Goings On

I’m working on making a cartoon version of the Walden essay. I like the idea of doing the essays as YouTube videos, so I’m going to try it.

I forgot to do this today. It was quite busy at work today, I’m exhausted from getting up entirely too early to get that work started, and I spent a fair amount of the afternoon arguing with some malfunctioning equipment. The entire day seemed like some kind of elaborate Saw movie set piece, designed specifically to make me cranky. It succeeded.

Today we commemorate the birth of two of my very favorite people, my niece and nephew, Abby and Alex. They are twins, and are seven years old today. You are now wishing them a happy birthday by reading this sentence, because by the time you realized that a happy birthday message was passing through your brain, it was already too late. You can’t unread something. Jokes on you, suckers.

I haven’t started reading Walden yet. It’s a busy week and I forgot I seldom have time to sit an read books. Too much self-generated nonsense to ignore first. I got through what was in the free sample I downloaded. Am I going to spend the $.99 for the full book? Only time will tell.

I forgot today was the Monday of a three day weekend and went into work anyway. That is all for today.

I’m back at my desk after a lovely holiday break. On one hand, this is great because I’m happy to be back and ready to take the new year head on. On the other, I’ve forgotten nearly everything I once knew about what was going on, so a lot of that clear-headed optimism will be expended remembering the details around what I do for a living.

I slept badly. I was concerned about the risks associated with not sleeping well before retuning to work, which of course created a level of anxiety strong enough to ensure the very consequences I had intended to avoid. I love irony as much as the next guy, but it looses its charm when confronted at three-thirty in the morning through bleary, sleep-deprived eyes. I don’t think I’m alone here. The first day back from holiday vacation must be one of the least productive of the year. It’s like everyone is onboarding all over again.

I did not die in 2023. Optimistic about keeping that streak going in 2024.

In order to encourage that sort of behavior, I’ve committed to checking in everyday. It’s a proof of life sort of thing. By committing to daily posting, I’m accomplishing several things at once.

• Giving myself unnecessary homework during a life already filled with actual life things.
• Doing my part by contributing to the ever growing landfill of content litter. We can always be messier. Does society need more publicly available thoughts? We do not, but that’s never stopped us before. It’s important to grow our strategic take reserve. We must add to its size and density until our combined takes generate enough gravitational force to support the orbit of a small moon, where I and my family will live. I have deemed this the only way to be free of our takes once and for all.
• Proving that I’ve survived another day. Or not survived, in which case I hope the last post is accidentally profound, and not just some deadline meeting filler about weather or my lunch or the quirkiness of that particular day of the week.
• Creating an illusion of productivity for myself so that I can watch dumb TV at night and relax without feeling guilty.

Will I make it a whole year without missing a day? Almost certainly not. But I just went an entire year without drinking, so who knows? No reason not to try, considering the stakes couldn’t be lower. Here goes nothing!

I’ve built this site, thought out the goals and the logic of this whole thing, and have left myself no choice but to actually create something. This is deeply unfortunate. I’d prefer to do nothing at all. Doing nothing is fantastic. It comes highly recommended. I try doing nothing all the time, but I’m pretty bad at it.

My understanding is that you just sit there, content, doing as much nothing as you can, gliding through the seconds like a cartoon hippie, vibing to the rhythm of your own, presumably very chill, drum. These drums are bongos. Bongo people can relax at an advanced level. It might be something biological, like being left-handed. Bongo people have a gift for relaxation. I envy this ability like I envy people who can play basketball. It looks fun, but I can’t even approach competence at it, despite my best efforts.

No, I’m a snare drum, intense even at low volumes. It’s as much an immutable fact about me as my curly hair, or being gay, or being five feet eight inches tall. I wake up every day loaded with static electricity. It’s like someone sneaks into my brain while I’m sleeping and rubs a balloon on the walls. Potential energy is everywhere, and I have a hard time relaxing for the day until I’ve made it kinetic.

This isn’t a low key brag. It’s not like I’m energized or inspired or even motivated. This isn’t cute or charming or really even anything to be particularly proud of. It’s more like wanting a cigarette. There is a gap that asks to be filled, and I can either fill it, or spend my time thinking about filling it. Doing nothing has to wait until after. I am driven to be creative. I’d prefer not to be, but I was creative for a few weeks in highschool and got addicted to it, so it is what it is. 30 years later, and I’m still a pack-a-day creative person.

That brings me to this website. This exists for the singular purpose of providing an outlet for that energy, so I can get back to watching TV and surfing my phone in something resembling contentment. This isn’t an artistic endeavor so much as an ashtray. Spent creativity has to go somewhere, and I picked this.