Presently, I’m taking a break and watching the classic Michael Keaton movie Multiplicity. I remember when this first came out, me and a friend of mine would constantly quote Number 4’s lines to each other. “I like pizza!”

But the other good news I have today is this -

My writer’s block, or should I say writer’s laziness, is starting to ease up and I’m actually getting stuff done. I say ‘ease’ because it’s still running slowly, dripping through in dribs and drabs. But if I can keep it up, It’ll pick up speed and I’ll be rolling like a penguin on a steep hill.

Here’s a little word count thing-a-mabob -

Well, That’s it for now, just a short update. Back to work, Steve.

Last night I was at work, It was unbelievably busy as it is every Tuesday and so I pretty much switched into autopilot mode. My brain switched off and time passed unnoticed. The words “That will be *insert number off of screen*”…”Swipe your card”…”Have a nice evening”… and so on fell from my mouth without thought. I found myself day dreaming about my upcoming holidays and how I’ll have two weeks without the terrible drudgery of my sisyphean day job.

When I realised something. My holidays begin in 13 days!

Hooray!

For some reason it hadn’t kicked in on how close they had got until last night. I’m crossing my toes with excitement. Well, it goes to show, Two gorillas are worth a thousand Paris Hiltons.

Just one question though. Bart shot a satellite with a tank. Was it a special tank with a surface to orbit cannon?

So, I hear no one asking, what am I going to do with my time off work?

Work!

‘Are you nuts?’ I hear no one asking.

No. Well, maybe a little, but not for this.

I’m going to spend my time working on my writing. I have plenty to do as well.

One - Get started on my Post-Apocalypse based novel. I have written about ten words of this, so I’m only about five years behind.

Two - Continue working on my surreal world based project. I’m having a bit of trouble on this one, I love the first chapter and can’t decide if I’m taking it in the right direction or not.

Three - Do a second draft and editing on a short story I’ve been avoiding for about a month now.

Four - Finish a short story I’ve been working on for the passed couple of days. Then do some editing and polish to a high sheen.

Five - Write some more Doug of the Darkness updates.

A lot to accomplish in two weeks? Quite Possibly.

Am I going to sleep in the first day and thus start off a domino effect leading to accomplishing absolutely nothing for the entire two weeks? Quite Possibly.

Am I going to find a penguin walking in circles on my driveway and feed him fish instead of working? Definitely.

But hey, They are holidays.

So here’s where I’m up to. I’m going to start putting these little doogies in every entry. I’ve found that updating Doug into a blog has stopped me from putting it off for too long and I’m hoping these will do the same. I’m calling my two projects - Project Apocalypse and Project Surreal because I’m not sure how permanent their present titles are.

And there you have it, My complete lack of progress.

It’s true.

It’s a world where I have godlike powers. I create, I destroy, I can wrap reality around my little finger and wear it as an ostentatious pinky ring. I have absolute freedom.

And I forget.

I tie myself up in the duct tape of logic, the hand cuffs of sensibility, the noose of the real life.

Then I wind up in the tangled web of writer’s block.

I blame my job.

Then I see something. A catalyst of sorts. Something to get my chemistry set bubbling, something that makes me scream like Mel Gibson in Braveheart - “You killed Jesus you damned Je…..” um, wait, that’s not it… “Freeeeeeedom!” (that’s the one)

By the power of greyskull, I have the freedom. Why do I forget this?

The answer is easy. Penguins.

I have no one to please but myself. Screw you, My imaginary fan base. It’s all about me. If I want to write a serious character driven drama about the difficulty of father-son relationships that ends with the son calling up the power of the penguin gods to cut the legs off of all his enemys… and as punishment for calling them too often without buying the pizza pockets, the penguin gods turn his father into a polar bear which only adds to the father and son’s problematic relationship - well, I can.

It may not sell, but then anything I don’t write won’t sell either.

The hardest part of writing, I have found, is the part where you’re writing.

Now… I’m off to write with all the freedom of an anarchist hedgehog.

Peas out.

Happy April Fool’s day everyone!

I got a prank played on me this morning.

Just before I woke up my house was broken into by a ninja. He slipped past all my security measures - A dog that will lick all intruders to death, Another dog that will hump intruder’s legs to death, and A very dangerous kitty-cat that will trip over anybody walking remotely in the direction of it’s food bowl.

The ninja slipped past all the danger’s of my house and into my bedroom where he traversed an intricate landscape of used coffee mugs, dirty clothes and a badly misplaced bean bag to where I lay in my bed.

While I lay there asleep, dreaming of penguins having dinner parties with the characters of south park… as usual, the ninja injected me with a rare strain of the common cold.

Minutes later, when I woke, the ninja had disappeared leaving behind only a stuffy nose, a sore throat, a head ache and a sore shoulder.

Damn Ninjas.

Also - Sick of lolcatz? What’s the next meme on the rise? Well the answer is - how the hell should I know? I’m not your mother, get your own dinner. But I did kinda half enjoy Lol books over at Jim c. Hines Livejournal.

Also on one of his entry’s I found a little wordcount thingamabob which showed an update on his progress with his latest project. ‘nifty’ I thought and worked out how I can get one of my own. So here it is -

Wow! Great Progress hey? No. Not at all.

I really do need to get to work on that.

Here’s one for Doug of the Darkness too -

Well that’s it for now folks, I’m back to bed to get rid of this ninja induced cold… until work tonight. eek. Then, starting tomorrow, I’m going to get it together and get some serious progress on my writing done. You’ll be seeing more of those counters in the next couple of months as they rise and rise and rise until they blow the mercury out the end.

That’s an idea. I might have fish for dinner.

Today begun much the same way as yesterday. I slept through my alarm and finally woke up at quarter to six. A half hour earlier than yesterday. So I had a bit of time to have my coffee and get ready at a more reasonable pace, and finally left for work at about twenty passed six. I would be on time. As I arrived at work though, much to my horror, I realised something…

It was sunday…

I start an hour later on sundays…

As a further kick in the nards from the powers that be, somewhere between half passed nine and ten o’clock I was suddenly struck with inspiration. A wonderous idea for a short story was born in my head. I had time to make a few notes in my pad that I carry always, but it would be four to five hours before I could really write anything.

So I anxiously work away serving annoying customer after annoying customer, all the more annoying because I wanted to be home writing, until finally it was time for me to leave.

Finally I arrive home and I think, “hey! why not take the laptop out back and sit in the shade and write there? It maybe as hot as a penguin in a microwave but there’s a nice breeze blowing. it might be good.”

So I gather my things and set out for the backyard. it’s quite a trek but I finally make the 10 metre hike.

And that’s when the breeze stopped.

I sit down anyway and open up my laptop. I open up a fresh new openoffice page and poise my fingers above the keyboard.

And then I thought, “hey, I wonder if anyone else is online? How about writing a mildly humurous account of today in your blog? hey? come on!”

And that’s where I am now.

So even if I have to force it, I’m going to tap in on the inspiration and anxiousness that I felt this morning and pump out another killer short story.

Fingers crossed.

bye now.

At Two o’clock this morning I came within a pidgeons fart of buying a sexy new Laptop.

One more click of the mouse and I would’ve bought it.

The truth is though, at the present moment, I really don’t need one. Not right now at least, Maybe in the future when my book gets published and becomes a number one bestseller and I have to travel a lot doing book tours. But I don’t need one right now, I just really, really, really, really want one.

I’ve decided, just for now, to put it off. I have decided to make it a reward for myself for finishing my novel… So it may be a while before I get one.

I figured this is a good idea and have also extended it to buying anything. - I tend to buy a lot of crap -

So now I need to hurry up and finish my novel. At this stage I’m not sure which it will be either Blue Flowers (the novel formerly known as The Transient) or Mal Macabre…

Place your bets now! Odds are 1:1 on both.

I saw this the other night. It has got to be the funniest and most random punching people in the face sketches out there.

In other news today - Super Mario is giving me the shits.

In other other news today - I Like Penguins… Except for Thomas. He’s Evil. He knows Judo and he’s not afraid of abusing it.

That is all… I think.