the least "rock and roll" thing i've ever seen...

I was at Barnes and Noble today and came across a magazine I've never seen before called "Guitar Aficionado". John McEnroe is on the cover holding a pricey Les Paul. One of the cover blurbs touts a story inside called "Golfing with Alex Lifeson of Rush". Being a long-time Rush fan, I flip through to find the article - past ads for expensive watches and top shelf vodkas - and when I get to the article, I find out that not only is Alex devoted to improving his golf game, but that he has a 1200 bottle wine collection in storage in Toronto. (We also learn that Geddy has a comparable cellar.)

A little more flipping revels lots of interviews with various rich people who have nothing better to do with their money than spent $35,000 on vintage Stratocasters. Not rock stars mind you - publicists and executives.

I hate this magazine. Hate hate hate hate. I also hate anyone who would buy this magazine. I hate anyone who would wear $5000 on their wrist or keep 1000 bottles of fucking spoiled fruit juice in their basement or hang a $50,000 guitar in a glass fucking case on their wall. I also hate anyone who would aspire to BE one of those people. And I would like to beat them all to death with my 1963 Sears Silvertone.

sabbatical, week two...

17,000 + words total
11,000 + words written in 8 days
avg ~1375 words/day
95 pages total

Ok, some of the pages are BLANK pages with chapter names, but the structure of the book is falling into place nicely. The tone is not quite what I was planning, but I think that's ok. It's still a draft, after all.

Oddly enough, the writing schedule is working out far better than the "personal fulfillment" schedule. After I write M-Th, I'm supposed to be devoting Fridays to things I enjoy doing, always MEAN to do, but never find the time. Working on recording projects, oil painting, stuff like that. This Friday I sat on my sofa in pajamas and watched Netflixes and DVD commentaries. Not that I don't ENJOY watching DVDs, but it's not something I always lament not having time for.

The fitness thing is lagging behind the other commitments. Still no yoga. Still no running. (Ok, there was one half-assed treadmill run.) This reinforces my realization that I am only capable of "getting serious" about one thing at a time. In the summer it was running, and I didn't do any work. In the fall it was my committee chairmanship, and my teaching kind of sucked. Now it's writing, and I can't even muster the mental energy to edit some half-finished piano compositions on a Friday afternoon. I don't know what this says about my mind, other than that it's 40 years old and I'm losing it.

sabbatical, week one...

Four days of writing - 1100 to 1300 words a day, putting me over my weekly goal by 850 words or so. On no day I have I started writing after 9:30 or so, or finished later than noon.

The exercise stuff hasn't started yet, but in terms of the work schedule... it's working. So far. The only thing that worries me is that I already kind of feel like the novelty of the whole "staying home and writing in my basement" thing is starting to wear off. Also, statistics say you are most likely to die in an accident in or near your home, and I'm home all the time now and I already almost died twice today.

sabbatical, day one...

I had an early lunch planned with my Mom, who is leaving town today, so I was worried I was going to wind up with a crappy start to my sabbatical. I only had from 9:00 until 11:00 or so to work, but I grabbed my tea and headed downstairs at 9:05 (like someone with a real job) and sat down to work.

Right off the bat - technical difficulty. Gah. Took me a half hour to straighten that issue out. So I got down to writing around 9:30.

Result? I hammered out 1200+ words in 90 minutes. That's well over the daily goal I've set, which is 1000.

So. This sabbatical stuff is gonna be a piece of cake. An hour and a half a day and I'll have a book by June.

What could go wrong?