How not to write a blog:
(1) Make grandiose claim to write 1 blog a week.
(2) Do 2 posts in 5 days and then take 2 weeks off
(3) Start writing an overdue post and use spotify to completely derail the procrastination train.
(4) Write stuff like this:
I’ve been staring at this flashing cursor, mocking me. Then switching back and forth between facebook and spotify, Chuck Palahniuk posts and The Stone Foxes. Chatting with one my uncles about Sixto Rodriguez of Searching for Sugar Man and staring at this cursor. Flash. Flash. Flash.
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| John Wesley Shipp as Barry Allen, aka Flash. Flash TV show 1990-91. FYI: There is a new Flash series 2014, I guess. |
Fittingly, I’m titling this post “procrastination” and moving on. Procrastination is a curse on us all, really, but writers make a fine craft of it. If you went to college, I know you can relate. It has taken me hours to sit down and write papers where-in-which I pretty much do any other work I may have. I should read that chapter first, then.. I should order a pizza so I don’t get hungry half way through.. Maybe have a beer first to loosen up the mind.. I’ll get the laundry started so that I can take breaks while I write.. Three hours, 5 pieces of pizza, 3 beers, 3 loads of laundry, 2 chapters, and a couple episodes of Friends later, without a damn thing written, I go to bed thinking I’m in a good position to get up early and knock it out.
Yesterday, I fixed the headlight connection on my truck - something I've been procrastinating about getting done for weeks. Well, the headlight started acting up about a year ago, to be honest, but a good whack to it always set it straight. But as of the last 2-3 weeks, I've finally beaten it to submission.
I was sitting down to finish this blog, and thought, I need to get that headlight fixed. Called in a favor from my whiskey-in-his-coffee-on-Saturday-afternoon to be the wing-man on this project where he could witness a first timer trying not to burn himself while soldering wires together. He proved to be an expert at holding wires and being a soundboard/adviser from the stool upon which he sipped his upper-downer coffee. Moral support is important. Went much smoother than anticipated and I either got lucky or am just tapping into the blood of my mechanic forefathers, because I think I pretty much rocked the solder work. You be the judge:
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| Am-Pro soldering work. |
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| I’d like to thank my neighborly friend, Dale for lending me his soldering gun from 1972 that worked like a dream. “They just don’t make shit like they used to.” |
But effectively, I did something I had put off for weeks, in order to duck out of writing for BD&LL. I should be ashamed. Should be. Feels too good to have that damn light fixed. As little of a job as it was - nigh insignificant - it feels good to have it done. The guilt of procrastination has been washed clean!
So there it is, life lesson 78.6: do something today that you can put off until tomorrow by putting off until tomorrow something you should do today. Write that down. You’re welcome. I’m getting scary good at giving advice.
Until we meet again.
Sincerely,
Mikey
Listening to: The Stone Foxes
~I’m really digging spotify. Great way to find new music and follow your favorites. I think if you join, you can follow me or something. Whatever that really means. I’ve meaning to get around to figuring out the details of the service..
Reading: A Crown of Swords by Robert Jordan. Wheel of Time series, book 7.
Drinking: Evan Williams whiskey because it’s cheap, and Sierra Nevada Pale Ale because it’s not.
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