Well now you mention it...

I was bored. Really bored. So bored in fact that I read Private Eye and the latest issue of Wired already. And then I went poking about on the internet looking for everything and nothing in particular. I even took a look through the blogger settings and noticed a 'new' editor. New? Crap, when did I last even look in the settings? Why wasn't I informed? Does it work? Because the text looks a little... weird. Guess we'll find out soon. The important part is that it's supposed to fix the problem we had back in Bitemarks chapter 4 where it posted on the day I began the draft rather than the actual day I published it to the world (that's you Ches). :P

Oh and then I noticed something else. I've been on Blogger over a year now and have made 200 posts! Well, this is post 201. In fact, that probably averages at a post every other day (sure doesn't feel like it sometimes huh?). I'm so glad I can't actually pull up statistics for how many of those posts were read. Sometimes ignorance really is bliss.

Earlier today I was thinking about Kurt Cobain (topic change seatbelt on? I hope so). Well, I was more trying to think *like* Kurt Cobain, in the hope I might be able to squeeze out a poem that embodies the sort of meaningless meaningfullness of 'Come As You Are'. I guess I'm just eager to find a way to spin metaphors that are a tad more abstract than my usual fare. Which is tricky, when your mind is logical and literal and overthinks every tiny detail. But it's doing things like trying to think like Kurt Cobain that eventually pushes my brain into the overdrive mode that spits out things like 'Cold Rainbows'.
Anyway, where was I?
Oh yeah, I was thinking about Kurt Cobain and how, you know, he killed himself, pretty much at the height of his fame (or three years after the peak if you think that way). An interesting move. Because it makes me think beyond it. What would he be like if he was still around? Would Nirvana still exist? Would they be long serving rock legends? Or washed up has-beens?
And then I was thinking about JK Rowling and her sudden explosion as one of the world's best known children's authors. Once she's finished with Harry Potter, what then? Early retirement? Snuggled up in front of her magnificent fireplace (which she has in my mind)? Or will she take up the pen again and try to do better? How would she top Harry Potter? How would Kurt top Nevermind? Where do you go when you've stood at the dizzying heights of perfection, casting your gaze downwards at the pitiful mewlings of your once-peers vying to climb up your bootstraps?
Fuck, lost my train of thought again.
Something about... moving on, yeah. See, I generally try not to think so much about what I have written (because Cold Rainbows and Song for the Girl were so good it gives me JK Rowling syndrome) but more about what's coming next. Because I always want everything to be at least mildly better than what came before. Otherwise what's the point? I guess that's the advantage of still being at the 'permasuck' stage. There's always better to strive for. I'd hate to become the overnight superstar like JK or Kurt. I'd hate to think I'd hit any sort of pinnacle or peak. I'd hate to have a specific piece of my work become so legendary that I could never best it. And yet... that's exactly what the net result would be if I continued to get better every time (optimistically speaking). Maybe trying too hard is what ultimately makes you the victim of your own success. And maybe, just maybe, that's why I prefer to put off the more ambitious projects. Like a novel, for example. There are plenty of authors my age or younger who've already written books and they're supposed to take like four years to write. So I'm nearly a decade behind anyone who would, I guess, be considered my 'peers' depending on your definition of that. And I haven't even begun one yet!
In short, I'd rather labour under the presumption that I'll slowly get better than already be as good as I'm gonna get even if it means sacrificing long term endeavours toward lasting infamy.

That was my primary musing for the day, in between bouts of poking around the net and listening to Nirvana. Some might call that a pretty lax day (I *did* write the next Bitemarks though, look!). I consider it highly productive. Thinking is one of those pastimes that people seem to largely forgo these days. Dwelling over one's achievements and prospects or even just enjoying thoughts and musings. People should spend more time thinking (and perhaps, faced with the risk of JK syndrome, a little less time doing, lest you achieve the perfection you strive for).

Your homework for today (or tomorrow, whatever). Go do some thinking.