...it's what you type when you're not typing an essay...

Six thousand words to go. Everything's now officially overdue, so I'm eating into my holidays while I rack up penalties. At least the Editing work is in, and the last part of my non-fiction folio will be submitted this afternoon. That will leave five thousand, split between two papers.

I'm finding short folio pieces (1000 words) to be damn hard to write - all my ideas seem to be too big, or don't have enough in them. I've started about six different pieces, eventually picking an entirely new topic for one when I got to Deakin last Friday. I wrote it in a few hours, and handed it straight in without a second glance. If only they were all that easy to write...

I've blocked out ideas for the next one (an actual research essay - no changing topic this time). Turning the essay structure from dot points to prose is like pulling teeth, though. I think I might make some headway writing it with an active, personal voice - although it probably breaks every unwritten rule about academic essay writing, anything will be an improvement on my lists of bullet points.

I went to RetroCon (briefly) and Golgotha (also briefly) over the weekend. Only ran a single session of A Broken City, but I had some good players. Spent three hours dancing at Golgotha, which seems to be more exercise than I've had in weeks... it must have done something good, though, as I managed to run from McKinnon college to the station in time to catch my train on Monday night. I also got to dispel some more rumours about UniCon not running, and got a cheer at the RetroCon award ceremony when I announced dates for the convention.

Quote from RetroCon, when I mentioned we'd be plugging unicon online/in stores/by LJ:
Kid in audience: "Livejournal is for emos!"
Me: "Yes, yes it is. But we need to promote to emos as well..."

I lay awake until about 5am, brain in overdrive while I thought about the million things I want to do in the holidays. My body clock wanted to power down at 9am, but I can't afford that luxury yet.

It's times like these...

Sometimes, you don't know what you're craving until it tears free of your speakers, grabs you by the throat and screams "SNAP OUT OF IT!" right in your face.

Today has been one of those times.


I've had a head full of fog and cobwebs for days now... every time I try to focus my thoughts, things slip unseen into the mist. Fortunately, I'm so close to freedom that I could rip a hole in the wall to find it waiting for me. It's taken a while to remember that I had the claws for it, though...

I may as well have been sleepwalking when I headed home tonight. Like any other night, I opened a folder of notes and sat at my computer - hours and weeks merge, fading into featureless grey. Like any other night, I absently turned on some background music to drown out the drone in my head. Unlike so many recent nights, I cranked the volume up loud enough for a song to drag me out of my stupor. And drag me it did... there's just something about a band who can call their first demo disc "Total Fucking Darkness" with a perfectly straight face :)

Time to tear down these walls and let the sky back in. I've stalled here too long.

Heavens above
Fear the gorgon eyes of a new caste rising
Expect no love
When they enter your golden halls

On sanguine floods
Hear the foregone cries of the last surviving
Skewered like doves
Outside these wailing walls