Ceridwen’s Cauldron

I’m in the midst of writing the script, (if ‘midst’ can describe a whole lot of staring at the screen and a painfully slow trickle of writing).

I find when I get to work in the morning, it’s extremely difficult for me to get started writing. Theoretically, when it’s going well, there’s a flow and I can really get on a writing jag. It’s the first few words that kill me. Even when I’m not staring at a blank screen, I’m staring at something that’s very rough and needs work.

Now, I know the best thing for writing is to do it often enough that the writing muscles get accustomed to producing word count, and then it gets better. And the best way to overcome that blank page is to do some exercises to warm yourself up.

And that dear blog, is where you come in. I am looking for suggestions of writing exercises that I can do, theoretically stuff that would be postable on the blog (thus killing two birds with one stone). How do you warm up when writing? Or, if you don’t write, what do you think would help?

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Here is a list of things that I want to do tonight, and in my head there is totally room for them all…

Play Beatles Rock Band
Play Plants vs. Zombies
Knit on two different projects
Crochet on two other projects
Bake pies
Write some blog posts
Read Solstice Wood

Perhaps instead I shall spend the time working on a device that warps the space/time continuum so I actually have time for all my hobbies.

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Yesterday, Scott and I spent the afternoon closing up the swimming pool for the winter. Now it is all covered up and dark, and I am sad.

It’s funny how this has become a symbol of summer’s end for me. It’s been too cold to really go swimming for a couple of weeks, but the pool still being open is kind of a sign in my mind that it’s not so bad – I could still go out there if I wanted to, right? It’d be a little cold, but heck, it’s still sunny and I don’t mind cold water all *that* much…

And really, it hardly seems like any time at all since we opened the pool. Even if I don’t go out swimming, I want the summer to last as long as possible in my mind. So closing up the pool at the autumn equinox seems absolutely appropriate.

And we’ll open it again as spring turns to summer, and the process will begin again.

While I waited for the pool water to drain, I picked the last of the zucchini from the garden and turned it all into four more jars of pickles.  I had intended to make shepherd’s pie as well, another one of my autumn rites, but I ran out of time and energy. Maybe I’ll manage it through the week.

Anyway, the leaves are changing, and we’ll have to start raking soon, and next weekend I’ll spend at least one afternoon cleaning up the garden and getting everything ready for winter. I do love this time of year – the colours, and the weather. But I’m missing summer.

ETA: Since I had a request for the Shepherd’s Pie recipe, you can find it here. I think it’s technically cottage pie, since it uses ground beef, and technically not that either, since it uses vegetables other than corn. But I am technically inaccurate with my cooking like that. The recipe does take a fair amount of time to make, but there’s nothing really tricky about it.

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• Wind some yarn into balls.
• Swatch for future knit projects
• Knit on current projects
• Bake some
• Do dishes
• Write a blog post or two (I did promise a series of creativity articles, didn’t I? Crap.)

Oh yeah. That work thing. Um… I’m writing a script? Trying not to think about it too much, lest the idea of making actual scenes scare the heck out of me.

ETA: It occurs to me that my methods of avoiding work by writing blog posts is much less interesting than taping bacon to a cat. Clearly, I have a long way to go before I’m a Real Writer.

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