Being a teacher, I freely admit to having one of the sweetest schedules in the working world. Of course, there are always people out there with better schedules---people who work for themselves and get to set their own schedules, or better yet, someone who doesn't work at all---but I think a teacher's schedule is still pretty damn good: weekends, holidays, vacations, and summers off.
However, most teachers take on some kind of employment during the summers because they're responsible adults and realize the extra money will help their family's financial situation. I didn't get that gene passed on to me. I take summers OFF. No work. The reason for this is simple: I'm lazy. This summer, however, I did tell myself that I was going to work through the novel I've been writing for a couple of years and have another draft by the end of August. That, I told myself, counts as work, only I'm not getting paid for it, nd it helped assuage the diminuitive amounts of guilt I feel for sitting on my ass for ten weeks. A modicum of my parents' work ethic must've rubbed off on me at some point.
So here we are, the beginning of August. My novel is 300 pages in draft form. Care to guess how far I've gotten into my rewrite? No, I won't make you guess. I'll tell you. 82 pages. Yup, that's been my work this summer, approximately half an hour of real writing a day.
I have become a veritable expert on making excuses not to write. Most of these excuses start and finish next to a beer tap, but there are other excuses as well. Today's excuse: There was a Scooby Dooby Doo, Where are You? marathon on cable. That's right, folks. I watched six hours of Scooby, Shaggy, Fred, Velma and that hot piece of ass Daphne on my couch with my kids. I did, however, get some inspiration to watch all of them by participating in some recreational activities. After six hours of Scooby Doo, I turned on the Red Sox game, and that did it. Here I am.
I was about to do some actual work a couple of minutes ago, but then I started writing a blog entry on my own slacking and Scooby Doo. Now, Entourage is almost on, so scratch today. Maybe tomorrow I'll work on writing a sequel to Teaching Metaphors about teachers during the summer break. I'll title it Doing Jack Shit. But don't expect me to start working on that any time soon. There has to be a Brady Bunch marathon on somewhere.
However, most teachers take on some kind of employment during the summers because they're responsible adults and realize the extra money will help their family's financial situation. I didn't get that gene passed on to me. I take summers OFF. No work. The reason for this is simple: I'm lazy. This summer, however, I did tell myself that I was going to work through the novel I've been writing for a couple of years and have another draft by the end of August. That, I told myself, counts as work, only I'm not getting paid for it, nd it helped assuage the diminuitive amounts of guilt I feel for sitting on my ass for ten weeks. A modicum of my parents' work ethic must've rubbed off on me at some point.
So here we are, the beginning of August. My novel is 300 pages in draft form. Care to guess how far I've gotten into my rewrite? No, I won't make you guess. I'll tell you. 82 pages. Yup, that's been my work this summer, approximately half an hour of real writing a day.
I have become a veritable expert on making excuses not to write. Most of these excuses start and finish next to a beer tap, but there are other excuses as well. Today's excuse: There was a Scooby Dooby Doo, Where are You? marathon on cable. That's right, folks. I watched six hours of Scooby, Shaggy, Fred, Velma and that hot piece of ass Daphne on my couch with my kids. I did, however, get some inspiration to watch all of them by participating in some recreational activities. After six hours of Scooby Doo, I turned on the Red Sox game, and that did it. Here I am.
I was about to do some actual work a couple of minutes ago, but then I started writing a blog entry on my own slacking and Scooby Doo. Now, Entourage is almost on, so scratch today. Maybe tomorrow I'll work on writing a sequel to Teaching Metaphors about teachers during the summer break. I'll title it Doing Jack Shit. But don't expect me to start working on that any time soon. There has to be a Brady Bunch marathon on somewhere.
1 comment:
what i thought you would be plowing through it like mad--oh well, who can resist Thelma....
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