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Monday, July 29, 2013

Adjusting the Balance

Image source: openclipart.org
It’s often difficult to keep some kind of balance in life, and that goes double for a writer. You have a job to maintain (until you hit it big, of course… I’m still working on that), the Muse is often prodding you with shiny new story ideas or driving you crazy by withholding same. There might be things you want to attend to on evenings and weekends besides writing. (Like blogging?)

Lots of little projects have been back-burner’ed over the years here, and not all of them because I was busy writing. But the new-to-me car sort of forced the issue, and in a good way. After putting the insulation back up, and making enough room to actually park a car in the garage (imagine!), I spent this last weekend attacking the mess on and around the workbench… which, of course, led to other sections of “my” half of the garage (The Boy has his band stuff in the other half). The wife, a while back, bought one of those shop-vac heads that snaps onto a 5-gallon bucket. I got it out of the box, found a donor bucket, and it became the new home for spider webs (and the spiders themselves, when I could catch 'em). I got a truckload of trash out of there, by which I mean it about filled the back end of a Tacoma pickup. A large tool box that was constantly in the way ended up on the bench, as did a drill press that we’re “storing” for someone and has been in the way for years. I collected enough antifreeze to… oh, I don’t know what. We won’t have to buy any for a long, long time. Various pieces of lumber went up in the rafters.

I’m not quite done arranging things, but I’m getting close. Close enough to actually get back to tackling a project that has been hanging fire for a long time: making a fan bracket for the little Suzuki. When I put the big gas tank on, I was able to flip the horn bracket, but there wasn’t room for the OEM fan. Many people just ride it without a fan, but you can mount a computer fan. I just needed to cut holes in a piece of sheet metal, and the new Dremel was well up to the task.

So with Evernote keeping track of stuff I’m remembering I wanted to do, and a place to actually do them, I’m back on track. And I still have plenty of writing time in the evenings. Except that I’m supposed to be editing a book for +Angela Kulig right now… so back to it!

5 comments:

  1. I was just thinking this morning that I need to do a major housecleaning this weekend -- thanks for the inspiration!

    John Gardiner says in his book on writing that tidiness (or lack thereof) can cause writer's block.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Funny, my workshop needs to be cleaned, too. ;-)

    ReplyDelete
  3. I'm spending my day off from the day job cleaning the apartment. It's a little dusty and needs it. Thankfully, the apartment is small so it won't take long and I can get back to edits or a book I need to finish reading.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Katherine, I hate housecleaning. I like a certain amount of clutter, to be sure, but you (and JG) are right: too much is just as bad.

    Tony, you're often in yours, right?

    Patricia, hope it went well. A small apartment does have its advantages!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Congrats on the productivty! that's a huge accomplishment, Larry. having an office that i've been putting off cleaning for months and months now I can appreciate how much it means to organize a space like that (and in the face of spiders, too! Eek!) Great job!

    ReplyDelete

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