Writer: Blocked

I don’t get writer’s block a lot, but when it hits, it hits HARD. I really wanted to turn in the Sappy Story for February on Valentine’s Day, but as you can see below, it did not happen. I had really potent images of sadness and loss in mind, too! I am sure they would have tugged at the heartstrings on that special evil day and resulted in tears. It is the goal of any writer to drive the reader to tears, and any writers who tells you different is either a liar or a ‘comedy writer’ which is just a bullshit made-up term for ‘fool’, let me tell you!

Here are some things I have done to combat my writer’s block:

• Posted this thread on the Sports-Den Forums in which I, Rocket Over Ohio, assume the guise of DR. SCIENCE and give people advice through the use of a bevy of charts and graphs and confusing scientific lingo! It is, perhaps, the weirdest writing I have done in months, and it takes far too long to do one response, but in terms of just raw creative ideas, it’s been helpful. It gets stuff out there, anyway.
• Doing a rewrite of the short story “Secret Ingredients” I wrote as the first assignment for my Professional Writing course. I wrote this story thinking I’d write something overly sappy and simplistic and be done with it. Going back to edit it has made me realize that I absolutely hate it with the raw power of a thousand suns. I now wish to tear the story into very tiny pieces, mix said pieces with gunpowder and elk blood, load it all into a cannon and fire it all into the ocean.
• Writing long rambling e-mails to people at 4 a.m.
• Making my way through SEASON EIGHT of ER and trying to avoid coming to terms with the knowledge that I have seen almost 200 episodes in just over four months. Peter Benton left and it was sad, guys. Carter gave him a subway token and I sniffled.
• Writing rambling imagery into my spiral notebook during French class, which I rarely go to anymore. It generally starts “WHISPER SHE DID AND THEN DIED IN OLD SNOW” and then proceeds to degenerate into a house with a little smoke coming out of the chimney and a happy sun.
• Watching DVDs, too many of which feature George Clooney for some reason.
• Watching way too much TV.
• Drinking more!

I’m thinking it all has something to do with my pressing need for a nice lengthy break and a change-of-scenery, all of which are coming when I return home to Ontario next week. I would like to start a chain story soon, as suggested in that article from long ago. I still have a functioning forum that lacks posts; so we could use that. I’ll probably set something up when I come back from the break.

In the meantime, I will continue to only write things that included bulleted lists, because they are easy and fun. Please do not stop reading this site out of boredom; I promise you that SOMETHING interesting will turn up eventually.

And if you have any suggestions for beating writer’s block, let me know!

Matt