Tuesday, September 15, 2009

fall day

I'm kind of disappointed for a few big reasons today.

Everything's changing. First off, yesterday was truly an autumnal day... and I know that most of my friends like autumn, but I don't.

Second, I made an outline. I realize that's a big disappointment for me. I never make outlines, but I am writing another book... and it just fucking happened. Poof. An outline. Well, at least for the first 150 pages or so. But the rest is predetermined after that. Hopefully, I'll be able to bash it with my hammer and make things change.

Third, I didn't manage to keep my pace yesterday. I know... I'm a completely obsessive freak, but once I really get to the "here we go" phase of writing -- even in the usual absence of an outline -- I can tell you pretty much the exact date when I will have in my hands a deliverable product.

On my last book, I was off by about one day.

But yesterday, I didn't get in the sufficient work in the morning, so I forced myself to give up on the entire day. Sure, I had plenty of time available in the afternoon, but I can only write CRAP in the afternoon. It's a complete waste of time.

I have to write in the mornings (which explains my usual habit of posting to the blog before 4:00 AM). By the afternoon, my brain has been too polluted by crap like newspapers, people drinking big foofy coffee drinks with Marie Antoinette coifs of whipped cream on them, right in my face -- and I'm, like, do coffee drinks really need to wear plastic see-through crash helmets? I mean, it's supposed to be freaking coffee, but it doesn't even fit in a goddamned cup, unabashedly parading them around like they're hood ornaments on the demolition derby of life, the eternal deathrace to let's-see-who-gets-adult-onset-diabetes-first, people in cars next to me singing along to mothafucka mothafucka mothafucka rap music and I look over at them and holy shit it's my daughter's junior high school teacher, and I've never seen a teacher with a tattoo of a devil skull smoking a joint on her neck before, so maybe it's just me and I shouldn't be so judgmental of the woman just because she said "Who?" when I asked about the kids reading some short stories by Octavio Paz.

That's why I don't write after 8:00 in the morning.

I need to play catch-up today.