Was I supposed to?

Actually, I do have an answer for this one, even if it is pretentious. http://365bullets.tumblr.com/.

The point of the exercise is to get me (back) in the habit of saying “hey, look at this (relatively) everyday thing. Isn’t it magic?”

So, yeah. That. Also, museums, art galleries, theatre, film, music, and the Hoxton Monster Supplies Shop.

Oh good, they are picking up a bit.

Heh. This would have been much easier to do last year, when I threw myself from a great height for a laugh.

But I racked my brains, and I came up with this. It’s a daft enough wee story, and I’m not sure it entirely qualifies, but I know exactly when I was most terrified this year. It involves a small dog. Told you it was stupid.

Miranda and I spent a week in Woolacombe in September. Picture postcard little village on the North Devon Coast which would, I imagine, be hellish during the school holidays. But we popped along for the week after that, when there were far fewer kids around, but the weather was still pretty good. A lovely, and much needed, break.

Woolacombe isn’t a haven of fine dining – much more geared toward the families-with-kids burgers-and-pizzas types places. But there’s one restaurant there, The Courtyard that was absolutely superb. We were staying self-catering, but we’d decided that we’d have one night to get dressed up and go out for a romantic dinner, and this did not disappoint. Afterwards, a night-time stroll on the beach seemed like a good idea. Romance, and all that.

And so pausing only briefly to nip back to the flat we were staying in for some warmer coats, we ambled toward the beach, hand in hand. We crossed the car park by the beach, and were heading down toward the little path that zig-zagged past the surf hire shop down to the sand. It was unlit at night – a little creepy perhaps, but there were two of us, but hardly terrifying, particularly not with the sound of the surf and so on. We were on a seaside holiday, after all. What could possibly happen?

And then I spotted a couple of figures in the shadows at the top of the path. (Actually, I smelled cigarette smoke before I spotted them – one of them had a lit tab in their hand.) I was about to suggest we head a couple of hundred yards in the other direction, down to the other path, when they broke apart, and it was apparent to me that they weren’t two local hoodies out to get the tourists – they were another young couple, and that they’d been kissing. Aaah, romance. So we strolled on a bit further.

At which point, there was a tremendous and unexpected barking from the shadows, and a dark blur shot a short distance toward us. I distinctly recall giving a yelp, and levitating about three feet in the air.

Before you laugh, (and yes, it is funny, I know) I invite you to recall that I’m cynophobic. It’s not exactly rational, but still, unexpected barking followed by a dog coming at me from the shadows is quite literally the stuff of my nightmares.

Anyway, the initial shock passed, and with some trepidation we made our way past the young couple, who were thoughtfully restraining their hell-hound, and down onto the sands.

Except that by now, my system was flooded with adrenaline. A moonlight stroll on the beach, with silver light dancing the surf had sounded a good idea twenty minutes before. Now, though, my brain was full of fearful images. I kept thinking of those marvellously creepy shots of the sea from Ringu, with the voice over the top of them muttering “frolic in brine, goblins be thine”. Of the beach sequences in “Oh Whistle and I’ll Come To You My Lad” or “A Warning To the Curious”. I wasn’t taking a romantic walk by the seaside, I was in the opening sequence of a horror movie. The moonlight was eerie, not romantic. The sand wasn’t cool between my toes, it was freezing. Even once my heart-rate had slowed to near normal, said organ was still pounding much too loudly.

We gave up on the walk in the moonlight in pretty short order, and went back to the flat.

Sorry, but I can’t face calling them “Reverb” anything. I don’t imagine I’ll stick with “December Dailies”, either, but it’ll do for today. Mind you, on the strength of this question, I may not sticking with doing them, as it has an unpleasant smell of “no I are a proper writter for serios!” about it, and amateurs/fanwriters doing that sets my teeth on edge. Anyway, on with the show.

There are two obvious answers here: the first one being “lots”. I work a day job, I spend time with friends and loved ones, I eat, sleep, shower and occasionally shave. I read, I blog, I take photos. None of these things contribute to my writing. This is the tedious literalist’s answer.

But of course that every last one of those things contributes to my writing, which is the other obvious answer, because at some time or another every experience can inform writing. This is the pretentious wanker’s answer.

The truth, of course is that the only thing that I am certain doesn’t contribute to my writing are those times when I think “Shall I sit down and write? Nah, it’s been a long day, I’ll play computer games/watch TV instead.” It happens less often than it used to (although I did just get savagely hooked on Renaissance Batman Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood, so that’s productivity shot for a little while longer), but I do still do it.

Yes, I could eliminate this. But I haven’t yet. Maybe in a few years. And in any case, I don’t do it each day. Things I do each day (or close enough to qualify, anyway), well, I listed them above. Short of “ditch the day job”, I don’t see a lot there that it’d even be useful to ditch.

I know this hasn’t been a very satisfying answer, but it wasn’t a very satisfying prompt (said the shoddy workman). Keep your fingers crossed for some better springboards.

See you tomorrow!

Dreadful title “Reverb”, but I enjoyed something similar I did last year, so here we go with a month of blog posts in December. As before, I reserve the right to ignore or replace any prompts I think are just plain daft. Prompt one challenges me to sum up the last year in one word, explain that choice, and then pick another word for next year.

2010: Inspiration

I’ve a number of friends, old and new, who have directly or indirectly inspired me this year, but none more so than Miranda. I’ll spare you all the gushing stuff I could put here – for all I know, there’ll be a later prompt I can use it for, and I’ll nauseate you all then. For now, I will simply and sincerely say that, by virtue of her own drive and passion she pushes me to do better, for which she has my thanks and more besides.

And one of the ways I’m doing better is that for the first time in years, I have a fiction-writing project I’m excited about – I’m inspired to write. While I’ve mentioned it to a few people, I’m trying not to talk about it too much, and not at all on-line (beyond the odd bit of twitter-based venting which doesn’t count). I’m mostly avoiding talking about it because every time I’ve done that in the past, I’ve dropped the ball, lost interest, or in some other way, failed to bring the thing to fruition. I really don’t want that to happen here, because I love this idea out of all measure, so this is all you’ll hear about it on this blog for now – I have an idea I’m excited about, and I hope it goes well. Shocking stuff, I know, but it’s actually the first time I’ve felt like this in a good few years now. So I’m pleased, and that’ll have to do for now.

And so I need to pick a word for my hopes for next year, and I chose “perspiration”, after Edison’s famous quote. Actually, I don’t think my idea is genius-level, but I’d also quite like to get back into regular exercise next year, so it seems like an apt one to pick, when talking about a year I hope will be filled with productive work, with something nearing completion by the end of it.

See you tomorrow.