Tag Archives: writing

Laptop Woes (Yesterday’s Post)

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I have a problem. It is a long-running problem. which I haven’t had to think about for a while. but it is now starting to affect me again. Put simply, I have trouble composing on a laptop. Balancing a piece of plastic on my lap and prodding at a keyboard with one finger is not a good way to write. It’s not just the laptop, of course, it’s also difficult to compose when you are sitting in the living room talking to your wife and coping with TV in the background. As a younger man I was able to follow TV whilst reading a book but as I get older my concentration isn’t what it was.

Last night I found myself grinding to a halt. I have haibun and tanka prose to transfer from paper to computer but the task was beyond me. The same goes for blogging. I stared at the screen, I tried a few paragraphs and I decided that even by my lax standards I was writing rubbish. I tried three times. I failed three times. I deleted three times. Then I fell asleep, woke at 2 am and made sandwiches. The sandwiches – herby cream cheese and cucumber, are not quite as bad as the blog, but they are far from my best. I was intending to make a mackerel spread from smoked mackerel fillets, spring onions, herby cream cheese and lemon juice, but at 2am it isn’t just sparkling prose that evades me.

At the moment I am writing this blog post (which will count as yesterday’s post) at work, and will email it to myself. Then I have one to write for today, and hopefully I will manage some poetry too, before everyone arrives. That was the plan yesterday, though it didn’t work out.

Tonight I will spend time making room for my laptop on my normal table and will plug a keyboard into it. Not only will it make it easier to type, but I will be able to divide my time clearly between work (or writing, eBay and procrastination) and relaxation (TV, conversation and napping). It is important to keep the balance between the two parts of my life.

The picture is the badge we sold to Germany today. I’m sorry to see it go, but that’s what I get paid for.

Day 150

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Californian Poppies

Today, I am going to rush through my 250 words and then get on with something else. I only realised this morning, with a shock, that it is the last day of May and I have submissions to make before midnight. Having been caught up at work this evening, then slept in front of the TV I find myself a little short on time.

This afternoon was interesting. We left work at 4.00 and locked the shop. My workmate exchanged a few words with an elderly gent and walked away. The man then came to me. I smiled in a warm and friendly manner, expecting some comment on our opening hours. Instead he said, “I need help, please can you help me?”

It was the start of a series of events that lasted for over an hour. That’s not long in terms of a lifetime, but it’s quit a long time to be involved in the problems of a complete stranger.

Wren

His problem was that he had been dropped off by a taxi driver. He didn’t know where he was or where he was going (apart from the fact it was a hospital). He had no money, no phone and no ID. All this came out in the course of our conversation. He wasn’t quite sure how old he was – late 80s – but the age and DOB he gave didn’t match up, and there was nobody at home we could ring because his partner was in hospital and was expecting him to visit. He was a touch confused, though he seemed o know his name and address, and had not shaved recently or had the benefit of clean clothes. This was not a man for whom things were going well, and in some respects, it was like looking in a mirror.

It was also a nudge into a memory that I don’t really like. About 40 years ago I saw a confused elderly man hit by a car as he tried to cross the M11 motorway near Cambridge. He went flying through the air, and when I attended the inquest the events of that afternoon had clearly placed a great strain on both the car driver and the wife of the deceased. I wasn’t going to let him wander off, but there wasn’t  a lot I could do to help him either.

Gannets

In the end I had to ring the police and wait until an officer turned up to attend to him. She was very friendly and efficient, and asked all the right questions and took him home, where she was going to check with the neighbours and see what was happening. I will probably hear no more about the story, and will always wonder how things turned out but, in the manner of these things, I suspect it is the start of a change in his life that will not be to his advantage. I hope he has a family and that they gather round to help.

And on that sombre note I will leave you and go to finish my submissions for the month. I am going to make the most of my brain while it is still working. Not sure what photographs I am going to post with this, I will try for something cheerful.

Yellow Flag Iris

Day 111

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It’s the 21st April already and I have a deadline on 25th, followed by another on the 30th. I am going to have to get a move on. When there are only two deadlines in a month (having already taken the decision to skip the one requiring a war/global warming theme) I have to make sure I keep my work rate up. One is for an editor who has never accepted anything from me and another is for an American magazine. I don’t do well in American magazines. It looks like this month will be the one that redresses the balance of last month’s success.

I wrote that last night, as it was on my mind as i thought of what to write. Today things moved on, and I wrote an entire haibun in my head on the way home.

I have now booked my second Covid booster vaccination, having had a text to tell me to do so. However, the government site seems sceptical and wants me to take proof of my compromised immune system. Left hand and right hand seem to be acting in a slightly disconnected way. I’m having this booster because my rheumatology specialist booked me in for it six months ago because of the drugs they are giving me. I would have thought that was all the proof they needed.

In a similarly disconnected way two practice nurses and the pharmacy are trying to get blood pressure readings off me, in three different ways. One nurse wants me to take my own readings in a morning. No chance – I have enough to do. One wants to take them when I have blood tests – which is why I am thinking of going back to the hospital – they just do blood tests and don’t poke about with anything else. The pharmacy is now telling me I can get a free blood pressure test if I make an appointment. I take it from all of this that, having not bothered about it for years, they are now being told, and possibly being paid, to hassle me about blood pressure. The self-fulfilling result of all this is that my blood pressure goes up every time I think about it.

Carrot & Ginger Soup

Day 88

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I’ve just written a post and discarded it. Not everything that goes on inside my head makes for good reading, particularly when it’s a discussion of the merits, or otherwise, of eating tofu. You know what I think of salad? Well I dislike tofu more. I know that’s difficult to believe, but it’s true. At least salad has flavour. Tofu, unfortunately, does not.

It’s late now, but under the titling system currently in use, I feel I must post every day and leave no gaps. If it wasn’t for that I’d just go to bed.

There’s something about a row of numbers, on the other hand,  that helps keep you up to the mark.

I’m going to try Carrot & Ginger Soup tomorrow and see how it turns out. Last time I tried it I couldn’t really taste the ginger, so I added it to the list of lacklustre soups and filed it in my mental list of soups to try again. I need to get back on the diet, so it’s time for more soup.

So far this year has seen a few good soups and a few to try again. After carrot & Ginger I will try Celery again, as I feel it’s one that should be good for a low carb diet. Owing to the effect of ordering groceries on the internet, I now have  a stockpile of celery.

I’m hoping it promotes clear thought, as i still have a raft of submissions to make, and a lack of suitable material. Tomorrow is make or break day – three submissions to do and  alack of days to do them in. I may have to shelve some of them and start work on the April submissions. April? Already?

 

 

Day 81

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Today I sorted a collection of tickets. Some of them are bus tickets and some relate to things like toll bridges and ferries, but many of them are considerably less interesting than that. Fortunately I have the day off tomorrow and will do some exercises to raise my enthusiasm levels.

Some of them have adverts on the back, and at least one of the adverts refers to rationing, so I’m guessing they go back to the 1940s in some cases.

After looking at all the pictures from previous years, I am starting to feel restless and would like to get out more. All I need to do is find a place that is crammed with interest, devoid of people, and accessible to a man with bad knees and a stick. It’s not as easy as it sounds.

I’m hoping to get an early start tomorrow and get a parking space close to phlebotomy for my overdue blood tests. After that I have a couple of errands to do and plan on spending the rest of the day getting to grips with some writing.

It’s all about practice. The more you write, the better you get. When I decided to start writing poetry again, about the time I started writing this blog, it must have taken a good two years before I started writing to an acceptable level.

This time, six months after being ill, I am struggling again. The quality is OK now, but the quantity isn’t there yet and I’m looking at four deadlines at the end of the week and only enough material for one submission.

That’s why I need a major effort tomorrow – lots of editing to do.

Planning

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I’ve just been reading LA in Waking up on the Wrong Side of 50. She is very organised and has all sorts of plans in prospect for next year. This is in contrast to me – I’m vaguely aiming for 100 submissions next year, reading 50 books and that’s it. The planning centres of my brain are not very developed. She has blogging subjects planned until April. I am, as you may have noticed, writing a blog post, but I’m not sure what I’m going to write about once I finish this paragraph.

End of paragraph. Pause. I could write about procrastination, or the amount of staring blankly that I end up doing when I’m supposed to be “writing”. I just drifted off to leave some feedback on eBay and look someone up on the internet. I’m like a small downy feather floating on the breeze – never quite settling.

We are steadily moving through the backlog of food I over-ordered fro Christmas, a situation not helped by  me ordering more for New Year. We have carved all the meat off the turkey crown and frozen it. Tomorrow we will be having turkey and bacon pie and apart from a couple of lots of sandwiches, that is the turkey done.

The planned Celery and Stilton soup[ has become Cauliflower and Stilton Soup as the cauli looked like it needed using, while the celery is still crisp.

Next, I will catalogue a few medallions for an article I’m planning and then will trawl my mind for five haiku I need for a deadline (tomorrow). It’s hard going at the moment, but I will get through. Then it’s just the quality that poses a problem.

I have shelved another submission I was planning for tomorrow and then start work on two submissions for 15th January. A target of 100 isn’t going to hit itself.

The Reading Paradox

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If you want to write, you have to read. That’s standard advice whenever you look at anything about how to be a better writer. At the moment, I’m struggling to read. My eyes aren’t as good as they were and I really need to get a decent reading lamp. That has limited my reading over the last year, and since I was ill at the end of summer, I seem to have lost interest and concentration.

I can still read from a screen, but it isn’t really  the same. On top of that I seem to have mislaid my tablet. I had it a few weeks ago, did some tidying, and now can’t find it. That’s the trouble with making electrical gear smaller – it’s easier to lose. I thought it might turn up under a book or something, but so far it has eluded me.

The other problem is that I have been trying to do so much writing. Or, to put it another way, the writing isn’t flowing like it used to and so it takes more time. This could, of course, be related to me not reading enough, which is where this started. It will be interesting to see if my target of reading 50 books in 2022 helps me out.

However, do I count poetry books as books? And if they do, do journals like The Haibun Journal also count. There are 56 pages of Haibun in the latest issue, and that is longer than some poetry books. I have a few days to think about it before 1st January arrives, and in that time I also have to finish at least two submissions – three if I feel really motivated.

Anyone got any views on the subject?

Reading – not as easy as it used to be

 

Cheap as Chips

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I don’t follow many blogs, because I’m not a sociable sort. The ones I do follow are followed sporadically. Over the last few months I have been almost entirely absent from WP as I struggled with a bad leg and worries about mortality and, of course, Covid.

Anyway, I’m back now. One of the blogs I generally follow is Charliecountryboy. He’s just had his first book published. I have ordered it, but not yet read it. It will, I’m sure, be good. It may even be excellent. In a few weeks we will know . . .

It is nice to be associated with genius, even if I am not one myself.

He made a point in one of the comments on his post that £6.99 seems a lot for a first book. Well, a portion of chips with curry sauce and peas cost us £7 last night. Yes, £6.99 is more than you can get a lot of books for but it has taken 20 years to write and it is cheaper than chips.  It’s also cheaper than having a doctor sign a death certificate or an accountant or lawyer do anything. Why are writers so reticent about putting a monetary value on their work?

(An aside – we also heated pies in the oven – the chips were just an accompaniment, and it was easier than doing them ourselves. We are lazy, but not so broke that we have to share a bag of chips, or so morally bankrupt that we would actually consider  chips, peas and curry a meal.)

It’s the same in the shop. People come in or ring and ask for advice and valuations. We have a wealth of knowledge, just like a doctor, accountant or lawyer, but people rarely seem to think it is worth paying for.

 

Slowing Down, Taking Stock

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Things are stuttering along. It is, as before, a zig-zag course towards improvement and today, after submitting my first piece for some time, I am once again wondering why I bother writing.

I’m clear on magazine articles. I don’t do many of them, but I do it for the money.

Poetry is different. I’ve been sent one or two free copies of magazines and have had two certificates, but the rewards of writing poetry are mainly spiritual.

At the moment, I’m thinking of stopping submitting so much. I can dress this up as spiritual renewal or an issue of quality over quantity, but in truth, I’m just getting a bit fed up with some of the editors I have to deal with.

Most of them are brilliant (though even the brilliant ones often turn me down – nobody is perfect) with a positive attitude, open minds and helpful comments.

Others are a bit on the academic side and a touch prescriptive. I won’t get too specific, as they all work hard to produce the magazines we rely on, and I don’t want to criticise anyone personally. However, one or two seem to get their preferences mixed up with the “rules” of writing Japanese poetry forms. Even the various societies, with their panels of experts, don’t produce rules, just guides. These also often edit what I consider to be my voice. I write as I speak, and if I want to use an expression from the midlands of the UK, I don’t see why it needs to be ironed out by an American with an academic background in English.

Meanwhile, there is the group of editors who want to be excited by my submissions. I write about my life. It’s not exciting. I’m unlikely to display the qualities required by these editors.

I have limited time at the moment, and have decided to use it more wisely. One submission has gone. The other, with its manufactured false excitement and linguistic fireworks, will stay in the draft section. Eventually, as it matures, it will be used, or dismantled for use in other work.

But it won’t be sent out this week to curry favour with an editor who wants me to be something I’m not.

My Orange Parker Pen

 

 

Overdoing it

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Yes, you guessed. After weeks of sitting with my leg elevated, I finally, after a week of building up to it, managed to overdo things. After my haircut and shopping I spent the rest of the day gradually deteriorating as my knee stiffened and my leg throbbed. Maybe “Back to Normal” was a bit optimistic. Just one more day on the zig zag of recovery.

It’s at times like this that you appreciate the magic of WP. I’ve been reading about Captain Moonlight, dining out and the Dave Clark Five over the last few days. Life would be a much poorer place without this ability. I don’t use the internet in the living room these days, as |I’m trying to restore the art of conversation (which is basically me talking while Julia grunts and uses her laptop. To be fair, she does take her work seriously, and does do a lot of planning, even though the general culture of the organisation is to take the money and do as little as possible.  I won’t go on, but as I watch her fill out forms, do training and plan sessions for hours every evening, I do a lot of thinking about the unfairness of life.

I’m going to go to the doctor soon, then will go to work for the first time in just over three weeks. I have grown lazy over that time. It hasn’t been like lockdown where I had plenty of time to do things – most of the time was spent sitting down like a vegetable, unable to concentrate for more than a few minutes at a time.  Four pages of a book has been a struggle.

In the last week things have improved and I’ve been writing again, though I haven’t actually typed or submitted anything. Good news is that I just had a haibun accepted, so things are still working their way through the system. I am able to write, but so far haven’t typed much. I’m going to have to start the whole, dull, copy typing process again if I’m going to get back to making regular submissions. I need to get a couple of submissions knocked into shape as the end date for two magazines is 15th of this month – five days is cutting it fine even by my standards.

Generally, despite the up and down nature of my recovery the week has been a positive one and I’m better now than I was when I started. Even yesterday was a positive, despite the knee pain – it was me that caused the pain by trying too much. My immune system just keeps chugging along and healing as fast as it can.