15 posts tagged “essay”

Woke up early to write a paper, which was a very weird experience for me. Not sure if I like it better than the classic "stay up until 4 am" approach.

Anyway, I have two links for you. First, this is why I can't go to Australia. Ever.

Second, an announcement about a new movie that makes me happy. Here's hoping it's handled well.

So, that's it for today. So you in a month, probably.

As you may have seen from my twittering (I refuse to admit that "tweet" is the verb for such actions), my work on my NaNoWriMo project is now seriously behind, with a deficit of five days and growing. At this point, I'm debating whether to just see exactly how far I can get, considering how good it felt when I was sticking to a strict schedule, or pull out now before I get too stressed with a project that is meant to be solely beneficial. After all, it's not as if I don't have other things on my plate; the essay on Into the Wild is due tomorrow, which I was hoping to have finished yesterday during my day off, except for the irritating fact that the more time I have, the less motivated I am to do work. And then there's the short story that I need to write and submit to the rep I met at TusCon, and there's the work on trying to get December published, and...

Busy, busy, busy.

We'll see how it goes. The essay is my first priority, since the grade matters and the thing is due tomorrow. After stalling on it all night, I was able to make some decent progress on it today, though I'm concerned that it isn't as tight as it could be due to how much I loved the subject matter, which, as you may note, is a rarity; usually, I am universally negative about the texts I have to write about, such as the whole Faulkner thing. Not sure what to make of that.

Well, off to work, and then finishing that essay, and THEN meeting up with The Brauer to prepare for Wrath of the Lich King night, which is completely inconvenient for me. Seriously, Wrath, couldn't you come out next week? I have a paper due tomorrow and you're making it impossible to concentrate.

Thank God I cannot buy it until midnight at the very earliest, grr.

Normally I can ignore banner adds and recognize them as a necessary aspect of free services such as this blog. Every so often, though, I see one that irritates me just enough to question how much "free blog space" is worth to me. Way to go, Vox.

Anyway, here's another post, to prove that I'm committed to writing in more than just random bursts. Oh, and yes, if you're wondering, I do have another essay that I'm working on. So far, I've got about a page written, with three more to go. I'm taking a break at the moment.

I have a strange white line running down my right arm as a result of a recent vacation to Mexico. The general consensus is that it was caused by applying sunblock to a wet body, which made the lotion run down my arm. Whatever. I hope it stays, because honestly, it looks like a bad-ass knife wound, which is what I've told a few people.

I've never quite known what tone to take, when writing these posts. I suppose that is because I don't exactly know who I'm writing for, due to the fact that I'm not attempting to tell a story. I imagine that I'm talking to some one, since I aspire to attain a conversational tone, which would imply that I'm talking to someone as I rarely, if ever, talk to myself. Which is strange, actually, because I consider myself very interesting; in fact, I believe I'm the most interesting person I've ever met.

Hey, self. Call me sometime.

. . . I won't call.

I should get back to that essay. If I've learned one thing this semester, it's that I'm not nearly as interested in history as I thought I was.

Good to know, I suppose.

I don't want to be writing an essay. I want to be in this chair, certainly, for this is my desk, my refuge and sanctuary, my perch from which I create and crawl through worlds that do not exist. I want the music around me, because it pleases me, because I fade in and out of it and though I did not create the composition, in this fragment of life, it seems to exist only for me. I want the bottle next to me, because I like it.

But I do not want this essay.

I could be writing stories. I could be making something. But instead, my precious time is wasted.

This is supposed to be my major, the whole point in spending so much money on a formal education. And yet, due to the brilliance of a "require course," I can't help but feel, at this moment, as though the entire charade were nothing more than a brilliant, glittering waste of my time, effort, and energy.

I'm taking a break from watching my academic life implode, something I'd be happy to comment on if you're curious. See, basically, I'm not sure what's wrong with me but it's physically impossible for me to do work in advance. Take this damn essay I have to write about a story I hate written by an author I don't care for to submit to a class I was forced to take; it's due on Thursday. This is Tuesday night. I -should- be working on it. And I've tried. And I've failed.

I'll get it done. I know I will. It might not be particularly good and it might drive me crazy, but I know eventually, I'll cave in and "just fucking do it." But I have to ask myself; why can't I do it now? Why do I procrastinate this? Why did I go to the grocery store to buy a frozen pizza? Why did I linger in the kitchen cooking it? Why did I recline in front of the TV for an hour after nibbling on it (I really wasn't that hungry.) Why couldn't I be working on my essay during those moments?

I don't know.

But it sucks that I can't knuckle down until the gun is directly against my temple, because I always worry that one of these days, I'm going to pass out drunk at my keyboard before I finish, or I'll crack under the pressure I willingly submit myself to, and the whole house of cards will tumble. And yeah, that's just a metaphor. No actual guns are involved here. It's just a stupid class.

But it still sucks and I wish I could change it.

Have you noticed that I only blog when I have something better to do? I have.

Anyway, the point of this post. My goofy little hit counter continues to scroll up ever so slowly, and I know it's not recording my own personal hits when I stop by to check for a stray comment. So, here's my question; who exactly is reading this? I'm curious. I know I've told a few people about this blog, but I can't imagine I'm consistent enough to earn more than a passing glance, even if I fancy myself as "very funny" when I'm motivated to perform in such a fashion.

Personally, I suspect it's a Google or Yahoo webcrawler combing through the vast, untamed warrens of "teh intertrons" to cataloged all in its patch, no matter how inane. But if you're an actual person and you're reading this, I wouldn't mind a comment. It doesn't have to be fancy. You don't even have to say anything. I'm just curious.

You might say that's who I am.

I'm writing my paper even though I'm a little bit drunk. I am certain my grade will reflect this.

-Draxle

I've figured out why I don't work on my novel as much as I used to: it seems like every time I sit down at my computer to write something creative, there's an essay or research paper that I have to write instead, and those academic prospects inevitably crush the desire to write out of me for the duration of the experience. And even after the damn paper is written, it's usually too late at night for me to contemplate devoting an hour to my novel, so I end up just crawling into bed and crashing.

I will also state that I have been trying to keep to my reading promise, and while I've failed to even open the book on my "reading for pleasure" list, I've opened numerous other fascinating books on subjects such as educational reform and other exciting topics.

-Draxle

Not a lot to talk about today. I don't know whether my inability to focus on my creative works is a result of overall laziness or if it might have something to do with the fact the college is crushing the creative juice out of me. I didn't think this was ever going to happen; I mean, I went to college so that I would write more, rather than sit around and play video games all day. But now, it seems like whenever I have even the remote interest to write, I'm usually sitting at my desk buried in so many procrastinated essays that by the time I'm done, it's so early in the morning it might not even be dark out. And that kind of frenzied, last minute writing really takes a number one one's mental health, not to mention makes the very act of sitting down to write something a painful torture.

On the other hand, I'm sitting here typing on this blog, whining about that unpleasant writing through, irony of ironies, more writing, so maybe I'm not so painfully afflicted as I like to imagine. Still, it'd be nice to have to write less bullshit essays and more, I don't know, poetry and fiction and whatever. You know, the creative things that a creative writing major actually does. Maybe I'm taking the wrong kinds of classes? I don't know.

I've noticed that my page view count seems to climb steadily, which makes me wonder if more people are reading this than I imagined. It's hard to tell, you know, it's not like I'm running a store where I can watch you come in and look around at the stuff, and then leave, a situation that leaves me secure in the knowledge that while you didn't buy anything, at least you stopped by and looked, which is really the only thing I ask for. Maybe people could start leaving comments or something? I guess that would represent actually purchasing merchandise at this imaginary store analogy, except that you wouldn't actually be spending money, so... yeah, I sort of lost my focus there. Let's move on.

What else do I usually do in this blog, aside from the whining? Ah yes, usually there's a link or two. Here's a good one: The Guild, a series of short videos about a group of people who play World of WarCraft waaaay too much. The sad part? I'm willing to bet that at least of quarter of the people I associate with (including myself) are or have been in this same situation: So it's Friday night, and...still jobless. Yay. Haven't left the house in a week. My therapist broke up with me. Oh yeah, there's a gnome warlock in my living room. Sleeping on my couch.

Why do we do this to ourselves?

-Draxle

Still working on my second essay. I definitely underestimated it, and what I thought would be an easy conquest has turned into a massive undertaking, full of citations and research and all kinds of actual work that I do not generally engage in when writing such projects. While it irritates me that this damn thing is due tomorrow, on the other hand, this situation really could not be avoided as I had these two essays assigned to me on the same day, and I spent virtually the entire week working on the other project first.

College sucks.

Anyway, while I was taking a break from essay writing, I scribbled this little poem down. I might add more to it later, but there's something about the brevity of a three-liner that makes it more potent, at least in my opinion. And yes, I do plan to get back to actually writing my fiction, at some point; it's just hard right now to want to put the energy into a story when I have all these damn research swirling around in my creative forge.

One final note on the poem: it was not an attempt at writing haiku.

-Draxle
------------------------------
Silver Woman Crying
By: Matt Ciarvella

At the apex of sorrow
the silver moon crests over the darkened ridge,
a beautifully pale maiden crying for her loss.

The first essay (and by far the scarier of the two) is completed. I thought about starting the other one, but I think I'm going to crawl into bed, maybe drink a little rum and relax. I've earned it, I think.

The essay grind begins anew in the morning.

I'd find it absolutely amazing if anybody who has read this even cares.

-Draxle