Writers block

I don't get it very often. 

But when I do, it's unpleasant, because writing is more or less what I do for a living.  So the inexplicable inability to write more than a sentence or two at a time gets compounded by a fairly unpleasant cocktail of economic anxiety and "what the hell is wrong with me?"

So far, it's always passed within a day or two.  Like my occasional bouts of insomnia, it seems to be just this weird thing that I get sometimes.

(Hey, this post is clearly labeled TMI.  Right down there at the bottom, see?)

So I sat up until 3 am last night, staring at the stupid Word document, until Claudia came down and hustled me upstairs to bed.  Then, bless her, she arranged things so that I could crash for a couple of hours in the afternoon -- no small thing, given that the boys are on vacation and hanging around the house all day.

And in the evening, it snowed, and I shoveled snow.  Such is the dramatic life of the international development consultant.

In other news, New Horizon is halfway to Pluto.  (God, I love astronomy blogs.)  Also, this from the Kung Fu Monkey:

I cast my eyes back on the last century ...

FDR: Oh, I'm sorry, was wiping out our entire Pacific fleet supposed to intimidate us? We have nothing to fear but fear itself, and right now we're coming to kick your ass with brand new destroyers riveted by waitresses. How's that going to feel?

CHURCHILL: Yeah, you keep bombing us. We'll be in the pub, flipping you off. I'm slapping Rolls-Royce engines into untested flying coffins to knock you out of the skies, and then I'm sending angry Welshmen to burn your country from the Rhine to the Polish border.

US. NOW: BE AFRAID!! Oh God, the Brown Bad people could strike any moment! They could strike ... NOW!! AHHHH. Okay, how about .. NOW!! AAGAGAHAHAHHAG! Quick, do whatever we tell you, and believe whatever we tell you, or YOU WILL BE KILLED BY BROWN PEOPLE!! PUT DOWN THAT SIPPY CUP!!

... and I'm just a little tired of being on the wrong side of that historical arc.

This is it, folks. This is the world, from now on. Even assuming the War on Terror is a not just a bad metaphor and there is an actual measurable winning point (which is a bad assumption, by the way), even short 4GW struggles last fifty years or so. We're going to be stopping one or two of these bastard mass-murder plots a year, minimum, for the rest of our lives. Hell, the way terror tactics and tech evolve, five years from now we're going to be pining for the dudes with the flammable juice boxes.

It's now part of our life. Let's try not to hop like the trained monkeys every time it happens.

Well played, John Rogers. -- Anyway.  I haven't asked this in a while, but: what would you guys like to read about?  Development stuff, kids, book reviews?  Something else entirely? 

Comments

[Nich Hills]

G'day Doug,

I'm lucky - haven't had work-related writer's block to date. My creative writing's been on hold the last few years, lacking the critical mix of boredom and anger to make the authorial juices flow. (Not that I'm really complaining.)

Back to you - your family related stuff is cosy and your history and economics stuff makes me think. Am curious about life in Germany stuff, particularly from your perspective as an American and a quasi-outsider.

Summing up, write what you feel like. You have a reader.

[James Bodi]

Embarrassing, isn't it? Some loser explodes his own crotch and the reaction would be better suited to a Simpson's episode than real life.

Book reviews are always good but as Nich says, write what seems best to you, I'll read it.

On an unrelated note, it seems to me that the Tower of the Ape is crying out to be used in a story for the kids. You could rework 'The Tower of the Elephant'. Using apes. Perhaps winged; everyone likes flying monkeys. Throw in Ulrich von Bek and it tells itself.

On an even less related note, you being in Germany, how come the boys have Lego instead of Playmobil? I've been spoiling my friends kids with Playmobil for years. It's awesome.

[Christine]

I'll third the comments above. You have another reader who enjoys what you post, all of it!

[Ana]

I like the development ones, but, then again, I AM a nerd...

[Bernard Guerrero]

Doug, James, let me play Devil's Advocate. You guys have some imagination and some smarts. Failing that, you probably have access to something written by John Barnes. I'd suggest that KFM is correct that in a couple of years we will be pining for the guys with flammable juice boxes. This isn't about one clown taking out an airliner. As ugly as that is (and we value our lives a bit more than that generation did, I think), it's limited in scope and scale. What's coming will be less so, and I think that is what has the Powers That Be spooked.

[Doug M.]

I agree that what's coming may be less so. If I had a cave, a dozen fanatically loyal followers and a few million dollars, I am quite certain I could do better than this.

Hell, the interleukin-4 experiment with mousepox was in 2003. That was unnervingly close to being a proof-of-concept for weaponized smallpox. (If it was, smallpox vaccine wouldn't do a thing. You'd need access to an antiviral cocktail, fast.) That's probably beyond the capability of any current terrorist group, BTW, but the era of kitchen biotech is probably going to arrive well before 2020.

More plausibly, I have no trouble thinking of ways to kill large numbers of people using off-the-shelf components and fairly modest amounts of money. And I would not be at all surprised to see (for instance) a Mumbai-style attack in the coming decade.

But I don't actually think it's what has the government spooked, and I /know/ it's not what has the media, various interest groups and the public spooked.

Doug M.