You may have noticed, but almost certainly did not care that there hasn't been a blog post around here for quite some time. Originally I was planning on skirting this issue; hoping that a shiny new blog post about my favorite Christmas movie would distract you from my apparent laziness in much the way that shiny things distracts me from updating my blog... wait scratch that last part. Since you take the time to read this nonsense, I thought I owed it to you to let you know what is really going on here. The truth is far more terrifying then the pleasant fiction I created in this paragraph, so only continue if you are not easily frightened.
Last month I participated in nanowrimo, which is a fancy word for writing a novel in a month. Their definition of a novel is any work of fiction of at least 50,000 words. Nanowrimo is actually a ton of fun, and I highly recommend doing it, but that's a story for another day. As the month went on, I found it difficult to keep up with the hectic nanowrimo schedule and write here at the same time, but I knew that I could finish the project and come back here. Or so I thought...
After finishing nanowrimo I proudly printed out what I had written and looked over it. It needed to be proofread and edited, but I would work on that in January. Right now I thought I had earned a month off, but I had thought wrong. In my haste to finish and move on with my life, I had forgotten an important principle Friedrich Nietzsche mentioned: Battle not with monsters, lest ye become a monster, and if you gaze into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you. From this it follows that if you write a book, the book also writes you! By writing the book I had told it what its world was like, and opened up the door for it to tell me what my world is like. Slowly but surely that manuscript began to exert control over me.
I cursed my blind ambition as the book started controlling my life. While I longed to tear up the carpet and install a hardwood floor down there, my new overlord would not permit anything of the sort.
"I'm not writing any more words for you this year!" I shouted at it defiantly.
The book stared at me and I was reminded of an unfunny joke I had heard as a child: Where does a 50,000lb gorilla sit? The answer is anywhere it wants. The novel had accumulated a similar bulk and started throwing its weight around to dictate policy. The untitled monstrosity gave me an ultimatum; if I was not going to update it, then I could do nothing productive at all! I was forced to play video games, watch movies and catch up on my web comics. Whenever I would think about defying it, a horrific manifestation of its presence filled my mind, threatening me with its countless words and its endless punctuation marks. So many words that a mind might break!
I drew a picture of it here so you can see why I have been living in fear of it. As you can see, an evil face appears to have formed on the back cover. To intimidate me, the book has placed the skulls of several small horned creatures that it has already killed. The message is clear, mess with it, and I would be next. Finally, the book appeared to have a blazing inferno behind it which makes it seem very menacing. In retrospect, a raging inferno is probably not a good thing to stand in front of if you are made out of paper. I valiantly shoved my evil creation into the fire, buying my freedom.I still cannot sleep soundly, knowing that I must one day complete the manuscript, and print out that dread tome once more.
