but the perfect coffeeshop. The one which was close to home, where I could go and spend a couple of hours writing and feel perfectly comfortable and productive.

It was a short quest. I found Urbana on my first try.

I like to think that my belief that there was a perfect coffeeshop (and much like finding The One, I don’t actually believe there’s just one coffeeshop that fit all my criteria, though probably no more than one within a two-block radius) wasn’t just another way to procrastinate. There are all kinds of ways to procrastinate without even knowing it, and sometimes I feel like I’ve tried all of them. After all, it’s that time of day again, when I have a couple of hours before I really need to work, when I have to decide whether I’m going to go and get dressed and head out early to go write or whether I’m going to stay here right in this sunbeam and kill time until I actually have to leave. Right now, the sunbeam is winning.

Sometimes I wonder why something I love is sometimes so hard. I have more works in progress than you can shake a stick at (this is a lie; I expect the average person and/or dog could shake a stick at them all in about fifteen seconds), but maybe that’s the problem. I spend as much time figuring out what I want to work on as I do actually writing. Frankly, sometimes more. I can’t imagine a life in which I was not writing, but sometimes not writing seems to be as much a part of the actual process of writing as writing itself.

Dad’s surgery is on November 4th. We’ll see what happens after that.

Plans to go overseas are now on hold indefinitely. Plans to move to Toronto seeming a bit more likely now, but not until some time next year. Until then, I need to find somewhere to live when my lease expires the end of November. Got a few places in mind, but will feel less stress about it when I have something signed.

Am also writing a novel in November again. I’ve never had a full month to write in before, why should this year be any different? Am excited about my story idea, but again, will feel less stressed when I now where everything is going.

Have come to the conclusion that I drink too many chillattes from Second Cup. But they’re so good! I have bad luck with getting watery Frappuccinos from Starbucks (well, all two of them, since we never used to have Starbucks here) but the chillattes from the place right across the street from my office are to die for. I need to be independently wealthy, and skinny, so I can have one every day and not feel the slightest twinge of guilt about it.

Spent the weekend out at mom’s farm, which is always nice, even though the actual reason I was there was for a board meeting yesterday. A board meeting that was short by our standards (“only” four hours) but which did not go well. Trouble is brewing and I don’t think I’ll be able to stay out of it, much as I would like to. Not much sense going into it here, since it is both uninteresting and not something I’m going to want to remember about years down the road, but it involves a board member taking advantage of her position and that’s just not cool.

It was 35 yesterday, without factoring in humidity, and I was longing for just one air conditioned room in the place. I had to settled for stripping down naked (uh, after the meeting) and lying in front of a fan. It did the trick, even though there went an hour I didn’t get to spend with mom. My visits there are never long enough, but there’s a fine line, for us, between enough and too much. The wedding is next Friday, though, so I’ll be back there soon.

Which reminds me, should probably start seriously thinking about finding myself something to wear to that.

Wrote a couple of new scenes for a story I’m working on during my trip. Which sounds good, but really isn’t when you consider I was on the bus for a total time of about five hours, and should have been able to write a hell of a lot more than a couple scenes. But a couple scenes is better than none, and I should probably be thankful for that. Sometimes these things come, and sometimes they just don’t.

I’ve been meaning to write up a few things lately, but just haven’t made time for it. I have a story I’m trying to finish that’s fighting me tooth and nail and it’s been commanding all my attention.

Just found this today and found it interesting. On a much more superficial level, I can relate to it. I have all the letters written to me by my boyfriend back in 9th grade, and can dig them out and reminisce from time to time. I have none of the emails written to my by my girlfriend in third year university because I had to delete them to make room on my hard drive (It was a 400 MB hard drive; it actually freed up significant space). It makes me sad now, just not having those. Losing history is a tragedy.

I burn all my email to CD now, have been for the last few years. I don’t want to lose anything.