Can't stay away

Well, so much for being offline.

I have written several times that blogging for me is primarily a writing exercise, and my daily blog posts are following the Gene Wolfe / Harlan Ellison rule of writing: If you want to be a writer, write something every day - even if it's just a shopping list (that's the Gene Wolfe part, from The Castle of Days); and a writer is someone who cannot not write (that's from one of the introductory notes to Dangerous Visions.) But for the past few days I have been, and for then next three-and-a-half weeks I will be, writing daily missives to a friend who is offline and will continue to be offline until (I think) September 7. These count as writing as well.

I'm in an awkward position, though. The thing with Gretchen took the wind out of my sails. I don't feel like being clever or funny or scintillating or whatever the hell I usually try to be, not right now. But I also don't want to be morose and relive the horror of this past week over and over again. And I don't feel like participating in the bickering that passes for Internet discourse - in that sense, the bastards have ground me down, which I think was one of the primary goals of this Summer of manufactured rage.*

So I don't feel much like blogging at the moment. Yet at the same time, I can't cover these topics in my messages to my friend. That would be counter-productive, at least.

I'm trying to write these letters in the morning hours, in between when I come home and when I go to sleep, so I can address them and put a stamp on them and get them in the mailbox for the mail carrier to pick up at mid-day. But I am at my least coherent in the morning when I write them.

Today was especially difficult, as I had to make a grocery store stop to pick up supplies for the next five (or six) nights of work. This threw my schedule off by nearly an hour, so I was extra-tired when I sat down to write my daily letter. (On the computer; I think at this point even my printing would be incomprehensible.) Tomorrow I may stop at Walmart on the way home to get a new color toner cartridge (HP #17 for my ancient DeskJet 842c) so I can print up cards featuring my paintings and maybe some photos. I may also stop for gas, and at a different grocery store for more kitten milk - not that we've burned through the forty-five containers I bought at the end of last month, but we always need more, even with one less mouth to feed.

So tomorrow I may be even less coherent when I write my daily letter. And I may get to bed even later, and sleep even later, and not feel like doing a blog post or hanging out on Facebook. We'll see how it goes.


*The stuff we are seeing at these town hall meetings is analogous to screaming crowds of kids at a Jonas Brothers concert. It's just as authentic, and just as inauthentic. Are those kids screaming because they are legitimately enthralled with this group, or are they screaming because that's what they've been programmed to do by the Disney marketing department?